Javeria Saud’s incorrect Punjabi in ‘Paristan’ not sitting right with many

‘Paristan’ is a new comedy drama serial running as a Ramazan special rom-com. The serial goes on air daily at 7 o’ clock, right after Iftar and stars prominent actors and social media celebrities such as Javeria Saud, Arslan Naseer, Aymen Saleem, Mira Sethi, Ali Safina and Naveen Waqar to name only a few from the ensemble cast.

‘Paristan’ stars Javeria Saud in a significant role, that of an authoritative aunt bent upon finding the right matches for all the young girls in her house. The identity which her character has been allotted is that of a Punjabi woman, but viewers cannot help noticing the poor Punjabi which Javeria Saud is speaking which sounds more like an insult to the language; such is her accent as well as her wordings.

Popular vlogger Lubna Faryad also took to her social media page to point out the faux Punjabi of the actress, saying that a Punjabi speaking actor instead of an Urdu speaking actor would have done justice to the role and would not have resulted in a strange and incomprehensible mixture of both the languages.

People have also compared Javeria Saud to Mira Sethi, saying that it is in the same serial that both are speaking Punjabi, but the latter, although young in both age and acting experience, is speaking it flawlessly.

It is also important to mention that a Punjabi character or two in comedy serials has become a trend in Pakistani drama serials, which has been offending Punjabis a lot, not only for the reason that Urdu speaking actors do not bother about the right pronunciation of the language, but also because Punjabi characters are shown as non-serious, conservative and unrefined in comparison with the Karachiites.

The trend started more than a decade ago with Bushra Ansari’s character of Saima Chaudhry in the ‘Barat’ series, and there has been no stopping ever since, for every other serial that makes it to the television screens during Ramazan carries a similar character. Things have gotten worse with Karachi productions in which Urdu speaking actors have now started taking up Punjabi roles, playing havoc with the pronunciation of one of the provincial languages of Pakistan.