Silchar's Saptaraj Chakraborty on launch of his JioCinema show Bajao: 'Aamir Khan, Aditya Dhar and Sooraj Barjatya watched snippets of my work'

Saptaraj Chakraborty, co-director of Bajao says that the biggest takeaway from his upcoming series on Jio Cinema is friendship. “I always believed that a friend is not someone who is with you when you are at the peak of your life. A true friend will support you even when you have screwed things up in life”, Chakraborty, who was born and brought up in Silchar, insisted.

Bajao, a musical comedy that will see rapper Raftaar make his acting debut will be streaming on Jio Cinema for free from August 25, 2023. In a conversation with Barak Bulletin over the phone, Chakraborty admitted that he is feeling a little nervous ahead of the release of his series. He along with Shiva Varma have been making films right from the days when they were engineering students. The director duo started out with music videos. They even shot one hit, Happy Single with Raftaar.

“At that time we discovered this crazy world of rappers which was very flamboyant and glamorous. They always wanted expensive cars, guns and high speed shots in their videos. They also dealt in a lot of cash”, Chakraborty added. One night both the directors were traveling around Delhi in a car with cash when an idea struck them – what if the cash gets lost! This was how the basic premise or plot of Bajao came to life.

Bajao is part of an ambitious project by Jio Studios involving some of the biggest names of Indian films. A total of 100 shows and films are being produced under the banner including the Shah Rukh Khan starrer Dunki. Chakraborty still gets excited while talking about the night when the project was officially launched. The who’s who of the Indian film fraternity attended the gala event.

“I don’t know how to describe the feeling. I mean there was Anil Kapoor, Mithun Chakraborty and Prasenjit Chatterjee. We got to chill out with directors like Raj and DK”, he said.

“People like Aamir Khan, Aditya Dhar and Sooraj Barjatya were watching snippets of my show. I called up my mother and told her about that night. She was also excited. It was a special feeling”, he added.

Almost every character in Bajao draws inspiration from someone the director duo know in real life. The cast includes some very good actors including national award winner Adinath Kothare. There were workshops held involving the actors before the actual shooting began. Sahil Khattar, Tanuj Virwani and Mahira Sharma too have prominent roles in the series.

It has been a remarkable journey so far for somebody who was born in the small town of Assam. Falling in love with films while growing up and later pursuing filmmaking as a profession Saptaraj Chakraborty has already achieved something which very few can even think of. But he is not one to be resting on his laurels.
“I have a bigger responsibility now. For me even if one person looks at me and starts believing that he too can pursue filmmaking than I will be happy”, Chaakraborty signed off.