‘Suspense Hour’ — Zee TV

‘Suspense Hour’
Year: 2000
Total Episodes: 20
Runtime: Around 45–50 minutes.

Shweta Shinde and Shakti Singh. Episode 19, ‘Tic Tic Tac’.
© Zee Entertainment

When Saturday Suspense’s day of telecast was changed from Saturday to another day of the week, it was renamed to Suspense Hour. Both shows were essentially the same. In records, Suspense Hour’s numbering is started afresh to avoid confusion.

The first episode of the series was inspired from Alfred Hitchcock’s movie Strangers On A Train.

The show’s theme music was an instrumental piece with no lyrics. I don’t remember Saturday Suspense’s theme music but it’s probable that both themes were the same.

Suspense Hour
No.	Episode Name	Cast
1	The Game	Akshay Anand, Zakir Hussain, Murali Sharma
2	National Highway 17	Mohan Kapur, Sumeet Raghavan, Ashish Roy
3	Pehchaan	Deepak Tijori, Shruti Ulfat, Murali Sharma, Kishwar Merchant, Rajesh Kumar
4	(Chehraa)	Sudhanshu Pandey, Grusha Kapoor, Abhimanyu Singh
5	Midnight	Bakul Thakkar
6
7	3-Star Laundry	Sonali Kapoor, Vicky Ahuja, Suneel Sinha, Vrajesh Hirjee
8	Killing Dose	Prashant Narayanan, Salim Shah, Vinod Sherawat
9	Giraft	Raza Murad, (unknown face)
10	Parchhayan	Shakti Singh, Rajpal Yadav, Raviraj, Kay Kay Menon, Murali Sharma
11	Checkmate	Raj Zutshi, (the girl from Mano Ya Na Mano ‘Vampire’ episode), Kishwar Merchant, (another 90s face), Murali Sharma, Nandita Puri, Saurabh Dubey, Vaani Tripathi
12	The Sketch Artist	Akshay Anand, Rajpal Yadav, Nivedita Bhattacharya, Raviraj
13	Anubhav	Shonali Malhotra, Kay Kay Menon, Rajesh Khera, Deepak Qazir Written by: Ashwini Malik, Cyrus Khambata Producer & Director: Ashwini Malik
14	Woh Kaun Tha	Tanaz Currim, Anupam Bhattacharya, Homi Wadia, Vaquar Shaikh, Raviraj, Rajendra Sethi, Resham Tipnis, Jiten Lalwani
15	Kashish	Supriya Pathak
16	The Daylight	Ashish Vidhyarthi, Nawab Shah
17	Shodh	Sachin Khedekar, Achint Kaur, Bakul Thakkar, Prashant Narayanan, Vineet Kumar
18	Dial M For Mother	Kartika Rane, Sudhanshu Pandey, Vrajesh Hirjee
19	Tic Tic Tac	Shakti Singh, Shweta Shinde, Seema Pandey, Beena Roy, Mansi Das, Vinit, Arun Khanna, R.S. Sethi, Chang Chaang Ho, Sanjay Bhatia, Kamal Jain
20	Ek Raat	Nishikant Kamat, Kishori Shahane

‘Saturday Suspense’ — Zee TV

‘Saturday Suspense’

Year: 1998 to 2000.

Total Episodes: 109.

Runtime: Around 45–50 minutes (60 minutes with ads).

Abhimanyu Singh and Chitrapama Banarjee from Episode 50.
© Zee Entertainment.

Saturday Suspense was a collection of suspense, thriller and crime stories telecast every Saturday on Zee TV. Each episode was a new story (except for “Dhund” that was shown in two episodes 107 and 108). Episode 86, “Daav” was adapted from James Hadley Chase’s novel There’s Always A Price Tag; an improvised version of the story was also adapted into a movie Maharathi in 2008 (Paresh Rawal, Neha Dhupia, Boman Irani). Episode 20, “Zakham” was later adapted into a full feature film Right Ya Wrong (2010) with Sunny Deol and Irrfan Khan in lead roles. 

Before they were famous, they were also here: Irrfan Khan, K. K. Menon, Abhimanyu Singh, Atul Kulkarni, Boman Irani etc. were amongst actors who were a part of this show. Although most episodes were mediocre, they were well-acted and encompassed several television actors of the 1990s; there were, however, some good episodes as well.

The background score was inferior—loud, dissonant and unrelated to the show. The show’s opening theme music was quite good but it’s not available anywhere on the internet, nor is the logo.

