Series: Trial By Fire
Cast: Abhay Deol, Rajshri Deshpande, Anupam Kher, Rajesh Tailang, Shilpa Shukla, Ratna Pathak Shah, Yashwant Wasnik, Ashish Vidyarthi, Kuljeet Singh, Shardul Bhardwaj
Director: Prashant Nair and Randeep Jha
OTT: Netflix
Rating: 3.5 Moons
In India, judiciary maybe an autonomous body than the parliament and the government yet we often come across instances where justice is delayed as well as denied. We often resign to the fact that the rich and the famous cannot be touched and it is a futile attempt to knock the doors of the court houses against them if they are the perpetrators of a crime or a grievance. However, in 1997 a group of middleclass people fought a legal battle for twenty five long years to demand accountability and punish those who were responsible for the fire at the Uphaar cinema in Delhi. The people who had lost their loved ones in the fire took the Ansal brothers to court who owned the theatre and did not give up even when the going was tough. Netflix’s new series Trial By Fire depicts this true incident which is adapted from the book Trial by Fire: The Tragic Tale of the Uphaar Fire Tragedy by Neelam and Shekhar Krishnamoorthy, who lost their two teenage children in the fire. The Uphaar tragedy was one of the worst fire tragedies in recent history in which 59 people died and 103 were seriously injured when a faulty transformer caught fire during a screening of JP Dutta’s film Border.
Trial By Fire is created by Prashant Nair and Kevin Lepurchlo and co-directed by Nair and Randeep Jha. The series stars Abhay Deol as Shekhar Krishnamoorthy and Rajshri Deshpande as Neelam Krishnamoorthy as the bereaved parents who lead the fight for justice. Trial By Fire does not overly dramatise the real-life incident nor does it dampen the tragedy which a lot of shows end up doing. What the series in fact does, painstakingly and never wavering from the point is to clinically examine the factors that led to the debacles, the greed behind the faulty infrastructure as well as the safety lapse that is so prevalent in Indian buildings and recreation centres.
The series does not take time to establish the premise and introduces us to the happy family of Neelam (Rajshri Deshpande) and Shekhar Krishnamoorthy (Abhay Deol) and their teenage son and daughter. However, their lives turn upside down when the two kids succumb to the accident at the Uphaar Cinema hall; but the Krishnamoorthys turn their grief into the fuel that drives them to unravel the whys, hows and wheres of the tragedy bringing out an investigative drama pieced together by media reports, TV footage, police and municipal reports and interviews. Neelam takes the lead here, running through reports, witness accounts and media footage of bodies being carried out of the cinema hall hoping to find a lucky breakthrough about the fire.
On the other hand, Shekhar goes around to band an ‘army’ by meeting the families of the victims in order to bring the perpetrators to trial. They get people to form the Association of the Victims of Uphaar Fire Tragedy to fight the case under their lawyer KT Tulsi (Kuljeet Singh). Their lives are put on hold as they fight the case for a quarter of a century as the Ansals have the financial and legal clout to keep adjourning the case under their accomplished lawyer (Ram Jethmalani represented them, here the name of the lawyer is changed to Keswani).
Trial By Fire offers some extremely poignant and heart wrenching scenes, one of which has Kishan Pal (Yashwant Wasnick), a slum dweller who loses his entire family in the tragedy and has no money to cremate the bodies. However, he adheres to his self-respect as he turns down the compensation offer from Niraj Suri (played by Ashish Vidyarthi), a goon of Ansal brothers to shush the tragedy. Trial By Fire not only deals with the Krishnamoorthys but also delves into the lives of other characters such as Niraj Suri, an electricity board worker (played by Rajesh Tailang) who had repaired the transformer, a regretful ex-military man (Anupam Kher) and his wife (Ratna Pathak Shah) and the difficulties of an usher (Shardul Bhardwaj) during the difficult times of single-screen theaters.
Rajshri Deshpande as Neelam emerges as the true-blue hero of the series. She is relentless in her pursuit as she tries to unravel the cause and irresponsible behaviour of the theatre owners towards safety measures. The series shows how the tragedy unfolded with no fire-fighting equipment in the theatre, with the exits blocked by extra seats and the doors of the balcony locked from the outside by the gatekeeper so that nobody without a ticket can sneak in and he had left his duty without handing over his charge.
On the other hand, Abhay Deol as Shekhar presents a formidable front with a measured performance but his role is secondary as compared to Neelam’s. They project a quiet sense of grief which is more profound and impactful than the chest-beating and tears that we expect. They expertly show the trauma that losing one’s children due to a horrific accident can bring and the fact that getting over it takes time, Trial By Fire keeps a tab on all these points and depicts them with sensitivity. The supporting cast of Rajesh Tailang, Anupam Kher, Ratna Pathak Shah, Ashish Vidyarthi and Shardul Bhardwaj also pack a punch.
Directors Prashant Nair and Randeep Jha provide a narrative that is taut, crisp and sensitive. They employ an anthology style narrative bringing together the different world of the victims and their families. The show also is a tribute to the investigators who did not sell their integrity and helped uncover facts so that the victims and their families not only get justice but as well as closure. Trial By Fire is worth a watch and deserves your time.
PeepingMoon.com gives Trial By Fire, 3.5 Moons.
