Dahaad Web series Review: Bollywood actress Sonakshi Sinha’s debut web series ‘Dahad’ has been streamed on Prime Video. Gulshan Devaiah, Sohum Shah and Zoya Morani are in the lead roles along with Sonakshi in this series directed by Reema Kagti and Ruchika Oberoi. All the actors have done strong acting in the interesting story.
The issue of love jihad is hot at the moment. Fierce controversy and support is being seen for the film ‘The Kerala Story’ based on this. The film has been banned in many states, while it has also been made tax free in states like Madhya Pradesh, Haryana and UP. On the pretext of the film, a movement is being seen against Love Jihad. A web series ‘Dahaad’ based on this issue is being streamed on Amazon Prime Video. In this series, casteism, politics, dowry, crime, police investigation have also been shown along with love jihad. The story of the series is based on the dreadful deeds of Mohan Kumar alias Cyanide Mohan, a serial killer from Karnataka.
Notorious serial killer Cyanide Mohan was a school teacher by profession. He would often trap women on the pretext of marriage. Inspires them to run away from home. When the girls came to him with money and jewelry from their homes, he would celebrate the honeymoon by marrying them. After this, the next day he used to feed cyanide on the pretext of feeding contraceptive pill. Used to loot their jewelry and money. In just four years, he had made more than 20 girls his victims. The story of this serial killer from Karnataka has been shown in the web series ‘Dahad’ on the background of Rajasthan. In this series, Bollywood actor Vijay Verma has played the role of Cyanide Mohan.
Gulshan Devaiah, Sohum Shah and Zoya Morani are also in lead roles along with Sonakshi in this series directed by Reema Kagti and Ruchika Oberoi. Its screenplay and dialogues are written by Zoya Akhtar, Chaitanya Chopra, Reema Kagti and Sumit Arora. There are many dialogues in it, which attack the issues considered as the curse of the society such as dowry and casteism. But the script is not very strong, due to which this series with 8 episodes of 50 minutes seems like a drag. Series editor Nitin Baid has ruined the hard work of cinematographer Tanay Satam. Tanay has beautifully captured the beauty of Rajasthan in his camera.
At the center of the story of the web series ‘Dahad’ are the characters of Sonakshi Sinha and Vijay Verma. Sonakshi plays sub-inspector Anjali Bhati, while Vijay plays serial killer Anand Savankar. Anjali lives with her mother, father died in childhood. Anand lives with his wife and a child. He is a teacher by profession. Every weekend he goes to far-flung villages and gives free education to the people. During this, it also searches for its prey. Often tries to trap the girls and women standing at the bus stand by talking to them on the pretext. Devi Prasad Singh (Gulshan Devaiah), the SHO of the police station where Sonakshi works, adores her a lot.
SHO Devi Prasad Singh gives all the big cases to Anjali Bhati only. Because of this, Kailash Parghi (Sohum Shah), a senior colleague of Anjali, is jealous of her. One day a dead body of a newly married woman is found in a public toilet in Mandawa, Rajasthan. In the investigation, it is found that he has died due to eating cyanide. The investigation of this case is handed over to Anjali. Many such incidents are revealed one after the other in his investigation. More than two dozen women and girls go missing from the towns and villages around Mandawa. The pattern of everyone’s disappearance and death is the same. While investigating, the police reaches closer to Anand Savankar.
Anand Savankar is a very simple, easygoing and common man in appearance. He teaches Hindi in a girls’ school. But behind this straight face, a creepy killer is hidden. Such a killer who does not even sigh after killing someone. It is his nature to trap girls and rob them after killing them. He hides the loot, obscene pictures of women and their mobiles in his van. One day his son takes out a mobile. Takes him to school, where boys start watching porn videos from mobile. This mobile is a big evidence against Anand, but very cleverly he escapes. In such a situation, the question arises whether the police will ever be able to catch a dreaded criminal like Anand? Will the girls of Mandawa be able to live peacefully? Who will win in this game of checkmate between the police and the criminal? To know this one has to watch the web series.
The casting in the web series ‘Dahad’ is tremendous. In true sense, behind the success of this series, the role of strong acting of the artists working in it is big. Series makers have selected such an artist for each character, who seems to be made for that. Sonakshi Sinha has made a grand comeback as an ‘actor’. The actress, who started her career with the film ‘Dabangg’, has also given a domineering performance in the series. Anjali as a character is under a lot of pressure with multiple layers, but Sonakshi pulls it off well. In one way she is a domineering police officer, and on the other hand she comes from such a caste, which the Thakur of the village does not even allow to enter their house.
“Many doors closed on my mouth, but my mouth did not close”… This dialogue of the series is enough to describe the condition of Anjali Bhati. Vijay Verma has done a great job in the role of serial killer Anand Savankar. He was last seen in a negative role in the film ‘Darlings’ alongside Alia Bhatt and Shefali Shah. But in this series, unlike that character, he plays a great role with such ease that he himself is a serial killer. Actor Sohum Shah, who played the lead role in Sony Liv’s web series ‘Maharani’, plays a secondary role in it, but despite being behind the lead characters, notices due to his strong acting. Gulshan Devaiah has done a wonderful job in what he has got as the boss of all of them. Overall, the interesting story and strong performances by the cast have made the series worth watching.
