Freedom at Midnight: A Retelling Onscreen
When a web series on a historical narrative takes on the story of 1947 – the year Pakistanis and Indians found themselves free from (or rid off) British rule, one must first note who’s telling the story. British, Indian, or…Pakistani? History might be a tightly threaded string of facts and figures, e.g. dates of independence or partition, (depending upon which side of the border you live), war, invasions, treaties, how many dead, and who made the first governor general…but beyond that, it’s all about perspectives. Freedom at Midnight, the web series is especially intriguing as it takes a British perspective, and then adds on Indian layers, or shall we say, Gandhian? But let’s begin from the beginning…
Freedom at Midnight, the web series is adapted from the book written by Dominque La Pierre and Larry Collins. The book was based on a British perspective of true events that led to the independence of the Indian sub-continent from the British; beginning with the appointment of Lord Mountbatten of Burma as the last Viceroy of British India, and ending with the assassination and funeral of Mahatma Gandhi.
At the outset, one must credit the makers that despite the story being told endlessly and in many versions, Freedom at Midnight, the web series is a watch that grows on you with every successive episode. The main players; Vallabhai Patel, Jawaharlal Nehru, Lord Mountbatten, Mahatma Gandhi and Muhammad Ali Jinnah battle out political (and personal) ideologies in a pre-1947 landscape. At some points, the negotiations become so intense as to demand nerves of steel, even for those sitting across the screen. From Jinnah’s unrelenting stance to gain a homeland for Muslims, to Gandhi’s relentless struggle for a united India, to Nehru, swinging from Gandhi to Vallabhai Patel’s ideology as he masterminded, (euphemistically, guided) Nehru to navigate Jinnah’s razor sharp stance, and Mountbatten’s persistence to break a deal; historical events were replayed through a lens that paid tribute to communal tensions, the motivations driving its characters, and a game of political powerplay that, one has to say, even from a Pakistani point of view, stayed largely true to the characters,… until it didn’t…
Because first, we address the positives, hold on for those who see the thorns before the rose… will come to that, eventually.
Let’s begin with the characters then
It is interesting to note that Sardar Vallabhai Patel, the right-hand man for Jawaharlal Nehru in the Indian Congress, the one side-stepped by Gandhi who handed the reins of power to Jawaharlal Nehru was in fact, holding on to the reins of power in intriguing ways. In fact, his was the mind that eventually convinced Nehru to succumb to the partition of the Indian sub continent and hold on to the Hindu majority areas to make up India. This move went against Mahatma Gandhi’s united India ideology where Hindus and Muslims would live together ever after. Rajendra Chawla did an admirable job of depicting the mastermind behind the battle of wits and political strategy that nailed the game in 1947. His friction with Gandhi, switching paths and taking Nehru along with him gave deeper insights into how the Congress party, from a stance of a united India, ultimately concluded that the sub-continent must be divided to retain centralized leadership of the region.
In historical narratives so far, Vallabhai’s character has not been highlighted as much as Nehru’s, Jinnah’s and Mountbatten’s, who played key roles. Hence his role in the movement served to add substantial and yet untapped context as to how Congress leadership had to submit to Jinnah’s demand for a separate Muslim homeland.
Jawaharlal Nehru played by Sidhant Gupta mirrored a young man, grown old under the tutelage of Mahatma Gandhi, yearned to keep his mission of non-violence alive. However, with time, he detoured in political strategy and aligned more, though reluctantly, with the idea of a divided India, one that gave him immense pain as he parted ways with the teachings of his revered teacher and friend, Mahatma Gandhi.
Chirag Vohra as Mahatma Gandhi nailed his character to a tee. This was one man whose characterization embodied the unfathomable love and respect he receives in India. Gandhi’s character was one that juggled sharp intellect with a childlike obstinacy – his commitment to non-violence and his utmost belief that Hindus and Muslims must live under one banner was aptly portrayed. What was also interesting to note was the perpetual rivalry between Gandhi and Jinnah, the way in which both historically prominent figures served to misunderstand the other, both respecting the other as a worthy opponent yet, never seeing eye to eye. Gandhi assumed Jinnah’s ego craved power, and Jinnah assumed Gandhi wanted Muslims to live as a minority, forever subjugated, forever suffering.
