New Delhi: Bastar: The Naxal Story is a 2024 Indian Hindi-language political thriller film directed by Sudipto Sen and produced by Vipul Amritlal Shah. It stars Adah Sharma, Indira Tiwari, Vijay Krishna, Shilpa Shukla, Yashpal Sharma, Subrata Dutta and Raima Sen. The film was announced in June 2023 with the title of the film being based on the Naxalite-Maoist insurgency. Bastar district of Chhattisgarh. Bastar was released theatrically on 15 March 2024. The film received negative reviews from critics and was a major box office bomb.

In a special conversation, director Sudipto Sen shared his views on the film.

Q: After the success of The Kerala Story, what challenges did you face while researching the film?

Answer: Research on Bastar started even before the research on Kerala Story. This was much before 2014. I grew up amidst the devastation of this Maoist movement in my native place, Jalpaiguri, North Bengal. It’s the same with my co-writer of the script. He was actively part of this movement and went to jail. So Bastar’s research was decades old. We were ready with the script around the same time The Kerala Story was ready. Vipul ji and I decided to do both the films almost at the same time.

Q: What inspired you to delve deeply into the topic of Naxalite-Maoist insurgency in Bastar district for Bastar: The Naxalite Story?

Answer: As I said, I have seen with my own eyes the movement which started in 1967 at a place called Naxalbari, which is just 40 km from my native place. As I was growing up, I saw the movement grow from North Bengal to South Bengal, then Bihar, Jharkhand, Odisha, Andhra Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh. And, by the time I decided to make a film on it, Bastar had become the center of this movement. Therefore, for academic reasons and out of curiosity and interest in the Maoists, I have continued to visit Bastar for years.

Q: How did you approach the process of balancing the narrative between the broader political context and the individual stories of characters like Ratna and Neerja?

Answer: It was not difficult. I was sure that I was going to tell the stories of Neerja and Ratna. So the narrative evolved between them—in fact, I never deviated. I knew that the story of Ratna and Neerja included everything of Bastar. So, to tell their stories, I got a chance to speak about the politics there. And the film Bastar is the story of the Salwa Judum period between 2005 to 2013. And that is my story of Bastar.