His Story (Hindi Series)

Its always hard to take sides when suddenly a married couple breaks up after years of being together, and this task gets especially hard after the fact that the husband turns out to be gay. The sympathies go with the male, of course, but what about he female. Even though the title of the show says "His Story", to be honest, what I felt was that the story was more of a "Her Story" because almost everything is told from the wife's perspective. There is nothing wrong in that, but I would have loved it even more if there was more of an exploration done from the husband's point of you, given the show title and of course my personal interest. Despite this, the series has approached the subject of homosexuality in Indian context with sensitivity, highlighting some of the inherent prejudices and trying to address them as best as possible in the limited timeframe.

Sakshi and Kunal are a South-Bombay power couple who are running a restaurant business together. Sakshi is the head chef and Kunal takes care of the business end of the restaurant. They have two children. Enter Preet, who is a food critic and becomes a family friend only for Sakshi to realize later that her husband Kunal has been having an affair with Preet for sometime now. The perfect couple is not so perfect anymore. The couple decide to separate and end the marriage. Kunal moves in with Preet; but the family, especially his eldest son Shivaay, doesn't take this very well. He is homophobic and abuses his father as well his own friend Ved, who is discovering his sexuality in his adolescence. Sakshi goes through various emotions where she feels her whole life was a lie. She slowly starts to come to terms with it and the gay couple starts living happily. But when they decide to get married, Preet has jitters and he leaves living the season one hanging.

The one thing that really stands out in the series is that it is devoid of melodrama and histrionics. It stays respectful and dignified in the way things are handled and kept the view point very balanced. The story is from wife's perspective who feels she has bene cheated and how she copes up with this new change, how to manage the restaurant and kids and everything. Her whole life falls apart. But given that her husband is coming out (and not really having an affair with another man) is what makes this worse because the husband gets the sympathies. It's understandable and interesting that at one point she completely supports the young boy Ved who is probably coming to terms with his sexuality, but when it comes to her own life, her reactions are different. She just cannot comprehend what made her husband gay. How I wish the whole story was also shown from the husband's perspective. I mean, its not easy for him to just move on from being a straight married guy to being gay and then leading it all to a gay wedding. That seems a bit unbelievable. I bet, life and circumstances were not easy. Besides one episode, where he confides in his wife on how he has always been gay but too faired to act on it for various social taboo reasons, is the only time when we really get the see the psyche of the leading man. We really don't get to know much about Kunal, except he is there as a very supportive partner to his boyfriend. They have also shown an interesting mix of how the younger generation also deals and thinks of the whole homosexuality aspect. While most kids are pretty acceptable, The couple's eldest son is a bully and homophobe, to the extent he won't stop from hurting people. There are plenty of side stories as well, like Ved, the neighbour's son exploring his sexuality and possibly being gay. That is handled very nicely and sensitive and could have a spinoff of its own. One of the their close friends, being absolute dickhead and homophobe was also shown well. 

As leading actors all three leads do an excellent job. They suit their part and convey their relationships, their anguish and their struggles really well. There are a lot of supporting actors and they all stand out. Main story thankfully continues to focus on the main love story of the two men and how the whole situation impacts the woman. This is a bold series to come out of India as a very conservative society in general. Things are changing and its probably still easier for very high society and rich people to deal with this, much easier than anyone regular. Still, the series deserves to be watched for being realistic and quite natural. Of course, I would make multiple changes, but that doesn't take away from the merits of what we get to see. (7/10)