“Khakee: The Bihar Chapter,” tells the story of the rivalry between “super cop” Amit Lodha and “super villain” Chandan Mahto. Although the Netflix series is based on the book written by the real-life Amit Lodha, it is narrated by Ranjan Kumar, who follows Lodha and Mahto from their “humble” beginnings all the way to their action-packed end. Lodha is portrayed as a righteous police officer who is ready to play the role of a hostage if it means that the protestors are going to unblock the train tracks. He has a wife, Tanu, who is ready to digest his sexist remarks just because he is doing so much for the state of Bihar. On the flip side, Mahto is a “gutkha”-eating fiend who will use every opportunity he gets to make some money and increase his reach and power. He apparently doesn’t have any family, friends, or morals. That’s why he carelessly helps in the kidnapping of a child, kills mafia boss Abhyuday Singh, and conducts a massacre in Manikpur, which puts him in Lodha’s crosshairs. Then, over the course of seven painfully dull episodes, Lodha tries to corner Mahto and send him to jail.
Major Spoilers Ahead
Amit Lodha And His Team Use Chyawanprash Sahu To Zero In On Chandan Mahto
After the Manikpur massacre, Amit Lodha requests Mukteshwar Chaubey and Sudhir Paswan to enable tapping into the calls from Chandan and his gang. With the help of BSNL Kolkata’s senior executive, Saumya, Lodha manages to listen to and track Chyawanprash Sahu. He learns that Chyawanprash, despite separating from Chandan, is conducting his operations elsewhere. Additionally, he is having an affair with another woman while maintaining his relationship with his wife, Meeta. And while listening to Sahu’s late-night chats is torturous, Lodha observes that he usually talks to his son and his wife but not with his daughter. When Sahu finally calls Chandan, he gets the latter’s number, thereby allowing him to listen to his chats as well. But instead of going after him, he orders Ranjan to follow Meeta in Deogarh and catch Sahu as soon as he comes to meet her. Post that, Chandan not only calls up Lodha to threaten him and his family but also figures out that Lodha is tracking him via his phone calls. He even sends Lodha on a wild goose chase so that he can go and massacre the businessmen who weren’t paying up.
In order to track Chandan down again, Lodha takes a different approach. Firstly, he fires Kanhaiya, the cop who is in cahoots with Chandan. Then he feeds him the wrong information that Chandan has been killed in an encounter. When Kanhaiya spreads this misinformation, a lot of calls go to one Dr. Virender, thereby indicating he’s the person who should be followed to get to Chandan again. And when Meeta (Sahu’s wife) calls Virender to check on Chandan and talks to Chandan as well, Lodha and his team realize that she is having an extramarital affair with Chandan while Sahu is rotting in the jail. From this (oh-so-predictable) plot twist, Lodha comes to know that Chandan is probably somewhere between Sahibganj and Farakka (West Bengal), and he travels to that area with his team to get a rough idea of the place. After getting a hold of Chandan’s latest number, Lodha impersonates a secret police informer and keeps Chandan engaged in a tall tale about a betrayer in his gang and whatnot. On the day of his capture, he orders his team to fan out and listen to every background sound on Chandan’s end while Lodha keeps him on the call so that they can pinpoint the house he’s in. If this sounds similar to “Narcos” Season 2, you’re not wrong.
See More: ‘Khakee: The Bihar Chapter’ Review: Neeraj Pandey’s Brand Of Bland Crime Dramas Continues To Worsen
Amit Takes Chandan On A Hate Rally, And Chandan Hits Back By Almost Killing Amit’s Family
Amit gets Chandan to come to the roof of his house, and that allows him and his whole team to see where he’s hiding. This leads to a chase through Sahibganj and ends on the highway with a truck nearly killing both Amit and Chandan. Amit informs only Paswan about Chandan’s capture. Paswan congratulates him but orders him not to make this news public. Because once Chandan’s gang and supporters know about it, they’ll attack Amit’s squad and help Chandan run away again. So, Amit decides to change cars midway and continue their journey. Chandan begins his mind games with Amit’s team first. When that doesn’t work, he gives rape threats to Amit’s wife. That triggers Amit enough to stop the car and point his gun at Chandan’s face. While most of the team coaxes Amit to pull the trigger, Ranjan urges him to make a decision only when he’s calm and level-headed. In order to get his bearings, Amit calls up Paswan, and he talks him out of conducting a police encounter so that Chandan can pay for all his crimes instead of getting the easy way out.
