In the still alleys of an imaginary Robertsganj, silence speaks louder than screams. Akshay Shere’s Bhagwat – Chapter 1: Raakshas steps into that silence, peeling open the festering underbelly of small-town life — where exploitation thrives not under the glare of power but behind the soft smile of civility.
The film begins with the disappearance of a young woman named Poonam. Inspector Vishwas Bhagwat (Arshad Warsi), arrives to investigate — his presence bringing a faint promise of order to a place where hope has long been bartered for survival. But Bhagwat himself carries shadows from his past; once entangled in a similar scandal, he is both the hunter and the haunted.
The trail of the missing girl leads him to Samir (Jitendra Kumar), a quiet college professor, whose calm exterior conceals something far more primal. Samir is not the archetypal villain that cinema loves to parade. He is ordinary — devastatingly, chillingly ordinary — the kind of man who would never raise suspicion, even in the most paranoid crowd. And therein lies the horror.
“Raakshas nahin hoon main, baaz hoon. (I am not a demon. I am a hawk)”.
That single line slices through the film like a blade — a self-portrait of a predator who watches, calculates, and strikes with precision. Samir doesn’t revel in carnage; he studies it. His monstrosity is intellectual, even surgical. Jitendra Kumar — known for his gentle, affable roles in Panchayat and Kota Factory — slips into this moral abyss with unnerving restraint. His stillness becomes the performance; his gaze, the weapon.
Warsi, meanwhile, brings a weary gravitas to Bhagwat — a cop not sculpted from righteousness but from fatigue. There’s grit, yes, but also guilt; an understanding that justice in such towns is less a system and more an act of faith. Best remembered for his comic ease in Munnabhai and Dhamaal, Warsi revisits the psychological greyness he once explored in Asur. Here, his silences weigh heavier than his words, as if every pause hides an unspoken confession.
Shere’s direction is deliberate and brooding. Bhagwat – Chapter 1 unfolds in shadows — light is rationed, almost forbidden. Daylight appears only in brief, deceptive intervals, as though purity itself feels intrusive. The soundscape, too, is sparse: footsteps, rustling leaves, an occasional thud — each amplified by absence. This restraint gives the film its pulse, its dread.
The screenplay resists the temptation to blame the powerful or the obvious. Instead, it exposes the predator within the ordinary — the professor next door, the polite stranger, the man whose empathy is a mask. Evil here doesn’t roar; it whispers.
Shere flirts with subtexts of interfaith tension and romance but wisely avoids sensationalism. What seems familiar at first soon twists into something disturbingly unexpected. Every thread that feels predictable frays without warning. The viewer’s certainty becomes the film’s most dangerous illusion.
Young women, drawn to the professor’s gentleness, become unwitting participants in their own undoing — a commentary on how affection, unexamined and impulsive, can blind one to the quiet signs of danger.
In essence, Bhagwat – Chapter 1: Raakshas isn’t a tale of monsters lurking in the dark — it’s about the darkness lurking within those who smile. Akshay Shere crafts a world where justice limps, morality blurs, and redemption feels almost mythical.
Warsi and Kumar are both cast against their usual type — and both triumph. One wears his scars like armour; the other hides his fangs behind intellect. Together, they form the film’s erratic heartbeat — conflicted, fragile, and disturbingly alive.
The result is a thriller that doesn’t chase adrenaline — it stalks it. And when it finally grips you, it doesn’t let go. It lingers like an aftertaste: bitter, cold, and impossible to wash away.
Movie: Bhagwat – Chapter 1: Raakshas
Director: Akshay Shere
Cast: Arshad Warsi, Jitendra Kumar, Tara Alisha Berry, Devas Dikshit, Hemant Saini, Ayesha Kaduskar, Rashmi Rajput
OTT Release Date: 17 October 2025
Streaming on: ZEE5
