Serial measurements

TELLY VISION

While Indian television soap sagas rarely go beyond the saas-bahu tales, every nook and corner of our country's streets seem to be flooded with sarees and suits and dress material inspired from the Ekta Kapoor factory of serials.

On a saree-shopping spree recently, shops (at one place we were asked to wait 10 minutes for our turn) glittered with the sort of sarees you'd find mothers-in-law, daughters-in-law, sisters-in-law and vamps wear in umpteen sagas. The prices were steep and went up to Rs 45,000-50,000. "People actually pay to look so bad," wondered my shopping companion, while the shopkeeper showed us a "Sabyasachi-inspired" design.

I remembered another instance when I had gone shopping spree to our neighbourhood market. At one of the shops, the person showing his range of sarees, including the "polka dot Satya Paul type, madam", decided to teach us a thing or two, and proceeded to show us racks full of salwar suits and sarees.

"This, madam, is the Kahin to Hoga range, and that," he said, pointing to another rack, "is the Kasam Se range." There were the Kyunki Saas Bhi Kabhi Bahu Thi sarees (the racks, I assume, will have to increase in number to accommodate clothes in accordance to the generation leaps Kapoor & Co love to include in their plots), the Kahani Ghar Ghar Ki range and Kasauti Zindagi Ki brand of suits and sarees.

"Do women know exactly what they're looking for?" I asked. The reply said it all: "Arre, a lady asked me to bring out a yellow-coloured saree with a green border in sequins, the exact one that Kashish once wore in Kahin Toh Hoga."

And even as some of us curse Ekta Kapoor's shows, shopkeepers are a happy lot. "Till the time Ekta (Kapoor) is reigning on the screen, we are reigning in the market," he said, folding another nine-yard wonder inspired from another telly serial.

Going by my mental calculation of these shows, I think characters in top serials probably wear at least five different outfits for one 30-minute episode, if not more. And the market for Indian serials-inspired clothing, promise shopkeepers, is growing.

"Tulsi (the protagonist of Kyunki...) ate up the Kanjivaram market," rued the same neighbourhood market shopkeeper, while pointing out to a heavily embroidered net saree, and quickly adding, "Thanks to Parvati, net sarees are back in fashion."

My rendezvous with Hindi serial wardrobes didn't end just here. On one of the occasions, where the tailor proceeded to take measurements, I was promptly asked to "try a V neck, the sorts that the saas of Mayka wears". "Maybe a dori (strings) at the back," I offered excitedly too. "Yes, sure, just like Rano's mother-in-law in Kasam Se," he said, pepped up by my sudden enthusiasm.

Coming back to my neighbourhood saree strore, I remembered a conversation with one of my colleagues sometime last year. She was ecstatic at her recent purchase: "A gorgeous georgette saree with a huge butterfly design that came right in front where you pin the pallu."

"Do you have something similar?" I asked, explaining the design to the shopkeeper. His response was a deadpan expression with a dialogue: "That's outdated." "Within a year?" I wondered. "Madam, serials can take generation leaps and not end, but our clothes do have a shelf life."n

P.S. While on the saree-TV connection, Bengali ladies are now wearing sarees with Saurav Ganguly's face on them, and Mandira Bedi has Rahul Dravid's signature strategically placed on the sarees she'll be wearing while anchoring the World Cup. But that's for another column.