Neeraj Pandey on whether it is important to separate art and politics while creating content: ‘I don’t think we need to take sides’

You started your filmmaking career with Anupam Kher in A Wednesday, how was it collaborating with him for The Freelancer?

(It is) Always pleasure to work with him and (I am) always looking forward to opportunities to collaborate with him. This has been an exciting three-year journey that’s now going to unveil on the first of September on Disney Plus Hotstar.

We started with the book called Ticket to Syria; Shirish Thorat has written the book, we acquired the rights, we put it into development and then right in the middle of Covid (Covid-19) we started trying to assemble the cast and crew together. Mohit (Raina) was one of the first people who came on board and after these years we are finally here.

Is the book based on a true life incident, or is it fiction, and how have you adapted it in your show?

It is based on a true life incident that happened. Of course the setting was different and we’ve changed it to our context for our audiences over here. But that’s just about it, we’ve only changed the setting and the core of the incident, what’s there in the book remained, we are pretty loyal to that. What got me interested in the first place is that it is a very unique character, the one that Mohit is essaying in the series. He is playing a Mumbai cop, ASI (Assistant Sub Inspector) to begin with and then life leads him through this very weird journey and he ends up becoming a global machinery.

Now we’ve not seen a character like that before because it’s never come out that way and what was striking for me was that it is not just a very natural progression of ASI from Mumbai Police to that post, it’s a completely different word. What Shirish has done that he has made us friendly with the world that he has created.

Your films, and recently shows like the Special Ops and Special Ops 1.5 have a fan following of its own. You are also making a Neeraj Pandey universe of sorts. How do you react to the reaction your audience has for your work?

We are blessed to have them on our side. It’s the result of the journey we’ve had and the trust that we’ve built over the years. Right from the first film which Mr Kher was again a part of (A Wednesday) to now, I think one thing that we’ve constantly done is not to undermine their intelligence. We have always respected our audience, never taken them for granted. It is a mutual relationship that is based on trust and respect. We take it as a challenge to come up with more exciting stories, so that the next time we come up with something we raise the bar and give them something new to think about, to get entertained, to be aware of. So that’s the relationship we share with our audience, we don’t take them for granted, we respect them and keep trying to push the envelope every time we come.

How do you keep your politics separate from your art, or do you?

No, I don’t think we need to take sides or anything of that sort. The first and the foremost thing that you need to take care of is how true you are to the story that you are telling. That story will empower you to make the right choices. So if you are honest about it then it is not too much of a struggle at all. In the case of The Freelancer, we had a novel, we had the story and we didn’t have to make those choices, it was all documented, whatever the choices were made, we are showing that and hence it was not a difficult one at all.

Naseeruddin Shah in A Wednesday.

Can there be a bias if there is no separation of art and politics while telling a story?

I think the right question should be ‘should there be a bias’. The simple answer is no.

Most of the time in shows like these we show terrorism coming from a particular community, and they face a lot of hate for it. How do we handle this problem?

The world has not changed, I’ve been trying to answer this question since 2008 (when A Wednesday released) and it’s going to be fifteen years that we are talking about terrorism. This goes to show that there is a problem in the first place, I believe that the problem is still continuing and if it is continuing what’s the problem in talking about it. Like I mentioned, you asked a question about bias, it is not our place. Should there be a bias, the answer is no. I don’t think we would have survived if we would be biased towards a particular point of view and that’s it. Our job is telling the story with a way that you would like to take a point of view, the rest remains with the audience.

Please also try and understand that the audience is consuming different kinds of content, whether it is The Kashmir Files, whether it is a Gadar 2, now that we’ve seen that in the last (few) weeks. So they are watching, they are looking at stories and making up their own mind about it. Both the stories are poles apart, you can look at them and they are chalk and cheese.