Today is World Television Day. Means the day of memories of TV. The opportunity is to revive some old memories of the TV world, but on this occasion, the absence of an evergreen flower in the bouquet of entertainment is blooming again and again. Ankara Tabassum (78 years old), who was called the world’s most famous and dear to the common man of Indian television, is no more among us. He breathed his last three days ago i.e. on 18 November in a hospital in Mumbai.
She wanted the news of his death to be given after two days. Tabassum’s show ‘Phool Khile Hain Gulshan Gulshan’ on TV was famous long before the advent of daily soap operas. In the 80s, the fame of the show was at its peak, the only reason for which was Tabassum’s special style. Due to this one show of his, TV made Tabassum live and Tabassum made TV live a lot.
remembered the past
In fact, in that era of black and white TV, Phool Khile Gulshan Gulshan Ho or simple yet enticing news. Be it soap operas with a limited number of thirteen episodes or entertaining commercials, television memories of the eighties and nineties are unforgettable. No matter how much you curse the internet and social media, but the truth is that because of them, you are not only able to live that era right for some time and you can also tell your children that this was the TV of our times.
However, before the mid-eighties, Doordarshan used to have only one channel and the number of programs was also very limited. TV sets were also in very few homes, because till 1975 only seven cities of the country had TV broadcasting services. In order to save the cost of electricity, people used to run TV less. Despite this, there was such an urge to watch TV that people used to gaze at programs ranging from agricultural philosophy to classical music and dance and even films in regional languages. Krishi Darshan started airing on January 26, 1967 and is known as the longest running show in the world of Indian TV with more than 16 thousand episodes under 52 seasons.
If seen, in the mid-80s i.e. before the era of soap operas, TV has come a long way to reach its audience.
Tale of three decades
According to some media reports, a television set was installed in Madras by a student of electrical engineering in 1950 at an exhibition. Nothing can be said about the claim that it was the first TV performance in its entirety, or an experiment. But this incident has been said and heard as the first appearance of television in India.
Although the first TV transmitter in the country was installed in 1951, experimental broadcasting began in 1959 and daily broadcasting began in 1965. In 1972, the second broadcast center after Delhi was started in Mumbai, with which the country’s first celebrity show ie Phool Khile Hain Gulshan Gulshan also started (October 8, 1972). However, when this show was started in the seventies, there were no such commercial shows on TV. Later it became the favorite show of TV advertisers. TV was separated from radio in 1976, with broadcast services reaching seven cities over the next decade, while national broadcasting began another six years later, in 1982. Color television was entered during this period. From here it can be said that the world of TV was hooked.
cable from antenna and umbrella to set top
Soon Hum Log (1984), Yeh Jo Hai Zindagi (1984), Karamchand (1985), Khandaan (1985), Buniyaad (1986), Nukkad (1986), Ramayan (1987), Mahabharat (1988) and Wagle Ki Duniya (1988) For more than a decade with the advent of shows like this, the audience group that remained glued to TV continued to grow. Among these, Ramayana and Mahabharata were such shows, during the time of telecast ie on Sunday morning, there was silence on the streets. However, in the same period, along with the fame of the above serials, Chitrahar (started in 1982) had its own place, which later turned into Rangoli (1988) and then superhit Muqabla (1993). Once a week i.e. on Sunday evening, a Hindi film was screened, for the sake of which it had become a tradition to prepare Sunday evening dinner before dusk.
Today Generation Z (born between 1997 to 2012) may find it strange to hear these things, but it is true that for Generation X (born between 1965 to 1980) the dose of entertainment served on TV, in a way Used to work in big screen cinema. If for some reason the lights went off during their favorite programme, people used to gherao the electricity office. So, by persuading some people, they used to get the work done. The same situation used to happen during the broadcast of cricket. But by the mid-nineties, things started changing.
