On the eve of Republic Day, a Pakistani TV serial called ‘Ghughi’ will go air which is based on Amrita Pritam’s famous book ‘Pinjar’ which is set on the India-Pakistan partition. The TV serial will see the famous Pakistani actor Adnan Siddiqui. Upon watching the movie Pinjar, Siddiqui read the book by Amrita Pritam and decided to make it into a TV serial. While speaking to The Indian Express, Siddiqui, a popular actor on Pakistani television, said that he was in hopes to make something “beyond the high TRP fetching fantasy snake dramas”.

The book, Pinjar, is set in the pre-India-Pakistan partition in the state of Punjab. Siddiqui managed to put a team to adapt the book into a serial. Siddiqui even convinced the channel TV One to make this come true. The shooting of the series started and the television adaptation of Pinjar is titled as Ghughi. The literal meaning of Ghughi is “dove” however, it is also referred as a term of endearment for girls. The interesting bit about the show is that it is scheduled to be launched on the evening of January 25.

While speaking to The Indian Express from Lahore, Siddiqui said, “Pinjar fitted the bill. It’s written by one of the celebrated authors of the sub-continent and considered to be a literary classic.” On the release date of Ghughi, Siddiqui said, “Good things happen if the intention is good.”

For the people in India interested in the serial, they can fetch view of the hour-long episodes on the Internet by 10 pm every Thursday.

“Ghughi will make people on both sides of the man-made border gravitate to their roots. It is not just about the horror of partition, two nations and religions. Primarily, the series talks about human beings and their emotions, which suffered at the hands of a few decision-makers,” says Siddiqui, co-producer and lead actor.

In 2004, Pinjar was adapted as a Bollywood movie starring Manoj Bajpayee and Urmila Matondkar. The movie managed to bag the National Film Award for Best Feature Film on National Integration. Written by Amrita Pritam, Pinjar is about a Hindu woman who is engaged to a doctor from her community. However, she is then abducted by a Muslim man in August 1946 in Amritsar to settle a family feud. The twist comes when the protagonist’s life changes forever after the partition of India and Pakistan.