Overall this was an interesting episode. We saw Pallavi put into motion her plan to start turning the tables on Mandaar. As I've said elsewhere, today's episode proved, at least to me, that not seeing Raghav Rao on screen for a couple of days feels like a drought. Was super happy to see him back on screen today with all that attitude.
As the title says, aqalmand ke liye ishaara hi kaafi hai, and Raghav Rao's claims of being born smart are about to be tested.
Emotional manipulation
Mandaar was in a panic not seeing Pallavi in her room but she nonchalantly went about making things in the kitchen. By not acting as a prisoner or a scared victim, she normalized her movements in the D-house. This would not only allow her to find ways to fight Mandaar while acting as if she had a right over him and house (just as she did with the Raos), but most importantly be able to move freely in the house to look after Ayi as well. She understood Mandaar's level of obsession and started emotionally manipulating him, first of all with the kheer. Oh the irony of it all! I don't know if he caught her taunt about mixing poison instead of sugar in the kheer but I am guessing she must have figured out he had drugged her. For a change, Pallavi's righteous indignation at Mandaar suspecting her intentions is what she will keep using to guilt him into giving her more freedoms and to put him on the backfoot. We saw that repeatedly in the episode, from the way she pretended to be upset that Mandaar was doubting her to the way she challenged him to give Raghav the divorce papers. So now we have the cunning Mandaar begging Pallavi and apologizing. The power of the fairer sex indeed. 
Mandaar is not naive, so doubting her sudden change of heart is exactly what I would have expected from him. I suppose Sunny will continue to play devil's advocate to ensure that Mandaar doesn't get fooled so easily by Pallavi. She needs to think her plan through because every time she's caught off guard she is shown thinking of how to recover from slips, and Mandaar will notice sooner or later. Right now he's basking in the glory of his so-called victory but not for long.
Ironically, once she knew Sunny was helping Mandaar, she concluded that Keerti must also be in on this, while Keerti had already started to doubt what she was doing and didn't seem comfortable with the situation. It might end up with Keerti genuinely trying to warn Raghav/Pallavi but Pallavi not believing her because of her past actions. In a way, it's good if Keerti has to walk a difficult path to redemption.
Pallavi's entire plan counted on triggering Raghav to come storming into D-house after seeing the divorce papers so that she at least got a chance to talk to him. I did find it alarming when she said let Raghav come here, phir mein sab kuch sambhaal loongi. We all know how that goes in serials, jahaan pe kuch sambhalta nahin hai. Again, we got a scene of her praying for divine assistance that felt like it was taken straight from an EK show. I hope the TRP generating viewers are happy with this. Ugh. 
So Mandaar went to give Raghav the divorce papers, with a smug look on his face the whole time. The scene was interesting, with Raghav in black and Mandaar in white, in direct contrast to their intentions. Amma was flabbergasted and even though she's a strong lady, I wonder how much of this non-stop stress she can take. Keerti was kind of right about there being no respite from D-fam drama.
As expected, Raghav didn't believe Pallavi would have sent those papers and concluded that Mandaar must have done something to him. His anger was rising by the minute, as was Mandaar's satisfaction at seeing Raghav in that state. Raghav still had no clue how dangerous Mandaar could actually be, so asking him what he'd done with Pallavi while grabbing his collar would get him nowhere. There's a pattern I've noticed in their exchanges. Mandaar riles Raghav up, Raghav reacts accordingly and tries to attack Mandaar physically and verbally. Mandaar in turn gets angry while defending himself, but then steps back and cools down, playing more mind games with his slithery words and making Raghav's thought process a mess. Today was no different. Raghav pulled a gun on Mandaar, and while I don't usually like Amma refereeing or giving Raghav her qasam I believe he would have shot Mandaar if he had completely lost his temper. She wanted to avoid bloodshed, and I agreed with her that Raghav should have gone to talk to Pallavi instead of wasting time with Mandaar. The fact that Mandaar didn't even flinch seeing the gun means that either he's used to weapons or that he knows Raghav's weaknesses well enough to fight him off with words while keeping himself safe.
