Pro-development teledramas for national uplift...

From Last week…..

However, when we look at local tele drama industry such production can be hardly found. Senehase Githaya ,a tele drama that broadcast daily a couple of years ago in Swarnavahini, directed by veteran tele drama and film director Udayakantha Warnasooriya, can be categorized as a pro –development tele drama.

It was a story about a widow who starts to make and sell Seeni sambol with the help of her three daughters after the sudden death of her husband.

Then, gradually she becomes a successful entrepreneur. During its telecast, many of its viewers talked happily about the drama because of its realistic depiction and its positive approach. Viewers too feel courageous when they see the gradual success of the widow.

This process of recognizing of a fictional character as representative of ourselves as we are or as we would like to be is known as ‘character identification’.

In media studies it has been found that ‘character identification’ can be actively used to disseminate development related information to the public.

Thaksalawa – Local attempt

Another such successful attempt was the tele drama, Thaksalawa (The School), which telecast recently in Swarnavahini, another brilliant production of veteran tele drama director Ananda Abeynayake.

Its plot revolves around a young female school teacher named Arulya, who comes from an urban area to a very remote village where there is no school.

All the villagers including children are exploited by a single mudalali as all of them are compelled to cultivate his chena.

Consequently, this young lady, Arulya, goes through enormous troubles to build a school and to get village children to the school.

It is worthy to call her a ‘development communicator’ more than a teacher because she does not only teach her students, she civilizes her students too. She gradually empowers the villagers, with the help of the chief Thero, mainly by educating their children.

When students are becoming gradually literate, their parents too gradually understand their oppressed situation.

Abarthu Etha (Vacancies), telecast recently in Rupavahini is another successful teledrama that can be categorized as a pro- development tele drama.

It shows the winning story of an unemployed graduate, Migara. This particular character can be seen as an ideal example for thousands of unemployed youths in the country.

Few creations

Likewise, among hundreds of tele dramas and so called mega series that telecast in almost every TV channel, we could find a fewer number of creations that would positively mold the attitudes and behaviours of their viewers. However, it’s obvious that only these kinds of few creations would not at all be enough for the task of disseminating positive and development related information among the public.

A change

Therefore, Sri Lankan tele drama industry has an immense responsibility to serve to a nation who vigorously marches towards the development through their creations.

This transformation can be easily started by altering the storyline of daily tele serials.

However, this does not mean that themes like love, poverty, must be totally swept out from these storylines.

They can be underlying or supporting themes while positive ideas towards development become the major themes. However, if we continue creating low grade love stories in this same manner, very soon our culture, morals, thinking capacity and specially media taste of the public will be in a great danger.