Salakaar review: This Naveen Kasturia series is a cringe-fest

Salakaar review: The only actors who rise above this series is Naveen Kasturia and Mukesh Rishi. Both deserve better.

Rating: 1 out of 5

Written by Shubhra Gupta

August 8, 2025 19:20 IST

Salakaar is streaming on JioHotstar.

In 1974, Pakistan’s vaulting nuclear ambitions were spiked single-handedly by an Indian spy. And now, in 2025, the chatter around nukes is back again. Will Pak succeed this time around? How will India deal with the new threat? That’s the thrust of Faruk Kabir’s five-part series, ‘Salakaar’, reportedly based on real-life agent Ajit Doval’s canny moves back in the 70s, which find a fresh airing.

This is yet another show built on showing the Pakistani establishment, including its then-president, as violent clowns, and the Indians as whip-smart. But it’s hard to take this iteration (writing credits are shared amongst Kabir, Spandan Mishra, Srinivas Abrol and Swati Tripathi) seriously: a scene which is meant to drip menace, has the supreme leader Zia Ullah (clearly based on Zia Ul-Haq, played by Mukesh Rishi) turn up himself at the Indian embassy with a dinner invitation for undercover agent-cum-attache Adhir Dayal (Naveen Kasturia).

Said spy swans into Zia’s mansion, where said leader is busy torturing a suspect, even as Project Kahuta, where the weapons of mass destruction are being built, is underway. You don’t know what is more cringe-worthy: the cartoonish way in which the entire edifice collapses, or in the way, in the present day, Zia’s grandson, the cruel Colonel Ashfaq (Surya Sharma) is back in the saddle, using a cricket bat to bash heads in.

Actually, you could be spoilt for choice, because this whole thing is a cringe-fest. We are presented with the comely Indian agent Mariam (Mouni Roy), now working under an older Adhir (Purnendu Bhattacharya), being ferried to a secret hide-out where the new plant is under construction. She has a way of transmitting information back to New Delhi which involves a pair of glasses. Don’t ask. Meanwhile, in a flashback, we see the spry Adhir, trying to get into the graces of the Pakistani establishment with one of the oldest tricks in the book, a kidnap gone wrong. Told you, don’t ask.

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You may remember Rishi from the 1999 ‘Sarfarosh’, in which John Mathew Mathan and his star Aamir Khan resurrected the spy saga: the former shone in his brief role as a patriotic Muslim. Here, you can see the flash of that actor through the exaggerated scowls: the only other actor who rises above this series is Naveen Kasturia. Both deserve better.

Salakaar cast: Naveen Kasturia, Mouni Roy, Mukesh Rishi, Surya Sharma, Purnendu Bhattacharya, Ashwath Bhatt
Salakaar director: Faruk Kabir
Salakaar rating: One star

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