Title: Lafangey
Directors: Prem Mistry, Abhishhek Yadav
Cast: Gagan Arora, Harsh Beniwal, Anud Singh Dhaka, Barkha Singh, Saloni Gaur, Rajan Raj
Where: Streaming on Amazon MX Player
Rating: 3 stars
There is something oddly comforting about watching other people’s dreams go awry, provided they’re doing it with humour, heart, and just enough style to keep us from switching tabs. Lafangey, true to its title, hands us three loveable wastrels—Kamlesh, Chaitanya, and Rohan Gupta—whose misadventures in the backstreets of Delhi unfold with the kind of messy charm that reminds one of late-night drinking session on the terrace and unfinished plans.
This isn’t a revolutionary premise—three childhood friends chasing dreams against familial scowls and economic realism—but Lafangey sneaks up on you with its emotional honesty. Kamlesh, or Kamobhaiya, played by the eminently watchable Harsh Beniwal, is an aspiring actor with more gumption than guidance. He doesn’t chase stardom out of delusion, but because he truly believes he has the talent—and that conviction, however misplaced, gives his character a stubborn, oddly endearing spark.
Anud Singh Dhaka’s Chaitanya, or Chattybhaiya, is perhaps the most sharply drawn of the trio—a government job aspirant who is slowly chewed up by the bureaucracy of dreams and nudged into the morally grey world of gambling. It isn’t thrill or rebellion that pulls him in, but the quiet desperation to support his debt-ridden family and his sister Chetna’s (Saloni Gaur) aspirations. Dhaka plays the role with restraint, never pleading for sympathy, yet quietly and convincingly earning it.
And then there’s Ronnie, the human shrug. Gagan Arora plays him with endearing lethargy—a salesman who runs headlong into the myth of romantic idealism, only to realise that love, unlike the laptops he sells, doesn’t come with a warranty. His live-in arrangement with Ishita (a sincere Barkha Singh) starts with Bollywood promise and ends in EMI reality, giving the show its most biting punchline: “You can’t survive on love alone.”
What’s refreshing about Lafangey is that it never mocks its protagonists. Their choices, though often flawed, stem from a deeply relatable logic. The show hides its commentary on socioeconomic inertia beneath layers of youthful bravado and misplaced confidence. It plays with the “false dilemma fallacy”—that one must either chase dreams or settle for respectability, even when those dreams remain elusive. There’s seemingly no middle ground. Yet nuance surfaces quietly, as life lessons emerge not through sermons but through the wear and tear of real experience.
Production-wise, the series is functional, not flashy. There’s a rough-around-the-edges charm, like a college play that didn’t have the budget for good lights but nailed the performances anyway—the entire cast is uniformly natural, never straining for effect. Each episode- bookends with a rap or a musical piece, cleverly used as both mood and mirror. It’s formulaic, yes, but forgivably so.
Overall, Lafangey delivers a narrative that begins in jest and ends with a lump in your throat. It doesn’t break new ground but tills the old with warmth and empathy. These so-called losers won’t make it to Forbes, but they’ve earned a spot in our hearts—and maybe our weekend watchlist.
