Khakee: The Bengal Chapter, which brings Neeraj Pandey’s much-loved cops vs criminals saga to our home ground, premieres on Netflix on March 20. Recently, the team of the series was in Calcutta to release its trailer. t2 caught up with actors Prosenjit and Jeet — who lead the cast — along with former Howrah boy and Khakee creator Neeraj Pandey, The Bengal Chapter’s co-director Debatma Mandal and Tanya Bami, series head, Netflix India, for a chat at Taj Bengal.

Khakee: The Bengal Chapter marks the collaboration of many eminent names. It also takes a much-loved franchise forward. Tanya, from Netflix’s perspective, how did it all come together?

Tanya Bami: We already have a great relationship with Friday Filmworks (the makers of the Khakee franchise) and this is our third outing with Neeraj (Pandey). Khakee: The Bihar Chapter has been an out-and-out fan favourite. When it released (in 2022), it trended for six months. That is a kind of record, and even now, we have a viewing surge for it quite often. There is palpable excitement for this breakout franchise.

We always want to connect deeper with every story in the country. Also, crime as a genre is very popular and Khakee is a huge hat tip to Neeraj’s inherent style of storytelling. He has a way of taking you deep into a story, keeping you on the edge of the seat, connecting the viewer with the characters and then throwing in a surprise at every twist and turn. For viewers, the experience of The Bihar Chapter was akin to being a page-turner, it was so compelling. The experience of The Bengal Chapter will take that a notch higher. This is a very immersive crime drama. We are also happy bringing in new voices like Debatma (Mandal) and Tushar (Kanti Ray) under Neeraj’s tutelage. There is a stellar cast, along with the history-in-the-making element of Jeet and Prosenjit coming together on screen for the first time. The cast also includes Ritwik (Bhowmik), Aadil (Zafar Khan), Chitrangda (Singh), Mimoh (Chakraborty)....

Neeraj, what kind of convincing did it need to get Prosenjit and Jeet together on screen for the first time?

Neeraj Pandey: Thankfully, just a phone call (smiles). For a long time, we have been trying to find the right material to work on together. I am glad that it finally turned out to be a six-hour piece of storytelling because The Bengal Chapter gave us a lot of memories. Prosenjit and Jeet are leading the cast and I am glad to have a mix of young and experienced actors, which, I feel, will be very magnetic for audiences.
Jeet: This was destiny. Sometimes, good things take time. If it has to happen, it will happen. I am very happy it happened with The Bengal Chapter.
Prosenjit: I always knew that if Neeraj came up with something, it would be worth everyone’s time and effort. I heard the script later, but I had complete faith on him even before that. Netflix being a part of this also played a big role in me wanting to do The Bengal Chapter. It has been a great journey, with some fantastic actors who will find themselves in the spotlight once the show releases. People will fall in love with them. As for Jeet and me, it was destiny... we had to come together with Neeraj and Netflix.

Debatma, this was a large canvas for you to play with, peppered as it is with some big names, but you also had the pressure of a huge franchise to contend with. How did you navigate that?

Debatma: Just to be in my city, to be telling a story that feels familiar in many ways, with characters that one sees around us, was enriching. To be able to tell a story set in my land which has the potential to reach a huge global audience has been the biggest high.

I had these stalwarts of the industry to work with and they made me feel so comfortable. Also, to be a part of the writing process gave me an opportunity to process and put out stories that I heard from my childhood and imagine and execute them on a big scale.

Neeraj, a decade ago you wrote and produced the Bengali film, The Royal Bengal Tiger, starring Jeet. Can you talk about the equation that the two of you share?

Neeraj: It is based on a lot of trust and respect. As professionals, we both want to do exciting things and there is a certain level of quality in our work that we are conscious about. We always knew that when we come together, the expectations of the audience will be at a certain threshold and we had to match that.
Jeet: Neeraj is not only a good friend, but a filmmaker and storyteller who I greatly admire. His ability to tell a layered, wholesome story is huge.

The Bengal Chapter shows a very different side of the city... its grimy, seedy underbelly steeped in crime and politics. How much of that was an enticing factor for all of you to be able to bring this facet of the city to the screen?

Tanya: Many stories have been told about Bengal and Calcutta, so many have been inspired from here... but for us, as you said, it was exciting to present it in a completely different light.

Although the stories are completely different, but Bihar and Bengal have an overlap just like every state in India will have an overlap with another. So there will be a cultural resonance, a certain familiarity that everyone will connect with. The Bengal Chapter has also been written in a way where the creators have been mindful about building compelling characters along with building a compelling plot. It has made for an unputdownable watch, even if I say so myself.

The way the performances have landed are exquisite. I am not familiar with the entirety of Prosenjit’s body of work, but I can definitely say that The Bengal Chapter shows him in a very different light, it is quite a surprising presentation of him. Jeet has so much flair! The whole cast takes you on a ride that is very unpredictable and edge of the seat. The fact that it also has a culturally rich backdrop takes it several notches higher.
Neeraj: The opportunity to show a different, unexplored side of the city was the foundational reason why we wanted to make this season. It gave us an opportunity to say and show something that has never been shown before, and that too in such an elaborate fashion. What also appealed to us was having this mish-mash of fiction and reality and mounting it into a seven-episode season.

What kind of inputs did the actors, particularly Prosenjit and Jeet who are homegrown, pitch in with?

Prosenjit: It was natural for us to come up with suggestions. The team had done their recce, but since we are familiar with the city, we did tell them things like: ‘Iss scene ke liye woh jagah bhi dekh lena.’
Calcutta is normally not associated with the so-called don culture. It is a new territory that the show explores. It will be interesting even for the Bengali audiences to watch. Even technically, it was a novel experience for me. I have done a few shots in this series where I didn’t even know where the camera was placed! I used to ask: ‘Achha, shot done? But where is the camera?!’ (Laughs)

Jeet, you have played a cop in quite a few films before. How is Arjun Maitra in The Bengal Chapter different?

Jeet: This is Neeraj’s cop! (Everyone laughs) That automatically makes him different. He is an honest, sincere cop and during the course of the series, you will also get to see how harsh he can be. It is a very well-written character, as is the series as a whole.

Tanya, how has the Khakee franchise added to Netflix’s already-rich global portfolio of crime, both true and fictional?

Tanya: Along with Delhi Crime and Aranyak, Khakee is an important part of the Netflix cop universe. We have had Kohrra, too, after that. Khakee is a very rich universe with a distinct tone of its own. It is hyperlocal, it tells stories of our times which resonate far and wide. Khakee is a franchise that viewers know they should invest in, there is a large fandom for it and it ties in with our overall approach for telling differentiated stories, like we have just done with Dabba Cartel.
Jeet: While I was dubbing for The Bengal Chapter, I came to know that Khakee has a huge viewership in Latin America!
Tanya: Indian content is popular there because of some cultural similarities, with Khakee being one of the biggest hits in that part of the world. Besides the diaspora-rich markets, we have seen that engaging content travels even beyond. The export value of some of our stories is pretty high. Just like we like Spanish or Korean content, they like Indian content.
Neeraj: The world is shrinking. We want to look beyond our stories, we want to see what is happening in other parts of the world. There is a curious audience out there and if they identify with a story, word goes around and that’s how you build a community.
Tanya: The world is shrinking... one story at a time.