In his first face-to-face with the dusht mantri, Daduji is given the line that made the entire nation return home early every weeknight. “Aur aap ka waqt shuru hota hai ab!” That same show had the Big B ask every contestant what they would do for charity if they were to win the jackpot. Most would be magnanimous in their musings –– “kya nek khayal!” –– but very few would go on to win.

Prakash Jha is the man with the noble thought here. But he doesn’t win. Far from it. For two-and-a-half hours he tries to tell the story of an aam-janta uprising that Rajkumar Hirani took two-and-a-half minutes to say. Remember that scene from Lage Raho Munnabhai where the old man strips publicly to claim his pension? Here they keep bickering throughout the movie, sometimes against the system, sometimes against each other, sometimes against themselves, but not a grain of Gandhigiri is cooked, not a speck of Satyagraha registered.

No matter what he claims in his interviews, the film is very much inspired from Anna Hazare and Arvind Kejriwal’s Jan Lokpal movement, replete with the demand for new legislation, indefinite hunger strikes and political party affiliations. Bachchan plays the old Gandhian here while Ajay Devgn plays the educated young Indian protesting for paribartan.

Yes there are personal stories weaved in but they are just there to connect the dots. And the excuse to start the whole revolution is so lame that you can’t possibly warm up to the cause. So Bachchan’s son (Indraneil Sengupta in a likeable cameo) is crushed by a truck and the evil minister (Manoj Bajpayee) announces a compensation of Rs 25 lakh since the deceased used to build highways and flyovers for the government.

When the widow (Amrita Rao) is repeatedly sent back from the collector’s office, Daduji goes and slaps the DM. That thundering typhoon of a slap results in his arrest, which results in the uprising. Yes, really! Now that uprising would go on to become the Jan Satyagraha and fields of Bhopal (shown as Ambikapur) would fill up with extras again (after Raajneeti, Aarakshan and Chakravyuh) to show the power of the common man. (Cue for SRK to re-re-re-re-plug his film for a few more crores.)

And everyone cries. Buckets and buckets of tears. On the road. On the table. In the car. In the office. For dead husband. For dead son. For dead friend. For alive girlfriend. For alive boyfriend. For buried hip flask. Have tear ducts, will cry.

There’s a noisy chorus in the background shouting the name of the film every now and then, in case you start wondering which of Jha’s last few films you are watching. To make things cool in this otherwise archaic setting, tweets and Facebook pages keep floating on the screen to show youth awakening. And there’s a lot of selling going on... from basmati rice to cement, from news channel to ganjee! Plus goodness and Gandhi, of course.

Even in this schmaltzy slush, Bachchan’s solid. There is never a stare that is out of tune. So many films over the years have failed him, but he’s hardly failed a film. It’s his presence here –– as the face of the revolution –– that stops you from crushing candy on your phone.

Having Karna’d him in Raajneeti, Jha gives Devgn the best role of the film but the star looks jaded and largely disinterested. With eye bags that have been airbrushed but face still puffy, Devgn fails to reprise the kind of seething anger that made Jha’s Gangaajal and Apaharan so edgy and engaging.

Kareena credited here as Kareena Kapoor Khan –– no wonder the liplock is from behind her head –– is saddled with the most confused character of the film. She is a TV news reporter but gets so involved with the movement that her picture is splashed on all the Jan Satyagraha billboards and posters. She cries too but is far down the bucket list headed by Amrita Rao who is the real Sobby LLB of the film.

There is no explanation as to why Arjun Rampal is part of the cast. His local leader has negligible screen time and not even a single big scene.

The real showstealer is Manoj Bajpayee, who’s in this purple patch of his career, with Gangs of Wasseypur, Chittagong, Shootout at Wadala and Special 26. He is so much fun as the bad guy here that at times you really want to tell the others not to take themselves so seriously.

Jha really should come out of the chakravyuh he’s got himself into. Lining up of stars in the backdrop of a burning issue and placing them in opposing camps is filmmaking at its laziest. No wonder Satyagraha has turned out into this over-sentimental, over-simplified, over-done porridge of a movie. Over and out!