Following is the list of episodes and cast. Anything written in brackets is for reference whenever the actual name is not available. If anybody knows the missing titles or cast, please feel free to mention in the comments section. Special thanks to Swapnil Raj for his contribution to the list.

‘Yule Love Stories’ — Zee TV

‘Yule Love Stories’
Later known as Love Stories.
Year: Anytime between 1994 to 1998. (Zee5 has listed the dates and years of the series ranging from 1993 to 1994. The years are incorrect. This show is definitely not from the first season of Zee TV.)
Total Episodes: 53.
Runtime: Approximately 22–23 minutes (30 minutes on TV with ad breaks).

Deepika Amin in a still from episode 12.
© Zee Entertainment

Sometime in the mid-nineties a feel-good, mellifluous tune introduced a purely romantic anthology series Yule Love Stories. Some stories were good, some were mediocre; some had happy endings, while a few ended on a heart-breaking note; some had feel-good youthfulness, while others had a sense of yearning and melancholy. Most importantly, there was dignity in those characters. The name Yule came from the sponsor Yule Tea group. After disassociation from the sponsor, the show was re-named to Love Stories, which is not a search-friendly title. Most stories finished in one episode while some went on for two parts. It also featured stories from directors like Anubhav Sinha and Ashutosh Gowariker who would go on to become famous film directors in future. Ashutosh Gowariker’s episode 49 and 50 ‘Vapasi’, written and enacted by himself, was the provenance of his 2004 film Swades starring Shahrukh Khan and Gayatri Joshi. There are two different stories called ‘Vapasi’, the first is in episodes 30 and 31 directed by Anubhav Sinha, while the second is Ashutosh Gowariker’s.

It was a precursor to the popular show Rishtey. They were practically same shows. The only differences were that the latter had one-hour episodes which allowed for better plot and character development; the stories in Rishtey dealt with various relationships, while Yule Love Stories was strictly grounded to romantic stories.

My favourite episodes are ‘Dhadkan’ and ‘Doc Subbu’. The former is a dreamy and fairytale-type story. The jazz background score is reminiscent of Kenny G is perfect. Whereas the latter is a light-hearted and charmingly uncomplicated romantic story which would have done better in the one-hour format.

© Zee Entertainment

Title Song: Only lyrics in the song were Yule love stories sung by a female singer whose name is so far unavailable. The tune was also a precursor to the tune of Rishtey.

Availability: The series is uploaded on Zee5 and Zee TV’s YouTube channel. I would recommend watching it on Zee5 to hear the title song, which is shamefully cut from the YouTube channel. A few of the available episodes have their endings truncated both on Zee5 and YouTube.

Episode and Cast list: I have compiled a list of episode names, cast and crew. Some episodes are missing from Zee’s library and there’s no data available on them so far. It’s difficult to say if the missing portions and episodes still exist. Among the available episodes, a few have their titles missing (due to Zee’s unethical editing); therefore, I have given them temporary titles in brackets for reference. The list is a work in progress. I will update the list as I get more data.

