Gunjan Saxena: The Kargil Girl

Gunjan Saxena: The Kargil Girl is a 2020 Indian Hindi-language biographical film directed by Sharan Sharma and produced under Dharma Productions and Zee Studios. The film stars Janhvi Kapoor as Indian Air Force pilot Gunjan Saxena, one of the first Indian female air-force pilots in combat, alongside Pankaj Tripathi and Angad Bedi in supporting roles.

Gunjan Saxena: The Kargil Girl
Netflix release poster
Directed by	Sharan Sharma
Produced by	Karan Johar Zee Studios Hiroo Yash Johar Apoorva Mehta
Written by	Nikhil Mehrotra Sharan Sharma
Starring	Janhvi Kapoor Pankaj Tripathi Angad Bedi
Music by	Score:John Stewart Eduri Screenplay by:Himanshu Jaykar Songs: Amit Trivedi
Cinematography	Manush Nandan
Edited by	Nitin Baid
Production company	Dharma Productions Zee Studios
Distributed by	Netflix
Release date	12 August 2020
Running time	112 minutes
Country	India
Language	Hindi

Principal photography commenced in February 2019 and was wrapped up in October; it was extensively filmed across Lucknow. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the film was unable to release theatrically and was picked up for distribution by Netflix. It was released globally on 12 August 2020.

Plot

Beginning in Lucknow, 1984, the story begins with young Gunjan Saxena in a flight along with her older brother, Anshuman. Gunjan wants to look out of the airplane window, but Anshuman doesn't let her. A kind air hostess tends to the problem and takes Gunjan to the cockpit. Looking at the cockpit immediately sparks a desire in her mind to become a pilot as she feels enthusiastic about the plane's features.

A few years later, Gunjan is congratulated for her academic excellence with her proud parents, Anup and Kirti, planning to send her to high school. Gunjan, however, wants to drop out of high school to become a pilot. Anshuman feels that women should not be in the cockpit, but Anup strongly disagrees. A firm believer of gender equality, he allows Gunjan to experiment with her desire to become a pilot. Gunjan makes multiple attempts, but these are thwarted by concerns regarding her educational qualifications and high costs, causing her to return home dejected each time. While her parents differ in their outlook towards her dream, with Kirti hoping her daughter would soon be wary and Anup insistent on allowing his daughter to pursue her dreams relentlessly, an advertisement in a newspaper for acceptance into the Indian Air Force provides Gunjan just the right opportunity for making an effort to enter the air force. Anshuman, who is himself serving in the army, completely disapproves and tells Gunjan that the Air Force isn't a place for women. She, however, ignores him, and goes ahead with the formalities, later finding out on the day of the results that she is the only person who got accepted.

During her medical tests, Gunjan learns that she is one centimeter too short and seven kilograms too much for the Air Force requirements. She is devastated by this, but learns that she can take a retest in two weeks, and discusses it with Anup, who asks her not to give up, and together they come up with a workout regime to lose weight. Across the retest, she still falls short on the height criterion, but the officers conclude that the length of her hands and legs would compensate for it, and accept her into the force. However, while Anup and Kirti are unable to contain their pride, Anshuman still remains in denial of his sister's dedication, but Gunjan decides to ignore his reservations and commences training. During her training, she finds herself subjected to several harsh realities and inconveniences due to the male-dominated order of the air force, and contemplates leaving the camp, when a crisis situation causes her to reconsider when, in 1999, the Kargil war begins, and all Air Force pilots are needed. Gunjan is determined to take part in the war, and despite Anshuman meeting her and dissuading her from participation, disregards his reservations yet again. She finds herself badly needed in a mission and proceeds with it, but is then ordered to abort because the mission is too difficult for her. She reluctantly resigns to the camp. Suddenly, news of army soldiers being heavily wounded in the battle arrives, and it is up to her to save them.

Gunjan and another pilot take separate helicopters and go over to aid the injured soldiers. Back at the camp, army soldiers ask her to abort the mission but regardless of their opinion, she proceeds. Suddenly, as the other helicopter suffers a fire attack, Gunjan rescues the other pilot and the wounded soldiers and successfully completes a risky maneuver, despite being exposed to bullets herself. After the mission and the war, she is rewarded for her courage and bravery, with Anup feeling proud of her.

