Ranneeti – Balakot and Beyond-2024 – “Truly” Beyond

Genre – Spy + Action Thriller; based on true stories

Time: 8 episodes x average 40 minutes each

Platform: Jio Hotstar

Director: Santosh Singh

Cast:  Jimmy Shergill. Ashish Vidyarthi. Ashutosh Rana. Lara Dutta.

One more weekend and one more spy thriller based on true stories. You must actually admire the makers for being “true” to their headlines. They said “Balakot and Beyond”. Since its “based on true stories’, its “truly beyond” anything that you can imagine. How  is it “truly” beyond?

Let’s consider the “true” part.

• On February 2019, a suicide bomber killed 40 CRPF personnel by ramming his Maruti van into the CRPF convoy.
• India responded with a conventional air attack on terror camps in Balakot , in Pakistan.
• Pakistani Air Force responded with an air attack on Indian Army camps but was foiled by Indian interceptors, one of which, an elderly Mig 21 was shot down. The pilot Abhinandan Vardhaman was captured and later repatriated.
• Social media went berserk with claims and counter claims; these included:
  • Abhinandan shooting down an F16.
  • Another Pakistani plane being lost in air combat and its pilot being lynched by Pakistani civilians.
  • Pakistani claims of more Indian fighters lost in air combat and so on.
• Both sides declared “Victory”.

Hello. Didn’t we see this sometime back? Who says history does not repeat itself!

Now for the ‘truly beyond”

• The ISI is upto no good. (Aha! Did they ever do any good?) Naturally. Its head Raqeeb (Ashutosh Rana) is a nasty officer who wants to be Ruler of Balochistan. (huh? Ruler of Balochistan?). He can control the media, issue threats to American journalists, take Chinese Army into its confidence and of course handle all your friendly neighborhood jihadis by promising them a good time, once they capture Delhi. Just your everyday ISI-jihadi who rolls his eyes and leers at foreign female journalists. (Ashutosh Rana in great form).
• Nature is always in perfect balance , right ? If Raqeeb can do all the nastiness then we have  his nemesis in …..
• Indian RAW agent , Kashyap Sinha (Jimmy Shergill) who is kept in the RAW department which reviews film scripts (did they go through this TV serial?) for some past mistakes. He has lost all sense of smell and taste which the doctor diagnoses as PTSD (See – you have been warned – you too will lose all sense of taste and smell – sort of PRE Stress Trauma Disorder) . He is of course called back to action once the Pulwama attack happens.
• RAW agents have infiltrated the Jaish and other allied jihadi camps and they keep giving accurate information on a day-to-day basis so that the Air Force can do its job.
• The ensuing media campaign is managed by Manisha Bhardwaj (Lara Dutta) who has the NSA Chief Madhusudan Dutta’s (Ashish Vidyarthi) confidence. She can instantly design trending data and online TV campaigns, without losing sleep or her perfect makeup.
• Naturally all the hard work of hacking, contacting enemy agents etc is done by her team that includes a Muslim hacker Zara, a North Eastern agent handler Victor, a Sikh media savvy officer Sodhi, who has multiple contacts everywhere.
• Oh yes. The enemy is also equally smart. That nasty Raqeeb, also has a female media handler who promises him sky-high ratings on the Pakistani and world media, by seeding doubts and confusion everywhere, to make the Indian looks foolish.
• Both sides stare at huge screens where multiple symbols denote the enemies. Data , ASCII characters and all sorts of stuff keep scrolling on screens. Very high tech eh?
• Naturally the RAW agents get the better of the enemy. Oh. Did I say that there are two RAW agents in Pakistan? One a female and another a male. They escape together but no – they don’t sing a duet.
• All Pakistanis are basically jihadis except for the poor newspaper editor, who is trying to find out the truth about the air combat. For his troubles, he is shot dead by helmet wearing motorcyclists.
• Before the go ahead is given by the Indian Prime Minister, he tells Dutta “we haven’t got our rockets to celebrate Diwali”. Arrey – didn’t someone make that same statement years ago? And  did they use rockets in that attack?
• It is Sinha who has the brilliant idea of exerting pressure on Pakistan thru China by threatening to attack the CPEC. The Chinese quake in fear and pressurise Pakistan to stop the attacks. See? it pays to be friendly with China.
• Dutta gives a speech to his team inside the giant control room that its all about making Pakistan appear as a supporter of terrorism and winning the information war. Raqeeb says the real war is the one of perception. So, do you see now? it is TRULY beyond.

Thus, you have decent dedicated RAW agents, decadent nasty Pakistani ISI agents, nasty jihadis, nasty Pakistani Army, nasty Pakistani Air Force What else do you want? Oh yes – explosions, car chases, motorcycle chases, chases on foot, gun fights, explosions. That female RAW agent’s AK47 keeps firing for almost a minute. Man. Those two RAW agents really know how to truly do their jobs. (If we only had a battalion of them. Sigh!)

If you have the patience to watch this, you will learn how to use facts to promote fiction. Oh – didn’t they say at the beginning of every episode that this is BASED ON true events and has examples of creative liberty? Indeed. That is why it is truly BEYOND.

Real History – 2 out of 5

Script – 3 out of 5

Story – 2 out of 5

Direction – 3 out of 5

Total – 2.5 out of 5