Season 2 of Bindiya Ke Bahubali marks a striking shift in tone, moving from humour to a far more intense and emotionally charged narrative. With power struggles turning ruthless and relationships pushed to breaking points, the series dives deeper into ambition, morality and survival. In this exclusive interview with The Free Press Journal, director Raj Amit Kumar discusses the organic evolution of the story, the interplay between observation and imagination, directing powerhouse performances, and portraying violence and political tension with emotional honesty rather than spectacle.
Q. Season 2 feels markedly darker and more brutal than the first. What pushed you to take the story into such an unforgiving emotional and moral space?
There was no specific intention to shift from a lighter space to a darker one. The story itself naturally progresses from comedy to tragedy, so beginning with humour felt appropriate.
However, as the narrative unfolds, we attempt to explore deeper themes: the emotions we carry, the absurdity surrounding us, and the consequences of ambition. So, there wasn’t a deliberate plan to make Season 2 darker; it’s simply the organic progression of the story.
Q. Power struggles in the series feel disturbingly familiar to real-world politics. How much of Season 2 is drawn from observation, and how much from imagination?
There is no imagination without observation, is there? Whatever we can imagine is, in some way, deeply connected to the knowledge and observations we have around us. Of course, you can set aside that knowledge and observation and imagine something entirely different.
But there is always a profound relationship between imagination and observation. I’m not sure how to create a strict distinction between the two. If the show feels close to home and familiar, I think that’s a good thing. We watch stories to experience something more deeply human.
So, if it feels familiar, touches our hearts, and makes us feel something, I believe that is its true success.
Q. Several characters are pushed to their psychological breaking points. As a director, how do you balance emotional realism with dramatic intensity without tipping into excess?
Doesn’t emotional realism bring dramatic intensity? I’m not sure how to neatly separate these ideas; they're all interconnected.
To answer your question about avoiding excess, yes, that’s always a challenge. You constantly have to decide where to stop and how long to stay with a particular emotion or moment. I don’t think there’s a fixed rule for it. I make that decision moment by moment, depending on the scene or the character I’m working with.
Often, the moment itself tells you when it has gone far enough when it feels like, “Okay, this is enough.” If there’s a risk of excess, you recognise that you’ve explored it sufficiently and it’s time to move on.
At the same time, you want to go as deep as possible until you discover something new within it. But you also have to sense when staying longer would dilute the emotion, when the feeling might start to fade if you push it too far.
Q. The ensemble cast delivers some of their most restrained yet explosive performances. What was your process of directing such seasoned actors within a tightly wound narrative?
I think it all begins with the characters you’ve written. Every actor is playing a specific character, and their performance naturally follows from that. If a character has a restrained approach to what’s happening around them, the actor portrays that restraint. If the character is a wild card, the actor brings that unpredictability to life.
So, in that sense, the process is quite simple. I’m very clear about the people I’ve imagined, shaped, as you mentioned earlier, through observation. I have a strong understanding of who these individuals are.
Directing, for me, begins from that clarity.
Q. Ranvir Shorey and Saurabh Shukla share a particularly volatile dynamic. How did you shape that rivalry on screen? Was it more scripted or discovered during rehearsals?
Every father and son have conflicts in some way. Here, we’re looking at a father and son figure who hold very different views about the world, about how to exist in it and carve out a place for themselves. Their perspectives are not only different but also flawed and complex in their own ways.
Once that dynamic is clearly understood and well-written in the script, the actors are free to explore it. From there, they can really take flight and approach each scene according to what it demands.
Q. Women characters in Season 2 are not just reactive but strategic and formidable. Was this a conscious corrective to how power is usually portrayed in political dramas?
But women are active in real life, aren’t they? We see women around us every day.
If you’re comparing this to other films or stories and the way women are represented on screen, I can’t really speak for that. But in real life, women are active agents. Depending on the situations they face, they take action and make choices.
The same applies to my character and the circumstances she is dealing with.
Q. The violence in the series is stark but never ornamental. What were your ethical or aesthetic boundaries while staging brutality?
I think the word “ethical” becomes very complicated, even problematic, when applied to a storyteller or filmmaker. I’m not particularly concerned with that label while telling a story. For me, the only real ethic is sincerity toward the subject I’m dealing with.
I’m not sure what other definition of “ethical” I would apply in this context. If there is sex or violence in a story, it isn’t included merely for the sake of it. But even if some filmmakers choose to use it purely for effect, that’s their creative freedom. I might even do that at some point. A filmmaker should have the liberty to explore any subject in whatever shape or form they choose.
In this case, however, the story is about human beings who live in a violent world. The violence emerges naturally from how their lives intersect, how they interact, and how conflicts arise. I wasn’t writing scenes simply to include action sequences or killings.
For me, it is an emotional story, a drama about the India we live in. It is ultimately about these human beings. So if violence or sexuality appears, it does so within that context, as an organic part of their world and their experiences.