Side note: good thing there are no kids in RR mansion. Who keeps a gun in the living room drawer? I feel like one day someone's going to be seriously injured or worse because of this.
I am really glad Amma got to see this side of Mandaar because before today it was just Raghav's words that she had heard. Today she realized how cheap Mandaar could be. He was being delusional while he was saying Pallavi was his, that from now on she was Pallavi Mandaar Deshmukh, even though the two aren't legally married. He was quick to announce that he had won her and that Raghav had lost but he clearly has no clue who he was dealing with. Even though we've seen his obsession with Pallavi, this dialogue and the way Mandaar said it made it seem like he was still out to destroy Raghav and Pallavi was the means. Let's see what his masterplan actually is.
As Mandaar left RR mansion with a snap of his fingers, Amma tried to calm Raghav down so as not to make things worse. She wanted him to ask Pallavi if this was a marriage or a joke. Yes, Amma, we are all asking the same thing because it's too complicated. I don't blame her for getting frustrated with a new drama everyday. I loved the way they shot that scene of Amma and Raghav both sitting in the living room, fuming after Mandaar's departure. It reminded me of Farhad's dialogue early on: jaisa beta waisi ma. I don't want her to keep refereeing but today it was needed. I do want to see the tables turned in the Krishna Rao track where she herself blesses Raghav to avenge the deaths of his family and the suffering the Raos went through for years.
Ayi's reaction on hearing that Mandaar had killed Devyani told me that either she wasn't surprised that her son would be capable of this after he tried to kill his own mother, or she knows a lot more about her son's twisted nature than she's letting on. I wasn't able to interpret her reaction when Pallavi said she would send Mandaar to jail. Was it resignation or something else? Pallavi's monologue also told the audience why she couldn't message Raghav from someone else's phone, as if to pacify the audience and preempt any backlash. They know social media fans really well. đ
LOL at Pallavi's beaming smile on hearing her furious husband's voice. Aa gaya mera ghamandi Rao. How times have changed!
A not-so-united front
The scenes that followed were a throwback to the one where Mandaar tried to stop Pallavi from leaving D-house the day Raghav and she brought Mandaar there. Pallavi had to curb her excitement at seeing Raghav because she didn't want to give anything away. To those asking why she didn't use their ILU sign well why would she? Everyone was watching with hawk eyes so they would have picked it up. Secondly, she wanted to use her words effectively in that pretend confrontation with Raghav in front of all the D-fam and ensure that the reaction she got from him was what one would expect from Raghav Rao in such a situation, making it seem genuine to everyone else. He didn't disappoint her (or us) and barged in, furious, as she had expected he would. Since she couldn't sneak about, whatever she told him had to be in the open and on multiple layers: one, for the rest of the D-fam, one that Mandaar would understand and find reassuring, and the other just for Raghav and her.
A big part of the episode was meant to showcase how a couple knows how to communicate with another after they form a bond, especially when it comes to providing and reading non-verbal cues. These two have been able to read such cues and especially each other's eyes before, so Pallavi was counting on all this. Raghav for his part knew that her words, at least on the surface, were a huge departure from what he would have expected of her, so the whole time he kept looking at her face, her eyes, and body language for signs, as he tried to read between her lines.
I personally don't know what I would have expected Raghav to feel in that moment. He wouldn't cry in front of the Ds of course but initially there was no sign of hurt or heartbreak on his face, just rage. He refused to sign the papers and asked her if Mandaar was forcing her to do all this. Then we got the famous threshold scene again, a staple of every confrontation at D-house that had always ended in Raghav and Pallavi walking out of there holding hands willingly, presenting a united front and their unshakable faith in each other. One had always led the other out, fully knowing and expecting the other would be on the same page as they left the house.
