Television soaps seem to be acquiring a certain contemporeity in their themes. This week Star One’s Siddhant was about a sozzled cop who gives a young solitary girl a ride and then rapes her in the police van. Shades of the Marine Drive cop-rape in Mumbai? Then Sony’s Rihaee this week was about a girl who is secretly video-photographed by a friend and then used for porn purposes. Though the treatment was red-hot and theatrical the theme of a ‘respectable’ family falling apart under societal stress came across loud and clear. But wish Rihaee would choose its supporting cast to match its lead players Nakul Vaid and Rajeshwari Sawant’s powerful presence.

Jassi has turned into Jessica and the serial seems to have lost all its flavour. It also appears to have lost its marbles somewhere along the way. They actually expect us to believe Jassi’s family doesn’t recognise her just because her braces and spectacles are gone! It’s certainly not TRPs any longer. I think the serial will soon come to a halt. It has nowhere else to go. In fact, I see the end of the road for a whole lot of serials like Astitwa and Kkusum. But the question is, do they feel the same?

Has religion been merchandised in this country? I caught an interesting debate on the issue on NDTV’s Muqabla. And when the subject was further stretched to ask, was the Pope’s death commercialised, matters really began to hot up. When someone asked the question about the commercialisation of the Pope’s death from a priest on the panel, another panelist piped in, ?How can he answer that? They’ll punish him?.

Loved Rajat Sharma’s probing, piercing, pungent dock-talk in India TV’s Aap Ki Adaalat with Farooq Abdullah. The Sheikh obviously didn’t think much about Musharraf’s dinner and lunch diplomacy in India. He made sneering references to the daawat and kababs. Could it have something to do with the fact that Mr Abdullah wasn’t invited to any of these meal-stones? He ended his self-righteous tirade against the power brokers with the declaration that he’d be happy if the Kashmiri pundits can return home and if he wouldn’t have to carry guards with guns with him. Frankly, Mr Abdullah, your idealism sounded doctored on the dock.