2023-24 Pakistani television series
Ishq Murshid (transl. Love Guide) is a 2023-24 romantic, light-hearted Pakistani television series directed by Farooq Rind, and produced by Moomal Entertainment and MD Productions. It stars Bilal Abbas Khan and Durefishan Saleem as leads. It first premiered on 8 October 2023 on Hum TV.
Plot
Shibra Salman is a headstrong, intelligent and self-less girl, unwavering in her principals and deeply cherishing her family values. Hailing from a modest middle-class background, she remains unswayed by material wealth or social status.
Shahmeer Sikandar emerges as an enigmatic, yielding figure of affluence, having pursued his education abroad in the UK. He is from a wealthy family, however, his mother had died in his childhood leaving him with that everlasting scar, and is conflicted with his father, Dawood. His mother, Zubaida, was supposedly sick in her last remaining moments and had a caretaker hired for her, Farah. Her husband and the caretaker had an affair, and the day Zubaida found this out, she passed away. The caretaker then married Shahmeer's father, and this, Shahmeer refuses to let go of.
When attending his best friends wedding, Faraz, he meets Shibra, demanding her change from a driver. Enthralled by her confidence and alluring personality, Shahmeer finds himself drawn to her in an instant. Shibra is also there attending her best friends wedding, Maliha.
On the wedding night of Faraz and Maliha, Shahmeer crashes into their room, and in a comedic sequence, implores to know more about Shibra by Maliha. This begins the ultimate plan between the three to get Shibra to marry Shahmeer, despite Maliha knowing Shibra's loathing for opulence and corruption. She insists on only marrying who her father chooses.
Meanwhile, Shibra's sister (Sukaina) is upset as she has been married with her cousin, Zohaib, for 3 years now, but because of his family's greedy demands, his mother refuses to take her in as his wife.
Shahmeer embarks on a perfect scheme to capture Shibra's heart, which involves disguising himself as a poor man and starting anew. This means securing employment at Shibra's father's office, transforming into the puzzled and sweet Fazal Bakhsh.
Fazal Bakhsh, in the guise of acquainting with Shibra and her family members, bribes the boy who delivers lunch to Shibra's father and takes up the work of collecting lunch from Shibra's home and delivering it to her father every day.
One day shibra's mother got side pain and falls on ground when fazal comes to their home for fetching lunch, then suddenly fazal bakhsh calls ambulance and refers shibra's mother to the hospital, where doctors examined and told that she has apendix and needs operation and after successful operation shibra's father asks his both daughters to sell jewellery and pay hospital charges but at reception and asking about payment he got answered that the bill of eight hundred thousands rupees has been paid by an angel.
Shibra's father gets shocked and calls to sukaina to tell that there is no need to bring jewelry although the hospital bill has been paid by an unknown angel.[needs update]
Soundtracks
The original soundtrack ‘Ishq Murshid Mera’ was released in August 2023. It's music was performed by Ahmed Jahanzeb and lyrics were by Sabir Zafar.[2][3]
Production
On 10 March 2023, Bilal Abbas Khan revealed his upcoming project through his Instagram account, in which he will be paired opposite Dur-e-Fishan Saleem.[4] Hum TV revealed the look of the actors on 7 June.[5] The first look of the lead actors from the series was revealed on 23 May.[6] The first and second teasers were released on 5 August 2023.[7]
Reception
Critical reception
Along with the characters of some other television productions, DAWN Images noted the character of the male protagonist for being in love and the female protagonist's character for being outspoken and strong. [8] In an article by Redbrick, the reviewer praised Bilal Abbas Khan's transition between two characters and called it as "effortless", and the character of female protagonist for not being typical. [9]
