Explained Row over names of hijackers in Netflix series ‘IC 814: The Kandahar Hijack’
A still from ‘IC 814: The Kandahar Hijack’ Photo credit: Netflix
Netflix’s latest web series IC 814: Kander Hijack A patch of unrest erupted earlier this week when several social media users expressed outrage over the naming of four spoilers from the critically-acclaimed series. In response to the furore, the Information and Broadcasting Ministry summoned the content head of the OTT platform, Monika Shergill. A public interest litigation was also filed in the Delhi High Court by the president of an organization called ‘Hindu Sena’. The petition alleged that the series distorted the religious identity of the hijackers by naming two of the five hijackers as Bhola and Shankar and sought withdrawal of the serial’s certificate.
Directed by Anubhav Sinha, the six-part series depicts the hijacking of flight IC-814 on December 24, 1999, shortly after it took off from Kathmandu to Delhi. The Airbus 300 was flown to Amritsar, Lahore, Dubai and finally to Kandahar, Afghanistan, which was under the control of the Taliban. After six days of intense negotiations, the Atal Bihari Vajpayee-led NDA government ended the hijacking by releasing the three dreaded terrorists, Masood Azhar, Omar Saeed Sheikh and Mushtaq Ahmed Zargar, in exchange for the safety of the passengers and crew on board.
Based on the series in part Flight to FearA first-hand account of events by Biman pilot Captain Devi Saran, which she wrote along with journalist Srinjoy Chowdhury. A disclaimer describes it as a work of fiction set against the backdrop of some real-life events.
Controversy over the name of the hijackers stems from the creative liberties taken by the series’ creators in not making it clear that the terrorists used a code name during the hijack, and seeing it as a piece of information that goes without saying.
Several journalistic accounts of the time make it clear that the hijackers used aliases. They cited a Union Home Ministry press release issued on January 6, 2000, which named the hijackers as Ibrahim Athar, Shaheed Akhtar Saeed, Sani Ahmed Kazi, Mistry Zahoor Ibrahim and Shakir and confirmed the aliases used by them. “These robbers were known to the passengers at the places robbed respectively as (1) Pradhan, (2) Doctor, (3) Burgher, (4) Bhola and (5) Shankar, the names by which the robbers were always addressed. each other,” read the press release.
It seems that some differences are evident among the angry and they seem more concerned about the future when the details of the hijacking are erased from the public memory. BJP leader Amit Malviya wrote in X, “The hijackers of IC-814 were fearsome terrorists, who acquired aliases to hide their Muslim identity. Filmmaker Anubhav Sinha, further legitimizes their criminal intent by giving them non-Muslim names. The result? Decades later, people will think Hindus hijacked IC-814.”
While the series doesn’t clearly spell out that Bhola and Shankar are code names, it unmasks Pradhan when negotiations threaten to end. In a post on X, journalist Nilesh Mishra, who has also written a book on the subject, said Chief Masood Azhar’s brother. In the context of the narrative, Bhola and Shankar are minor players and are addressed by their code names only once in six episodes.
