Santosh Singh On Ranneeti Being Compared With Fighter, Operation Valentine: Woh Justice Nahi Kar Paaye | EXCLUSIVE (2024)

Santosh Singh's latest directorial venture Ranneeti: Balakot & Beyond, is currently streaming on Jio Cinema. Featuring Jimmy Shergill, Lara Dutta, Ashutosh Rana, Ashish Vidyarthi, and Prasanna in pivotal roles, the web series delves into contemporary warfare. It explores how warfare extends beyond physical borders, encompassing social media, digital strategies, and covert political manoeuvres capable of reshaping geopolitics.

A few days ago, we sat down with the director to talk about the show in brief, which is based on a true story. The one thing that pushed him towards creating this show was the 'hybrid warfare', one of the central topics used in the show. Santosh told Zoom, "It's a different warfare strategy, which was fought on social media, news media and journalism, which is very different than what is being done. And, I find, it was very interesting to explore this side of the story, rather than just Balakot, which everybody already knows."

The fictional drama, drawing inspiration from real-life events that gripped the nation, is captured on an epic scale. Featuring unprecedented aerial sequences and outstanding performances, the story covers both the action and personal sides of India's biggest defence operation.

Creating this type of show requires extensive research and fact-checking and addressing the same, Santosh quipped, "The series is based on the true events. Aapke zimmedari double ho jati hai. Very little scope for errors. Kaafi time laga iske research mai. Ye poora mission classified hai, iske exact details kisi ke paas nahi hai.

(Translation: Your responsibility seems to have doubled. Very little scope for errors. We spent a lot of time researching it. This entire mission is classified, its exact details are not available to anyone.)

"We had to go through a lot of research. We had different consultants and experts whom we spoke to. Unse kaafi details mili, which are not out in media. It took a year and a half to write it, getting everything correct before shooting. Koi ungli nhi utha paega ki ye cheez galat hai," he added.

"But, how to execute it was a big challenge, because aap bohot tight budget par kaam karte ho series mai," Santosh told us.

Recalling the incidents, where he faced challenges while shooting the series, he shared, "Just recreating the whole Pulwama bus blast, I remember, we didn't get the CRPF vehicles. So, we had to make 50 vehicles from scratch, to get that real effect. It took 2 days to reach the mountains, where we were shooting. It was one of the most expensive days of shooting, logistically and financially."

Talking about the aerial action scenes, he added, "We were not getting permission to shoot in India, in any of the air bases. We had to go all the way to Serbia. We shot on Serbian airbase, Serbian aircraft. We used those and at the same time, this Russia-Ukraine thing was going on, Serbia was very close. And while we were shooting at the air base, we got the permission. Everything has to be so meticulously planned because ek plane bhi yaha se take off karta hai, and Serbia is such a small country, ki woh dusri country ka border touch karne lagta hai. They told us, that our planes would be shot down if it happened. So it was like, very challenging. We had five cameras set up for this whole process.

This year, we have watched several films touching upon the Balakot airstrike, be it Hrithik Roshan-Deepika Padukone’s Fighter or Varun Tej-Manushi Chhillar’s Operation Valentine. When asked what made him delve deeper into a story revolving around the Balakot airstrike.

Santosh cheekily said, "Actually, when we started writing, we were the first ones to start this. Jaise bolte hai, good things take time, toh humein thoda jyada time laga. And, once it comes out, you can see, it is not about Balakot, there's more to it."

"Start from Pulwama, aap uske depth mai ghuste ho. Mujhe lagta hai, joh kaafi saari cheezein aayi hai, but woh bohot hi touch and go wala feel hua. Woh kahi pe, justice nhi ho paya. To be fair, to them, aap do ghante main operate kar rahe ho, aapko do ghante mai poori kahaani batani hi, toh thoda sa you miss out on detailing part of it.

(Starting from Pulwama, you are immersed in the depth of it. I feel many have covered the topic, but it was a touch-and-go feeling. Justice has not been found. To be fair, in a film, you have to tell the whole story in two hours, you miss the detailing part.)

And, when we were making this, we had this luxury of time. We went into more detail and humne poora event cover kiya, it's not just Balakot. It's very different from what has come out and what has been told so far," Santosh signs off.