Neither budged an inch from his stance, yet both were revered by their followers – worthy opponents for sure.
Muhamad Ali Jinnah essayed by Arif Zakaria delivered some powerful (and some perhaps staged), dialogues. The actor portrayed the unflinching staying power of a man who had his eyes on the end game. And although many saw him as an obstinate politician who wanted his slice of the cake and then, to eat it too, the essence of this hugely significant figure in world history, was once again brushed over, infact, even misrepresented by the storytellers – but alas, not for the first time.
But that was Jinnah for you – forever relegated to the history books and now onscreen adaptations, as an egoistic, unyielding, arrogant man. No surprises for the Pakistani audiences here. We must suffer the depiction till we learn to write our own?
Where Jinnah struck the perfect sartorial pose, spoke the eloquence he is widely reputed for, and stuck to his guns, it was perhaps in dismissing his resilience as a man who stood all alone against the tide – demanding a shift in power dynamics at a time when the British were handing over a massive piece of land to a handful (and more) of warring kingdoms, to then demand first, decentralized government and subsequently, when that failed, to fight for a seperate homeland for the Muslim minority, and to do that, with death looming overhead (a secret he did well to hide from his opponents) was nothing short of an absolute miracle.
In summary, if anyone had to be admired, it was Jinnah – for achieving the impossible.
And not because of his ego (misread priorities by many historians and web series creators), but because he could foresee that a Muslim minority might not sit well in a nation where the seeds of communal division were planted much earlier, (note the inception of the RSS, hugely absent from the storytelling), and just bearing fruit now. So while Pakistan’s Jinnah might have come off as an apt portrayal in clinical terms, mouthing the dialogues he’s known for, and some he’s not, donning the suits to strike the pose; the creators failed to capture the essence of the man, the way they did for instance, with Mahatma Gandhi.
Why? One would ask, almost naively. Well because, perspectives rule narratives, even historical ones, where fact and fiction overlap considerably, depending upon who’s telling the story.
And last but not the least, we have Lord Mountbatten essayed superbly by Luke McGibney. The character seemed to gain traction from a narrator whose undeniable sympathies lay with the ‘poor viceroy’ – a thankless job it was to hand over power, won’t you say? And that too, to a patchwork of warring kingdoms. He had many hair-pulling moments this man, times when he had to retreat from his word and others where he had to play one politician against another, all under the guise of manipulating a breakthrough.
Yet, despite staying true to the events, the narrative struggled to add a shade of grey to our hero in uniform. His ‘operation seduction’ against Nehru, with Lady Mountbatten in cohorts perhaps needed to uncover a layer or two of the real relationship. Was he really encouraging their partnership in order to score a political win? Did he really tell off Jinnah in order to push this reform through, and if so, did not both men leave the party with a semblance of victory with no complete losers – one was able to leave India finally, establishing reluctant agreement between warring parties, and the other, won his demand for a seperate homeland for Muslims.
But what the creators fail to highlight, every time this story is told, is that however we see it, Jinnah was not necessarily in it to win a popularity contest, or power; since he rejected the offer of prime ministership of a united India, and also, any attempt to hobnob with the British if it meant compromising on his demands for Pakistan.
So, if the characters and events outlined were nearly as we wanted them to be, what went askew with the telling of it? Not from the Indian side, mind you. That one is hitting rave reviews. But there seems to be a missing link, many missing links from the other side.
Did Freedom at Midnight, the web series, attempt to sanitize the version for Indian audiences?
The makers glossed over the near clandestine and practically overt relationship shared by Jawaharlal Nehru and Lady Mountbatten, almost as if it was a planned incursion on behalf of the Mountbattens to seduce Nehru into succumbing to negotiations? To add insult to injury, it was as if the RSS, Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, an organization founded in 1925, with an ideology for an overtly Hindu nation state, never existed. So when Freedom at Midnight the web series outlined communal tensions, the depictions conveniently, or purposely left out Muslim massacres and focused heavily on the Hindu and Sikh deaths, reference Noakhali, Calcutta, Kahuta etc. Even where Hindu aggression was shown in one instance perhaps, it was depicted more as a reaction or a provocation from the other side.
