Yeh Rishta Kya Kehlata Hai E1296 : The Originals !!
While the episode may seem to be continuation of Armaan – Ruhi’s alliance discussion, Abhira’s new journey, Armaan’s emotional exhaustion – It was more than that!
Today’s episode was a subtle dissection of Abhira’s, Armaan’s & Ruhi’s personalities. The episode explored their weaknesses in their core strengths.
Abhira who is fiercely independent, believes in facing every difficulties head and solve it. Abhira who believes in solving every issues by herself. These are her strengths, they have served her well most often. However, there are time & place for everything. You pick your strategy based on the situation, work on it, improvise it . Abhira unfortunately is quite mule headed when it comes to advice.
The first instance happens in the office when her office head abruptly gives her exit notice. The shrewd move would have been to appeal to his finer sense, guilt trip to delay the firing and think up a plan to negotiate or get back in his favor. Instead she immediately goes into combative mode “Mujhe mera job vapas chahiye” – a move that will genrally warrant a hostile move from the opponent. What happens? the office head immediately throws down the outstanding payment & asks her to leave. Instead of gaining few precious hours as HR files forms/letters terminating her from internship, Abhira thoughtless combative mode gets her immediate discharge from service.
The next and crucial example is in how she handles crisis and relationships. As she is walking out of her firm, she gets a call from her well wishers concerned about her. What does Abhira do? she straightaway lies to them to allay their concerns. She does the same by ignoring Chachisa’s request for her address. For Abhira, any admission that she is emotionally down, feeling sad or struggling to eke out a living is an admission of weakness. She would rather fake it than break it. She considers any forms of weakness or getting help a form of defeat. She would rather suffer than get help! This was one of the trait that had irked Kaveri Poddar. Abhira’s insistence of handling everything herself instead of sharing with family created an impression that she is a misfit for joint family where everybody is in everybody’s business, as was her penchant for unilateral decision making when some issues required the inputs of elders or experts. Privacy & Independence is good but when you are living in a society, when you are living amongst family and when you hope to be part of that family, clamming up, hiding within her shell will not do. Abhira must understand that seeking help does not make a weak woman, fearing to get help does. Abhira must understand, doing things for family does not make her the part of family, trusting them does.
Armaan is like that carcass that is getting ripped apart by frenzied animals from all sides. If there’s Dadi and Vidya pressurizing him to marry. There’s Ruhi manipulating him with her tears. On the other side is Manish whose blunt words are hitting a bulls eye in his dazed mind.
Armaan has lived for his family, lives for his family. He knows that his family have set their heart on his marriage to Ruhi, he does not want to disappoint them yet he does not want to marry someone whom he does not love. But he has been indoctrinated to always obey Dadisa, never disappoint Maa. So Armaan agrees for the marriage. Even when he is announcing the news of his wedding to Ruhi, his eyes unwaveringly watches Abhira. If Abhira had shown slightest sign of wanting the marriage. He would have employed his usual delay/stall/sabotage & talk your way out of crisis strategy but Armaan believes that Abhira does not want any relationship with him.
Therefore he becomes the sacrificial goat! He believes he can survive through rest of his life with Ruhi by co-existing peacefully as friend, serving & keeping their elders of the family happy. As Ruhi pertinently points out, one cannot live one’s whole life like that. It sucks the joy out of life, destroys the will to live. Armaan knows this, understands this but he has no incentive to fight it. Moreover, anytime he tries to breakfree, he gets emotionally manipulated. Armaan’s strength – his family is is biggest weakness. While Abhira erects high boundary walls disallowing tresspassing, Armaan’s problem is he has no boundaries, his life, his happiness is up for grabs..His family decides his life.
Armaan’s family has decided Ruhi is his soulmate, khandan mate etc. Ruhi is happy at the turn of events. She is dreaming of a blissful life but rude shock awaited her when Armaan indirectly hinted that he does not love her any more. Ruhi is shocked as until that moment she had fondly believed that she & Armaan were star crossed lovers who finally were being united thanks to the depth of their love. Words of warning by her B Nanu resonate in her ears, words warning her of pain, sorrow, unhappiness. Ruhi for the moment shrugs the words of wisdom. But the specter of fear, insecurity rears its head when her grandmother poses the same questions couched in different words.
Ruhi’s response to her grandmother’s probing questions are quite revealing. She tells her grandmother that she will not lie to her & then proceeds to tell her grandmother that she believes things have changed between her and Armaan but their love for each other has not changed. She believes that Armaan has practiced the art of hiding his love for so long that he is not able to reconnect to their love instantly. But as time goes on, Armaan’s love for her will awaken! – The sheer level of denial in her words is astonishing to say the least. Nevertheless to Ruhi, this is the truth, she is convinced of it!. To think anything to the contrary is accepting failure, accepting that her love was weak, accepting that Armaan discarded her. THAT is not acceptable.
Armaan is HER trophy, her pride, her possession! SHE will not allow anybody to snatch it from her. If she has to convince herself that Armaan is her true mate, if she has to believe that she is Armaan’s true love, if she has to manipulate Armaan into marrying her, so be it !! Armaan is her’s!! says her Zidd but the manipulative, sweet natured facade paints it as “true love”
