Case Study – Ek Ruka Hua Faisla

Movie brief:

Ek Ruka Hua Faisla is a movie about 19 year old boy who was a suspect for murder of his father.

There was a committee of 12 people assigned to decide whether boy was culprit or not. They had

to reach a consensus, unanimously, regarding the boy’s fate – guilty or not guilty. When the movie

begins it seems like the committee is already sure about the decision- guilty. However, once the

voting takes place the plot thickens. Only one juror is unconvinced of the boy’s involvement in

the crime resulting in a difference in opinion and further discussion on the case. The following

discussion brings out different angles to the story along with highlighting the characteristic traits

of the committee member and their power of communication over the discussion.

Power of Communication:

The Power of Communication is the effect a person creates by asking the right questions and

practicing good listening skills to understand the subject well. The questions get the

communication going and encourages the other party to talk, to share information with you and

according you can negotiate your view points on it. This helps to confirm your knowledge about

the subject plot and also to know more things which are missing or we don’t know.

Characteristics of 12 Jurors in the movie:

In this movie, we observe the entire decision making process and way the people communicate

with each other, where each individual had different perception and different behavior in

particular situation, their personal opinion leads them to one wrong decision first but later on

with just one leading, convincing, neutral and practical individual, they were able to think on the

other side of the case and finally they reached to right conclusion.

Juror 1 (Deepak Kejriwal): He acts as a co-ordinator throught the film. He is the facilitator and

mediator of the discussion and is hence expected to be someone who guides the discussion forward

and resolute the conflicts. He is social as he tried to bring everybody to the table and maintained

good relationship with everyone.

Juror 2 (Amitabh Srivastav): He is relatively new to such situation and thus has certain

inhibitions. He is shy by nature who is easily convinced and influenced during stressed moments.

His part in the movie is affronted by the Juror #3. But finally, he speaks up about some evidence

that bothered him.

Juror 3 (Pankaj Kapoor): He is the arrogant, criticizing and was the shouting member of the

group. Though he plays the role of the most divisive character who is falsely convinced that the

accused is the murderer; his dissentious stand was because, his only son deserted him, so this

painful relationship with his son caused anger toward all young people, thereby influencing his

vote.

Juror 4 (S. M. Zaheer): He is a smart guy who based his decisions on hardcore facts and

demonstrates an active constructive personality. He is very patient and calm throughout the process

and bases his decisions on pure logic. He showed signs of thinker and

controller in his decision making style. He faced hindrance of the evidence trap because once Juror

8 had presented him the other side of coin, and there were evidences supporting him, he

immediately went into a thoughtful state realizing his blunder in ignoring the details and then

shifted his decision in the favor of Juror 8.

Juror 5 (Subhash Udghate): He is the person who belongs the same slum as the accused. He

becomes very defensive and does not react well to others prejudice. Since he comes from a similar

background, he is in a better position to understand the accused situations and empathize with him.

Other than that, he was acting like a follower and going with the flow of majority.

Juror 6 (Hemant Mishra): He plays a secondary role in the movie, with no substantial

contributions. He also demonstrates a passive constructive personality. This

characterdoes not shy away from voicing his opinions and likes to maintain decorum during the

discussions. He is traditional by thinking. That is, he showed respect to elders, others and their

personal life.

Juror 7 (M. K. Raina): He very effortlessly demonstrates the role of a self-centered person who

is more worried about his own comforts and leisure than being fair and detailed. He shows least

concern about the case even though a life was dependent on it. He show no regard to protocols or

justice and does not actively support the decision making process.

Juror 8 (K. K. Raina): He is the voice of reason, and plays the most crucial role. At the

beginning, he is the only member of the jury who votes ‘not guilty' and with stands all the

pressure from the other jury members. By saying that it's not easy for him sentence a boy to

death without even discussing the facts he opens the other jury member's minds to the possibility

that the accused may not be guilty. He is calm, cool, and collected, and is probably one of

the few jury members who fully understand his role as a jury. Along with this, he approaches the

trial logically, calmly and competently by scrutinizing each and every fact discussed during the

trial, so that they are doubly sure that they haven’t left any loop-hole during their decision

making process.

Juror 9 (Anu Kapoor): He is the old and wise juror who proves to be open to difference in

opinions and supports them. He brings along with him loads of wisdom and experience which

eventually helps the jury members to come to aconclusion regarding a faulty witness.

Juror 10 (Subbiraj): He is the most actively destructive juror having his original opinions and

prejudices which are biased in nature. His community biases lead to many verbal conflicts resulting

in an aggressive approach. He showed a lot of arrogance in his style was trying to influence others

in the favor of punishing the guilty without going over the detailed facts. He was also very

impatient in his decision making.

Juror 11 (Shailendra Goel): He is one of the characters who show an adult ego state while the

decision making process. He was pacifying other members of the jury and calming the

environment. His decision style is again a mix of a charismatic and a follower. He was one of the

members who were ready with the decision almost immediately when the discussion started, but

later on when logic and facts were presented, he changed sides.

Juror 12 (Aziz Qureshi): He portrays the role of the most indifferent character. He was behaving

as if he is just passing his time and is least interested in the decision making process. He displays

a typical child ego state who is excited but not serious about the task assigned. He again shows

a mix of charismatic and a follower in his decision making style and was a victim of the status quo

bias like most other characters in this movie.

Power of Communication effect: Take away from the movie

There is overall change on the total group after having the long the discussion on the subject. The

power of asking various questions and coming to down to common view made them think about

various analytics.

We learn that whenever a number of people from different background, mindset, and culture come

together then conflicts are bound to happen. In similar circumstances the role of power and politics

comes into play when people with a dominant personality try to influence others and make them

think and do things according to them. So in such cases proper attention has to be taken so that the

discussion takes place in an unbiased and non-influential way and everybody gets a fair chance to

participate and express his/her opinion.

Also whenever some decisions are taken as a team then the focus should be on taking the

viewpoints of everybody and collectively coming to a decision rather than focusing on expressing

only individual viewpoints and influencing others as well.

We also learn that every decision should be based on reasonable evidence and it can be dangerous

to rush to conclusions. In the movie, most of the Jury members were initially in a hurry to shut the

case and pronounce the accused guilty even when they know it’s a matter of someone’s life. Only

Mr. Raina stands against such a decision and demands that the jury should give appropriate time

to the issue and have a healthy discussion on the entire case.

We take below points while we have to make any decision as a team/ group:

Equal and fair chance to voice their opinions

A welcoming and supporting environment

Experience trust, acceptance and understanding within the team

New learnings i.e. a chance to pick up skills and attitudes from others

Good insight to expand self-knowledge

Share other people’s experiences- concerns, difficulties and hopes