Kafeel finally brings us to the climax we waited for so desperately. No, it was not Zeba walking out of Jami’s house, it was Zeba walking out of the court house with a khula verdict that endorsed the truth many women have lived – a poor marriage needs an escape route, whether it is 4 years in or 24.
Zeba chose to stay for 24 years and 4 children… and while the drama is getting it right mostly, here’s a breakdown of what worked and what didn’t after Zeba’s story comes to near full culmination.
1. Divorce is still a stigma and a woman might be the first (and last) to discourage you
From Zeba’s mom weeping over the khula verdict to the judge trying to dissuade Zeba, (we won’t even mention Farhana), it is the women she encountered who made it harder to win her battle. Luckily for her, she stood strong. Another silent signal to all those watching that just because the naysayers seem and sound confident doesn’t mean they’re always right.
2. It was also a woman who stands by your side, often enough.
For every woman who fails to give you courage, is at least one who will stand by you. Sumera was that support for Zeba – not family, yet closer than a blood relative. Sometimes all it takes is one person who speaks the truth and repeats it over and over again, never tires of listening to you, and often leads by example. Whether Zeba admits or not, whether we admit or not, Sumera’s life journey might have given a quiet confidence to Zeba, that what her mother and dadi had etched inside her mind, was not necessarily the right choice. People evolve as they must with changing times. And so must their life choices. Sumera was the one person who showed Zeba she always had a right to choose, and religion, rationality, the law, awarded her that right – to move on and give her life, her children’s future, a second chance.
3. Children in a bad marriage might be more scarred than children with happy childhood memories even if with one parent
When Zeba says, she wants to make some happy memories for her children, we get it. There is the guilt of a single mother who regrets dragging her children through years of abuse, believing all along that she was in it for them, but realising much later, that it is they who needed out. They, her children, her most precious relationship, that needed saving. This message alone rang loud and clear.
4. But here’s where Zeba might get it wrong. Can she rely, should she rely on Subuk to take her through the rest of her life?
Zeba might have drawn strength from Subuk at this delicate point in her life. Zeba might never have gathered courage to ask for khula if she didn’t have Subuk in her life, but she might understand soon that there is a silent pressure Subuk feels now.
That one man is not representative of all men, and offering an antithesis to Jami through characters like Saif and Subuk is not necessarily a complete or satisfying solution either. While it does attempt to correct the imbalance, it risks oversimplifying the conversation into a binary—good men versus failed men—rather than engaging with the more realistic spectrum in between. What we actually need is a more balanced set of expectations, where responsibility is shown as complex, shared, and human rather than idealised or entirely absent. Instead of using contrasting characters as moral replacements for one another, the narrative could benefit from showing that accountability, effort, and failure can coexist in the same space without turning men into either symbols of success or cautionary tales.
One asks – what lessons have the characters drawn from Zeba’s journey? Why are Zeba’s daughters not following a career that makes them independent, self sufficient financially and hence, not dependent on a man alone? Why this obsession with marriage of a daughter as the ultimate solution? Yes, men must be providers, caregivers, enablers of a stable, secure life for their family, but in doing so, women must not make it their life journey to seek a husband who answers their every need – be it Javeria, Zeba’s daughter, Daneen, or even Sumera. Subuk selling his car to finance his sister’s wedding, denying himself a future with a girl whom he does not even acknowledge he likes, all because he is too overwhelmed with his responsibilities is just the male version of isolated struggle and quiet suffering we don’t want to endorse anymore. A youth that Subuk might spend in perpetual hardship might have guaranteed his and his mother’s freedom but might also scar him further or prevent him from ever really living his own life – which he had every right to. Is Subuk setting unnecessarily perfect and hard to achieve goals for young men?
Subuk’s sisters, and Daneen as well, can come together to make a family where everyone helps build a home. This is the Kafeel of 2026 that shows us – men and women, brothers and sisters, can all come together to be each other’s strength. That’s what will make Zeba’s battle worthwhile and that’s the message to carry forward in a generation where everyone needs to pitch in, and no one person feels they’re going it alone. There’s still some story left in Kafeel abd we’re hoping Subuk and Daneen’s journey will take us there.
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