Mata-e-Jaan Hai Tu: Where music and drama meet

New drama will feature call’s Junaid and Bilal Khan.

Mata-e-Jaan Hai Tu, a social romantic Urdu novel, written by popular novelist Farhat Ishtiaq is now being turned into a television drama series by Pakistan’s ace film-maker and television director Mehreen Jabbar. The drama serial revolves around a love story of a young couple, a Pakistani boy and a US-born girl studying Engineering and Architecture in Columbia University in the  US.

“Mata-e-Jaan Hai Tu”, which will be Jabbar’s 20^th directorial venture, will be aired on Hum TV either in December this year or in January 2012. The series is set in New York City and stars Call’s lead vocalist and guitarist Junaid Khan in one of the pivotal roles. It will be Junaid’s fourth acting experience. Meanwhile, other cast members of “Mata-e-Jaan Hai Tu” include Sarwat Gillani, Sanam Saaed and Adeel Husain, reports koolmuzone.com.

Jabbar, who recently helped in the casting for Mira Nair’s Reluctant Fundamentalist, announced the news on her Facebook page and added that, “Bilal Khan will be doing an original song for ‘Mata-e-Jaan Hai Tu’.” This is going to be Bilal’s first song for a television series. The Express Tribune spoke with the musician who said,“I haven’t started writing the song yet, but it will hopefully be ready by mid-November. It’ll most probably be just one song.”

Bilal started playing guitar at the age of 16, but first came into the spotlight when he recorded the song “Bachana” at home and then circulated it among his batchmates at the Lahore University of Management Sciences. Bilal started off by performing at college concerts and later his performances were uploaded on YouTube. His song “To Kia Hua” was one of the few original compositions showcased on “Coke Studio” this year.

Published in The Express Tribune, October 19^th, 2011.