Shakti - Astitva Ke Ehsaas Ki


Shakti – Astitva Ke Ehsaas Ki is an Indian social drama television series that premiered on 30 May 2016 on Colors TV. Produced by Rashmi Sharma Telefilms, it stars Rubina Dilaik, Vivian Dsena, Jigyasa Singh and Simba Nagpal.

Plot

The story set in Punjab begins with a man Maninder, who tries to bury his recently born daughter in night. He is caught by his wife Nimmi who saves their daughter and warns him. Maninder still plans to kill her despite being her father. The daughter is later named Soumya.

8 years later

Soumya is a simpleton. Nimmi has bore Maninder a second daughter Surbhi, who gets all love and attention in the family. Soumya is hated by Maninder and his mother Nalini, but loved by Nimmi. Later Nalini misleads Surbhi that Soumya destroyed all her favorite toys. Believing Nalini, Surbhi pushes Soumya into a river but she is rescued and forgives her despite being aware that she did this to her.

10 years later

Soumya and Surbhi have grown up. Surbhi decides to teach lesson to a spoilt troublemaker, Harman Singh. Wanting to take revenge, Harman decides to kidnap Surbhi but ends up kidnapping Soumya. To avoid social embarrassment, Harak orders Harman to marry Soumya and they get married. Soon, Harman develops feelings for her.
Soumya learns that she is transgender. When she tells Harman, he is enraged. Preeto finds out about Soumya and exiles her to a transgender society. She asks Harman for a second wife. He disagrees. Nimmi dies of a heart attack, and Harman having rescued Soumya brings her back to his house. His family refuse to accept her.
Preeto convinces Soumya to get Harman and Surbhi married, to which Surbhi agrees. Harman weds Surbhi but refuses to give her Soumya's place. Kareena tries to create problems in Soumya's life but in vain. Surbhi realizes Harman and Soumya are made for each other. She files for a divorce.
Soumya and Harman adopt an orphan Aditya. Preeto reveals that she was married to Nihaal but after a year of their marriage, he chose mocking and left her, after which Harak wed Preeto and she later bore him Harman and Raavi. She tells Soumya's truth to the orphanage, and they take away Aditya.
Soumya and Harman leave the house but Preeto permits them to stay together. Refused by Harman to reveal her truth to the city everytime, Soumya begins feeling that Harman loves her beauty. She decides to live according to her identity and leaves for Bangkok with Mallika's help.
Harman learns about Soumya's whereabouts and decides to re-win her. Maharani kidnaps Soumya and tries to sell her, but Harman comes to save her and she realizes that his love is true for her. Surbhi and Varun get married. Misunderstandings between Harak and Preeto due to Mohini lead Preeto to leave the house.
Soumya rescues her due to which she gets acceptance by Preeto. When she decides to reveal Soumya's truth, Harak blackmails to divorce her. Maharani returns to ruin Soumya's life, but falls into a river and goes missing. All things sort out as Preeto returns to her family.
Kareena causes problems between Harman and Soumya before Harman meets with an accident. He decides to marry Jasleen and Soumya leaves for his happiness, but he realizes his love for her and Jasleen calls off the wedding. Harman is too late to stop Soumya as she visits Ludhiana.
Soumya meets toy shopkeeper Sameer Singh and they become friends, and she helps him in managing his shop. Unhappy with her marriage to Ballu, Raavi files for divorce and indulges in an affair with Jeet. She gets pregnant and they marry. Sameer starts falling for Soumya before learning the truth.
Sameer's mother Gopika, believing Soumya is gold digger for his shop, kidnaps her. Sameer saves Soumya after meeting Harman. Soumya and Harman reunite. Veeran, Varun and Ballu beat Soumya and Harman and throw them in river. They are taken to the hospital but lose their memory.
With no previous memories of one another, their relationship starts off as mutual disliking but later, they become friends. Ballu gets Jeet arrested falsely and blackmails Raavi. Harak finds out Harman and takes him back. While on Harak's orders, Sameer returns, telling Soumya that he is her fiancé and brings her to his home.
Lavneet falls for Harman and tries to kill Soumya. She kidnaps Harman, and Raavi follows her but gets stabbed by her and miscarries. Harman and Soumya elope, developing attraction. Soon, they recall everything and unite. Pregnant, Surbhi returns from Delhi. Varun attacks her and she dies after giving birth to Soham.
On her deathbed, Surbhi asks Soumya to accept and take care of Soham. Varun tries to win Soham's custody with Sukhwinder's help. Soumya and Harman defeat Varun through help from Rajat and get him reunited with Sneha. Later Soumya brings a man to her in-laws family and he turns out to be Nihaal.
As Preeto asks Nihaal to leave, he dies of heart attack and she is forced to do widow rituals. Preeto holds Soumya responsible for it and starts detesting her again. Soumya takes away Soham to live with transgenders and searches for work. She gets the job of being caretaker for Sunil Bansal's son Vedant.
Hating Soumya at first, Vedant falls for her and confesses it; she rejects him. He falsely frames Harman to get him jailed and asks Soumya to fake marrying him in exchange of his freedom. Helpless, Soumya agrees. Harman feels that Soumya has cheated on him and marries Mahi in jealousy.

2 months later

Harman is suffering liver problems due to excessive drinking and blames his family when he learns about Mahi's pregnancy. Vedant's sister Rekha, brother-in-law Vidhaan and nephew Rohan arrive on a holiday from London. Rohan develops a strong bond with Soumya.
When Rekha learns Soumya's truth, she leaves along with Vidhaan and Rohan. They meet with an accident where Rohan is saved, while his parents Rekha and Vidhaan die. Shattered, Vedant tries to forcefully marry Soumya and takes her to the temple. Sunil informs Harman who rescues Soumya, marries her again and assaults Vedant.
Vedant pushes Harman off a cliff and gets arrested, whereas Harman is declared dead. Devastated, Soumya promises Sunil that she will raise Rohan as her nephew. Mahi delivers a transgender named Heer and wants to disown her. However, Preeto and Soumya stop her and threaten her to hide this.

