Batla House director Nikkhil Advani on maintaining a balanced view of the controversial 2008 encounter
Mohar Basu (MID-DAY; July 8, 2019)

Well before he greenlit Batla House, filmmaker Nikkhil Advani knew that the challenge would lie in depicting the controversial 2008 police encounter without bias. The director reveals that the team dedicated four years to research before taking the John Abraham-starrer on floors.

Besides studying the different conspiracy theories that emerged around the encounter that was planned by Delhi Police Special Cell DCP Sanjeev Kumar Yadav, Advani and writer Ritesh Shah also pored over the proceedings of the judicial enquiry that was set up to probe allegations of a fake encounter.

Advani says, "Ritesh had done a lot of the research. When my team jumped in, we started to create the timeline and get the various perspectives to be ironed out. We read the detailed accounts from both the Delhi Police and the boys' [suspected terrorists] sides and carefully considered what we were going to add to the narrative." The director asserts that it was imperative to showcase both sides of the encounter. "There is a huge responsibility to balance the drama and at the same time, tell the facts as they unfolded."

While gathering information on police encounters can be difficult, Advani says they were fortunate to find abundant material on the incident. "We have stuck to facts that were available in public domain."