Yule Love Stories
No.	Episode Name	Actors	Credits
1	Pehla Pyar	Rajit Kapoor, Renuka Shahane, Asawari Joshi, Sulabha Deshpande	Writer: Brij Katyal Producer: Radha Seth Director: Ramesh Gupta
2	Maut Ke Rahi	Pavan Malhotra, Deepika Deshpande Amin
3		Tushar Dalvi, Renuka Shahane	(The episode is unavailable. The exact number and title are unknown.)
4
5	The Note	Renuka Shahane, Mahesh Thakur	Writer: Brij Katyal Producer: Radha Seth Director: Ramesh Gupta
6	The Anniversary	Anju Mahendru,  Parixit Sahni, Kalpana Iyer
7	Toofan Se Pehle	Mahesh Thakur, Winnie Paranjpye
8–9	Mehendi	Ananya Khare, Jatin Sial, Sudhir Dalvi
10
11	(Dosti)	Pavan Malhotra, Renuka Shahane
12	(Will)	Deepika Deshpande Amin
13	Asha	Pavan Malhotra, Winnie Paranjpye	Writer: Brij Katyal Producer: Radha Seth Director: Ramesh Gupta
14	Memories	Tom Alter, Asawari Joshi
15
16
17		Vaquar Shaikh	(The episode is unavailable. The exact number and title are unknown.)
18–19	Dhadkan	Natasha Singh	Odyssey Video Communications Ltd.
20	Faasle	Roshini Achreja, Vinay Jain, Smita Jaykar
21	(Flashback)	Kartika Rane, Rakesh Thareja, Rituraj Singh
22	Chaal	Pooja Madan, Rakhee Tandon
23
24–25	Nazdeekiyan	Sanjeev Seth, Ashwin Kaushal
26	Jazbaat	Rituraj Singh, Ardhendu Bose, Tarakesh Chauhan, Kanika Shivpuri	Odyssey Video Communications Ltd.
27	Uska Sach	Milind Gunaji, Vineet Kumar	Writer: Kamlesh Pandey Producer & Director: Anubhav Sinha
28–29	Parvaz	Sadiya Siddiqui, Seema Pahwa, Nirmal Pandey, Jitendra Shastri
30–31	Vapasi	Utkarsha Naik, Shishir Sharma
32
33
34
35
36
37
38–39	Love... just happens	Aly Khan, Rakhee Tandon, Bhairavi Raichura	Screenplay: Priya Singh Paul
40	(Ek Raat)	Pooja Madan, R. Madhavan	Director: Vivek Behl
41–42	Aakanksha	Sachin Khedekar, Iravati Harshe	Odyssey Video Communications Ltd.
43	Tasveer	Vinay Jain
44-45	Yaadein	Viplove, Prateeksha Lonkar
46-47	Saadhana	Iravati Harshe, Yatin Karyekar
48	Bio-Data	Kumud Mishra
49-50	Vapasi	Ashutosh Gowariker	Odyssey Video Communications Ltd. Writer: Ashutosh Gowariker
51	Anokha Milan		Odyssey Video Communications Ltd.
52	Interview	Deepraj Rana
53	Doc Subbu		Odyssey Video Communications Ltd. Director: Anand Subramanian

‘Saanp Seedi’ — Zee TV

‘Saanp Seedi’ 

Also known as Snakes and Ladders, Maha Saanp Seedi.
Years: 1992 to at least 1994.
Host: Mohan Kapur.
Hostess: Bindiya.
Guests: Moon Moon Sen, Parvati Khan, Rahul Roy, Arjun, Namrata Shirodkar etc.
Director: Adi Pocha.
Produced by UTV Movies (also known as United Television).

Mohan Kapur from Saanp Seedi promo.
© UTV Movies
Courtesy: Zeshaan Ejaz

A game show provenanced on the popular board game Snakes and Ladders was a fantastic idea which was backed up by a superb presentation. It was a vibrant show, well-presented by Mohan Kapur. He deliberately played a smug and somewhat unlikeable host; he pulled it off well without coming across an obnoxious snob.

There was a new guest every episode and four participants dressed red, yellow, green and blue uniforms. The show’s format was changed a few times but the basic format was like this: in the first round of the show, the host would ask each participant a frivolous question about the guest with two answers, pre-rated by the guest: the right answer would get them on the board, while with the wrong answer they would have to pull a chain, emptying a pendant bucket of water on their heads. In the main round, each question would have four options rated from 1 to 4 by the guest beforehand. The participant would jump on the vertical Snakes and Ladders board upon receiving the score from the guest. They would also have to ride the water slide in certain situations. The participant standing on the highest number at the end would be the winner.

A celebrity guest smudging cake on Mohan Kapur. 
© UTV Movies 
Courtesy: Zeshaan Ejaz

The show had a few different rounds, changed from time to time but the original format was arguably the best. In one round the guest would “autograph” the participants on their face with paint, subject to their answers. The tired new rounds like anda dhulai, jai anda dhulai but they were shortly changed.

In one particularly low-scoring episode the winner stood on the first number on the board, while the remaining three participants could not even stay on the board and hence remained locked in the cage outside. One of the participants was called Jeeganesh, who was greeted by his friends in the audience with “Ganpati Bappa Moreya” chants. Another participant was called Prachi but neither of them won the show. At the end of one episode from the earlier days of the show, a guest lured Mohan Kapur to jump off the water side. When the guest’s turn came to do the same, he backed out while mocking Mohan Kapur.

The show had many celebrity guests ranging from television to films (or even other fields). If I find out the names of more guests I will update the list.  So far there is only one episode of the show available, which is uploaded by one of the participants on YouTube.

The show’s theme music was a beautiful jazz tune that matched the show’s flair and verve. Decades have gone by but Saanp Seedi remains the most vibrant game show of India. 

‘Daak Ghar’ and ‘Bollein Taare’ — Zee TV

‘Daak Ghar’
Channel: Zee TV
Years: 1992 to unknown.
Hosts: Phalguni Parekh and Tushar Dalvi.