This change was something that started a decade ago with the advent of soap operas. With the arrival of satellite channels, the antennas on the roofs started disappearing and black cables started laying in the streets. Wherever you see cables and boosters hanging from the walls. In the era of DD, the limited hours of entertainment were now turning into 24-hour non-stop entertainment. Channel V (1993) and MTV (1996) ended the week-long wait for Chitrahar. In this period, Phool Khile Hai Gulshan Gulshan also went off air after 21 years of continuous telecast.
After the decision of economic reforms in 1991, the world of TV started changing very fast. In this period, many domestic and foreign channels came one after the other, including GTV, Star Plus, MTV, Star Movies, BBC, Prime Sports, Sony etc. The craze for Doordarshan started decreasing. People’s craze for shows like Tara, Sitara, Saanp-Seedhi, Main Bhi Detective, Antakshari, Boogie Woogie was increasing. Till the advent of CNN, Discovery and National Geography, channels were classified as Entertainment Channels (GEC), News Channels (Khabriya Channels) and Sports Channels.
Then with the advent of the new century came the entry of HBO and History Channel. In this period, a separate place of news channels started to emerge, in which people’s interest was almost like that of entertainment programs. By the year 2005, there was a flood of channels. What the audience should see and what not. The competing market was dominated by the middle class, whose preferences had changed twice in twenty years and were preparing for a third change, as conditional access systems (CAS) and DTH (direct to home) were on the line.
In fact, in the year 2001, the Conditional Access System (CAS) was brought to remove many irregularities including stopping the arbitrariness of cable operators and correcting local problems of broadcasting. But only two years later, DTH was introduced which could solve the problems faced earlier in a better way. The first set top box in the country was installed in Chennai (2002).
when the stars don’t move
The tales of TV are never going to end. Since the conversation started with World TV Day and Tabassum, let’s end with some forgotten memories. In the year 2015, Tabassum started Tabassum Talkies channel on YouTube, which has lakhs of subscribers. If you watch his old videos, you will find that he has a charismatic connection with the guests coming in the interviews. She welcomes to come on the show with a smile and questions Tapak. The guest is also sitting very comfortably, as if he will go after lunch and dinner.
There is a possibility that the visiting guest would feel comfortable in front of him, but more than that his presence would give him confidence that he can answer any scoop at least here comfortably. In an old video, she asks actor Arun Govil (brother of her husband Vijay Govil) why you don’t get work with star actresses. Believe me, Arun Govil’s answer on this deserves a scathing statement.
In another short clip, she asks actress Tanuja that you have played heroine with Jitendra, now you are playing his mother, tell why? His eyes and sitting posture while asking this question are worth noting. And while answering, there is no evasive feeling in Tanuja’s eyes. In another clip, she is questioning actor Jeevan, is there too much mannerism in his acting these days? The pose here is like a complaint, but Jeevan’s answer tells that an actor wants to tell something about himself to the audience, and is not talking here and there with the intention of impressing them.
There is one interview, which he might have done at Parveen Babi’s house, that grabs attention despite the poor recording. Aap Jaisa Koi Meri Zindagi Mein Aaye… Singers Nazia Hassan, Sambha i.e. Mac Mohan, Shakti Kapoor, K. N. Singh, we will find that the reason why she was liked was not only because there was no other option then, but she was herself and had her own style.
However, after his show, Simi Grewal’s talk show Rondevu (1997) also became very popular and later Koffee with Karan also got a lot of success. It is said that one of the reasons for Tabassum’s fame was that she was active in films as a child artist since 1947. Everyone in the industry must have been familiar with him. When his show started, his activism remained in films even before and after that.
Because of this, she probably did not hesitate to ask anything. Apart from this, his style and dress was also amazing. Gajab does not mean any fashionable dress, but used to take saree, flowers in hair, big earrings or earrings in ears, bangles in hands, bindi on forehead and sometimes shawl too. On this, the mixed juice of Hindi-Urdu was enough to add charm to the conversation. No such anchor of a celebrity talk show was seen during her lifetime and may not be seen in the future as well.
