'Solah Singaar'' arranges real life widow remarriage on sets

Mumbai, Aug 10 (UNI) In a classic case of whether art imitates life or life imitates art, the cast of popular Sahara One serial 'Solah Singaar'' which is based on widow remarriage arranged a real life marriage of Maaya and Mukesh today on their sets.

In an exclusive chat with UNI, Kinnari Mehta of Jay Production said, ''Maaya (40) who is a widow, saw the serial and came to us and said that widow remarriages happen only on TV not in real life. It was then that we decided to find her a life partner. We contacted various marriage bureaus and matrimonial sites.

''It was then Mukesh Pai (42) who is the Managing Director of the matrimonial website dulhaadulhan.com and also a divorcee came forward and said that he would marry Maaya. And in order to commemorate 200 episodes of ''Solaah Singar'' we have arranged a real life wedding for them. They are just like family''.

Says Jay Mehta, of Jay Productions, ''In the interiors of India there is a bias towards widows. People have this perception that a widow of 40 years of age has already lined her life. But infact her life has just begun. She will probably live to the age of 70 years.

her being a widow is no fault of her.

''We are also going to start our own NGO ''Naya Jeevan'' for women living in the interiors like Gujarat where nothing is done about widow remarriage. There are initiatives for widows in the cities. We will be holding seminars in various parts of India and in future we will also involve eminent figures to promote the cause of widow remarriage. The NGO will also enter into a tie up with dulhaadulhan.com and support all such widow remarriages through the matrimonial site.'' In order to celebrate Maya and Mukesh's marriage the entire cast and crew of 'Solah Singaar' were present naming Akanksha Rawat, Sudha Chandran, Apara Mehta, Mrinal Kulkarni, Sachin Tyagi, Kishori Shahane and Faisal Khan among others.

The protagonist of the serial Mrinal Kulkarni said,'' The minute I heard the script I knew we were dealing with a very sensitive issue.

I was in Benares at that time and I also did a lot of research for the role. During the course of my research I realised what widows the traumatic life lived by windows in Benares and Varanasi. Unless we enact emotions we don't know what others are going through''.

A thought echoed by Kishori Shahane who says,'' Serials and films are a huge influence on people. We are living in the age of globalisation and are moving ahead in every field. We just have a few cultural drawbacks that we need to correct and we will be fine.'' UNI