Kesari Chapter 2, starring Akshay Kumar, R Madhavan, and Ananya Panday, continues to be in public discourse even months after its April release. The Karan Singh Tyagi directorial is a courtroom drama based on the life of C Sankaran Nair (Akshay), a lawyer who challenged the British Raj after the horrific Jallianwala Bagh massacre of 1919. The film has garnered effusive praise from author Chetan Bhagat, even as it faces serious accusations of plagiarism and historical inaccuracies.Saying he “walked out shaken” from the film, Chetan wrote that the film “drags history out of textbooks and makes you feel it in your bones.”According to the makers, the film is based on Raghu and Pushpa Palat’s book ‘The Case That Shook The Empire’. An excerpt from Cinema Express’ review notes that this “text details C Sankaran Nair’s defence against a defamation case” in London, filed by Michael O’Dwyer, Lieutenant Governor of Punjab during the Jallianwala Bagh tragedy.The review further points out that while Sankaran Nair resigned from the Viceroy’s council, contesting the massacre, and condemned the Raj, the film portrays him as a powerful figure, ‘who filed a genocide case against the British in the Amritsar district court’—a claim unsupported by historical records.’Despite such historical discrepancies, Chetan continued his commendation, acknowledging the cinematic liberties taken. “Sure, the film takes cinematic liberties. There are imagined confrontations, dramatized moments, and even some revenge fantasy. Think Inglourious Basterds in Amritsar. But the core truth remains: over a thousand Indians were trapped and massacred in cold blood by British troops in 1919. That horror is real. That pain is generational. And that silence from Britain? Also very real,” he said.
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