But more than that, Nakkash is important — because it’s a good thing when movies refuse to let us slip into complacency. Because it’s a good thing when movies remind us that democracy, secularism cannot and must not be taken for granted. Because it’s a good thing when movies tell us that our job is not done just by standing proudly and humming along when Jan Gan Man is played on the screen.

All we did was take a pledge. Now we must honour those words with our actions, work.

The tone gets too sanctimonious and earnest and often screechy, the acting veers towards the melodramatic but film’s plea to save manushyata (humaneness and humanity) is well-intentioned and hits the right spot. The timing of its release makes one wonder if it’s an unintended metaphor of our times. Or if it’s a film that is marooned and stranded because the cause it’s propagating is itself a lost one. At least for now.

Clearly the intention of the film is to hold a mirror to where we have reached as a nation, with hatred and bigotry replacing trust and ‘bhaichara’, the sort of intention we need to see more of because it would seem only cinema can join the vanishing dots of the India that used to be.

In a nutshell, this drama on social issues ticks all the boxes of a progressive and offbeat movie, and despite its inconsiderable flaws, one should give this ‘art film’ a try!