Kota Factory

Kota Factory is an 2019 Indian Hindi-language web series created by Saurabh Khanna and directed by Raghav Subbu for The Viral Fever. The story is set is in Kota, which is a hub for many coaching centres where students come from all over India to prepare for various entrance exams. The show follows the life of 16-year-old Vaibhav (Mayur More) who moves to Kota from Itarsi. It shows the life of students in the city, and Vaibhav's efforts to get into IIT. It also stars Jitendra Kumar, Ahsaas Channa, Alam Khan and Ranjan Raj in prominent roles. The series feature musical score and a soundtrack album composed by Karthik Rao and Simran Hora, with an additional soundtrack composed and produced by Ankur Tewari and The Ghalat Family band. The cinematography for the series were handled by Jerin Paul and was edited by Gourav Gopal Jha. It was shot in colour and graded into monochrome later on post production, thus becoming the first black-and-white web series in India. 
Saurabh Khanna, the creator of the show, says that through Kota Factory he aims to change the perspective about Kota and IIT preparation which he feels has always been one sided emphasising on the trauma that education brings in a student's life. The series which contains of five episodes were premiered simultaneously on TVFPlay and YouTube on 16 April 2019, and the season finale premiered on 14 May 2019. The series received overwhelming response from critics, praising the monochrome setting, the realistic portrayal of coaching centres in India, and the major technical aspects of the series. Following its positive response, the makers renewed for a second season, which will stream on Netflix.
Production.
Development.
The screenwriter Saurabh Khanna who worked on The Viral Fever's "Yeh Meri Family", started the scriptwritng process of his another project for TVF, after the release of "Yeh Meri Family" in July 2018. It was reported that the series is based on a teenager who joins a coaching institute that prepares students for the Indian Institute of Technology entrance examination, and deals with intense academic pressure and a colourful hostel experience. While Khanna compared the script of the series to Biswa Kalyan Rath's "Laakhon Mein Ek", a similar web show released in late 2017, and a documentary "An Engineered Dream", by Hemant Gaba, Khanna stated that the script is distinctively different from both the works as this show is set in India's coaching hub of Kota in Rajasthan.
Casting.
Khanna drew the inspiration of the series as he and the creative team of TVF (Arunabh Kumar, Amit Golani, and Biswapati Sarkar) were IIT graduates. The series star Jitendra Kumar in a principal character as Jeetu Bhaiya, as like all the TVF series and sketches featuring Kumar. He was also an ex-IIT graduate studied in Kota, and his experience made them easier for him to work in the series. Khanna stated about his role, adding that, "Teaching is a very humble, underrated profession, where those who practise it are not that high up on the social ladder. That's not how it is in Kota. Teachers are heavily paid and they are, consequently, under pressure to extract the best from students. Jeetu is one such teacher, a well-to-do guy with a taste for fine things in life. He is a motivator, a friend, a guide, and does not do lip service to make a student feel good. When Vaibhav requests to be allowed to move up to the elite students’ batch, Jeetu snaps at him to not beg." One of the characters Uday, is played Alam Khan who also appeared in "Laakhon Mein Ek", having the similar storyline and role as of "Kota Factory", but Khanna conveyed it as unintentional.
Filming.
"Kota Factory" was shot in colour and graded into monochrome later during post production (black-and-white). The shooting was kickstarted in January 2018 and ended within 30 days. After the announcement of the series' second season being renewed, the makers started their works of writing in July 2019. The team initially planned to shoot the series in March 2020, but the shooting was delayed indefinitely due to the COVID-19 pandemic lockdown in India. The makers later started the shooting process in September 2020, and was filmed across two to three months in and around Madhya Pradesh. The crew shot the series under the supervision of a special team designated as in order to observe the crew members abiding the COVID-19 protocol. In January 2021, the makers announced that the shooting of the series had been wrapped.
Soundtrack.
"Kota Factory"'s musical score is composed by Karthik Rao and Simran Hora, and was produced by Ankur Tewari. It features twelve original composition with two songs "The Gentleman" sung and written by Simran Hora and "Main Bola Hey!" is sung by Abhsihek Yadav, Manish Chandwani and Karthik Rao. The soundtrack album was released on 23 May 2019, through media streaming platforms and in YouTube through the official channel of TVF, where the songs are independently released without launching a separate jukebox format. In addition to the original soundtrack, "Kota Factory" also features two songs composed by Ankur Tewari, Karsh Kale and his rock band "The Ghalat Family", whereas the songs were written by Ankur Tewari. The songs were released as a part of the additional soundtrack released on 3 June 2019.
Themes.
"Kota Factory" drew inspiration from the life of engineering students, who join the coaching institute in Kota, to crack the IIT entrance exam. This plot has been found similar to the 2009 film "3 Idiots", the web series "Laakhon Mein Ek" and the docu-drama "An Engineer's Dream". But, Tanul Thakur of the British magazine "The Wire", deploys the realistic portrayals of the series as compared to the feature films based on the same theme. Thakur stated that the first half of the series is interesting due to the "intellectual curiosity about the city, and its people". He added that apart from the realistic portrayals, it also added the acceptance to abnormalities in the coaching life, as instead of critiquing the coaching institute.
Release.
"Kota Factory" sponsored with Unacademy in order to promote the series, based on its storyline. In December 2018, TVF released the official teaser through its YouTube channel which received wide response from audiences. Later, the official trailer of the first season was unveiled on 28 March 2019. The series consisting of five episodes was released simultaneously through TVF Play and YouTube from 16 April 2019, with each episode being aired per week. The series finale premiered on 14 May 2019.
After the second season being renewed Netflix acquired the distribution rights of the series; an official announcement regarding "Season 2" was made on 3 March 2021, where Netflix released several other original contents in their 2021 slate. This marked TVF's second collaboration with the platform after "Yeh Meri Family".
Reception.
Devasheesh Pandey of "News18" praised the cinematography, art direction, sound design as well as the acting performances of the show and gave it a rating of 3.5 out of 5 saying that, ""Kota Factory" maintains an edge over other shows in the genre, courtesy of its on-point, deadpan humour and a relatably bittersweet aftertaste of existential battle that the protagonist is facing." Ishita Sengupta of "The Indian Express" found the show to be engaging and applauded it saying that, "The ingenuity of "Kota Factory" lies in its ability to deal with different narrative strands and coalesce them effortlessly." Ishita also felt that the performances of the actors, specially Mayur More and Ranjan Raj, add a lot of value to the show. Rahul Desai of "Film Companion" was impressed with the mature depiction of the subject at hand and praised the acting performances as well as the writing of the show saying that, ""Kota Factory"’s biggest asset is its writing which somehow maintains a semi-dramatic progression without compromising on the factual tone of the series."
Gautam Batra of "Koimoi" praised the direction and the acting performances of the show and gave it a rating of 4 out of 5 saying that, "the web series has taken a very less dramatic route to narrate the story which makes it extremely relatable watch." Priyanka Bansal of "The Quint" praised the show for presenting a fresh perspective on the education system in India. Impressed with the acting performances, production quality and music of Kota Factory, Priyanka gave the show a rating of 3.5 out of 5 and said that, "If you are looking for something worthwhile, The Kota Factory can be a nice watch that will make you think not about death and gloom but leave you with optimism." Tanul Thakur of "The Wire" praised the show for being realistic and relatable but felt that the show shies away from criticising the culture of coaching institutes prevalent in the Indian society. Dilip D'Souza writing for "The Caravan" praised the storytelling, as well.