This is another Eid special long play aired on PTV in the past. PTV old had a strong tradition of special Eid dramas which used to be celebrated and liked by a majority of viewers. In fact Pakistanis used to schedule their Eid with PTV’s Eid schedule. PTV dramas were at their peak in the past and every new production was considered better than the previous ones.
Pakistan Television had the tradition of presenting special long plays on Eid festivals and majority of them would be comedy. We can’t find all of such dramas now but there are a few available on YouTube. “Eid Train” was a masterpiece drama on Eid topic. For many many years in the past, people would love to see Moin Akhtar on screen especially on Eid days and PTV had knew that. Moin Akhtar became a part of the Eid for so many years.
The story of the drama is about three brothers who have become old and are not yet married and also have no jobs. They have one married sister who loves her brothers very much. The three brothers while in an effort to get married choose different fields of arts as a profession. The arts are sometimes referred to as “Fanoon-e-Lateefa” in Urdu and as these three brothers make jokes about the arts fields, the drama was best given the title as “Fanooni Lateefey”.
Taleem-e-Balighan was aired on PTV in 1966 and PTV itself came into being in 1964. So the drama was one of the earliest productions of the Pakistan Television. It was written by Khwaja Moinuddin and it was first presented on Radio Pakistan in 1956.
This long play deals with the situation of Pakistani society that emerged after the partition and tells how things changed after 1947. To keep the past and present side by side, the character of Mirza Ghalib is produced who comes back to life after meeting Mir Taqi Mir in heavens to see what’s going on in India and Pakistan which jointly were home to him decades back. Ghalib after facing the changing world recalls his gone times and finally leaves the world again.
One of the historic and memorable long plays of PTV, “Half Plate” was written by Anwar Maqsood and was directed by Syed Mohsin Ali. It was Karachi Station’s presentation. Moin Akhtar and Khalida Reyasat played the main roles while other actors included Badar Khalil, Jamshed Ansari, Latif Kapadia, and Arshad Mehmood.
Long plays were a very special part of PTV transmission in the past and PTV has produced outstanding long plays which have become beautiful memories. ‘Adam, Hawwa Aur Shaitan’ is one of the special long plays of the past.
Aangan Terha was, and it is, so nostalgic to watch. Written by Anwar Maqsood and directed by Qaisar Farooq, it is among the most celebrated dramas PTV has ever produced. With a very small cast but an attractive story, Aangan Terha earned huge appreciation.