When “Pyari Mona” began, it appeared to be a story that would genuinely highlight the plight of women who do not adhere to the stereotypical South Asian notion of how a woman should look. However, as the story moves forward, we are getting caught up in storylines that we have seen all too often before – though the presentation is different. Pyari Mona stars Sanam Jung, Adeel Hussain, Adnan Jaffar, Uzma Beg, Muhammad Hunbal, Shaheen Khan and Mashal Khan in central roles. The story has been written by Haseeb Ahmed and directed by Ali Hassan.
In episode 13, Zee (Mashal Khan) and Babar (Adeel Hussain) begin to spend time together…..a lot of time together. With Mona (Sanam Jung) and Ayaan in Karachi for a wedding, this gives them full freedom to do so and the buds of an affair have been planted. Meanwhile, Mona continues to be a problem in Kinza (Naureen Mumtaz) and Irfan’s (Muhammad Hunbal) marriage, though not directly. While Kinza and Irfan have open, honest conversations and Kinza has befriended Mona, it’s their families who are most concerned about Mona’s re-entry. On her part, Mona is doing her best to capture Babar’s attention, questioning why he hasn’t even called to check in on her since she has been gone.
The dynamic between Zee and Babar is interesting, but not in a good way. Zee is a dominating personality, a self-centered one and if this relationship were to go further, it would be detrimental for Ayaan’s future. However, would it even get that far? Is Zee just playing a game of revenge to get back at Babar? It’s clear that Babar is on the rebound, trying to not only escape his memories of Samia (Sabeeka Imam), but also trying to escape his marriage to Mona, which was forced upon him. We can criticize Babar’s bad behavior, his verbally abusive and emotionally abusive personality and especially his current foray into the world of infidelity – but his stance regarding his marriage to Mona isn’t entirely off. Wasn’t this marriage forced on both Mona and Babar? Is it really easy to go from being brother-in-law and sister-in-law who despise each other to suddenly being expected to share a bedroom and raise a child together? It’s not hard to see why Babar is seeking an escape from his home life – but what he is doing is wrong.
Likewise, we can also excuse Mona and Irfan hanging out constantly by saying they are friends and Kinza is supportive. But is this relationship really as pure and clean as they want to portray it? Initially, sure, it was, because they were simply friends. But as soon as marriage talk hit, their relationship certainly has a different shade to it now. Kinza’s hurt at being left in the dark was valid and while Irfan is doing his best to be a devoted, loyal husband to Kinza, Mona’s actions aren’t much different from Babar’s. She is distracting herself with Irfan’s company, someone who makes her feel good about herself. She may not be doing it with any negative intentions whatsoever, while Babar is openly flirting and sharing a relationship heading in an indecent direction, but the reasoning behind it is the same……it’s to escape a bad marriage.
“Pyari Mona” is no longer that stress-free, light-hearted show we were hoping it would be. However, it does continue to push the envelope and make us think. This episode focuses more on Kinza and Irfan’s relationship and that’s not necessarily a bad thing, as Muhammad and Naureen are both strong performers with sweet chemistry. Moving forward, with Khalid (Adnan Jaffar) now aware that Babar is meeting another woman, how will this impact Mona and Babar’s relationship?