Written by: Hurmat Majid
Posted on: July 19, 2022 | 
| 中文
(L to R) Asad Siddiqui, Madiha Imam, and Mikaal Zulfiqar
There’s a trend in Pakistani dramas these days, they start out really well and then completely lose the plot, turn problematic and make viewers question their own intelligence for watching these dramas. Chauraha did precisely this.
The show started off really well, with the social media painting a perfect picture of Zoya’s (Madiha Imam). She is portrayed as a girl from a lower middle-class background, who cultivates a fabricated ideal life on social media. She posts pictures with fancy cars, makes boomerangs of herself in fancy shopping malls, and does everything that an average beginner social media influencer does online. Through her social media posts, Zoya attracts the attention of Junaid (Mikaal Zulfiqar) a Robinhoodesque conman, who kidnaps rich girls for ransom and then uses that money to help the under-privileged.
Zoya using Social Media
Seeing Zoya’s posts, Junaid lures her into his trap by using a fake female profile. Once Zoya’s comfortable with this fabricated persona, he kidnaps her and asks for a heavy ransom for her return, it is when she is in Junaid’s custody that he realizes that not only is Zoya poor, she is nothing like her online persona. This is where the drama takes all of the wrong turns, we see a villain take the road to redemption by saving his kidnappee from being raped by three men. He then sets her free and even takes her back home.
The kidnapping scene
At home, Zoya lives with her mother Shireen (Saba Hameed), and her paternal aunt Naseem (Bushra Ansari). While Zoya is kidnapped, people from the neighborhood are giving the two women a hard time, insinuating that she has run away. This leads to Naseem having a heart attack and her swift demise. Naseem’s death was another blow to the progressive element of the storyline as the bond and camaraderie between these three women living alone in an average Pakistani neighborhood, was the main reason for viewers to tune in to the drama.
A scene of Naseem's death
In the process of kidnapping and then safely returning Zoya to her home, Junaid finds out that she is, in fact, his neighbor. Not only that, the viewers find out over the course of the show that Junaid’s father, Saleem (Behroz Sabzwari), is actually interested in marrying Shireen. There’s also Arsal (Asad Siddiqui) lurking in the background, who has feelings for Zoya, but whom Zoya only uses as a means to perfect her online persona.
Asad Siddiqui and Madiha Imam
We then see Junaid go through the typical villain’s road to recovery as he tries to help Zoya and her mother, while having obviously developed feelings for the girl. Zoya is starting to also feel the same way about Junaid, and the only thing that we have to say about it is that showrunners in Pakistan really need to understand that protagonists having Stockholm syndrome is not credible in Pakistan.
Saba Hameed and Madiha Imam as mother-daughter
In terms of acting, we think everyone has done a decent job. Madiha, as usual, has done justice to her role and brought finesse and nuance to it. It is delightful to watch Mikaal grow as an actor. Asad has done an okay job in a role that does not demand much from him, we hope to see him in more challenging roles in the future. Bushra Ansari, Saba Hameed and Behroz Subzwari are all complete powerhouses when it comes to acting, and be it this drama or any other, we see them do a great job in roles such as these, which they have played many times before in their long careers.
It is okay to create commercial ventures, and to expect money to come out of TV shows, but it is not okay to do a halfhearted job because you know viewers have no choice but to endure utter nonsense on TV. We hope that the next set of dramas we watch on TV will be shorter, crisper, more meaningful and mindful of the change in social climate that Pakistan is experiencing. It is high time that we adapt
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