Meet The Duo Who Brought Operation Safed Sagar, The Story About The Golden Arrows Squadron Of The Indian Air Force Dueing The Kargil War, To Life: FPJ Exclusive
Operation Safed Sagar (OSS), has emerged as one of the breakout shows of the year, and India can finally say that we have a show that not only rivals, but is better than the iconic Top Gun (1986). The series is about the Golden Arrows Squadron of the Indian Air Force who led an extraordinary historic, high-altitude mission that altered the course of the 1999 Kargil War and made history as the…
Abhijeet Singh Parmar and Mehboob Pal Singh Brar, co-creators and co-producers of the hit show Operation Safed Sagar, discuss their journey of four and a half years to bring the story of the Golden Arrows Squadron of the Indian Air Force during the Kargil War to life. The duo, who previously worked on projects such as Gullak, Panchayat 2 and Rocket Boys, decided to move from enabling other filmmakers' visions to building their own show.
Operation Safed Sagar, or OSS, emerged as a breakout show of the year and was praised as being better than the iconic Top Gun (1986). The series is about the IAF's Golden Arrows Squadron and their high-altitude mission that altered the course of the 1999 Kargil War. Behind the hit show is the journey of Parmar and Brar, who built their careers on the production side before deciding to create their own project.
Their initial idea came from Kushal Srivastava, an ex-IAF officer who had researched the Golden Arrows and the Kargil air war. When he brought his idea to them, the story of the squadron and their everyday lives in the IAF fascinated them more than the larger historical narrative. They realized that a two-hour film could not contain the story, and that a series would be the best format to tell it.
One of their biggest fears was executing the aerial combat sequences convincingly. After writing the first draft, they faced the daunting task of how to bring the story to life. They tackled each difficult aspect as a separate problem and treated it as their own mini project, with years of research, development and preparation. The aerial sequences served the story and not the other way around.
The four and a half-year journey was not a long, arduous wait but rather a series of discoveries and new things revealed every few months. Speaking to veterans and families of the pilots made the responsibility of telling their story much bigger than just making a show. They knew that walking away was never an option.
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