5 years later

Heer and Soham grow up, with Rohan. Heer is a bubbly young girl, loved by Soumya and Preeto but hated by Mahi. Vedant escapes to exact revenge on and take away Soumya, but is arrested again. Shanno gets to know about Heer being transgender. Mallika also reveals Heer's truth to Harak.
Heer falls unconscious. Harak tries to shoot her. Soumya, to save her comes in between and falls into a river. Harak is arrested. Dr. Gayatri saves and gives Soumya a place in her house, while Reet gets admission in Heer, Rohan and Soham's school and they become friends.
As Harak learns Soumya is alive, he plans to kill her but Gayatri shifts to Maninder's new house mistakenly with Soumya and Reet for a few days, on Preeto's insistence. Maninder and Nalini realise their misdeeds towards Soumya. Eventually, Soumya recovers and unites with her family.
Harak meets Preeto through police and asks her to send Soumya away from their life in exchange of Heer's acceptance. Soumya agrees to leave the country also leaving Heer, Rohan and Soham tearful. However, she swears to Preeto to return after 16 years to check if she fulfilled her promise. Shanno tells Varun about this and a plan of him works, as Soumya meets with a fatal accident.

16 years later

Heer has become a beautiful, young girl, fiercely protected by her brothers, Soham and Rohan. Still, she misses Soumya and her carefree childhood. Heer and her classmate start off as enemies but later become good friends and fall in love. They express their feelings and plan to marry.
Sant Baksh gets Virat engaged to Jharna, as a part of his beneficial plan. Heer tries to break the engagement in disguise and eventually succeeds, but obtains hate from Virat's family. She visits a temple with Virat where they married.
Sant Baksh severes all ties with Virat and disowns him, as he wants him to reform after being homeless. A bitter turn occurs as Preeto reveals Heer's true reality and he begins hating her. Heer finds out her real identity as well as about Soumya's story. Virat returns to his house.
Preeto tells Heer that Virat faked love for her to avenge his insult as he was thrown off from college building by Soham. Heer promises to forget Virat. Soham feels decieved and now detests Soumya as she was a transgender and he dislike them.

Cast

Main

Development

First promo of the series was released on 10 April 2016. It was launched on 30 May 2016 at 8:00 pm on weekdays.
The production and airing of the show was halted indefinitely in late March 2020 due to the Covid-19 outbreak in India. Because of the outbreak, the filming of television series and films was halted on 19 March 2020 and expected to resume on 1 April 2020 but could not and the series was last broadcast on 31 March 2020 when the remaining episodes were aired. After four months, the episodes of the show resumed on 6 July 2020.

Casting

After a 10 year-leap in June 2016, child actors Mahira Khurrana and Tasheen Shah were replaced by Rubina Dilaik and Roshni Sahota respectively. Vivian Dsena was roped in as the male lead. Besides them Kamya Panjabi, Sudesh Berry, Garima Jain, Bhuvan Chopra, Aarya Rawal, Mahek Thaakur and Lakshya Handa joined the cast.
In November 2016 Reena Kapoor quit the series and her character Nimmi was killed off. It had a crossover with Sasural Simar Ka in April 2017 and Savitri Devi College & Hospital in June 2017. In August 2017 Anand Goradia was chosen to play Maharani. In November 2017 Sara Khan bagged the series as Mohini. Three months later, Jain stepped out of the show and was replaced by Pooja Singh. Later Amrita Prakash was roped in to play Jasleen. Some other new cast entered including Sahil Mehta, Hemant Choudhary, Alka Mogha and Sonal Handa.
Afterwards Krutika Desai Khan played Payal but she later quit the show. The same month Sahota too quit. During Soumya and Harman's memory loss story, Tiya Gandwani joined the cast as Lavneet Kaushal whereas Mehta and Mogha returned. In very late of December 2018 Iti Kaurav replaced Sahota as Surbhi, but quit after a short 10 episodes in January 2019, before Jaswant Menaria, Shivani Gosain and Rohit Chandel joined the cast. In March 2019, Rohit Roy, Ronit Roy, Mouli Ganguly and Roopal Tyagi were cast and Aashish Kaul appeared in a special appearance.
Next month, Nidhi Bhavsar and Hitanshu Jinsi entered. In May 2019, Nikita Sharma and Prakash Ramchandani were seen in the series. In June 2019, Sahil Uppal entered in a negative role along with Rajesh Puri. In July 2019, Sareeka Dhillon became a part of the show. Next month, Shweta Sinha was cast for a short appearance and Dsena quit because of not wanting to play a father, as a 5 year leap was confirmed.
In September 2019, child actors Sumaiya Khan, Vivaan Sharma and Meet Mukhi were cast in the series. In October 2019, Mamta Luthra, Handa and Ayub Khan returned while Preeti Puri and Avisha Shahu became a part of the show. Initially the 16 year leap was planned for November 2019, but got extended to January 2020. Dilaik quit the show, and several actors joined the cast, with Jigyasa Singh and Simba Nagpal as new leads. Others included Avinash Mukherjee, Meherzan Mazda, Parag Tyagi, Gauri Tonk, Kanwarjit Paintal, Aakash Talwar, Vaani Sharma, Ekroop Bedi and Rachana Mistry. In February 2020, Sonyaa Ayodhya, Prerna Panwar and Naveen Saini were roped in.
In late June 2020 actress Gauri Tonk quit the show and was replaced by Jasveer Kaur.