Guns And Heists:
In 1995, the arms drop in Purulia had caused quite a sensation. The man, responsible for it, who gave himself the swashbuckling name of Kim Davy, was in the midst of a political storm then. The story was quickly buried, probably because of the people involved.
It is a thrilling episode by itself but the new web series, Loot Kaand, directed by Ruchir Arun from Saurav Dey’s story, uses the scandal as a peg– the prologue shows the drop– to concoct a crime drama, that arouses some curiosity because of the real incident but is also instantly forgettable, due to its blandness.
Siblings Latika (Tanya Maniktala), a sports coach in a school, and suddenly unemployed brother Palash (Sahil Mehta) are in deep financial trouble, and about to lose their ancestral home. As a last resort, they rope in Soni (Mihika Vasavada), a student of hers to pull off a harebrained bank heist scheme. Latika has passed off Soni as a boy, because she is a football champ. This has no real bearing on the plot but the girl is okay with it.
When Palash wants to try one more heist, things go wrong. Two bandits strike the bank at the same time and in the melee, Soni is taken hostage.
Around this mayhem there is a search on for the long-lost guns by a criminal zamindar, Burman (Brij Bhushan Shukla), while an earnest cop (Prashansha Sharma) tries to investigate, within a corrupt law enforcement system. Meanwhile a geography teacher (Gyanendra Tripathi), along with Burman’s henchman (Akash Sinha) discovers an underground network of tunnels, where the guns might be hidden.
If there is any character who deserves any sympathy, it’s the child, who is endangered by greedy adults, but agrees to help them again.
Loot Kaand, does bring the various strands together by the end and leaves scope for a possible Season 2, but they will have to try harder. The actors too, who seem to be doing their jobs with bare minimum enthusiasm.
(This piece first appeared in rediff.com)
