The banning culture in Pakistan seems to be getting out of hand. The week started with calls to ban Mehwish Hayat’s latest biscuit commercial and now original Pakistani series Churails has been banned from streaming in Pakistan.

The director and creator of the show, Asim Abbasi took to social media to express his disappointment and hurt over the move.

“How strange for Churails to be lauded internationally, and now be shut down in its country of origin,” wrote Abbasi on social media. “In the very country where hundreds of artists came together to create something that could initiate dialogue and open doors for new narratives. Artistic freedom squashed because it is wrongly perceived by some as a moral threat. Predictable, and yet, still disappointing.”

RELATED STORIES

He added: “For this is not just my loss. This is a loss for women and marginalised communities that this show meant to re-represent.”

Sarwat Gilani, who plays one of the leads in the show, also posted a cryptic message on social media after the ban.

Several Twitter users including Osman Khalid Butt and Sanam Saeed expressed their outrage over the ban.

Read more – The ‘Churails’ are the superheroes we wish we had

Though Churails released on August 11 and has already been streaming for almost two months, it is believed that the ban was imposed after a clip from the show went viral on social media. In the clip, Hina Khawaja Bayat’s character talks about giving a ‘hand job’ to a much older man for a promotion.

Featuring Sarwat, Yasra Rizvi, Nimra Bucha, Meher Bano and Omair Rana among others, Churails is the story of four self-proclaimed ‘Churails’ who come together to open a covert detective agency to expose cheating husbands amongst the city’s elite. As their operations expand, they come to be saviours of abused, harassed and mistreated women. The 10-episode series covers a myriad of issues such as child abuse, sexism, the domination of class and race and aims to challenge the hypocrisy of patriarchal societies.