On the demand of Prime Minister of Pakistan, superhit Turkish series Dirilis Ertugrul started airing on PTV Home in Urdu dub. However, film star Shaan Shahid was not happy about it.
The Turkish historical epic series Dirilis Ertugrul that gave a positive glimpse at Ottoman-Muslim history. The series loosely based on Ertugrul, father of Osman I overwhelmed not only the Muslim world, but it brought a diversity of the non-Muslim audience, too. Setting records of popularity, by many large tv journals, and webzines, it was declared “an eastern rival to Game of Thrones”
Lollywood filmstar Shaan Shahid, along with many was pretty reluctant about it which was showed by his tweet:
Asad Siddiqui and Bilal Ashraf, however, were found in disagreement with the Waar film star.
I really hope that if not anyone, then I myself will make such a tv show like #ErtugrulGhazi and the sequel #KurulusOsman where the teachings of Islam are being projected along with the history of the Muslim world. Started watching it in 2018 and still not over it.
Asad Siddiqui
ERTUGRUL is brilliant. Great story and awesome production. Happy to see it was introduced to the local audiences. Film/ Drama is a form of art and needs to be appreciated regardless of where it was made 😊 #Ertugrulgazi 👍 What do you guys think?
Bilal Ashraf
The Twitterati of Pakistan came with a huge response as well, which would be interpreted as a turndown from the public.
While some agreed with him to some extent:
Many opposed him as well, referring to all of the Muslims having shared heroes, regardless of the nations and origins:
While some others shared references to Shaan’s own attempts at promoting “local culture” and “local heroes”.
There is no question that Pakistani media that has been for years obsessed over domestic fights of Saas-bahu. Whereas at the same time, Turkey, Arab World, and Western Media has been evolving every other minute and upgrading their art of story telling. India as well is breaking the stereotypes and making their way to explore new possibilities. Pakistan as well needs to get out of this domestic-pity-generating routine and browse through the new way of drama making.
There are a lot more stories, of national heroes, of tragedies, triumphs than household disputes which have been buried beneath a pile of crap, especially since the decline of PTV. However, PTV is back in the race with its boosted popularity for airing Ertugrul Ghazi. Their Youtube channel as well has been regarded as one of the fastest-growing channels. This might be a come back for PTV with greater quality, as Dirilis Ertugrul has set the bar pretty high.
