Satluj: Diljit Dosanjh reveals why his toughest role left him emotionally drained

Diljit Dosanjh's latest film, Satluj, formerly titled Punjab 95, finally forayed into a streaming platform after being delayed for nearly three years due to titled changes and censorship hurdles. In regard to this, the actor of the film, Diljit, recently spoke about how this role in the film took a toll on him emotionally and physically.

Diljit on being part of Punjab 95 and the challenges he faced

Speaking to Variety India, Diljit opened up about the challenges and the amount of stress he had to endure. He stated, “It’s honestly one of the hardest films I have ever made in my career. Emotionally and physically, it extracted everything out of all of us. There were the long days, difficult conditions and intense scenes. But ultimately, it was the nature of the subject matter which really clung on to me. I think this is perhaps the first film in my career which required me to recuperate after the shoot."

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He further said, "Once a film is wrapped, I quickly move on as I don’t enjoy taking a break. However, after this film, I had to take a week off to process everything that I went through portraying Jaswant Singh Khalra. The scenes, the emotions, and the aspects of the character lingered on, so it took time for me to pull away from that.”

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Diljit Dosanjh's Satluj based on true events

Satluj is based on true events and real people. It is the story of Jaswant Singh Kalra, a Sikh human rights activist who risked his life to uncover state-sanctioned extrajudicial killings and secret cremations in Punjab during the 1990s.

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Apart from Diljit Dosanjh, the film also stars Arjun Rampal, Varun Badola, Sukhdev Balra, Sushil Dahiya, Jyoti Dogra, Veer Abhinav, among others.

Helmed by Honey Trehan, the movie stars Diljit Dosanjh, Arjun Rampal, and Suvinder Vicky. It faced a three-year certification battle with the Central Board of Film Certification (CBFC) before finally releasing on the OTT platform ZEE5 on July 3.

Who was Jaswant Sinhg Kalra?

Jaswant Singh Khalra was a human rights activist who was kidnapped and subsequently murdered in 1995. After Operation Blue Star, which led to the assassination of Indira Gandhi, and the 1984 Anti-Sikh Riots, the police were empowered to detain the suspects.

Using the given power, the police back then illegally detained and tortured innocents on the pretext of being militants. Bravely speaking up against the illegal activities and killings, Khalra fought against the human rights abuses in Punjab during the insurgency period, when several armed campaigns took place by the militants of the Khalistan Movement.

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Notably, he was known for uncovering the illegal murder and cremation of Sikhs by the Punjab Police. Working on the atrocities taking place, he investigated four major cases about the cremation of 25,000 unidentified bodies in Punjab and the murder of around 2,000 police officers who didn't cooperate with the other police officers. Later, the Union government's investigative agency, the CBI, also revealed that police had unlawfully cremated 2,097 people in Tarn Taran district alone.

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Tragically, Khalra was kidnapped from his home in the city of Amritsar on September 6, 1995, when he was washing his car in front of his house. It has been said that the Punjab Police abducted, detained, and tortured him for almost two months before they murdered him in Oct 1995. His body was dumped in a canal.

In 1996, the CBI found proof of Khalra being kept at a Tarn Taran police station. In the report, they recommended that nine Punjab police officers be charged with kidnapping and murder. Ten years after Khalra's death, six Punjab police officials were convicted in 2005. Two defendants, Deputy Superintendent Jaspal Singh and Amarjit Singh, were sentenced to life imprisonment. Khalra's wife, Paramjit Kaur Khalra, carried forward her husband's work and legacy. He was posthumously awarded the Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights Award in 1997.