Gyanseshwar Tripathi (Kay Kay Menon) is the principal of ABV, where he spends much of his time playing cricket with his students, when not dashing his head against the intractable wall of ‘no money, no resources’ which stops his wards from doing well in exams. And that’s a factor which prevents him from taking off to a foreign jaunt which he has set his heart upon, not just for himself, but for his loyal wife (Prachee Shah), who has stood by him all these years.

Adarsh Baal Vidyalaya review:

Over seven episodes, around 25-35 minutes each, such issues as corruption, honesty, respect for an older generation, as well as jobs that are considered beneath your dignity, sex education by a shrinking female teacher (Annapurna Soni), and others, are brought up for an airing, and kept aside after being neatly resolved. Not much is left hanging, because that would make things complex, and that wouldn’t do, would it?

The able Naveen Kasturia plays a counsellor raising his teenage daughter — who attends the same school — and learning on the job. Abhimanyu Singh, breaking from his usual grey roles, pitches in as the burly teacher who learns better than using force to get the students to fall in line: the fact that he has a second job to augment his meagre salary – moonlighting as a mehendi artist to make ends meet — makes for an interesting layer.

Archana Puran Singh, shilling for a local MP (Deven Bhojani), keeps coming in the way of the principal and his undeniable affection for his students. Prasanna Bisht is a newbie who adjusts to the ways of an ill-funded government-run school without losing sight of why she wanted to be a teacher in the first place: she speaks up against the labelling of kids as ‘malaai vs khurchan’, telling us every child has the right to an education.

The premise is solid, and in between all the preachiness, there’s an attempt to showcase the difficulties faced by over-burdened and underfunded sarkari institutions. But that keeps disappearing in the pile of cliches: how a sanskari teacher is reluctant to use the word ‘penis’ in a sex ed class is such an old one. I also wasn’t very sure about a North Eastern actor playing the stereotyped role of a canteen cook rustling up spicy ‘chow mein’, even though he is held up as a role model in passing. Kay Kay does his best, staying consistently watchable, but that’s nothing new. That a teacher can be dyslexic is a good touch, but the clear intention of inserting low-hanging laughs at every step dilutes the impact.

One line cracked me up, though. An act of eating-and-spitting paan is called peek detailing, hehe. Now why wasn’t there more from where that came?

Adarsh Baal Vidyalaya cast: Kay Kay Menon, Naveen Kasturia, Abhimanyu Singh, Ajitesh Gupta, Prasanna Bisht, Archana Puran Singh, Annapoorna Soni, Deven Bhojani, Prachee Shah
Adarsh Baal Vidyalaya director: Himank Gaur
Adarsh Baal Vidyalaya rating: 2 stars