Aashram

Aashram
Promotional poster
Genre	Crime drama
Screenplay by	Kuldeep Ruhil, Tejpal Singh Rawat, Avinash Kumar, Madhvi Bhatt
Story by	Habib Faisal
Directed by	Prakash Jha
Starring	Bobby Deol
Voices of	Sanjay Masoom
Composer	Advait Nemlekar
Country of origin	India
Original language	Hindi
No. of seasons	2
No. of episodes	18 (list of episodes)
Production
Producer	Prakash Jha
Production location	India
Cinematography	Chandan Kowli
Editor	Santosh Mandal
Camera setup	Multi-camera
Production company	Prakash Jha Productions
Distributor	MX Player
Release
Original network	MX Player
Picture format	HDTV
Audio format	Dolby Digital
Original release	28 August 2020 (2020-08-28) – present (present)
External links
Website
Production website

Aashram is a Hindi-language crime drama web series directed by Prakash Jha for MX Player original.^[1] It is produced by Prakash Jha under Prakash Jha Productions.^[2] The series stars Bobby Deol along with Aaditi Pohankar, Darshan Kumar, Chandan Roy Sanyal, Tushar Pandey, Anupriya Goenka, Adhyayan Suman, Vikram Kochhar, Tridha Choudhury, Rajeev Siddhartha, Sachin Shroff, Anurita Jha, Parinitaa Seth, Jahangir Khan, Kanupriya Gupta, Preeti Sood and Navdeep Tomar in key roles.^[3][4] It is written by Madhvi Bhatt, Avinash Kumar, Sanjay Masoomm, Tejpal Singh Rawat and Kuldeep Ruhil.^[5] Its first season was made available for streaming on OTT platform MX Player for free from 28 August 2020.^[6]

The trailer of the second season titled "Aashram Chapter 2: The Dark Side" was released on 29 October 2020.^[7] This season, the story continues, while more colours of the Baba's Aashram are revealed and a mix of blind faith and politics are put on display.^[8] The second season is available for streaming on OTT platform MX Player from 11 November 2020 for free.

Plot[]

The story revolves around a preacher Baba Nirala (Bobby Deol), whose followers (mostly from the disadvantaged sections of the society) have blind faith in him and will do anything that he asks of them. But in reality, Baba Nirala is a conman turned godman, who ensures that his devotees devote their wealth to him and stay attached to the ashram for life, while politicians Hukum Singh (Sachin Shroff) and incumbent CM Sundar Lal (Anil Rastogi) vie for his support in the upcoming State Legislative Assembly Elections owing to his large number of followers, which only increase after a pop singer, Tinka Singh (Adhyayan Suman) decides to conduct tours with Baba Nirala to promote his new song.

Meanwhile, SI Ujagar Singh (Darshan Kumar) is a cop who isn't really interested in his job and simply follows his seniors' orders, until he meets Dr. Natasha (Anupriya Goenka) in a case related to a skeleton found on the property of an industrial group which has good ties with Sundar Lal. Her constant pestering, along with the stubbornness of a small-time journalist Akhivendra Rathi a.k.a Akki (Rajeev Siddhartha) encourages him to take up this case, along with his assistant-cum-sidekick Sadhu Sharma (Vikram Kocchar).

Every episode unfolds a mystery that revolves around the Baba Nirala. Whether the cop will find evidence and prove anything is left for the Part II of 'Aashram' . All episodes of Part II of 'Aashram' were aired on 11 November 2020 on MX Player.

Controversy[]

In Oct 2021, the Bajrang Dal group targeted Ashram web series sets and Prakash Jha for defaming Hindus and the entire ashram system, through his web series.^[9]

Cast[]

• Bobby Deol as Kashipur Waale Baba Nirala / Monty Singh
• Chandan Roy Sanyal as Bhopa Bhai/Bhopa Swami/Bhupendra Singh
• Aaditi Pohankar as Parminder aka Pammi
• Tushar Pandey as Satti aka Satwinder Lochan
• Darshan Kumar as SI Ujagar Singh
• Anupriya Goenka as Dr. Natasha
• Tridha Choudhury as Babita
• Vikram Kochhar as Sadhu Sharma
• Anil Rastogi as CM Sundar Lal
• Sachin Shroff as Hukum Singh
• Anurita Jha as Kavita
• Rajeev Siddhartha as Akki
• Jahangir Khan as Michael Rathi
• as Mohini/ Sohini
• Adhyayan Suman as Tinka Singh, a famous pop singer
• as Himanshu, Kavita's brother
• Keshav Pandit as Kavita's father
• Mala Sinha as Kavita's mother
• Rupesh Kumar as Nonny, Pammi's cousin
• as Warden of Girls Hostel
• as Bagga, PA of Hukum Singh
• Navdeep Tomar as Sunny, an Aashram Goon
• as Gabha, an Aashram Goon
• as Johnny, an Aashram Goon
• as Gurusharan, Pammi's Father
• as Navjot, Pammi's Mother
• as Vishal Singh, Pammi's Best Friend
• as Iqbal Kureshi, Pammi's Coach
• as Gurubaksh, Nonny's Father
• as Kuljot, Nonny's Mother
• Amit Sinha as IG DP Sharma
• Amit Sahu as Haricharan Das, a Police officer
• Ikram Khan as Samandar Singh, Bada Mohalla Head
• Ajay Singh as Sumit Kaushik, CM's PA and Brother-in-law
• as Baba's Wife
• Akhilesh Tripathi and as Baba's sons
• as Baba Mansukh, Baba Nirala's Guru and the predecessor of the ashram
• Uday Veer Singh Yadav as Ishwar Nath, Sanober's father and Baba Mansukh's close aide
• Aakash Pandey as Rohtas, a lower cast sewadar
• Varun Tamta as Vikrant Punia, NCB Officer who busts Tinka
• Midhat Ullah Khan as Malang, an old sewadar at Aashram
• Subrato Roy as Goyal, Aashram Head Administrator
• Manish Mishra as Yogesh Rehghar who is a transgender
• Preeti Singh as Sangeeta Wrestler
• as Sangeeta's brother
• Akanksha Pandey as Renu, an Aashram Wrestler
• as Sadhvi Mata
• Preeti Sood as Sanober
• Arun Trivedi as Harbhajan Singh, Bada Mohalla Resident
• Adarsh Pandey as a member of Bada Mohalla.
• Jaimin Panchal as a member of Bada Mohalla
• as Rohit, a lower cast sewadar

Marketing and release[]

Promotion[]

The official trailer of two seasons of this web series was launched on 16 August 2020^[10] and 29 October 2020 respectively by MX Player on YouTube.^[11]

Release[]

Season 1 and Season 2 was made available for streaming from 28 August 2020 and 11 November 2020 respectively on OTT Platform MX Player.^[12]

The series is made its TV debut on The Q channel on 11 October 2021.

Critical reception[]

Writing for NDTV, Saibal Chatterjee rated the series 3 out of 5 adding that “Prakash Jha's digital debut is ambitious, provocative and action-packed.” He praised the performances of actors and concept handling from the director Prakash Jha.^[13] Rohan Nahaar of Hindustan Times wrote that Aashram is “a show that doesn’t have the courage of its convictions. The self-censorship of sex scenes is emblematic of the trepidation with which Jha approaches the story. As it turns out, that ridiculous disclaimer was utterly unnecessary.”^[14]

Episodes[]

Series overview[]

Season 1 (2020)[]

Season 2 (2020)[]

References[]

External links[]

• Aashram at IMDb