A tense, state-of-the-nation drama set in Covid-era India successfully exposes how the caste system underpins much of the country\u2019s division and strife <\/p>\n
\u2018No one ever plans for the poor,\u201d says a young police officer in this tense, painful pandemic drama from India. Shot in black and white, it\u2019s set at the start of the government-imposed lockdown in May 2020 that led to the exodus of 10 million migrant workers from India\u2019s cities. The police officer has been put in charge of a rural roadblock to stop poor workers returning to their families and villages \u2013 preventing the spread of the virus. But realising that no help is arriving, the crowd, feeling hungry and abandoned, get angry. The results are explosive, exposing the fault lines of caste prejudice and class conflict.<\/p>\n
The officer Surya (Rajkummar Rao), is himself from a lower-caste family, but he\u2019s climbing the ladder; he is a competent, decent cop who refuses kickbacks or bribes (just what a modern police force needs). Still, his boss never lets him forget his place, and we see how Surya has internalised prejudice too. All of society turns up at his checkpoint. A rich upper-caste woman (Dia Mirza) waltzes over accompanied by her driver, fully expecting to sail through. A young woman who worked as a maid in the city risks her life to get her alcoholic father home to their village. There\u2019s an elderly security guard travelling on a bus; then a film crew arrives from a TV news channel.<\/p>\n