Jai Gangaajal 2016

Jai Gangaajal (English:Hail The Ganges) is a 2016 Indian Hindi action drama film, directed by Prakash Jha. It is a sequel of the 2003 crime film Gangaajal, and stars Priyanka Chopra in the lead role with Jha appearing in a supporting role. The film also features Manav Kaul, Rahul Bhat and Queen Harish. The film was released worldwide on March 4, 2016. The Government of Madhya Pradesh declared Jai Gangaajal as tax-free status on 9 March 2016.

Bablu Pandey the MLA of Bankipur district and his brother Dablu Pandey(ninad kamat) run a jungle raaj in their town of Lakhisarai. They are grabbing land for a power plant whose financiers are backing their party politically. The home minister of the party appoints SP Abha Mathur(Priyanka Chopra) as the SP expecting her to be soft on criminals and supportive of her mentor who is the home minister. But she goes all out against the criminal brothers. Her subordinates get encouraged by her brave acts against corruption and slowly are bringing the jungle raaj to an end. Bhola Nath Singh aka B.N. Singh(Prakash Jha) is a corrupt circle inspector who has helped the brothers for a long time and using legal loopholes and other corrupt ways to keep them out of harms way in return for financial and political support.

As the brothers feel cornered, Dablu out of desperation makes the mistake of kidnapping an orphaned teenage girl and her younger brother who refuses to give away the land. During the kidnapping Dablu rapes and kills the girl and hangs her from a tree showing this as a suicide as her father had committed suicide too under pressure of selling the land. B.N. Singh comes to his senses after seeing this brutal crime and tries to arrest Dablu Pandey which starts a riot in the town inducing the younger brother of the murdered girl to use his belt throttle Dablus neck and killing him, seeing which the common people gather around some more goons and corrupt Sarpanch and kill them and hang them on the tree claiming it to be suicide and this also starts a chain reaction where corrupt people are killed in similar manner elsewhere. Abha is frustrated unable to control these illegal killings and tries to control it. B.N. Singh gets injured when ganged upon and attacked. But in a final show down Bablu Pandey also dies and closes the circle of political corruption.

Cast

Priyanka Chopra as SP Abha Mathur IPS

Prakash Jha as Bhola Nath Singh aka B.N. Singh

Manav Kaul as MLA Babloo Pandey

Murli Sharma as Munna Mardani

Pranay Narayan as Ratnakar

Rahul Bhat as Pawan Raghav

Kiran Karmarkar as Ramakant Chowdhary

Ninad Kamat as W. Pandey

Vega Tamotia as Sunita

Ayush Mahesh Khedekar as Nagesh

Jagat Singh as Amreek Tiwari

Tanmaay Ranjan as Sujeet

Mikhail Yawalkar as SP Naveen Chandra

Queen Harish as Dancer in drag

Vipin singh as IG

Ankush Bali as Motipehalwan

Review

Rajeev Masand gave the film 2.5 stars out of 5, mentioning it as a predictable police drama filled with the usual stereotypes but added that Priyanka Chopra and Prakash Jha's performances engaging. Shubhra Gupta from The Indian Express gave only 1.5 stars, writing "Priyanka Chopra's too-sophisticated unmade-up-make-up is very distracting, even in her few convincing moments. And the film goes on for far too long, even when we know how all of it will end." However,she was all praise for Prakash Jha's full-fledged role. Srijana Mitra Das from The Times of India gave the film 3.5 stars. She praised the dialogues,editing and story, writing,"It weaves together crucial contemporary threads – land mafias, corrupt netas, broker-cops, broken farmers-with Jha's enduring concern about vigilante justice." She applauded Priyanka Chopra's performance, writing, "Priyanka Chopra shines as 'Madam Sir' Abha Mathur, whose lightning slaps and lathi charges have you applauding. This is a polished, restrained Priyanka, who barely smiles but conveys the ethics and empathy of the law." She commended Rahul Bhat's cameo and the dynamics between BN and Dablu but was disappointed with Manav Kaul's performance in particular. Rohit Vats of Hindustan Times gave 2.5 stars, writing, "Jai Gangaajal is just another attempt at making a blockbuster, but it lacks the depth of Gangaajal and Apharan. Still, there's enough for the audience to keep whistling and clapping." According to him,Prakash Jha is restrained in dialogue delivery and really effective in emotional scenes. He wrote that the storyline doesn't offer anything that haven't seen before but it has tear-inducing moments with explosive dialogues. Bollywood Hungama gave 3 stars out of 5, mentioning the screenplay engaging, cinematography decent, editing praiseworthy, dialogues excellent. As for the performances, Priyanka Chopra delivers a superlative performance, be it her perfect and impeccable timing or her intimidating screen persona and presence but Prakash Jha pushes himself a bit too hard to get the nuances and the finer points of his character. Writing for NDTV, Saibal Chatterjee gave 2.5 stars, saying, "Despite the topical themes it tackles and all the supercharged action that unfolds on the screen, Jai Gangaajal never really kicks into top gear

When it comes to directing of films belonging to the 'political thriller' genre, Prakash Jha has been very good at it. JAI GANGAAJAL only acts as yet another testimony to the same. While the story establishes itself in the engaging first half, the second half revolves around the confrontation between Priyanka Chopra and corrupt villains. In the second half, the camera is not on Priyanka Chopra, but on Prakash Jha, which totally takes focus away from the central character. Despite all the odds, Prakash Jha manages somehow to keep the viewers on the hooks with his engaging narrative.

The storyline of Jai Gangaajal doesn’t offer anything that you haven’t seen before. This holds true even if you have watched only Prakash Jha’s films. But, it has tear-inducing moments and Priyanka Chopra ensures they keep coming at regular intervals. Once again, the dark underbelly of the Hindi heart land has been explored with explosive dialogues and superficial sensibilities.

Jai Gangaajal is just another attempt at making a blockbuster, but it lacks the depth of Gangaajal and Apharan. Still, there’s enough for the audience to keep whistling and clapping. Priyanka Chopra is the new ‘Dabangg’.