It is a pity that the Indian adaptation stressed on the idea of ‘batwara‘ a divided India as a repeated call to action by Jinnah, not appreciating fully, the events that lead to that division. It is also hugely unfortunate that thousands of Muslim lives were made to diminish in relevance against the time and space accorded to Hindu and Sikh massacres in the narrative.
A couple of directional moments that were seriously confusing and questionable were the flashbacks in black and white lens that seemed to depict real footage interspersed with recreated scenes, yet using the same black and white frame, hence, adding to considerable confusion for the viewer as to which one was real? The massacre scenes often failed to give context on who was being killed by whom, yet the majority of the narrative depicted Muslims as the agressors and the Hindus and Sikhs as victims with the Congress as sympathizers, grieving over the immense loss of life and violence, and hence, gravitating towards a divided state in order to save lives – this selfless sentiment juxtaposed against the vision of The All Pakistan Muslim League being either instigators or silent spectators of the same.
Characters that added life to the narrative were Sarojini Naidu, a friend of both sides of the divide, Liaqat Ali Khan, and Fatima Jinnah, whose relationship with Jinnah nevertheless, could have been explored in more depth. Jinnah’s spoken desire to be equal to Nehru on one or more instances, seemed to hint at his quest for power which again, seems demeaning for a man who had risen above and beyond personal glory. If anything, the creators now know what the political players didn’t at the time – that Jinnah was fighting a battle of life and death, unknown to his opponents. How then, could he have wanted to hold on to power in a world he knew he won’t be inhabiting very soon?
If anything, Jinnah’s crusade was all about saving lives, keeping a minority safe from persecution and giving them a homeland – not a religious state, but a state for those who needed to be safe. Did Jinnah not envisage Pakistan as a “homeland for India’s Muslims”, as opposed to an Islamic state? The two are very different. One is not a theocracy but merely a safe haven for a population that even after 70 odd years, being a minority, still faces persecution in India.
But it is unfortunate indeed that when it comes to the characterization of Jinnah, the adjectives often employed make him out to be stubborn, obstinate, egotistical, unyielding, arrogant and disdainful – is it merely because he had the courage to say no?
Indeed, they (most storytellers of history), can’t seem to make head or tail of him, well because, he really was beyond comprehension. There’s something to be said about holding out longer than anyone else, almost as if it was a competition to see who can hold his breath longer. And when all was said and done, he held it the longest, perhaps because, the lives of many were dependent on it?
Ask a land of over 240 million people in 2024, and they’ll tell you why.
Freedom At Midnight Season 1 is a 7 episodic web series streaming on SonyLiv and while the series is a gripping depiction of the events that led upto 1947 with all the period architecture, landscape, costumes and frames to delight the history buff in those who can’t forego a watch on the story of 1947, viewers are advised to watch keeping in mind that it is afterall, one depiction of many.
It is also interesting to note that the subcontinent will have its fair share of stories in the near future as Fatima Jinnah, a 3 part series on the life of Fatima Jinnah, sister of Muhammad Ali Jinnah and the events and people surrounding her political and personal life is due to hit our screens in 2025. The series is a Pakistani production, spearheaded by director Daniyal K Afzal being brought to life on a grand scale, and with a talented cast. This depiction will hopefully outline key historical figures from the era in a light that adds more shades and perspectives to a story, retold over the years with great passion, devotion and intrigue. What Fatima Jinnah brings to the table remains to be seen, but Pakistani viewers will finally have a version of events different from one they’ve seen onscreen or read about so far.
Freedom at Midnight, the 7 episodic web series, season 1, is an adaptation of the non-fiction work by Larry Collins and Dominique Lapierre called Freedom At Midnight. Directed by acclaimed director Nikkhil Advani, the series features a talented cast including Sidhant Gupta as Jawaharlal Nehru, Chirag Vohra as Mahatma Gandhi, Rajendra Chawla as Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, Luke McGibney as Lord Mountbatten, Cordelia Bugeja as Edwina Mountbatten, Malishka Mendonsa as Sarojini Naidu, Arif Zakaria as Mohammad Ali Jinnah, Pawan Chopra as Maulana Abul Kalam Azad, Ira Dubey as Fatima Jinnah, Rajesh Kumar as Liaquat Ali Khan, K.C. Shankar as V.P. Menon, Andrew Cullum as Clement Attlee, Alistair Findlay as Archibald Wavell, Ed Robinson as George Abell.
