Genre: Comedy Drama
Language: Hindi
Country of Origin: India
Season: 1
No. of Episodes: 8
Streaming On: Amazon Prime Video
Running Time: 25-35 minutes
Writer: Chandan Kumar
Director: Deepak Kumar Mishra
Cast: Raghubir Yadav, Neena Gupta, Jitendra Kumar, Faisal Malik, Chandan Roy, Biswajit Sarkar
Music: Anurag Saikia
Cinematography: Amitabh Singh
Introduction:
Panchayat repeats the lovable UPite mother-son casting of Neena Gupta and Jitendra Kumar, whose performances were applauded in 'Shubh Mangal Zyada Saavdhan', a recent hit and critically acclaimed Bollywood release.
But Raghubir Yadav, playing the role of the village Pradhan, steals the show, right under everyone's nose, with his all knowing eyes, chaste UP dialect, witty remarks, loving and chiding attitude towards his wife and the overall body language of the village patriarch.
Plot:
Abhishek Tripathi (Jitendra Kumar) an average engineering graduate, in the scenario of no lucrative high paying or high profile job in his kitty, reluctantly accepts the post of the sachiv or secretary of Phullera village panchayat in Uttar Pradesh.
In the remote village of Phullera, though due to the government’s reservation for women in the previous election, the pradhan or head happens to be Manju Devi (Neena Gupta), her husband Brij Bhushan Dubey (Raghubir Yadav) is the one who actually dons the hat of the acting pradhan. He is blindly supported and followed by his up-pradhan aka deputy head Prahalad Pandey (Faisal Malik).
Abhishek's welcoming team comprises of the aforementioned men and Vikas (Chandan Roy), the office attendanant, a relatively smart and trustworthy guy, committed to his job and well being of his immediate boss aka Abhishek.
Expectantly, during his first year at Phullera, Abhishek comes across myriad idiosyncrasies of the villagers and gets frustrated with the slow pace of life, loneliness and stark difference in the biological clock, as the entire village goes off to sleep by 7:30 pm and considers 9 am as late noon.
But mostly, he is disillusioned about his non-happening life. Unlike his city friends, he has no fun times to post or brag about on social media.
To pass off his extra time and to fulfill his ambition, he asks his best friend Pradeep (Buswajit Sarkar) to courier him the CAT (entrance examination for MBA) courseware and studies for around four hours everyday after the office hours.
Amidst all the comedy and drama around him, eventually he appears for the CAT examination.
You need to see the series to know his result, his decision thereafter and whether or not something happening happened in his life.
Analysis:
Preceeded by Uttar Pradesh based series like - Mirzapur, Rangbaaz and Bhaukaal, which showcased high end usage of abusives, criminal activities and dirty politics in UP, thankfully and refreshingly Panchayat is a far cry from the aforementioned series.
It focuses on the simplicity, illiteracy and the state of non awareness of the people and the government aids and guidelines issued to combat them. In Panchayat, no one is a criminal or harbinger of dismay and unhappiness.
As mentioned in the beginning, Raghubir Yadav is just perfect in his portrayal of the acting pradhan and patriarch. In fact, many a times his style of acting and contemplation resembles that of Amitabh Bachchan!
Neena Gupta has well portrayed the role of hard-working and wise but bossy and illiterate homemaker, who is quite confident of her husband's wealth and power, but keeps both his generosity and over confidence in check.
Chandan Roy is a glee to watch in all his earnestness and obedience.
Jitendra Kumar comes across as a decent but disillusioned city guy who generally believes in bottling up and keeping quite in the face of ridicule that surrounds him.
Rest of the cast has also performed well. The casting is quite apt.
The background music is upbeat and interesting. In the limited given scope, the cinematography is good.
Conclusion:
If you love to see the comedy and drama ensued out of the following scenarios -
- someone getting a better office chair
- a thief returning the mistakenly stolen article with a sorry note
- a groom in tears and his marriage on the edge of being cancelled because someone called him an 'asshole'
- villagers finding a particular family planning slogan on the wall to be insulting to their child(ren) that took birth after their second child
then Panchayat is your to-watch out series.
Panchayat is also a must-watch for those who enjoy the simple tales of rustic India.
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