Made In India – A Titan Story review: Decades before the phrase became a sarkaari slogan, a world class product became a shining example of the dictum, Made In India. India’s first Quartz watch, Titan by the Tatas, proudly manufactured in India, for Indians, by Indians, was launched back in the late 80s.
The timepiece that took on the entrenched power of old favourite HMT, and the ingrained habit of winding a knob, took its time getting there. Incorporating the setbacks and breakthroughs, it is a fascinating story of individual passion and solid teamwork, backed by the goodwill of one of India’s most powerful business houses.
Under the charismatic-yet-mercurial leadership of the legendary Xerxes Desai, whose mentor was JRD himself, ‘The Titan Story’, based on Vinay Kamath’s book as an inside-look, is a saga which elicits multiple feelings: the confidence in an on-the-rise India, based on high-quality technology and best ethical practices, the demands of successful entrepreneurship, the power of an idea, the people who remained steadfast to their purpose, all wrapped up in popular Bollywood songs-driven nostalgia.
Made In India – A Titan Story trailer:
The six-episode series is a fairly straight-forward, linear account of how Desai (Jim Sarbh), under the twinkly-eyed yet discerning tutelage of Jeh aka JRD (Naseeruddin Shah), assembles his core team — trusty friend and sounding board Akash Bansal (Vaibhav Tatwawadi), bright IIT grad Gaurav Dhar (Lakshvir Singh Saran), doe-eyed, determined Megha Mhatre (Kaveri Seth) — each committed to the goal of creating a wearable device that would change the way Indians clocked time.
The lack of slickness works for a series which was set in a time when hard work and perseverance were help up as exemplary qualities, but some portions looks very much like sets, which is one of my peeves: you want to show a juice stall on a street, fine, but why can’t it look like something which is on a street?
You can feel the stretch in each 45 minute episode, especially when circular loops appear: how many times can Megha’s mother turn up with yet another unsuitable boy, when it’s clear to anyone who has eyes that Megha and Gaurav are bonding over besan-ke laddoo? That Akash has a father with Alzheimer’s becomes his only domestic thread, till the series remembers to bring in his wife only towards the end. How many times can Xerxes be shown to be making akuri, while his supportive wife (Namita Dubey) keeps him going during his ups and downs: what about that other Parsi staple, dhansak? You know, just to vary things a little?
Time is devoted to showing us how the moving parts of the watch were assembled. The show also shows us the dips caused by wrong calls taken by the venerable Xerxes, who learns how to say sorry, when not coming up with such aphorisms as discussion nahin demonstration. Clearly chary of being dubbed documentary-like, the show inserts foot-tapping film songs like sar jo tera chakraye, as well as those evergreen ruminations on life: zindagi ek safar hai suhana, zindagi kaisi hai paheli hai, among others. Nice to begin with, but becoming too much of a muchness after a while.
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But I have to say that there’s about a comfort watch about the making of a watch, haha, which manages to push past its occasional DD-style flatness, by front-loading it with glimpses of an era when people wore watches to tell the time. Yes, it’s bygone, but the qualities it endorses are timeless: the Titan story, a branding and marketing triumph, is inspiring, and the show remains watchable despite those quibbles, bookended by wonderful performances from Shah and Sarbh, and a switched-on ensemble, telling us about the power of leadership, camaraderie, consistency, and, yes, besan laddoos.
It also gives us a line which must have been prescient: achche din chalte nahin hain, laane padte hain.
Made In India – A Titan Story cast: Naseeruddin Shah, Jim Sarbh, Vaibhav Tatwawadi, Lakshvir Singh Saran, Namita Dubey, Kaveri Seth
Made In India – A Titan Story director: Robbie Grewal
Made In India – A Titan Story rating: 3 stars