Cast

• Janhvi Kapoor as IAF pilot Gunjan Saxena
  • Riva Arora as Young Gunjan
• Pankaj Tripathi as Anup Saxena, Gunjan's father
• Angad Bedi as Anshuman Saxena, Gunjan's brother
  • Aaryan Arora as Young Anshuman
• Ayesha Raza Mishra as Kirti Saxena Gunjan's mother
• Manav Vij as Commanding officer Gautam Sinha
• Vineet Kumar Singh as Fight commander officer Dileep Singh
• Chandan K Anand as Chief Instructor Ashish Ahuja

Release

The film was scheduled to release theatrically on 13 March 2020. However, that release postponed to 24 April 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic. It was then pulled from the schedule. Netflix later acquired distribution rights to the film and on 9 June 2020. Netflix released a teaser video introducing Gunjan Saxena and announcing that the film was premiered on 12 August 2020 on Netflix.

Reception

On the review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds a rating of 100% based on 15 reviews.

Anna M. M. Vetticad of Firstpost gave the film 4 stars out of 5, and found the film to be a "deeply moving account of a remarkable woman's heartbreaks and soaring triumph". Saibal Chatterjee of NDTV rated it 3.5 out of 5 lauded Pankaj Tripathi's performance and praised the film for sparing audience a "spectacle of ungainly chest-thumping" and for presenting "good old touching tale of a girl who dared to break free from her cage and fly away – a heroine we can cheer without resorting to a blood-curdling war cry". Mike McCahill of The Guardian praised Kapoor's portrayal of Saxena.

Controversies

Portrayal of Armed Forces

Authorities in the Indian Air Force (IAF) wrote a letter to the Central Board of Film Certification (CBFC) over the alleged "undue negative portrayal" of the IAF personnel. Pointing out that IAF was the first branch of Indian Armed Forces to allow women, the IAF conveyed that they have a gender-neutral workforce and do not propagate gender biases in their service. IAF claimed that Johar had agreed to represent it with authenticity and "make all efforts to ensure that the film helps inspire the next generation of IAF Officers." Certain scenes and dialogues in the film and its trailer were shown to have projected the IAF in bad light. Many ex-army officers expressed similar concerns. A lady officer and helicopter pilot of the same batch, Wing Commander Namrita Chandi also remarked that the makers had exaggerated the gender conflict. Wing Commander Deepa Nailwal also stated the same. Later, the Defense Ministry also raised concerns over the gender disparity shown in the film.

Defending the portrayal of gender bias in the film, Saxena clarified that the "bias is not at an organizational level", but added that "to deny it completely speaks of a feudal mindset and undermines the grit of women officers".

Nepotism

Following the death of actor Sushant Singh Rajput, Gunjan Saxena: The Kargil Girl was subject to a campaign targeted against the film and the film's producer Karan Johar for supporting nepotism by casting Janhvi Kapoor, a member of the Kapoor dynasty (of Surrinder Kapoor), in the film. In a teaser poster announcing the film's 12 August 2020 release date on Netflix, Johar and Dharma Productions were not mentioned. Commentators believed this was due to the nepotism allegations.

Soundtrack

Gunjan Saxena: The Kargil Girl
Soundtrack album by Amit Trivedi & Himanshu Jaykar
Released	3 August 2020
Recorded	2019
Genre	Feature film soundtrack
Length	25:24
Language	Hindi
Label	Zee Music Company
Amit Trivedi & Himanshu Jaykar chronology
Sye Raa Narasimha Reddy(2019) Gunjan Saxena: The Kargil Girl(2020) V(2020)
Official audio
Gunjan Saxena - Full Album on YouTube

The film's music was composed by Amit Trivedi while lyrics written by Kausar Munir.

Track listing

No.	Title	Singer(s)	Length
1.	"Bharat Ki Beti"	Arijit Singh	4:20
2.	"Asmaan Di Pari"	Jyoti Nooran	3:52
3.	"Dori Tutt Gaiyaan"	Rekha Bhardwaj	3:51
4.	"Dhoom Dhadaka"	Sukhwinder Singh	3:12
5.	"Rekha O Rekha"	Nakash Aziz	3:38
6.	"Mann Ki Dori"	Armaan Malik	3:35
7.	"Mann Ki Dori" (Female Version)	Palak Muchhal	2:56
Total length:			25:24

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