Prahaar Review:
There’s nothing better than a film that surprises you. I admit, I did preemptively box Prahaar: The Ujjwal Nikam Story as another propaganda piece-- a subtler one if not of the blaring loud type. It wasn’t an unfounded opinion. If you read up about Ujjwal Nikam you will find an impressive CV. Before getting on the 26/11 Mumbai terror attacks trial, the Maharashtra-based lawyer had already served as a special prosecutor on high-profile cases like that of the 1993 Bombay bombings and that of T-series head Gulshan Kumar’s murder. If you research a layer deep, you will find that the lawyer was a candidate for the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) from Mumbai North Central Lok Sabha constituency in the 2024 Maharashtra state assembly elections. A Caravan article details how the BJP played up Nikam’s image as the lawyer who delivered the death penalty to terrorist Ajmal Kasab and reduced the whole campaign to be either for or against terrorism. Nikam lost the election but was given a Rajya Sabha seat by the ruling party in 2025.
Director: Avinash Arun
Writer: Sumit Roy
Cast: Rajkummar Rao, Wamiqa Gabbi, Lalit Prabhakar, Jaideep Ahlawat, Sikandar Kher, and Ashish Vidyarthi
Thus, Prahaar seemed like PR for Nikam. Maybe to embolden his future political career? The red-angry aesthetics of the posters didn't help and also the fact that the film is being led by Rajkummar Rao, an otherwise exceptional actor, who, in a now deleted comment on social media, justified being part of a “Modi hain toh mumkin hain” music video stating “You can never know the pressure.”
But all those doubts are laid to rest when you start watching Prahaar. The film is a detail-by-detail journey into the trial of Kasab. It begins with Nikam not completely satisfied with the outcome of the 1993 blasts because he couldn’t expose the network behind the attacks. He gets another chance with the 26/11 terror attack.
On the surface, the case seemed like an easy conviction. There was photographic evidence of Kasab walking into the Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Terminus (CSMT) with an AK-47 and police testimonies implicated him. But Nikam focuses on building an airtight case rather than giving in to public rage and delivering quick judgment. The defense led by Abbas Kazmi (an impressive Sikandar Kher) continuously pokes holes in the prosecution’s case. Kasab too flips on his own confession, tells the court that he is a minor, and continuously tries to derail the case. Nikam, however, sticks to procedure going by the dictum “justice delayed is justice denied but justice hurried is also justice buried.”
Director Avinash Arun handles the film with neutral precision. There is little theatrics to the court case and no chest-thumping nationalism. The film seems very old school in its presentation of India as a country which believes in the rule of law and as a teacher of ethics to the world. Prahaar prides itself on the right things. It refuses to reduce itself into a rage-bait. The makers portray an aspirational view of India for Indians, as a democratic country which allows even a mass-murdering terrorist the fair right to defend himself. It might seem a utopian vision at the moment, but it is a vision still worth fighting for.
Rajkummar Rao plays Nikam with a peculiarity. He is soft-spoken and often squeaky outside but in court he bellows his arguments. This is no hagiography and Nikam is shown as a difficult man who doesn’t give time to his family and has a troubled relationship with his son. We also witness Kasab’s tumultuous journey of becoming a man from a monster. Jaideep Ahlawat too comes in a guest appearance as a Pakistani lawyer Chaudhary Zulfikar and with his performance, humanizes the people of the neighbouring country. Sikandar Kher as Kasab’s Muslim defense lawyer is not an evil, bigot but just a man believing in the secular fabric of the nation and the power and neutrality of the law.
Prahaar shows us what we were at a time, before we went out baying for blood. It’s a heart-wrenching story of a grievous tragedy but it doesn’t aim to make you blind with anger and rather wants you to reflect and understand. It makes you remember what India stood for once. During an argument, Rao’s Nikam shouts and tells Ahlawat’s Zulfikar: “India is a democracy and that too the biggest democracy in the world.” A single line which, at the moment, sounds both hollow and hopeful.
