An action drama set in Mumbai, Shrikant Bashir is about two colleagues, Shrikant Mhatre and Bashir Khan, who work in the surgical operations team (SOT). The two rarely see eye to eye and are constantly bickering about something or the other. But when it comes to defending the nation against terrorist organisations and deadly viruses, will they manage to come together and save the day?
Too many plots spoil the broth
Set in Mumbai, the show revolves around the Surgical Operations Team (SOT). The core unit comprises Shrikant Mhatre (Gashmeer Mahajani), who returns after a brief suspension, Bashir Khan (Yudhishthir Singh), Raveena (Pooja Gor), Chandrika (Ashmita Jaggi), Madan (Kunal Pant) and Ajit (Imran Javed). Together, they deal with everything from thieves who steal codes of national secrecy to serial rapists and international criminals.
When their chief officer dies during a sting operation, Shrikant is appointed the SOT’s temporary chief, much to Bashir’s chagrin. You see, Shrikant is the kind of man who just can’t say no to money. He works with corrupt politicians for money and is a serial rule-breaker. One of the characters on the show even calls him a “jalebi type officer”. Bashir believes that he’s a far more deserving candidate for the position of temporary chief. This is only one of the reasons why Shrikant and Bashir don’t get along very well.
From here on, it seems as if the makers wanted to cover every topic under the sun. The show jumps from case to case and does this in a manner that leaves viewers wondering what they were watching in the previous episode. There’s an international arms dealer, a corrupt pharma company owner, an international contract killer, rapists, terrorists and even an outbreak of the ebola virus in Mumbai thrown in for good measure. All cases are tackled by the SOT.
A 14-hour ordeal
The show drags for 26 episodes. In between shootouts and chases, Shrikant and Bashir argue like kids about the pettiest of things. Their religious identities are continuously highlighted for no good reason. Shrikant often lapses into Marathi mid-sentence and refers to Bashir as “Bashir miya”, before joking about Bashir’s tendency to use Urdu words.
The other players include Shrikant’s love interest Carla (Priya Chauhan), head of forensics at the SOT and the childishly jealous Raveena, who also has her sights set on Shrikant. Mantra plays the international goon Parker. Manish Choudhary is Mr. Kaura, owner of a pharma company. They’re all equally forgettable.
WATCH OR NOT
If you had high hopes about SonyLIV dishing out yet another fantastic show after Scam 1992, lose them immediately.
Creator: Santosh Shetty
Cast: Gashmeer Mahajani, Yudhishthir Singh, Pooja Gaur, Ashmita Jaggi, Kunal Pant, Imran Javed, Mantra, Manish Choudhary
Streaming on: SonyLIV
