Pakistan Popular Culture History

Pakistan Popular Culture History

[1981: Products] Cassette Kahani

Jul 20, '03 9:01 AM
by Nasir for everyone

This wasnt for teens, it was for kids aged 4-8. It was a big hit with me at least, I am not sure how much of a hit it was with others. Most of the kids that I knew would have at least some of these cassettes. I however, had them all, and would listen to them most of the day.

I dont know why they finished producing them. Perhaps they werent as big a hit with the masses as I think they were.

I got introduced to Tarzan and Sindbad through these cassettes. Most of the Hans Christian Anderson stories I had read in English as well, but it was still fun listening to their dubbed versions in Urdu. What was also interesting was to listen to a voice all day, and then see that person on TV !!!! Qazi Wajid probably had the most distinctive voice, so was the lady playing Kala, Tarzans Gorilla Mother (I think the name was Ismat Tahira or Zeenat Yasmin or something like that).

I think the Casette Kahanis went up till number 20, and then died. The quality of these cassettes was super, or at least I used to think so. Havent heard them for nearly 20 years now, so dont really know if I was too young to notice, or if they were really very high in production value.

On Muziq.net, you can listen to all Cassette Kahani's I believe. The link is:

http://www.muziqpakistan.com/songs.php?auth=79

Tags: 1980's

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9 Comments

msn-finkeroosh wrote on Jul 24, '03

My favorite one was 'Deo kai teen sunehri baal'. I really liked the Deo kee nani. Yes, the production quality was really quite good. I would listen to them for hours and hours on end. Did anyone notice how many of the characters were played by the TV actor Qazi Wajid!

msn-vampyresblood wrote on Aug 14, '03

I LOVED cassette kahanis... I had all of them... but then they got misplaced... I dont know if I even have one of them or not.. I used to listen to them all the time and there was a time when my mother got so sick of them that she hid all of them somewhere and it wasnt until I cried and refused to eat anything that they were handed back...

logixlord wrote on Aug 28, '03

Does anyone remember what the frequency of release for these cassettes was? There were 20-24 of them in all, and I think I remember the last one being in 86 or 87. So it lasted for 6 years, that makes the average release rate to be once every 4 months. Did they actually come out after such a long time??

Another thing that I am now remembering is the 'teaser' tralier that they used to give at the end of every Cassette Kahani about the next one.

Most of my friends had just one or two cassette kahani tapes, and they used to listen to them over and over again. Swapping of these cassettes was also pretty common. It was quite common for 3-4 kids to sit around a cassette player and quietly listen to the story. We also tried to play a game of acting out the characters, but that didnt go down well... I dont remember for what reason.

msn-motaaloo2 wrote on Mar 2, '04

I remember being deeply disturbed by the story of "Laalchi Macharnee". I read Macbeth about 10 years later and found a strong resemblance between Lady Macbeth and the Laalchi Macharnee... chilling

logixlord wrote on Mar 5, '04

Apart from the Sindbad and Tarzan stories, there were also others which I found to be quite interesting (well, they are still in my head after 23 years

). "Podna Podni", about a couple of birds, where the Podni gets lost and the Podna then goes on an adventure to rescue her (what type of an animal was a Podna anyway); "Bhaloo aur Bheloo", about two cows which start fighting with each other; and finally "Ahmed ne Jab urna seekha", which I think was cassette kahani number 8.

I also remember that there was a TV ad about these cassette kahanian.

logixlord wrote on Apr 21, '04

Anyone knows why they had to stop making these cassettes? I mean, they had a following, children loved them, they were good entertainment for the kids...... so why did they eventually stop making them?

msn-emthree wrote on Apr 22, '04

By way of a favour to me could you tell me what these tapes were?
I am just thinking that if these were taped stories, could these not have
been copied by others thus limiting sales of the originals, and then
inspite of [and because of] their popularity the sales may have
plummeted, or did not pick up. Consequently, the sales did not keep
pace with the cost of production.

Alternatively, the profits may not have been large enough to offset the
possibility of that capital earning higher returns elsewhere in some other
enterprize.

logixlord wrote on Apr 24, '04

emthree, you are evaluating their business model of the 80s in pakistan, by today's standards.

They were cassettes with stories; my link above points to a website which has all the tapes online. Think of them in terms of 'Book on tape' without the book.

As far as copying is concerned, nobody copies a Rs 20 tape in Pakistan, because the cost is just so cheap, and also, in the early to mid eighties when casette kahanis finally died, 'tape to tape' recorders were not commonly available.

So I guess there was some other reason why they died. Maybe Zia ul haq had a brainwave that such things were not good for kids

. Or maybe they just ran out of stories to tell.

msn-frailtee wrote on Jun 25, '04

Logixlord, thanks link on muziqpakistan. It was wonderful to hear the old cassettee kahaanees! I am sure I will listen to them over and over again as I did in the past....keep us posted with any other interesting websites you may know of.

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