Know The Making Of Bitta Karate - The Antagonist Of The Kashmir Files

Yet another surgical strike. The josh seems to be high. On Day 5, 'The Kashmir Files' grossed Rs 18 cr, while 'Uri- the Surgical Strike' had netted only Rs 9.57 cr.

Bollywood is in awe. Because, when Bahubalis in the box office thins down with the passage of time, this file keeps acquiring on a new top-shelf each passing day. The assault and battery file on the Pandits in the valley in the 90s have simply gone epochal.

Tsunami At Box Office

Terming the show of this film documentary as the tsunami at the box office, film trade analyst Taran Adarsh did some number crunching. The number-play is given below.

• The Kashmir Files - Rs 18cr on Day 5
• Sooryvanshi (Akshay Kumar starred) - Rs 11.22 cr
• Gangubhai Kathiawadi - Rs 10.01 cr.
• 83 The Film (Ranveer Singh starred) - Rs 6.7 cr

Pre-Covid Times

• Tanhaji (Ajay Devgn starred) - Rs 15.28 cr
• Uri - The Surgical Strike - Rs 9.57 cr.

Other trade analysts are of the opinion that the way it is raising its collections each passing day, the film-documentary may create the record of quickest to enter the Rs 100 cr club. The gross collection of The Kashmir Files has already touched Rs 60 cr.

As per Taran Adarsh, the Vivek Agnihotri directed film is no less than a tsunami at the box office. The film's stellar show despite the following factors is the evidence of a tsunami here.

• Limited promotions
• Non-holiday release
• Mighty Opponent (Bahubali Star starred Radhey Shyam)
• Limited screen count (around 630)

Significantly, Bahubali after cashing on an opening day collection of Rs 41cr saw the gross thinning to Rs 30 cr on day 5. But The Kashmir Files see it's gross soaring to Rs 18 cr from Rs 3.5cr.

Kashmir Files Protagonist Real?

The film documents how militant commander Bitta breached Pushkar Nath's house and shot at his son who is hiding in a rice container. Pushkar and his daughter-in-law Sharda pleaded for their lives. But Bitta impels Sharda to eat the blood-soaked rice in exchange of their lives.

As per a document by the European Foundation For South Asian Studies (EFSAS) titled 'The Exodus of Kashmiri Pandits', the killing of Pushkar Nath's son strikes a resemblance with BK Ganjoo, an engineer in Telecom Department.

Here are the excerpts of the book by EFSAS. 

"In March 1990, B.K. Ganjoo, an engineer in Telecommunication Department was brutally gunned down while he tried to hide himself in an empty drum used for storing rice. The assailants climbed the third floor of his house to catch hold of him. His wife begged the murderers to kill her too but only to receive the sadist remark, "there should be someone left to cry over his dead body".

The Making Of Antagonist Bitta Karate

Bitta Karate was one of the top JKLF militants who had crossed over to Pakistan Occupied Jammu and Kashmir in 1989 and received training and indoctrination in the camps there. In an interview with a journalist later, to a question on who was his first victim, he said the following...  

" When asked who was the first victim of his bullets he took the name of one Satish Kumar Tiku, who was a friend (and perhaps also a class fellow) of Bitta Karate, and occasionally visited him in his Srinagar home."

Bitta then portrayed the sequences.

• Bitta Karate had just returned after undergoing training in terrorist camps and Satish, not knowing where his friend Bitta had disappeared for a while, went to see him in his home.
• Satish found Bitta cleaning a gun (AK 47) there.
• Surprised on seeing the weapon Satish asked him what it was.
• Bitta avoided the question and said that it was a toy he played with.
• Naive Satish took it lightly and soon forgot the incident and left his friend.
• But Bitta was greatly disturbed and went to see the ‘commander’.
• Narrated to him the story and asked for directions.
• The commander told him to finish Satish lest he discloses it to the police.
• Bitta went to Satish’s house and called him to come out of his home.
• No sooner did Satish step out on the street, Bitta, in a flash of a moment, aimed his China-made Kalashnikov at him and fired shots that pierced through Satish’s heart.
• He fell down dead in a pool of blood. Brandishing the rifle in the air in broad daylight, Bitta scared the pedestrians and walked away in complete confidence.
• In the interview, he claimed to have killed more than 22 Pandits.
• Bitta clearly said that he obeyed the orders of Ashfaq Wani and Amanullah Khan (top leaders of JKLF)

JKLF Background

The Jammu Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF), runs from twin centres - one in Pakistan Occupied Jammu and Kashmir and the other in the UK. The militant organisation is propped by Pakistan's ISI.

As per the EFSAS account, the organisation initiated armed insurgency in the Kashmir Valley in the mid-1980s with the outright support of ISI. It opened its account of killing Hindus with the kidnapping and subsequent murder of Indian Assistant Commissioner Ravindra Mhatre in Birmingham in 1984.