Not this time. Raghav held her hand and wanted to take her home to discuss the matter but she made a show of stopping at the threshold, shocking him (and most of D-fam). This was the moment when you saw most of the D-fam smiling because finally Raghav was not going to be able to walk out proudly with his wife the way he always had in the past and she clearly wasn't interested in accompanying him either. Poor Milind and Amruta were dumbfounded and looked at Pallavi as though she were an alien.
The importance of consent
The play on words that followed was quite well written. She let him know that she was willingly staying there and that no one could force her, not even him. It's interesting that while he had the right intention when wanted to take her home, the subtle message was still that even at times like this, her consent and point of view was important and he would have to consider it. She quoted the Indian Marriage Act section 307. Now I don't know what that law actually says, maybe someone on the forum can enlighten me but I feel it was also a general message for viewers that husbands cannot force their wives to do anything. (She was also probably letting the audience know the same in the case of Mandaar, that he couldn't force her to do anything she didn't want to).
I wanted to slap Sanki for his smug look at hearing this because how hypocritical was he?! He was just happy to hear Raghav being told off by Pallavi because he knew Raghav drew strength from having her by his side. Ehsaan faramosh kahin ka! Though I would say if she weren't in his life, Raghav wouldn't be dealing with a lowlife like Sanki (or Mandaar). I had written in an earlier post that I didn't think Raghav would drag Pallavi out of there against her will but I wasn't sure how this scene would play out. Thanks CVs for keeping his character consistent in this regard and showing him respecting her wishes as a spouse, even if he didn't like what was happening.
This line cracked me up:
Tum paagal ho gaya hai kya?
Yahan main tumse baat karne ko aaya aur tum mereko law samjha raha hai?
Typical Raghav Rao saying things in anger/sarcasm that makes viewers laugh. I wonder if he will look that book up or hawa mein filter.
Where once, Pallavi willingly took Raghav's hand and walked out of D-house, today she asked him to stay away from her and not touch her. We know a lot of this was for Mandaar's benefit but it wasn't clear yet if it had hurt Raghav. We know how much she likes touching himđ so for her to appear as if his touch was abhorrent had to have hit him hard (more on this later). As she screamed at him saying she wanted to be free of his behisaab ghussa and ziddh, you could see identical smirks on Mandaar and Sanki's face. The camera panning their faces brilliantly portrayed how the apple hasn't fallen far from the tree at all. đ
Play on words
The next set of lines was also interesting for the way they were written, where Pallavi said Raghav only cared about himself (which couldn't be further from the truth) while Mandaar cared only about her (again, not true but not known to people yet). While she looked at Mandaar, the dialogues she said described Raghav and while she looked at Raghav the accusations she hurled at him were actually her feelings about Mandaar. To the outsiders it wasn't obvious but Pallavi was building it up so that when Raghav would later assess everything he'd get the message (or so she hoped).
(Mandaar) mujhe aasman mein bithakar rakhta hai. Again, she looked at Mandaar when saying it but thought about Raghav, because he was the one who had helped her soar in the skies. Mandaar, the fool, was overjoyed at such praise.
Tum mujhe sirf oonchayi se neeche girate ho, she told Raghav. By this point he was more bewildered than furious (probably trying to remember when he had done that), but we the audience know she was referring to what happened to Ayi and attributing that action Mandaar.
Kya ho gaya tumko Pallavi, sach batao. Tum aisa kyun baat kar raha hai. Yeh tumhe pressure kar raha hai na?
Main sab kuch handle karlega. Darne ka koi zaroorat nahin. Sach batao Pallavi.
Protective Rao mode was on and as always Raghav wanted to challenge Mandaar and sort things out in the open. This was not that kind of situation or game, because it needed subtlety and cold planning on both sides, which Raghav was obviously not in the frame of mind for. We know he excels at it but this was not the time and place. Pallavi had to lash out at him because she knew how seriously Raghav would take her words, so that even in quiet times of contemplation later on he'd try to decipher them.
She kept insisting that the truth was in front of him, that she had been a fool not to have seen the truth sooner. This was her admission that she had been wrong about Mandaar and Raghav had been right to suspect him, but in front of her D-fam audience she wanted it to seem as if she'd been wrong about Raghav and that he had come in between Mandaar and her.
