In the last one month, both the new series, Netflix’s original Delhi Crime and now Amazon Prime’s ‘Laakhon Mein Ek’ have brought us close to the realities of the major events of the nation which were dug deep beneath all the political and media manipulations. ‘Delhi Crime’ is based on investigation files of unfortunate Nirbhaya case of Dec 16,2012; ‘Laakhon Mein Ek’ draws its inspiration from the botched up cataract surgery scandals in the states of Punjab and Chhattisgarh.

Created by Biswa Kalyan Rath and co-written by Hussain Dala, ‘Laakhon Mein Ek’ is an eye opening(pun unintended) tale of politically handicapped and corrupt health care system of our nation but what makes it stand out is its sincere and honest yet emotional portrayal of the realities without exploiting the ample thrills and scandals provided by the theme and script.

Season 2 of Laakhon Mein Ek is prominently the story of Shreya Pathare, a junior doctor who is unwillingly sent to a remote village to organise a cataract camp. Elections are near and the desperation of the Chief Minister of taking credit for organizing large numbers of successful cataract camps under his government has imposed hierarchical pressure upon CMO Patwardhan(Sandeep Mehta) and his senior colleague Dr. Mansi(Praveena Deshpande), drug suppliers, rural hospital staff and eventually on junior doctors like Shreya.

Shreya is an earnest, idealistic and feisty professional who wants to finish the task in her hands diligently and then move to US for better opportunities but this doesn’t make her an escapist. Her naivety and honesty are sometimes baffling. She is stubborn and loyal as Nutan Kumar from Amit Musarkar’s ‘Newton’ but Nutan Kumar still acts cleverer than her. A part of her character arc also reminds us of Ashutosh Gowarikar’s ‘Swades’ but Shreya is no Mohan Bhargava who moved by the love of his motherland leaves US and stays back in his village to serve his people. Shitlapur too is no lovely, scenic, virtuous place like Charanpur. The doctor’s quarters are unhabitable, toilets are unusable, villagers are unforgiving and distrusting. In one scene Shreya is bullied and threatened by an assistant to the assistant of a politician.

The writers do not succumb to stereotypes by associating villagers with righteousness and Shreya, an outsider with exploitation. The villagers too are deceitful for their own benefits. They are victims both out of choice and out of circumstances.The most trusted and popular doctor in the village, Jagmohan is practicing illegally and is remorse to any guilt caused by his ill treatments.

One of the other important characters Babu( Rupesh Tillu), an over smart, sneaky compounder who doesn’t shy away from procuring illegal medicines from black market. He too wants to escape to the city and run his own medical store but gets a sense of purpose with Shreya’s mission and turns into her biggest ally.

The director Abhishek Sengupta is not interested in showing the picturesque locales of the village, no scenic greenery nor heritage sites, what we get to see are the dearth of basic facilities, mosquitoes filled rooms, mud puddles and Dr. Shreya surviving her stay on the packets of maggi and biscuits.

Shreya’s journey and her fate is inevitable. We can foresee the devils in her story, her battle, the way the events will shape up and the verdict.In this chain of politics and corruption, there is also a supplier who is willing to supply expired products because he has arrears of crores to be paid. The arrears which are not being cleared by the government department and the government whose politician’s apathy is the cause of this whole misery.

The extremely well researched script by the writers brings forward many unknown malpractices and the hierarchy of accomplices to this convoluted system.

Dr. Patwardhan and Dr. Mansi are the seasoned players and unaffected by the scandal, their experiences have made them stoic. They all are villains made out of the system.

Shreya trying till the end to convince both of them that the actual discrepancies might have occurred with the supply of medicines is one of the most heartbreaking scenes. It’s saddening and both annoying to see a young idealist woman totally oblivious to the convoluted practices of her field. Honestly, Shreya’s naivety annoys after a point. Why she couldn’t foresee where the things were heading?

And therefore, Shreya’s disbelief in her compromised bosses and colleagues looks ridiculous. The director stir even the compromised souls of the audiences showing them that it’s foolish to expect anything happy and good out of it. But Shreya is not one of us, she is truly lakh on mein ek, both in idealism and idiocy.

Shreya’s fate in the end reminds us of Sudhir and Vinod getting arrested on the account of murder of D’ Mello. They all are failed heroes, also a cautionary tale. They all deserve this, probably for believing too much in the system.

Shweta Tripathi’s face in dismay, her widening eyes in disbelief and her breaking body language makes her tailor made for the role of Dr. Shreya Pathare. She shows a range of emotions looking innocent, honest,hopeful, victim and hero all at once. She is supported by a very efficient supporting cast like Arun Nalawade, Rupesh Tillu, Abhay Kumar, Sandeep Mehta and Suyash Joshi. A very special mention to the moody music by Advait Nemlekar, emotional and perky background score by Bigyna Dahal and bleak, suffocative cinematography by Akash Agrawal.