The time has come to say ‘Good Bye’ to television’s long running Saas-Bahu serial ‘Kyunki Saas Bhi Kahi Bahu Thi’, as the Bombay High Court on Monday has dismissed Balaji Telefilms’ appeal against a termination notice served by Star TV.

The final episode of Kyunki… will be aired on Thursday (November 6).

The most popular TV channel Star has decided to annihilate the serial due to a fall in its television rating points (TRPs) between July and September.

TV bigwig Ekta Kapoor, head of Balaji Telefilms, had moved vacation bench of Bombay High Court last week, looking for a stay to the termination notice.
 
Balaji’s counsel Ram Jethmalani termed the termination as a breach of contract signed between both the parties.

Mr. Jethmalani argued that the contract stated that the show will run at least up to March 2009.

He also said that the channel (STAR) did not fulfill its responsibility to endorse the serial through advertising.

The contract, which had been modified during August, permitting the channel (STAR) to terminate the serial if its ‘TRP’ falls by 20% since June 2008.

However, Mr. Jethmalani said that when the agreement was modified, the TRP was already 28% down, so the benchmark TRP should be the one in August, and not that in June 2008.

On the other hand, Star’s counsel Ravi Kadam said that the agreement specified that the June TRP was the benchmark standard, and it had descended over 20 per cent since then.

Kadam argued, “The programme has outlived its life.”

Balaji gets Rs 27 lakh per episode. But STAR, Kadam said, would be a “bigger loser” if serial continued because the channel was losing out viewers of prime time slot to other channels.