‘Panchayat' Season 4 review: Election season delivers mixed results

The Hindu

3 days ago

In its four seasons, Panchayat has evolved considerably. It has possibly taken its biggest leap yet towards shedding its image as slice-of-life comedy. Panchayat's Season 4 was highly anticipated with a political showdown expected between Phulera's current chief (Pradhan) Manju Devi (Neena Gupta), and her rival Kranti (Sunita Rajwar). While the show this season moves along the contours of the electoral battle, its insistence on hanging on to its core identity as casual comfort watch delivers a mixed result.
Picking up days after where Season 3 left off, the show opens with Brij Bhushan (Raghubir Yadav) recovering from the attempt on his life, and Abhishek (Jitendra Kumar) looking at legal ramifications of starting a brawl with Bhushan (Durgesh Kumar). He continues to await the results of his CAT exam, but that takes a backseat as the show sets itself up for the upcoming Panchayat elections.
Panchayat Season 4 (Hindi)
Directors: Deepak Kumar Mishra, Akshat Vijaywargiya
Cast: Jitendra Kumar, Raghubir Yadav, Neena Gupta, Chandan Roy, Faisal Malik, Sanvikaa Pooja Singh, Durgesh Kumar, and others
Episodes: 8
Runtime: 35-40 minutes
Storyline: Phulera witnesses an exciting election season as Manju Devi and Kranti Devi go toe-to-toe
Panchayat has made it a habit to end its seasons on a cliffhanger, presenting a rough draft of the next season for its viewers. With the characters more lived in and the daily oddities of Phulera established, the audience has naturally become better at predicting these scenarios and their outcomes. The writers, in this regard, struggle to race ahead of expectations and predictions.
With Phulera in the throes of local election season, the plot tries to cover all possible bases, with all levels of political subterfuge at play. So, while we are following the ramifications of the former MLA (Pankaj Jha) being sidelined by his own party, the show cuts to give a glimpse of Manju Devi's grand plan of hoarding up all the free potatoes being distributed by Bhushan. In the eight episodes the show also doubles as a Whodunnit, as it unravels the mystery of Brij Bhushan's shooter. The show finds itself unfolding in this mixed affectation of seemingly intense political battle interspersed with the comedy of the banal. It tends to switches between but often fails to carry the weight to ensure a seamless transition.
Another glaring issue that makes itself noticeable is Panchayat's insistence on remaining a Boy's Club. Manju Devi is not made part of nearly enough serious political business, and while she becomes the face of the electoral campaign, she only shadows her husband in the campaign. Neena Gupta, though underutilised, makes the most of her screentime.
Panchayat began with the formula of a slow-moving slice-of-life comedy where the best scenes often ended up being the uncomfortably long ones, the ones that stretched a gimmick just a little too far and made it work. But now that the show has sought to reinvent itself, its new themes do not always gel with its traditional formulae. A recurring line that makes its way in the latter half of this season re-iterates the dirty business of politics. Brij Bhushan describes the whole affair as one filled with lies, tricks and deceit, but the gravity of the sentiment and the consequences are rushed off for a lighter moment that breaks an otherwise impactful momentum.
However, this season may be better understood if it is watched as a filler one to set the show up for a fifth season. It may excite viewers for the show's future, but it leaves question marks over its present.
All episodes of Panchayat are streaming on Prime Video