INSTITUTE OF MANAGEMENT, NIRMA UNIVERSITY

BBA-MBA FIVE YEAR INTEGRATED PROGRAMME 2016-21

YEAR 2, SEMESTER 4
INDIAN ORGANISATION BEHAVIOUR

INDIVIDUAL ASSIGNMENT
EK RUKA HUA FAISLA
ANALYSIS AND REVIEW

SUBMITTED TO:
PROF. BHAJAN LAL

SUBMITTED BY
TUSHAR PRAJAPATI
167159

DATE OF SUBMISSION: 26/02/2018

Introduction
The story of Ek Ruka Hua Faisla circles around 12 male members of a jury who have assembled
together in room to deliberate on charges of murder against a young boy who is accused of
murdering his father. The case against the boy looks undisputable and unconquerable. All the
jury members, except for one – Juror 8, are convinced that the boy is guilty of the crime. Juror
8 is not completely convinced about the case and he starts the deliberations, in which all the
members have to contribute to reach a common consensus which ultimately proves the boy
innocent.

Director
Basu Chatterjee

Release date
1986 (India)

Running time
117 minutes

Genre
Bollywood Courtroom Drama

Theme
One recalcitrant juror in a murder trial attempts to sway the judgement with his individual
biases and prejudices.
Character Analysis
The nature of each character in the story is slowly revealed through the process of the
deliberations which reflect their personal dogmas, ideas, idiosyncrasies, biases, and socio-
cultural backgrounds. This review and analysis tries to determine the personality of each of
these characters on the basis of the structure of their characters or psychosomatic state at
work.
Juror 1 (Deepak Kejriwal) is the selected foreman of the jury who does his best to keep the
deliberation arranged and procedural. The primary role of the foreman is to maintain the
accuracy of the discussion and to stop the jury members from getting into unrelated
discussions. He is an individual who is either active by nature or by role and is therefore
playing the role of initiator.
Juror 2 (Amitabh Srivastava) is the nervous first-timer who is easily convinced and swayed in
tense moments. He tries hard to keep up with the group. He also tries to keep the discussion
peaceful. The character shows a typical passive constructive personality. His logical skills are
very sharp. For most part of the movie, this character is easily disregarded by Pankaj Kaur.
Juror 3 (Pankaj Kapur) is the disdainful, disapproving, loud-mouth member of the group.
Though he plays the role of the most condescending character till the end and is untruthfully
convinced that the suspect is the murderer; his heart-wrenching story of himself being the
father abandoned by his only son illustrates the main reason for his stand. The stressed
relationship causes him to feel annoyed towards all young people, thereby influencing his
vote. He depicts an active-destructive personality. He is over emotional and he takes the case
very personally. He is enormously active in the decision making procedure but in a critical way
while having an aggressive and imposing attitude.
Juror 4 (S.M. Zaheer) is the elegant broker who comes off as proud and impassive. He bases
his decisions on hard-core facts and stick to to rules and regulations. He demonstrates an
active- constructive character. During the entire decision making process he is very persistent
and peaceful. Although he is marginally biased against the accused but he is open to counter
arguments and listened to them attentively. He proves to be a good team member leading
the side who wanted to prove the accused guilty of all charges.
Juror 5 (Subhash Udghate) comes from the similar slum as the defendant and does not react
well to prejudice. Since he hails from an alike background, he is in a better position to
understand the situation of the accused and empathize with him, than any other in the jury
member. He demonstrates an unreceptive constructive character. He actively takes part in
the discussions by giving some effective points related to the appropriate use of the switch,
knife etc.
Juror 6 (Hemant Mishra) plays a subordinate role in the movie, with no considerable
contributions. He demonstrates an inert constructive character. This character does not shy
away from expression his opinions and likes to uphold decorum during the deliberations.
Juror 7 (M.K Raina) is a person who very effortlessly validates the role of a self-centred person
who is more concerned about his own luxuries and leisure than being reasonable and
detailed. He shows the slightest amount concern about the case even though a life was
dependent on it. He shows no respect to protocols or integrity and does not enthusiastically
support the decision making process.
Juror 8 (K.K Raina) is the voice of reason in the jury, and plays the most crucial role in the
story. At the commencement, he is the only member of the jury who votes ‘not guilty' and
endures all the pressure from the other fellow jury members. He is calm, composed, and
collected, and is possibly one of the few jury members who truly understands his role as a
jury member.
Juror 9 (Anu Kapoor) is the wise and elderly juror who is open to differences in opinions and
also backs them. This character portrays a lot of tolerance but is still disturbed due to
inappropriate behaviour on the part of the other jurors. His passion for reality and justice
drives his overall decision making process and helps him to critically and logically analyse all
the details.
Juror 10 (Subbiraj) is the most actively unhelpful and destructive juror who has his original
opinions and biases which are prejudiced in nature. He exhibits a clear cut example of a
tailored method leading to destructive behaviour. His community biases give birth to many
verbal conflicts resultant of an aggressive approach.
Juror 11 (Shailendra Goel) is one of the other characters who portrays an adult ego state
almost throughout the deliberations. It proves to be a blessing in disguise for a situation like
this where there are a few characters who do not take their roles seriously which results in
an aggressive environment that has to be controlled.
Juror 12 (Aziz Qureshi) is the most uninterested character who is busy squiggling away his
time and has agreed to be a member of the jury just for the amusement. He depicts a child
ego state, which is lively, eager, playful, but not thoughtful.
This critical analysis of each and every character in the story states that each juror had his
own individual bigotries and prejudices, cultural differences, ignorance, weaknesses and fears
that impaired their judgement and decision making skills and caused them to ignore the true
and real issues of the case.
Attitudinal Change:
Inducement or rather, Persuasion, being the function of attitude, plays an essential aspect in
the fascinating nature of the movie. Persuasion is the process by which attitudes are molded
and altered. The two ways to persuade are: peripheral and central.
The central route is the process by which an individual carefully contemplates a communication and
is eventually swayed by the power of disagreement. K.K Raina and S.M Zaheer, both follow this
approach towards attitudinal change. Mr. Raina appeals to the innocence of the accused in a
systematized and elucidated manner. He lays down his points through empirical evidence and
eventually sways the other jury members.
The peripheral route of persuasion is categorized by artificial clues revolving the argument
rather than the validity of the facts put up in the argument. M.K Raina and Subbiraj display
this kind of an approach. Subbiraj very inappropriately urges other jury members to construe
an attitude based on marginal ethnic and racial signs, M.K Raina asks them to get away with
the decision quickly as discussing the facts was a waste of time. Through the use of non-
factual, environmental cues, the sick gentlemen utilize the peripheral route to persuasion.
Route selection is a component of important relevance in the story. Some of the jurors who
care deeply about the fate of the accused boy, are concerned with justice and they take pride
in their intellect regardless of the social status and are involved in deliberations which is
susceptible to the central route. Those who are not able to understand the intricacy of the
trial, are sidetracked and constrained for time tend to take the peripheral route.