This made Raghav very concerned as he reminded her of their promises, of the love she had seen in his eyes, and this is where it got even more interesting.
She denied that there had been love in her eyes for him, that people could go to any length out of fear, again looking at Raghav but meaning Mandaar the whole time. She kept asking him if he hadn't seen the fear in her eyes and admonished him for not seeing it because he was too busy focusing on himself. I am guessing this was her message to him to put his emotions and anger aside so that he could observe what was happening around them.
Mauqa miley to ghar jaake dekhna... Aaina... Again, multiple meanings here where on one hand she wanted the Ds to think she was telling Raghav to take a good look at himself in the mirror and consider his actions. On the other hand, she wanted him to do some soul searching and ask himself these questions so that he would get all his answers and realize what she was trying to say, plus the more obvious play on words: Aina and Ayi na... referring to all this having to do with Ayi. She had mentioned her doubts to him about the whole accident and she wanted him to connect the dots later.
Aksar jo dikhta hai woh hota nahin hai, Raghav. Again, double meanings here that she wanted him to figure out later.
Mandaar stepped in between them - how dare he đĄ- just like Raghav had stepped in between Mandaar and her last time. Again, he claimed that Pallavi was no longer Raghav's wife but his. Somebody tell him marriages don't work like that, especially not from a legal perspective!
Of course, that was enough to trigger Raghav from wanting to beat him into a pulp and murder him, stopping only when Pallavi asked him to. She kept telling him to understand and accept the truth because creating a scene wouldn't solve anything. She insisted that he go home and think about everything with a cool head. He agreed to leave, but not before warning her.
Abhi main ja raha hai Saree ka Dukaan, lekin ek baat yaad rakh, ke yeh tereko bohot mehenga padne waala hai.
I am not sure what he meant here. Had he understood what she was trying to say and pretended to start a fight with her? If not, I don't see Raghav as the kind to take revenge on a wife who no longer wanted to be with him, or to force Pallavi to live with him if she didn't want to. That's not the kind of man/husband he is. He never will be. So the tumhe mehenga padega warning was a bit confusing for me, but let's see how that plays out. It was enough to satisfy Sanki and Mandaar though, that they'd scored a big win against Raghav without needing to say a single word, since Pallavi had done it for them. BWA looked like she'd won the lottery, while poor Milind looked like he wanted to wake up from this nightmare.
Raghav snapped his finger at Mandaar to mirror Mandaa'rs earlier action at RR mansion, and stormed out of D-house in anger, trying to keep his frustration and hurt in check. He would not give the Ds the satisfaction of seeing him weak.
Gold digger
Keerti was still unhappy about Sunny partnering up with Mandaar, but Sunny managed to sweet talk her into letting it go. So today, Sunny basically confirmed what most of us suspected, that he was a gold digger after all and an expert at emotionally manipulating Keerti. So much for her calling Pallavi a gold-digger. Sunny thinks he can get Keerti to commit murder in the name of love, but something tells me this is where he will be proved wrong. I hope it never comes to that anyway. I don't want to get my hopes up, but it was good to see Keerti feeling uncomfortable for the first time in a long time. Hopefully it builds up where she takes action herself. She's a Rao after all and the day she strips Sunny of his power over her, Sunny will be helpless and useless. (interesting parallel to Pallavi stripping Mandaar of the power to emotionally manipulate her). Who knows how far away that day is, though? As for him taking over half of Raghav's property, well Raghav will safeguard his sister's interests and his own through lawyers. Even if he doesn't, we know that as a self-made man Raghav is more than capable of building back anything he might lose.
Paheli
Back home, Raghav slammed the file on the ping pong table and headed to his default location, the bar.
I wonder why he brought the file home. Will he look at the text later, use it to play further games with Mandaar by refusing to sign, or was it just for continuity's sake?
