Accounts of the terrorist attacks on Mumbai in November 2008 tend to focus on the Taj Mahal Palace Hotel. There have also been efforts to spotlight the other sites targetted by the Lashkar-e-Taiba terrorists who arrived in Mumbai to commit mass slaughter.Nikkhil Advani’s Prime Video series Mumbai Diaries 26/11 (2021) looked at how the staffers of Cama & Albless Hospital dealt with a crisis way above their training. Ismail Khan and Ajmal Kasab walked into the government-run hospital with automatic weapons and grenades on the night of November 26, 2008, intent on killing as many people as possible. The hospital staffers had the presence of mind to shut off the lights and herd the patients – many of them pregnant women – out of sight.Khan and Kasab did manage to kill seven people, including two security guards.Manoj Tapadia’s Hindi film Bharat Bhhagya Viddhaata zooms in on a sub-group of hospital employees: the nurses. Led by Kangana Ranaut’s Geeta, the nurses act like knights in starched white uniforms.Tapadia’s debut feature is a crisp, gripping and moving account of uncommon valour in the face of unimaginable horror. Bharat Bhhagya Viddhaata is also a tribute to Mumbai’s vital working classes.It is increasingly rare for Bollywood productions to be mindful of the importance of train timetables for people who live miles away from their workplaces, or the ways in which they joke with as well as look out for each other. The film looks out for this unsung group too.A day before the attack, Geeta (Ranaut) and her colleagues are expertly handling nervous women and swatting away annoying relatives who question their competence. Geeta has a reputation for calming troubled waters. Trupti (Smita Tambe) is fond of quoting Mirza Ghalib. Sheetal (Girija Oak Godbole), Babita (Esha Dey) and Mohini (Rasika Agashe) are devoted to their jobs and to each other.The hospital’s superintendent Maya (Asha Shelar) gets a strong measure of the compact between the nurses when she tries to haul up one of them for a false infraction. The nurses refuse to be mollified by the matron Deena (Suhita Thatte). They know their responsibilities and rights. Tapadia has fashioned Bharat Bhhagya Viddhaata like a home invasion thriller, or a zombie horror movie. The 127-minute film is quick to get off the mark, speedily establishing the arcs of the nurses and their colleagues before diving into their strategy against the attackers. Tapadia’s script is also very sharp in capturing the pragmatism, hardiness and sense of duty that goes above and beyond during the long night.When characters die in the film, their loss is felt. When Ismail (Aditya Mishra) and Kasab (Zahid Khan) are flummoxed by how empty the hospital appears, and when they are dangerously close to finding the staffers and patients, the heart skips several beats.Secondary players stand out: the elderly ex-Army security guard who declares that he will take on highly trained terrorists; the nurse who comes up with a hack in a desperate situation; the anxious calls from home that are dismissed because the situation in the hospital is rather more important.Like Governor, another of the week’s other releases, Bharat Bhhagya Viddhaata arrives with the imperative to pay obeisance to the Narendra Modi era. The film’s title itself is from the Modi government’s specious characterisation of workers as creators of India’s glory.The presence of Kangana Ranaut, who is a Member of Parliament from Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party, gives the film the patina of propaganda.There is a mission to uncover a hidden history, to show that the “true heroes” of a crisis Before Modi were not counted. Although there have been several media reports on the valour of the Cama staff, the film comes up with its own conspiracy theory on why the nurses, particularly Geeta, were not adequately acknowledged.The caricatured villains include the cowering superintendent. A senior nurse robs Geeta of the honour due to her. Might Cama & Albless Hospital, which has lent its name to the film, regret its participation? Might the doctors and other employees be angered by the focus on the nurses? Or did the management of the Maharashtra government-run hospital not have a choice in the matter?Manoj Tapadia finds ways to introduce balance. Although Kangana Ranaut’s Geeta is shown as the one who comes up with all the bright ideas, she does not dominate the narrative. If anything, Geeta is one among a crowd, a leader but also a co-worker. By giving Geeta’s colleagues strong scenes, the film lets them become a part of her reflected glory.The efforts of the small people who expect nothing more than an extra-tight hug before they go back to emptying out bedpans stand out in Bharat Bhhagya Viddhaata. The film rescues itself from being a mouthpiece of the regime, instead becoming a voice for an unheralded strata of society.