Screenindia-Parvarish-Review

Cast: Shweta Tiwari, Rupali Ganguly, Vivek Mushran, Rajesh Puri, Vishal Singh

Monday to Thursday, 9.30 pm, Sony

Rating:*** 1/2

The show is a good exercise in finding out where exactly you as a parent may be going right or wrong

The premise of Parvarrish seems to have been borrowed from our own backyard. The age-old parent-child tussle, the differences arising out of generation gap, the parents' holier than thou I-am-always-right attitude and the child's 'Will-they-ever-understand-us' sentiments are not new to any family. That's exactly why Deeya and Tony Singh's (they seem to have finally hit the nail after a string of so-so soap operas) new labour of love scores big time. It's a good exercise in finding out where exactly you as a parent may be going right or wrong and how exactly your child may be perceiving you — monster mom, tyrant dad or 'Danger Amma', as Sweety's children in the show secretly call her, complete with a policewala siren as the caller tune!

Sweety and Pinky are sisters. Sweety has two children — Rocky and Ginny and Pinky, three — Raashi, Raavi and Sunny. Each has their own style of parenting. Sweety is the 'helicopter' mother who could smother her children with so much love that they could die of suffocation. She is the kind of mum who likes to do everything for her children apne haath se, loves to put her daughter through singing, cooking, dancing classes, doesn't trust her children talking to their friends behind closed doors darwaza khula rakho, saaf hava aati jaati rahegi she says, confiscates their phones at the slightest pretext and generally bullying them with a smile. Pinky and her husband follow a 'let's be their buddy' policy. They would rather win their children's trust and be their confidantes than monitor their each and every move. While it may seem a great way of parenting, at the end of the day, Pinky finds herself walking a tightrope balancing her mother-friend act and most often than not tripping into the 'suspicious mother' mode!

The daughters' parenting styles are juxtaposed against their father's rather orthodox traditional style of bringing up children. For example, he doesn't think twice before asking the boy in Raavi's class to get a raakhi tied by her as a punishment to him for saying 'I Love You' to her.

While Shweta Tiwari as the little loud, dominating, perennially breathing-down-her-children's-necks Sweety is a delight to watch, Rupali Ganguly, who returns to fiction after a long time, does well too. However, Ganguly has a tendency to go overboard with her rona dhona and bechari maa act reminding you of her 'crybaby' performance in the first season of Bigg Boss. Vivek Mushran as the 'aahoji Sweetiji's husband and Vishal Singh as Pinky's better half lend great support to the leading ladies but it's the kids who manage to steal the show. They bring the right dose of cockiness, attitude and humour to their parts and are the life of the show. Now only, if Parvarrish gets the channel a decent report card and goes for a longer haul, that would be perfect.