Restart and Restart!

12th Fail (2023)
Directed by: Vidhu Vinod Chopra

I remember my parents, more expressively my mother, going through the same emotions as the elders in this family. They believed unabashedly that education was the only weapon they could use to break the shackles of poverty and hopelessness. Towards this end, they sacrificed their luxuries, comforts in life, and pride to show off to their peers what they had that their parents did not have.

I remember seeing the same expressions in my mother's eyes every time her plans were derailed by inevitable mistakes or inactions. She soldiered on, thinking everything would be solved once her children graduated. Rightly or wrongly, in her mind, a sound education was her panacea to all difficulties in life. With that single-minded determination, no mountain was too high to scale, and no river was too deep to sail. To the economically challenged, education is a more assured and level playing field way to prosper.

This biopic is based on an unbelievably true story of a student in Chamboli, MP, who failed his 12th Standard but went on later to win the coveted UPSC (Union Public Service Commission) examinations to become an IPS officer. He overcame abject poverty and the many obstacles to shine in the end. Coming from an area known more for dacoity rather than anything, the teachers in the school collectively volunteered the answers to their students to improve their scoring and, hopefully, a better life. Bad luck to Manoj Kumar Sharma. The year he sat for his 12th Standard examinations, an honest DSP was posted to his district. He stopped the whole examination as blatant copying was going on. So everybody in the school failed the 12th Standard that year. The DSP later became the motivating factor for living an honest life. Manoj passed the 12th Standard the following year and went on to Gwalior, aiming to be DSP like his hero.

His life in Gwalior was no bed of roses. Robbed of his luggage, pocket money and cancellation of the state government-sponsored public service examinations, he was left hungry and homeless.

His life took a turn again when he met Pandey. Together, they head to Delhi to try to sit for the Union Public Service Commission examinations to aim to become an IPS officer.

The rest of the story is an account of his adventures, including the ups and downs of his journey to finally be bequeathed the prized post of an Indian Police services officer.

Sailing through his journey, almost side by side, was his later wife, Shraddha, who became a Deputy Collector of the IRS. Currently, she is the managing director of the Maharashtra Tourism Board, and Manoj Sharma is the additional commissioner of the Mumbai Police.

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.