Pakistani drama industry has achieved tremendous recognition for their work; we have good quality of production with tremendous efforts done by our actors and directors. Pakistan Television since its inception aired all categories of programmes, including music, dramas, cartoons shows, news, Islamic programs which kept audience fully entertained. Drama like Dhuwan, Alpha Bravo Charlie and Tanhaiyan were some outstanding works which were well recognized all over the world .During that time, directors chose to air programmes which they knew could attract audience as well as promote Pakistani culture. New channels came up with quality production, where household stories, family politics and social issues in Pakistan were highlighted riveting the audience. These production houses strived to give quality serials.

 Pakistan is facing a wave of Cultural Imperialism, as after the Indian soaps, some private TV Channels have started telecast of Turkish TV plays.     These dramas have been brought to Pakistan at low cost, and have become popular among the masses due to extreme modern lifestyles and bold themes. The shows are Turkish but they have been dubbed marvelously in Pakistan. The lip movement goes exactly with the dubbing and it looks very natural. Pakistani dramas on the other hand have same actors which are working for all the dramas and channels, and due to high workload and less time they do not really work on their dialogue as our previous actors  did.

This Turkish Drama frenzy has affected our local industry as they’ve been given much high ratings in comparison to your plays.

Mr. Ayub Khawar PTV drama producer, said, ‘’With the start of Pakistan Television, Directors always decided what they wanted to show people, but now directors direct a drama on how a  viewer wants to watch it, Now dramas are focused around what the market demands for.’’

 With a huge market for our very own serials, there shouldn’t have been any need of entertaining an entirely new industry that affected the functioning of our own. People got attracted by watching new faces, new fashion and new family politics, which divided the interests. Airing of Indian soaps was a one sided trade, which unbalanced our Pakistani drama industry also.

Pakistani masses are hooked up to Turkish daily soaps that depict the liberal Muslim society. Turkey is a Muslim country but the society portrays the European culture. Some were engrossed by new faces and profligate life styles; and want to see the Turkish culture and those who are bored by watching typical saas bahu Indian soaps or increasingly similar stories welcome these dramas. 

The Pakistani artists say that these “external cultural invasion” was snatching away the remaining opportunities available for Pakistani artists to show their skills in the field of performing arts.

In these Turkish shows, Fatimagul and Ishq-e-Mamnu were highly famous. Ishq-e-Mamnu had a very catchy script and lot of glamour with some stunning cinematography of Istanbul. This however had a great influence on the youth as the glamour, fashion and boldness have been shown to an unlimited extent. Drama Serial Fareha which is based on college love story shows open use vulgarity and limitless charm. These serial display inappropriate relationships and highlight the ills of the society.

Nowadays producers and directors don’t really work on the story line; a drama is only being rated if the cast is famous, no matter what the story is. Along with the loss of economy, airing Turkish serials is depriving us from focusing over our own culture and traditions. These serials left impacts on the attitude of youth and a thinking of a common woman. While surveying the reaction of the housewives to such dramas, 40% response were positive as they were happy by the downfall of the Indian dramas, and 50% were negative and about 10% don’t like to watch these serials. We need to get more organized and give our dramas more priority. The directors need to refresh their minds in order to write scripts on various subjects and gain attention of the audience.

According to Mr. Ayub Khawar, ’’We can’t mention how much time we will take to overcome this gap, because people want only rated cast, channels don’t want to pay more than the budget of drama serials.’’  

Pakistan is a beautiful country especially the amazing sight scenes in northern areas are a treat to the eyes, directors should use these beautiful locations in their dramas and give the audience something different and worth to watch. Although heavy budget is needed for this but with some efforts quality dramas can also be produced at low budget. The trend of Turkish Soaps will soon come to an end just like Indian Soaps lost their viewer ship, because almost every channel is telecasting these serials. We have quality dramas and production in our industry which featured some very well directed story line. With such quality and progress, there’s no need to cater any foreign industry at the cost of declining our own industry.

Our nation has so much talent and potential but the platform is not available here, that is why our singers and actors are going across the borders and getting better recognition of their talent . The export of CDs and DVDs of our dramas bring great profit for our economy but promoting Turkish Dramas on our TV channels surely brings a shame to our industry. Our industry masters at making quality dramas that surely stick millions of eye balls to the television. We should support our own industry that will also bring positive change in our economy as well as employment opportunities for the people in the industry.