The pivot everyone’s talking about
Jitendra Kumar builds a career on gentle smarts—the relatable mentor, the soft-spoken fixer, the guy who lowers heat with presence, not volume. Bhagwat Chapter One: Raakshas flips that image like a coin. In the trailer, Kumar’s Sameer keeps calm until menace shows, and his calm outline pushes against a widening search for missing girls. He faces Arshad Warsi as Inspector Vishwas Bhagwat, a procedural purist who trusts time, tape, and timelines more than show. The film streams on October 17, 2025, for all to watch that day.
If you’re building your mid-October watchlist, start with the fresh trailer and teaser, then sweep through Movies to see where this crime thriller sits alongside other October tentpoles. (Pro tip: queue the title so you can jump in on premiere night.)
Context: teaser to trailer, and the release runway
The roll-out is clean and deliberate: the teaser arrives first to establish mood—shadowed rooms, a single missing girl named Poonam, and quick cuts that refuse closure. The trailer (October 3 coverage) then expands the scope: more disappearances, cross-city pins on evidence boards, and Bhagwat’s quiet grind as the case keeps fracturing. Every report converges on the same core: this is an intense crime/psychological thriller built around a duel of temperaments. Premiere date: October 17, 2025 on ZEE5.
The line that detonates the internet: “Raakshas nahin hoon main, baaz hoon”
You’ve seen it clipped already: “I’m not a monster, I’m a hawk.” The metaphor is not chest-thumping; it’s method. Hawks are aerial accountants—patience, altitude, clean vectors. The line encodes how Sameer might think: surveillance over spectacle, angles over anger. It’s also the tonal key for Bhagwat Chapter One: Raakshas—a story about watching, waiting, and choosing the exact second to act. Hindi press summaries have latched onto this cue as the trailer’s signature rhythm.
Why this role matters for Jitendra Kumar (and for the film)
Kumar’s prior work (think Panchayat, Kota Factory) trained audiences to expect warmth and moral ballast. Here, he uses the same economy—controlled gaze, measured cadence—but drains it of comfort. Early interviews and round-ups note he found stepping into a negative shade “challenging,” which tracks with the trailer’s restrained, unnerving construction. For the film, the casting is a feature, not a gamble: it sets up cognitive whiplash, making viewers second-guess every line he delivers.
Building a villain without noise
There’s no villain cackle, no baroque monologues. The trailer cuts around silences, asymmetric smiles, and a posture that barely shifts even when the stakes do. Watch the edit grammar: close-ups that hold a fraction too long; a sound bed that favours hiss over hits; evidence-board inserts that advance the story while characters say almost nothing. Coverage across outlets frames Bhagwat Chapter One: Raakshas as a serial-killer-leaning procedural where psychology does the heavy lifting.
The cat-and-mouse: stillness vs. method
Inspector Bhagwat isn’t the loud cop; he’s the file-keeper. The trailer emphasises method—maps, timestamps, and interviews that refuse to be rushed. Set that against Sameer’s glacial calm and you get a duel that privileges thinking over sprinting. Which machine blinks first: the predator’s pattern or the institution’s patience? Media takes repeatedly spotlight this tension as the film’s draw.
Reading the clues the trailer is hiding in plain sight
Freeze frames matter here. A pin-map suggests geographic repetition; a yellowed calendar implies time-of-day windows; a phone screen flashes just long enough to hint at a contact loop. None of this is accidental. Trailers for procedural thrillers often bury breadcrumbs in these inserts; the point is to reward the second watch without breaking the first. Press coverage explicitly calls out the film’s mystery-forward design—expect Bhagwat Chapter One: Raakshas to make you work for the answers.
Performance craft: what to look for in Kumar’s portrayal
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Voice temperature: he under-heats lines, occasionally clipping syllables—classic control tells.
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Gaze management: eyes lock, then drift; it reads as scanning, not shyness.
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Kinetic minimalism: micro-movements at emotional peaks; restraint where others go operatic.
These choices line up with the “hawk” doctrine—resource conservation until the strike. The result is a villain shaped by strategy, not spectacle.
Where this lands in the OTT crime landscape
Even in a crowded year for thrillers, the pairing—Arshad Warsi and Jitendra Kumar—feels fresh. Add Akshay Shere at the helm and a release strategy that kept spoilers locked until trailer day, and you’ve got a title designed for premiere-week conversation. Several outlets underline the October 17 global availability and the tonal commitment to dread over gore, which positions the film as a thinking person’s watch rather than a jump-scare carousel.
Why audiences should care (beyond novelty casting)
Because the film seems to be staking its reputation on credibility—of police work, of behavioral patterns, of how violence silently reshapes everyone in its radius. The most interesting villains are not the loudest ones; they are the ones whose logic terrifies you because it feels plausible. On that front, Bhagwat Chapter One: Raakshas looks unusually self-assured.
FAQs
Who plays Sameer in Bhagwat Chapter One: Raakshas?
Jitendra Kumar. The trailer positions him opposite Arshad Warsi’s inspector in a cerebral clash.
When is Bhagwat Chapter One: Raakshas releasing on OTT?
October 17, 2025 on ZEE5.
What do the teaser and trailer reveal about the plot?
A missing-girls investigation widens into a patterned threat, with the first case centered on Poonam.
Who directed Bhagwat Chapter One: Raakshas?
Akshay Shere.
Is Jitendra Kumar playing a negative role for the first time?
Coverage notes he stepped into a negative shade and found the transition challenging.
Does the trailer confirm a serial-killer angle?
Reporting and headlines repeatedly describe it as a serial-killer/psychological thriller, without revealing the perpetrator’s identity.
Bio of Author: Gayatri Tiwari is an experienced digital strategist and entertainment writer, bringing 20+ years of content expertise to one of India’s largest OTT platforms. She blends industry insight with a passion for cinema to deliver engaging, trustworthy perspectives on movies, TV shows and web series.
