Aasman Se Aage

Aasman Se Aage (English: Beyond the Sky) is an Indian Hindi language television drama that first aired on Life OK. It premiered on 23 April 2012 and was telecast from Monday to Friday evenings through 13 July 2012.

Each episode was 24 minutes in duration. In April 2012, the first Maha Episode of ASA was aired which was 46 minutes. Two more Maha Episodes were aired in May and June 2012. On 11 June 2012, it was confirmed that Life OK was going to change the program line-up, and on doing this they decided to end Aasman Se Aage due to it getting constant low trp's. The decision lead to protests from many die-hard fans of the show - the channel was criticized for cancelling the show within 2 months of its airing, leading to speculation that the decision may have been politically motivated.^{[1][2][3][4][5][6]}

The show tells the story of Meenakshi, a talented but poor slum girl who gets the opportunity of a lifetime to be on a dance reality show on TV called Aasman Se Aage (Beyond The Skies).

ASA was both a drama about dancing as well as a critical examination of reality shows, laying bare behind-the-scene exploitation and manipulations of the medium. It was promoted with the tagline 'the reality behind reality shows'.

Plot summary

The story follows a very talented dancer Meenakshi who hails from a poor slum in Mumbai. Meenakshi gets the chance to take part in a TV Dance Reality Show Aasman Se Aage when the charismatic and unscrupulous producer of the show, DC, sees in her an opportunity get higher TRPs (TV Ratings) by exploiting her poverty.

Initially her mother Malti is opposed to the idea of her daughter going on the show because she is afraid for her daughter. Eventually Malti allows her to go forth and try to win the show after she sees how much it means to Meenakshi. From here the show starts following the journey of Meenakshi and some other participants - Karishma (a cut-throat competitor who is ready to do anything to win), the brothers Angad (who is good-natured and extremely supportive of his brother) and Akshat (who always needs to win at any cost, but suffers terrible performance anxiety), Sameer (a young desperate school kid whose parents want him to become a doctor rather than a dancer).

Meenakshi gets through the auditions and is invited to live in the ASA Academy with all the other participants which is run like the Big Brother house by DC - it is wired with cameras throughout. As soon as Meenakshi enters the academy, DC cleverly leaks a video between him and her which suggests that he has a sexual relationship with her. This makes all the other participants angry and anti-Meenakshi even as DC continues to remain a mentor and angelic figure for the naive Meenakshi. Karishma leads a hazing campaign against Meenakshi where she is mercilessly taunted for being a naukrani (maid's) daughter. DC knows that to get ratings he needs to get Meenakshi to cry - and sure enough all the taunting ensures that she is constantly breaking down, much to DC's glee.

Meenakshi's one beacon of hope at the academy is Alan her choreographer who always inspires her to give her best and dance for the sake of expressing herself and not for the contest. However, even Alan can't help her when Karishma connives with Akshat to steal a song on which Meenakshi is supposed to perform. Consequently, Meenakshi's performance is ruined and ends up being a complete disaster. Once again she is taunted by everyone in the academy. Meenakshi, unable to take it anymore, breaks down and runs back home.

DC, while happy with all the drama he is getting which will make his show a hit - wants Meenakshi back at the academy. He shrewdly plays Alan, making him believe Meenakshi likes him romantically - and sends him to convince her to come back. Partly because of Alan's inspiring words and also because she witnesses her own sister Poonam going down the wrong moral path because of poverty - Meenakshi comes back to the ASA Academy with renewed strength.

Soon after, DC announces the final shortlist of 12 candidates who are to go to the next round. Sameer, Meenakshi's closest confidante is thrown out of the show. Sameer had nervously flubbed his performance with Akshat because of his bullying - DC tells Sameer that he is still too raw for the show.

DC now wants a love story on ASA - and pairs the constantly fighting duo of Akshat and Meenakshi together. Sameer is turned away from his house by his father and feels completely lost and dejected. On his way back to ASA, a group of thieves take his stuff and leave a pocket knife behind. Now Sameer takes the shocking decision to end his own life.

However, Sameer gets saved by Akshat and Meenakshi who reach him on time and take him to hospital which leads to Akshat and Meenakshi's friendship. DC, who has a new plan up to his sleeve, gives a punishment to Meenakshi and Akshat which leads to further closeness between the two. At the gala round Akshat goes into depression and nobody knows where he is. His brother convinces him to perform and Akshat performs with Meenakshi though they are not crowned the hottest couple.

Cast

• Ojaswi Oberoi as Meenakshi Kumar
• Apurva Agnihotri as Dev Chopra
• Siddhant Karnick as Akshat
• Aham Sharma as Angad
• Monica Khanna as Karishma
• Kushal Punjabi as Alan
• Mauli Ganguly as Roshni
• Rajesh Khera as Sanam
• Manini De as Mahua
• Malini Sengupta as |Malti
• Pooja Singh as Poonam
• Sheela Sharma as Vinita
• Mansi Sharma as Sandhya
• Pulkit Sandhu as Bobby
• Vrushika Mehta as Vrushika
• Akash Shetty as Akash

References

• Indian Express Review