It was interesting to see which of Pallavi's lines he remembered as soon as he started drinking: she wanted to divorce him, she didn't want him to touch her, she wanted freedom from his unlimited anger and stubbornness. Clearly, these were the ones that hit him hardest because of how their relationship had gradually developed. He also remember her saying that Mandaar and she were made for each other, and that Raghav was the one who had come in between them. She had only had fear of Raghav in her eyes (not love) and implied that now that Mandaar was back she didn't need to afraid or bound to Raghav anymore. She wanted to be free to go back to the life with Mandaar that she had dreamt of/planned for until fate had taken a detour. Pallavi didn't mean it but these words touched a nerve because deep down he had always felt that before and maybe still did to a certain extent. The fact that he had forced her to marry him would always put him on the backfoot, as it did again today. I really loved the writing in this bit.
Waise bhi bande ki Hindi weak hai aur Pallavi ne itni paheliyan bujhayi. We all expected her to give Raghav hints that only he would get, no one else, but let's see if he gets it at all.
I know a lot of people are complaining about her not using the ILU signal but I don't think it would have been safe to do so in front of Mandaar, Mansi, or BWA. She couldn't risk her plan being exposed or Mandaar would cause further damage.
I think they deliberately left it ambiguous as to whether or not Raghav had understood her message at the D-house or when he went back home. We'll find out later, but I don't think it matters anyway since they don't drag things on this show.
I kept asking myself, is he drinking in anger because he knows Mandaar is trapping Pallavi and that they can't strike him down right now, or is he pretending in front of Keerti? Honestly, I wouldn't mind seeing him initially blinded by rage, being hurt and basically acting like a mad bull for a bit, then calming down once his energy has been expended to think about all the other things she said.
I am hoping we will get a scene of him looking at himself in the mirror and then having an aha! moment, not just because Sai would nail it but also because of how great this team is with using mirrors in creative ways. Also the Aina - Ayi... na reference has made me curious to see when Raghav's bulb would go on. Let's see.
I might be in the minority who's hoping that Pallavi hadn't written any secret messages on the divorce papers or slipped him a letter. This situation is a brilliant opportunity to show how they understand and trust one another implicitly and I want him to be able to figure out, without any further props, what she had been trying to say beyond the literal meaning behind her words.
I totally LOVED the precap where Raghav is in his zone and is taking Mandaar for a ride, refusing to listen to him or I guess to sign those papers. He knows that as long as he doesn't do so, Mandaar will be desperate and unable to harm him. It's not clear whether Raghav has understood Pallavi's plan by this point or if he's doing his own thing. If it's the latter, and I hope it is, then I love the way he said that the game was on, no holds barred because Pallavi was no longer in the picture. If it's the former, then there's more acting on his part to show he didn't care about Pallavi so he'd go all out to harm Mandaar because his pride had been hurt at losing the challenge (and his wife) to Mandaar. đ
I really loved Sai's body language, tone, and facial expression when Raghav said "Aaj tak sirf Pallavi ki wajeh se main tereko jhelte aa raha hai. Abhi Pallavi beech mein nahin hai, to tereko andaaza bhi nahin hai main tera kya haal kar sakta hai". I want to see this don mode of his. It's high time. I would be happy to see her plan to go to the parlor fail because Mandaar needs to win a couple more rounds to become complacent, but also to see some nervous energy on both sides - Pallavi wondering if her understanding of Raghav would be proved right so that his ghamand would make the plan work, and Raghav questioning if he'd understood Pallavi at all over the past few months or had made an error in judgement about her character. I also want to see Raghav angry for a couple of days and go all out to destroy Mandaar, instead of being Devdas. His don mode is very much needed. I quite like the face offs between Raghav and Mandaar. Sai and Ashok are doing a great job bringing their rivalry alive on screen, very entertaining to watch. Ek se bad kar ek kameena. As someone on the forum once said, in this show you have bad guy vs. bad guy. Heroes are not needed.
CVs, we need Farhad back on screen now ASAP. If he doesn't help his Anna now, when will he?
Sai wanted angry Raghav Rao again as did we... To chalo ab wahi milega.
