I have always been conflicted in how I feel about Kota Factory. It has been, no doubt, a consistent winner in terms of popularity, scoring high on the relatability factor, but its semi-romanticisation of the obsession to crack competitive exams has always made me quite uncomfortable.
Yes, of course, the Netflix show, over three seasons, mirrors what is reality. Of course, Kota — the city with more students than any other demographic — is exactly the way it is shown in the series, caught as it is in a time flux from one JEE exam to the next. Yes, of course, we get to see a bunch of youngsters trying to keep friendships and relationships alive even while solving equations in their sleep, their shared moments of laughter and tears truly defining what Kota Factory has meant to its viewers.
But Kota Factory, until very late into Season 2, chose to remain on the periphery of the darkness that this world comes with. The suicide of a student at the end of that season proved to be a turning point in its narrative and rattled its core, in ways both good and bad.
In its latest season, spanning five dramatic episodes, Kota Factory, in many ways a coming-of-age story, finally grows up. Its black-and-white frames — a palette which has distinguished it from every other show out there — now have shades of grey. It forges a journey towards a crescendo which shows its key players experiencing both ecstatic moments of epiphany as well as moments of crushing disappointment.
If there is one word to describe Season 3, it would be vulnerability. Everyone, at some point, comes face to face with a situation that has the power to completely change their lives. Vaibhav’s (Mayur More) meltdown in Episode 4 where he launches into a breathless tirade against the whole joint entrance examination system is not played out for laughs (Pyaar Ka Punchnama monologue, we are looking at you). It makes the reality of what these young, stressed-out minds face on a daily basis, all too real.
Meena’s (Ranjan Raj) moment of truth where he has to support himself financially by taking up teaching even while being a student himself and cutting down on his own study hours, illustrates the reality that many lower middle-class students have to grapple with. In the same vein, Uday’s (Alam Khan) accident brings him within sniffing distance of giving up on his dream.
The biggest instance of the show’s changing fabric arrives early... and hits hard. ‘Jeetu Bhaiya’ (Jitendra Kumar), shaken by the death at the end of the previous season, is no longer the demigod-like figure helping his students at Aimers with both Physics problems and life lessons. Jeetu, who we see grappling with more questions than answers for the first time ever in Kota Factory, now wants to be ‘Jeetu Sir’, aiming to detach himself from the lives of his students for the sake of his own sanity. A lucrative job offer only helps him in changing the course of his life.
Working with a script by Puneet Batra and Pravin Yadav, director Pratish Mehta’s attempt to give a new direction to Kota Factory is commendable. With Tillotama Shome’s ‘Pooja Didi’, who teaches chemistry at Aimers and seamlessly moves into the position being slowly vacated by Jeetu Bhaiya, the season does well in more ways than one. Pooja’s words in Episode 4: “Kota ab ek factory bann gaya hain,” brings Kota Factory to its full circle moment. Would we want to watch more? We would, as long as it stays within the grey.
