Powerfully and poignantly recreating the Bhopal gas tragedy that took place nearly four decades ago, and telling the story of that catastrophic night through the heroics of four 'railway men', The Railway Men is a winner. The four-episode series, the first from Yash Raj Films in its creative collaboration with Netflix, The Railway Men is brought to life by Kay Kay Menon, R. Madhavan, Divyenndu and Babil Khan. t2 chatted with Kay Kay, Divyenndu, Babil, director Shiv Rawail and writer Aayush Gupta on the much-appreciated series.

The Railway Men has earned unanimous praise so far, with many even referring to it as the best show of 2023. Is there anything that you have been told about the show that has made a permanent place in your hearts?

Shiv Rawail: The feedback has been amazing. Over the next few days, I hope the show resonates with a wider audience. I hope this story goes everywhere because it is truly a story of courage, determination, grit, the human spirit and the fact that humanity will always rise above anything else.

Everyone knows about the Bhopal gas tragedy but to show it from the point of view of the heroics of the 'railway men', which is based on true events, is a very different viewpoint. What made you approach it from this angle?

Aayush Gupta: I had known about the Bhopal gas tragedy for quite a while. The angle of 'the railway men' came into my head when I read that the (Bhopal Junction) station was operational the next morning itself! People were taking trains out of Bhopal and coming into Bhopal for relief by 7am and by 10am, the station was fully operational. This was after 20-25 people had died in the night in the station. So this is the time we are talking about when a train used to stop in the middle of the tracks and get delayed for 12 hours, to the extent that passengers would think that the authorities had forgotten about the train! In this scenario, to restart a station where 20-25 people have died within a span of four-five hours, that is the story.

When I realised that this is what happened, I started looking into how it happened. The curiosity stemmed from the fact that this can't be done by one or two people alone. This had to be an organisational effort, one which has not been very well documented.

So our effort was to try and tell a story — from whatever inferences we could draw and based on whatever we knew.... This idea first stemmed from an Internet post, which was some railway man's account.
Shiv: The curiosity of what actually happened between midnight and 10am the next morning is what intrigued us. People died and yet trains were operational the next morning. The footage of the morning after is in the series as well.

Each of your characters may seem simple on the surface but are complex. One is on a mission to bring the killers of his friend to book. One has survivor's guilt. One pretends to be someone he isn't. While playing them did you find it easier to break them down to a facet that you resonated with the most?

Divyenndu: It was anything but easy. My character (Balwant Yadav/ 'Express Bandit') was in a very different space in terms of his need and his want from the situation. It was a task to make him believable because he doesn't really belong to the kind of situation that he is in. Rather he comes from a very opposite sort of a space. It was about going with the flow, seeing people going out of their way to help others, discovering something new about himself and but still keeping that inner want intact that makes him all the more human. With all the flaws and different shades, it was exciting to play such a character who comes from different sides of the same coin.
Kay Kay Menon: I believe that every human being has the entire spectrum of personalities, spectrum of emotions. As an actor, you decide to shut off a few and bring out what is needed. In the case of this man (Iftekaar Siddiqui, station master), you realise that these are the areas in which he operates in terms of his heart and his mind. He has PTSD (Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder), he has a lot of issues... and those things override his personality. He may have once been a boisterous guy but ever since that has happened (his inability to save a young boy from plunging to his death in a train accident), he is a changed man. So keeping that in mind, you shut off the other qualities that you have as a person and you decide that you will operate in these areas. Once you do that, it is your playground. Then you see where it leads you and automatically the moment it starts leading you, you trust it as much as you can and the scenes happen. That's how I do my work.
Babil Khan: There were two pillars of core emotion that basically guided Imad's (Riaz) motivations — which is losing a best friend and worshipping his mother. I have experienced both the things in my own life and I held on to that and I let those things show me where to go.

Shiv and Aayush, this series is emotionally intimate yet epic in terms of scale. What was it like creating that balance?

Shiv: We had a lot of responsibilities while making The Railway Men. We were trying to recreate something so tragic. The responsibility to recreate that era was very crucial. We had to be careful with both authenticity and to present everything aesthetically. We had to present the story in a manner that wasn't sensational but was sensitive. We made a railway station, we had trains and that was a big challenge, but the biggest challenge was the emotional aspect. We had to be sensitive towards people who lost family in that gas leak. Everything else took care of itself.
Aayush: The biggest challenge was that there were multiple vantage points from which one was seeing the story and it's almost real-time from the end of Episode One. So how does one manage the time during which this was happening and yet bring everything together when it is supposed to come together. That was tough.

Kay Kay, you have worked with Irrfan extensively and now you have shared a lot of screen space with Babil in this series. Babil is a very competent actor and an individual in his own right. But do you find any similarities in father and son as actors?

Kay Kay: He has a separate take on acting which is his and from where he operates, I think he is in a very, very good place and if that continues, then the sky is the limit. The honesty that he brings across, the way his personality is, matters. He has the quality of surrender, which is very good.

Divyenndu and Babil, what were your biggest learnings from watching Kay Kay at work?

Divyenndu: Just the sheer commitment he has towards his craft. We have grown up watching him deliver one brilliant performance after another, but still being so much there and not taking anything for granted. He was so kind and generous towards both me and Babil, his support as a co-actor was so amazing. It was a fanboy moment for me every day.
Babil: I just noticed that Kay Kay sir doesn't listen with his ears, he listens with his body. It seems like his body is absorbing vibrations all the time. If one is feeling something, sir will somehow know that you are uncomfortable or you are this or you are that.... His awareness of energy is insane. While shooting, he used to know when I was not happy with the take, he used to know when I was uncomfortable, without me saying anything.