Ravinder Mukhiya requests Amit and Ranjan to take out a rally where Chandan can be shamed so that his image comes crashing down. They allow it without anticipating the backlash. Because right after sending Chandan to jail, Chandan’s gang terrorizes Manikpur and forces the eyewitnesses of that massacre to back off. Yes, even after admitting to seeing Chandan, Sahu, and the rest kill their own, the people of Manikpur come up with flimsy alibis to avoid more violent incidents. Ranjan tries to win over the trust of Manikpur by promising them 24×7 police protection. But one of the residents underscores the main issue of “Khakee: The Bihar Chapter” by saying that the uniform is the only difference between the police and someone like Chandan Mahto. If you remove that, they are one and the same. Next, Ranjan reveals Meeta’s extramarital affair with Chandan to Sahu to manipulate him into testifying against Chandan. However, that doesn’t work in his favor. And then Chandan does the unthinkable by sending a bomber to kill Tanu and her son. Both of them survive, but Ajit (a fellow police officer responsible for protecting Amit’s family) dies.
‘Khakee: The Bihar Chapter’ Ending Explained: How Does Amit Lodha Exploit Chandan Mahto’s Achilles’ Heel?
Due to the stalemate between Chandan and Amit, the latter goes after Vinayak, Chandan’s old friend, and a politician who’s on the rise, and asks him to stop supporting Chandan. After some initial hesitation, Vinayak obliges. This, for some reason, allows Ranjan to straight-up kill every member of Chandan’s gang. I think the showrunners want to say that all these guys were under protection until Vinayak had their backs. But how that allows a lone police officer to go on a killing spree is beyond my comprehension. Anyway, Verma reprimands Vinayak for making such a drastic decision without consulting him. Vinayak says that the police are aware of the fact that he’s planning to build a mall in Patna, and that too on the land that belongs to the Forest Department. So, if he continues to associate himself with Chandan, then that piece of information will be made public, and he’ll be tried legally for it. With the politicians out of the way, Amit goes to Sahu and motivates him to testify against Chandan because if he doesn’t, Amit says he is going to make sure that his son’s future goes into the gutter.
After Sahu’s testimony, the court finds Chandan and Sahu guilty of committing the Manikpur massacre and imprisons them for the rest of their lives. But Sahu feels that it won’t be enough to demoralize Chandan and keep him from retaliating from his jail cell. Therefore, Amit goes to Sahu’s house after finding out that the girl they were assuming to be Sahu and Meeta’s daughter is actually Chandan’s daughter from his first marriage. He takes a picture of her and presents it in front of Chandan, letting him know that he can ruin her life if Chandan doesn’t silently accept his sentence. And, by the looks of it and as confirmed by the narrator, Chandan promises not to exact revenge against Amit or all the people who have “betrayed” him for his daughter’s sake. Everyone else goes home while the viewers are left with the notion that the police are essentially criminals in uniforms. They can give out death threats, break the rules, and react emotionally because criminals are doing the same. In fact, the police are more dangerous than criminals because, while criminals can be sent to jail, the police continue to be protected by the law and celebrated by the system through shows like this. So, does that make “Khakee” a reflection of this sad reality or an endorsement? You decide.
“Khakee: The Bihar Chapter” is a 2022 Drama Thriller series created by Neeraj Pandey.