Phalguni Parekh
Courtesy: Zeshaan Ejaz

Daak Ghar was a show about Zee TV, co-hosted by Phalguni Parekh and Tushar Dalvi. They would talk about the current and upcoming shows, news about the channel and read letters from fans across the world. They would also interview a guest usually actors connected to Zee TV’s shows from their homes through a video conference or a pre-recorded interview.

One of the guests was Surendra Pal who was playing the notorious ghost Vikranta Jabbar from the longest Zee Horror Show episode ‘Saaya’ that lasted for 11 parts. At the end of the episode he was asked to recite a jingle from the episode. Amongst other guests was Shatrughan Sinha’s family including his twin boys.

It had a pleasant opening theme without lyrics, which is unfortunately not available anywhere. It was an inoffensive show that allowed people to get authentic news about the programmes. Both the hosts were affable and spoke like well-mannered, well-cultured individuals.

‘Bollein Taare’
Channel: Zee TV
Years: 1992 to unknown.
Host: Unknown.

Bollein Taare (the spelling could be wrong) was a morning show talking about astrology, horoscopes etc.

Theme song
The show’s best part was its theme song. The song was mainly sung by a male singer, possibly a famous one, whose name isn’t available as of now. The song probably had some female vocals as well.

The lyrics aren’t perfect; some lines or words may be missing. There’s no footage of this show available anywhere on the internet.

Lyrics
Kiski kismat hai roshan. Kiske hain vaare nyare. Kiske hain bhag adhoore. 
Dekhein kya bollein taare. Dekhein kya bollein taare. 
Kisko apnana hoga. Kiso thukrana hogya. 
Shayad batlayein tare kis mod pe jana hoga. Kya kya batlayein taare. 
Dekhin kya bollein taare. Dekhein kya bollein taare. 

‘Philips Top Ten’ and ‘BPL Oye’

‘Philips Top Ten’
Channel: Zee TV
Years: 1993 to 1999
Hosts: Sonal Dabral, Satish Shah, (various)

© Zee Entertainment
Courtesy: Zeshaan Ejaz

Philips Top Ten was a countdown show of film songs based on weekly sales of audio cassettes and later on CDs. Sonal Dabral was the first host. He left the show soon after a few episodes, though he did well in his short stint. He was a humorous host who sometimes spoke in a Bhojpuri accent. Satish Shah succeeded him; his tenure was longer than Dabral’s. He hosted an episode with the pro-wrestler “Macho Man” Randy Savage as a special guest during WWE’s (known as WWF at that time) tour of India.

In 1994 there was an interesting battle for the number one slot between two popular songs of the time “Ek ladki ko dekha to aiasa laga” and “Tu cheez badi hai mast mast”, with each song alternating between number one and two from time to time. In the last quarter of the year, Hum Aapke Hain Kaun’s album held the coveted spot for roughly six or seven months and was probably dethroned by the 1995 album Raja. Philips Top Ten also had guest hosts from time to time from film actors to singers including Raveena Tandon. It also had a theme song, a sort of a jingle, which was something like this: Number paanch, number char....  gaana number one — Philips Top Ten. (Followed by a musical beat.)

Sometime in 1996 the show’s format changed with the arrival of Pankaj Kapoor and Satish Kaushik as Titu and Tony respectively. It became a mini-sitcom with little emphasis on the countdown songs and more on story-telling. The character’s names were later changed to Nitu and Noni and instead of turbans they had to wear hats following objections from “hurt sentiments” organisations. Regardless of the protests, the show went on; Pankaj Kapoor and Satish Kaushik’s characters became iconic. The show became so popular that they could have turned it into a full-fledged sitcom without the countdown format.

‘BPL Oye’
Earlier known as Oye MTV
Channel: MTV
VJ: Ruby Bhatia, Raageshwari.
Years: around 1993 to unknown.

It started as Oye MTV and was later renamed to BPL Oye by which it became better known in the popular culture. It started around the same time as Philips Top Ten. Instead it was a top-20 countdown show, one-hour long; being from a music channel, the stress was obviously on songs. The song numbers were displayed by beautifully creative videos showing diverse facets of Indian rural and city life.

The VJ, Ruby Bhatia, would also do interviews of people on the streets, asking them questions or opinions on various things. At the end of 1994, they did a multi-hour special covering the top-50 songs of the year, also including interviews of listeners, asking them facetious questions. Like Philips Top Ten, Ek ladi ko dekha and Tu cheez badi hai mast mast took turns for the number-one spot. In one segment, Ruby Bhatia asked people which song they preferred. The response was divided in favour of both songs. One person was asked to sing Ek ladki ko dekha song and he made a mess of the lyrics: Ek ladki ko dekha to aisa laga, ek khilta gulab, ek khilti gulab... That’s all he kept crooning. Raageshwari also hosted the show after Ruby Bhatia. It’s unknown if there was any other VJ apart from the two.

