Each week ‘Aakhri Station’ follows the story of one of the women in the train cabin. This week Farzana takes the main spotlight.
This week’s episode follows the story of Farzana and Sajjad. Both of them belong to middle-class families and are university educated. In fact, the couple met in university and fell in love there.
Before the flashback begins, Farzana talks a bit about love. She says ‘muhabbat mein laga tha ke bas woh hi woh tha, shayyad iss liye maine woh saaray cheezain bardasht kiye’.
The flashback starts at Sajjad’s house, right after the couple has married. Sajjad’s mother and younger brother, Majid, are poking fun at Sajjad and how they’re glad he found Farzana in his life. It’s the type of humor you usually expect from family, however, Sajjad does not think so. In this early scene, we see how insecure he is and how much he despises his family. For a moment you would think, hmm maybe his family ACTUALLY is evil.
This thought is immediately disregarded. Farzana tends to her saas and devar really well and she’s appreciated for it. Purely based on what Majid and his mother said, they sound like perfectly reasonable and progressive people. They encourage the fact that she works and love the fact that she balances her work and home so well. When Sajjad hears them saying this he taunts Farzana by saying ‘meri fikar tou chor do, apne saas ke saamne apne number banalo.’
Sajjad really establishes himself as a first-class ass**** in the first half of the show.
The couple discusses moving out and away from Sajjad’s family. Farzana and Sajjad work jobs and save up slowly and eventually move out; that too without telling anyone until absolutely necessary (on Sajjad’s command, duh) . Even at that, her saas supports her and tells her that all her prayers are with them. In the end, she even says ‘mujhe pata hai sab, aakhir kaar woh mera beta hai!’.
Actually, Farzana doesn’t say anything till the absolute end! The other major incident is when Sajjad calls his friends over for dinner. They compliment Farzana’s cooking but Sajjad cannot handle it and pretends to have gotten a bone in his qeema. Now that on its own isn’t a crime at all but Sajjad makes it into one. Now because the dish was Farzana’s mother’s recipe, in typical Pakistani male fashion, he goes into bashing her tarbiyyat and what her mother taught her. Oh, it doesn’t stop there. He even goes as far as to say ‘agar tum ustaani bannay ke khwaab na dekhti, tou hummay ye din na dekhna parta’. All of this happened IN FRONT OF HIS FRIENDS!
It’s clear that Sajjad’s view of love is pretty messed up.
His family kept taunting him for not being as good as his brother, probably at some point, the character learned that that’s how love is conveyed. Other than that, he has issues with not being in control or having attention. He clearly harbours a lot of hate in his heart, and sees himself as a bechara in every sitaution. His reactions are always defensive and the only person who takes it all in, is Farzana.
These factors govern the way the character acts in this episode. These things slowly give way to anger and doubt towards Farzana and her career, especially after they have their baby girl, Bunty.
According to Sajjad, Farazna is spending time in her school and not paying attention to the baby and her needs. He even goes to the lengths of asking the maid whether or not she slacks off from mothering after he leaves for work. This feeling he has grows and eventually one day when Farzana is late from a meeting, he loses it. He forces her out of the meeting and takes her home. Finally, in this scene Farzana speaks back to which he has a disgusting response, ‘Tumhe apne shakal pe maan hai aur saleekay pe gharoor, lekin dono cheezain tumhare paas hi nahin hai’.
Before she can say anything else, he pushes her into their room, the door closes on the camera and all we can hear are Farzana’s screams.