Panchayat: Season 1

Panchayat: Season 1
Image source: Google

Ratings: 3/5

Director: Deepak Kumar Mishra

Genre: Comedy, Drama

Release Date: 03 April 2020

Streaming Platform: Amazon Prime Video

Star Cast: Jitendra Kumar, Chandan Roy, Raghuvir Yadav, Faisal Malik, Neena Gupta, Biswajit Sarkar, Vishwanath Chatterjee, Deepak Kumar Mishra

Plot: Panchayat is about the journey of an engineering graduate Abhishek (Jitendra Kumar) who joins as secretary of a Panchayat office in a remote village of Uttar Pradesh, the only job offer he had in hand, an unattractive government posting as he was unable to find a good job in the city.

Raised in the city, he goes straight from hanging out with his friends, instagramming to the dusty village, and hence finds it very difficult to adjust to the rural lifestyle and the mindset of the people. Therefore, his sole purpose in life was to prepare for CAT, the MBA entrance exam as he was determined to  move out of the village and find a better job. And in order to crack the national level exam, he was in need of basic necessities like electricity, water and other comforts to study, which makes him realize the  vast disparity in the lifestyle of rural Indians and urban Indians.

How Abhishek tackles the crazy villagers, the difficult village lifestyle and will he be able to find a job out of the village is what the webseries is all about.

Review:  Panchayat, the 8 episode webseries - a perfect combination of comedy and drama set in the village of Uttar Pradesh has attempted to paint a ‘slice-of-life picture’ of the village life that breaks the Indian small town in mainstream narratives where either everyone is seen singing and dancing in the lush fields, or where everyone has a weapon slinging behind. It brings a fresh perspective to the rural narrative and it works for the most part.

The tone remains light-hearted throughout as each episode presents a new problem that Abhishek deals with but none of these problems seems particularly grave or appear to be building up to something bigger. At the onset, it seems as though Abhishek will slowly warm up to the village and its people, and work for their welfare. But this isn’t Swades!

When it comes to performances, all the actors in the series are very convincing in their respective characters. Jitendra Kumar makes his character very convincing and shines in the character of Abhishek.

Actor Neena Gupta as Manju Devi, the village pradhan or head could have been given more impactful dialogues though she leaves an impact with her acting skills and does justice to her script. Raghuvir Yadav plays her husband Brij Bhushan Dubey well, who governs the village on her behalf. Faisal Malik, the deputy pradhan Prahlad Pandey and Chandan Roy who plays the office attendant Vikas are the surprise packages.

The dialect has been taken good care of with an engaging script. The plot is well crafted, and has portrayed finely the struggle of every middle-class young man who, due to the lack of better options, settles down for a job below his liking. The ending, not that it's lazy writing, but is predictable.

Panchayat is not trying to show the dark side of the Indian rural setup, nor is it trying to point out the gender dynamics. It does nod at all of this, but still leaves the viewers with a happy afterthought, that all is not lost.

Overall, Panchayat is a man-driven, light-hearted show. This, of course, is deliberately done, for that is rural India - women never come to the fore.  But it still serves a purpose - helping Abhishek find himself, or just being able to be comfortable being himself. In today's trying times, this is the need of the hour and is quite a pleasant watch!