Indian TV Shows Related To Defence Forces: the must watch list

Unlike today when with a few exceptions , most of the TV shows are based on household politics and quarrels mostly between the female in-laws, continuing for decades  and 99.99% marriage ceremonies not concluding successfully, we had some more sensible and meaningful TV shows in the last two decades of the previous century and the starting of 2000s. These were easily relatable to our daily lives and had motives other than ‘entertainment at any cost’. Some of these shows portrayed the defence forces  ,personnel and their lives like never before. We definitely require more like the following:

FAUJI: Most of us think of Shah Rukh Khan in circus when it comes to TV but Fauji was his debut on the Indian television. Aired in 1988-89 on DD NATIONAL, the show was said to be based on the story of Lt Col Sanjoy Bannerji of the Bombay Sappers,Indian Army.It portrays the story of a young lieutenant  during commando training and how he goes on to become a good officer.

PARAM VEER CHAKRA:  Became hugely popular among the masses , when aired in 1988. It was directed by Chetan Anand and portrayed episode-wise stories of the supreme sacrifices made  particularly by the Pram VeerChakra recepients  during wars. Puneet Issar and Naseeruddin Shah were some of the prominent actors who worked in it.

SEA HAWKS: Aired on DD Metro in the late 1990s and later on Star Plus, it was based on the challenges of Indian Coast Guard/Indian Navy . it was directed by Anubhav Sinha, Anirudhya Mitra and Shivam Nair of UTV .Mitra was also the writer of the show. It included land ,aerial and underwater action sequence between a mafia don,  and the force personnel. The leading star cast included  Om Puri , R. Madhavan, Milind Soman and others.

CHHOONA HAI AASMAAN: Aired in 2007-08 it was based on HAWK, a team formed by six officers of the Indian Air Force  in order to secure the country from terrorist attacks. The main characters were The head of the HAWKS played by Narendra Jha, Flight Lt. Sameera Singh played by Jahnvi Chadhha, Flight Lt. Abhimanyu Adhikari played by Iqbal Khan and others.

AAROHAN: Hats off to Pallavi Joshi for being the producer , writer, protagonist Nikita in the show . It was a first of its kind thing on Indian television in 1990s and must have inspired many girls to walk a different path in life. Women were not allowed in most entries in the Indian Navy when it was aired. The protagonist’s father and brother  served in the army, it was about her days in the Naval Academy during training.

SAMANDAR:Aired on DD National in 1994, the best part  about this show was that most people involved in the show were real life defence personnel. It was primarily based upon the real service stories by various Indian Navy Officers. It also included real manoeuvres of Indian Naval Fleet . legendary  army singer Col (Dr) Sultan Singh Malik was also involved  in the show, the title song became very popular.

Later on in the list we can add LEFT RIGHT LEFT aired on Sab TV between 2006-08.It was about six cadets at a military academy called KMA. The main leads were played by Rajiv Khandelwal, Priyanka Bassi and others. The latest addition that can be made to this series can be a web series  THE TEST CASE, involving extremely talented actress Nimrat Kaur.

All and all we definitely need more of these to cope up from ‘forcefully developed/scripted  love between two contestants to save themselves from elimination/dumping’ kind of stuffs.