Emotional Atyachaar shifts focus to married couples

With nearly fifty episodes in the fourth season, the channel now attempts to widen the genre to include troubled marriages.

One of the most controversial shows on 'relationships' has crossed another landmark and is ready to celebrate it, albeit in a different way. Emotional Atyachaar, currently in Season four, has completed 50 episodes (of Season four), longer than any other season. To mark the success, Bindass has chosen to widen the angle of 'betrayal' stories and will now focus on the disloyalty in marriage.

For the record, the format of the show revolves around a partner being unfaithful in a relationship. Earlier, the format involved loyalty tests conducted on unaware suspects and filmed on camera, egged on by a suspicious partner. After a lot of controversy, the current season changed the story telling pattern such that the complainant/victim now comes on the show to narrate the story of the betrayal. The whole episode is then dramatised.

While the show, in its multiple seasons, has showcased cheating within all kinds of relationships, this will be the first time that it will speak about the betrayal in marriage.

The purpose, as suggested by Shalini Sethi, director, programming, Bindass, is to inspire women to fight against marital injustice. Christened Shaadi Mein Atyachaar, it will be telecast on Saturdays at 7 pm, the regular Emotional Atyachaar timing, starting December, 21.

In the initial phase, four such episodes have been filmed. Though the show otherwise encourages betrayal stories narrated by men, all the stories in the current genre will be from the perspective of the woman protagonist as the channel claims women face marital injustice more frequently. It will, however, feature youngsters, since it is a youth GEC.

What differentiates the show from any other 'dramatisation' format is that the victim himself/herself will narrate the stories.

Sethi explains that even within marriages, sexual infidelity is not the only betrayal that one can suffer. "The show will bring alive multiple cases of betrayal involving emotional cheating, frauds, dowry, NRI marriages gone wrong and domestic violence, which certain brave hearts have managed to overcome. We want to inspire people to come out of their marriages if the relationships have gone sour for as long as 10 or 12 years."

Pravesh Rana, who has been the face of Emotional Atyachaar, will continue to host the show and take the viewers through the four-episode special on Shaadi Mein Atyachaar. The victims, however, may not be shown, depending on their choice.