Conformity:
The power of social influence is portrayed in the movie which shows how biases and
prejudices can veil our decision making capabilities. Normative social influence and
informational social influence are the two theories of conformity that can be studied from
this movie. According to informational social influence, individuals conform because they
come to a conclusion that the one’s interpretation of the vague situation at hand is more
valid, than their own. This is intensified by the vagueness of situation, time constraints, and
presence of experts. Normative social influence is a theory that states that the cause of
individual conformity is because of the possibility of appearing divergent. Thus, group
functioning can highly influence the working capability and the efficacy of the decisions of the
group members.
Group Process
The theory of social facilitation states that the presence of others hampers performance over
tedious tasks but improves the performance over easy tasks. Throughout the movie, the timid
man of high understanding is left flabbergasted and anxious when he is approached by the
group for the assessment of his opinion. This timid person institutes his intellect later in the
film. A component of social facilitation i.e. the evaluation apprehension theory is
demonstrated via this. This theory states that the presence of others produces effects of
social enablement when the audience is supposed as possible assessors. K.K Raina’s
conviction in evaluating the case is an example of social compensation.

Group Polarization
This concept states that group conversations generally aid to strengthen the pre-existent
prevailing point of view. The movie initially demonstrates this concept but the consistent
disdain of other members is curbed by K.K Raina and the people who start to back him.

Group Effectiveness
The brainstorming by all the 12 jury members gave light to new facts and issues which were
not covered in multiple courtroom meetings. This shows that a group is effective in nature
since different mind-sets clash and collaborate to give birth to facts which ultimately lead to
rational and ethical decision making. As the GESTALT effects states, a whole is much powerful
than a part, similarly, the decision of the group is more concrete than the decision on any
single jury member.

Group Dynamics
The jury members in the movie have to decide the fate of a young teenager who is accused
of killing his father. The consent of every jury member plays an important role in the decision
making. Every jury member has his own thought process, biases and conceptions. Group
dynamics is observed throughout the movie as it plays an important role in the moulding the
mind-set of the jury members. The group persuasion changes the decisions and perception of
most of the jury members who initially has different opinions.
Diversification of Ideas
When all the jury members were engaged in deliberations, teamwork and brainstorming
occurred which took into consideration all the facts for example the lady witness who wore
spectacles which could have caused difficulty of sight from a far distance and thus helped in
proving the young teenager innocent.

Conclusion
A group can consist of people from different backgrounds having different mindsets. This can
cause conflicts as portrayed in the movie “Ek Ruka Hua Faisla”. The same can occur in an
organisation where people of different backgrounds come together and work in a systematic
manner but the possibility of conflicts prevails. The personality of people also plays a major
role which is a sub part of power and politics. A dominant person tries to suppress a timid one
and influence his or her decision. The boy who is accused of murder in the story comes from
a poor background and some of the jury members have preconceived notions regarding him.
These presumptions impacted their decision making. The power of social influences clouds
the mind of decision makers which points out that a person who is to decide should judge on
the basis of facts and not on preconceived notions. A few key takeaways from the movie are;
every group member should actively take interest in the decision making process, aggression
should be kept at bay and rational thinkers should be encouraged.