It’s slated on IMDB (an extremely unreliable source for Indian television) that Neelam Kothari was also the VJ but there’s no truth to that. Neelam indeed hosted a music show in 1996 (Ooh La La) but that show was on Star Plus. (She is shown as an MTV video jockey in the movie Kuch Kuch Hota Hai but that’s only in the story.)

Trivia: To counter stiff competition from satellite channels, Doordarshan started its own countdown show Superhit Muqabala which also included private albums. At the end of a particular year, they gave themselves an award for the best TV channel of the year. 

‘Commander’: Zee TV

This is where it all began. The first show to be aired on Zee TV was Commander. Ramesh Bhatkar, the veteran Marathi actor, was a perfect fit for the role. He had the talent and charisma to play the iconic detective. He left the show after 103 episodes. Sudhir Mittoo slipped into Commander’s part with ease. He played the eponymous sleuth for a few months. Eventually Ramesh Bhatkar made a return till the end of the series. Both were good in their own ways, the way every actor who played James Bond brought his own touch to the character whilst keeping the essence.

Ramesh Bhatkar
© Sri Adhikari Brothers
Courtesy: Zeshaan Ejaz

Little is known about Commander’s personal life. His last name or for that matter his first name are unknown. It’s likely that Commander is between 35–45 years of age, like James Bond. He lives by himself and is obviously single. There’s no mention of his background or clues to his parents, relatives or any love interest. He has a few close friends with whom he plays tennis. The mystery works well for the character. He has a helper named Tony (played by Sharad Sharma) who carries out the field work and enquiries. There’s a secretary as well who changes from time to time. Commander’s character is uncomplicated and powerful. He is stern but not dour. He is real, grounded, yet charismatic. He is not your average six-pack Joe, he doesn’t have a finely chiselled stubble; he has a strong presence and there’s something about that him that tells you that he is not just another person in the crowd. Ramesh Bhatkar brought that out with ease. He was a wonderful actor who strangely wasn’t seen in any other popular show that time (not that I am aware of). On the other hand, Sudhir Mittoo had a thankless task of fitting into a role made memorable by another actor, but his version of Commander stood out on his own. He mostly dressed in suits and got into more hand-to-hand combats.

Sudhir Mittoo
© Sri Adhikari Brothers

The episodes had no names. Most stories were two episodes long while a few finished in one episode. I am tempted to compile a cast and episode list of Commander but that’s a tall task, which I will reserve for another day. Zee TV has finally uploaded the show on its YouTube channel, though more than 60 episodes are still missing.

Years: 1992-1995.
Producers: Sri Adhikari Brothers.
Runtime per episode: Around 20 minutes (30 minutes with advertisements).
Total Episodes: Likely more than 150.

Season 1: Ramesh Bhatkar (episode number 1 to 104).
Season 2: Sudhir Mittoo (episode number 104 to unknown; probably 15-25 episodes in total).
Season 3: Ramesh Bhatkar (until the final episode).

*Episode 104 showed highlights of a few earlier episodes, followed by an introduction to the new Commander.

Commander theme
Title Song Singers: Annie, Shankar Mahadevan (vocals).

Like most shows of that era, one of the best aspects of Commander was its title music and background score. The theme song was mostly instrumental with minimal lyrics. Annie did a fantastic job singing the song with her long range voice and a touch of western music, complemented well by Shankar Mahadevan’s classically Indian vocals.

Most of the title song can be listened at Zee TV’s official YouTube channel in the following links:

1. From episode 17.
2. From episode 104 (nearly complete version; watch till the end of the video).
3. From episode 2 (tune only).

Hello World

Before the influx of vapid soap-operas with blustering, dissonant background music and tawdry reality shows, there was the golden era of Indian television in the decade of the 90s. Zee TV led the way with the emergence of satellite television in the early 1990s along with Star, MTV etc. Then came Sony, Channel [V], Home TV etc. This blog is my attempt to reminisce the shows, compile episode and cast lists of select programmes of the 1990s.

I would like to thank Swapnil Raj for his guidance. He is an amateur historian of Indian television, whose first exposure to satellite television came after the year 2000, but possesses an immense know-how of that era.

Let the good times roll.