Kohrra, Paatal Lok creator Sudip Sharma: The time to create socio-political stories is dead

Sudip Sharma always finds himself returning to violence. In his writing debut NH10 (2015), an otherwise bubbly Anushka Sharma, in pursuit of vengeance, runs over one of her husband’s killers with an SUV. In his first series, the path-breaking Paatal Lok, a character slices the throats of his bullies on a foggy morning in Punjab. “I don’t want to show violence just for effect,” says Sudip, who is returning to the misty badlands of the western state with the Netflix series Kohrra, but this time, as a co-creator along with Gunjit Chopra and Diggi Sisodia (“He is Punjab’s encyclopedia”). He adds, “I want them to flinch with the gore. To understand how it feels.”

But, still, how far is he willing to go when it comes to showing violence on screen? Barun Sobti, who plays one of the leads in the series, interjects with a laugh. “Can I answer that for you? Pretty far.”

Kohrra kick starts with a rich, NRI guy’s body found in the fields. His throat is slit, his head is smashed. His gora friend is missing. Assigned to the case are cops Garundi (Barun) and Balbir Singh, played by Suvinder Vicky, who has become sort of the go-to actor for everything Punjab. He was recently seen in CAT (2022), another Netflix series based in the northern state, in which he incidentally played a cop. Before that, there was Meel Patthar, in which he played a contemplative Punjabi truck driver. “I know in the last couple of years a lot of Suvinder paaji’s work has come out,” says Sudip. “But, just to put things in perspective, we actually cast him before all of this had been released, before CAT and Meel Pathhar.”

Sudip states that Suvinder was on his mind while he was penning the script for Kohrra. “In fact, he played a small role in Paatal Lok too. There also he was named Balbir Singh,” he adds. “What can I say? He was perfect for the part in Kohrra. He has that gravitas.”

For Barun too, essaying Garundi is treading on familiar grounds, at least when it comes to playing a cop. He collaborated previously with the series director Randeep Jha on Halahal (2020), a police procedural in which he donned khaki along with a moustache, which makes a return in Kohrra. “Oh, Randeep has had beef with my moustache since Halahal. While shooting for Kohrra, he would come to give me the scene briefing and after he was done, he would continue staring at my face and say, ‘This moustache man!’ before leaving.” Barun, however, says that the similarities ended there. “Garundi is a fairly different character, compared to what I played in Halahal and Asur (2020). Even if he wasn’t a cop, he would have been equally colourful.”

The banter between a young Garundi and an experienced Balbir makes up for humour in this otherwise gritty series. “Punjabis are just naturally so funny,” shares Sudip. “Even if you are doing a murder show based in Punjab, the humour still manages to seep in. You just can’t help it.”

“But, I never even smiled in my scenes,” says Harleen Sethi, who plays Balbir’s daughter Nimrat in the show. The two share a troubled relationship. Nimrat blames Suvinder’s Balbir for her mother’s demise. Balbir judges Nimrat for abandoning her husband. It’s a role with a lot of simmering emotional turmoil. “The first thing I did before approaching the character was write my qualities and Nimrat’s. To find things that are similar and reach for those which are not,” says Harleen. “For the toxicity, the effects of patriarchy, I had to go into some dark spaces in my life. For women, there have been such relationships, such moments, and some seemingly innocent comments. It isn’t that hard to find.”

Compared to Paatal Lok, whose sly commentary on external society ruffled some feathers, Kohrra feels a bit on the fringes, turning the lens more inwards. “I focused on family as the unit for a larger society. I wanted to explore the politics between two brothers, between a father and a daughter. It just became more personal for me,” says Sudip. Paatal Lok, when it was released, irked the sentiments of the Gorkha community, the Sikhs and invited a complaint from a BJP MLA. “My work has always been political. But, as heartbreaking as it might sound, the time to do overtly sociopolitical stories is dead".