Nila Madhab’s Sony Liv original, The Jengaburu Curse, is a suspense-filled miniseries that recently completed airing all of its seven episodes. With Faria Abdullah as the main indigenous protagonist, this series calls itself one of India’s very few Cli-Fi (Climate-Fiction) shows that focus on the environment.
The storyline of The Jengaburu Curse revolves around Priya Das, a London-based financial analyst who gets a call from a stranger named Ravichandra Rao, asking her to come back to India to identify a body that he believes could belong to her father, Das. However, once Priya reaches India, she sees that the body isn’t her father’s but that he’s still been missing for almost a week.
As Priya tries to find her father, she falls into a deep rabbit hole of human greed and environmental exploitation. Each episode features a new part of the conspiracy being revealed, and Priya has no choice but to fight for her tribe and bring awareness to the devastating effects of mining.
Asides from Faria Abdullah in the role of Priya, the cast of The Jengaburu Curse consists of Nasser as Ravichandra Rao and Sudev Nair as Dhruv. Other crew members include Makarand Deshpande, Deipak Sampat, Melanie Ruth Hill, and Indraneel Bhattacharya.
The Jengaburu Curse: What Happens In The Series?
In the last few episodes of Jengaburu Curse, we see Priya finding out the cunning scheme that she was caught up in had made her believe that her father was kidnapped by the crazy Naxals when in reality, her father was their leader. The government had labeled Das’s people as naxals as they were trying to stop the exploitation caused by Mining in their area.
Not only was this extensive mining harming the environment, but it was also affecting the local Bondrias with skin diseases that caused them to pass away within a few days of contracting the sickness. Priya is arrested after her father’s death as she’s accused of being a naxal sympathizer. Priya is released on one condition, which states that she must leave for London and never come back.
Seeing her own tribe in danger was enough reason for Priya to stay back and continue her investigations secretly with the help of Dhruv and the others. The final episode begins with Priya and the tribals gearing up to go into the mines and see what’s really going down in these horrid places.
After not being able to break into these mines, the only way left is for the tribals to keep the guards busy while Priya and others secretly rush into the mines. Once they’re inside the red mines, Priya soon finds out that the substance that they were mining was none other than the extremely radioactive element, Uranium.
The Jengaburu Curse Ending Explained
As we approach the end of The Jengaburu Curse, we see that Priya lets Dhruv know that the element that Dutta mines was after was Uranium, a powerful substance that can even be used to make nuclear weapons. Dhruv immediately informs the central agencies about the mines, and they are soon shut off. As for Mr. Rao, he ends up losing his life in chaos with the tribal people and people from the Dutta mines.
Although the Dutta mines were no longer going to operate, the tribal people indigenous to Jengaburu could not live in the beautiful place as the land was contaminated with Uranium (which was not as exposed before the mining took place).
This is the reason why the remaining Bondria people are given new land to live in, where they wouldn’t have to worry about radiation or any of the severe diseases associated with its exposure.
The government chooses to hide the news about the Dutta Mines as exposing it publicly on a larger level would have caused much more outrageous problems with other countries. Priya is finally able to protect her Bondria people from more harm and can provide them with a good place to live, something which was always her father’s dream.
The ending scenes of The Jengaburu Curse show Priya receiving a message which congratulates her for her excellent work, however, we don’t see who the message is from. Seeing the way Priya received the message at the right time, it was most likely someone who knew about the whole Jengaburu ordeal.
Overall, The Jengaburu Curse was able to successfully deliver its negative portrayal of mining and the effects it has on not only the environment but also the people that become involved in it unintentionally.
Nila Madhab is known for her work that always tries to bring attention to a significant cause, and this time, it was excessive mining. Asides from this, we also see how various tribes are often mistreated and not given the respect that they deserve in their own land.
The Jengaburu Curse is a must-watch for any suspense or Sci-fi lovers who’d like to see these genres in a new style. At present, all episodes of The Jengaburu Curse are available to stream on Sony Liv.
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