What the women of Kasturba Nagar went through when Akku Yadav was ruling the village with his gang is spine-chilling, nerve-racking, and mind-numbing. Thanks to Zee5’s 200 Halla Ho web series that was made in 2021 on Akku Yadav and the women he harassed, I already knew about this incident and the story of Akku Yadav. This is actually the first Indian Predator season that I have watched hoping that Netflix tells the story as it is.
When I read about Akku Yadav online, especially on wikipedia where all his crimes are listed, I thought that 200 Halla Ho web series couldn’t do justice to these women. To an extent, Netflix’s Indian Predator: Murder In A Courtoom did.
I would say that it is still made within the boundaries and hence keeps mum about a lot of things. If you haven’t read or heard about this guy previously or the way he tortured the women of Kasturba Nagar, you might consider him just another goon but he was more than ‘just a goon.’ Why am I saying this? Because just another goon, when comes out of the jail, doesn’t come out stronger than before. Just another goon doesn’t knock the door of the house he wishes to every night to rape a woman of his choice. Just another goon doesn’t threaten to rape a woman in front of the police and they, definitely, don’t laugh together at it. Just another goon doesn’t rape a woman on the street in public view and get away with it. If he would have been just another goon, the police wouldn’t have arrested him to protect him, to save him from the furious crowd.
Indian Predator: Murder In A Courtroom being a docuseries sticks to the facts and speaks to real people who were actually involved in the murder. The accused sits in front of the camera, looks into its eye, and confesses that he/she was part of the plan.
When the women can, on camera, say that they cooked mutton after hearing the news of Akku Yadav’s murder, you know how desperately they wanted to kill him. When someone’s death, or let’s say, a brutal murder is celebrated , you can imagine the hell they were living in.
You know what I liked the most about this docuseries? It makes you question a lot of things. It makes you think. When a lawyer, in front of the camera, says that the families in this village are not financially stable and hence the women get into prostitution to earn some extra cash… When he says that these women were not raped by his client, your blood boils. When the women are asked why did you not report the rape earlier, when the police never filed a complaint against Akku Yadav, you question the entire system. I went a little further and wondered who was actually supporting this guy and his heinous crime? How can someone murder and rape women even on the streets in public view and never get arrested for it?
This is the problem which we have failed to tackle. When convicts are freed, how can someone against whom the complaints were never filed get arrested? Anyway, Netflix’s Indian Predator: Murder In A Courtroom has spoken to everyone in this docuseries – from the victims to Yadav’s lawyer, journalists, and the eye witnesses. All have spoken about their point of view. Now, you can either believe that there was much more than what the eyes saw and what the ears heard about Akku Yadav’s murder but whatever or let’s say, whoever was the reason behind this murder, it was the curse of those women that killed Akku Yadav. I remember one man said how can women kill someone so brutally? All I can say is only a woman can get to that level of brutality. Do not underestimate her.
It took only one voice, the voice of Usha Narayane, to change the fate of the villagers. That one voice had the power to change the destiny of the entire village. In the face of death, she found courage and that courage turned tables around. That courage wiped off the darkness and made way for the sun to shine bright, once again, in the skies of Kasturba Nagar.
When I was watching Indian Predator: Murder In A Courtroom, there was a lot going on in my mind but as I sit down to write, I cannot write much. Maybe because I am still decoding a lot of things in my head trying to make sense of how can someone like Akku Yadav roam freely terrorizing an entire community to an extent where people either left the village, committed suicide, or straight away picked the weapons and butchered a man without the fear of law.
Will justice never prevail in this country?
I hope, someday it will…
ALSO READ: 200 Hallo Ho Web Series Review
Streaming On: Netflix
The Digital Popcorn 