General · EdgepediaOctober 3, 20266 min read

State of Siege: 26/11

State of Siege: 26/11 is an Indian action-thriller web series that dramatizes the 2008 Mumbai attacks and the National Security Guard (NSG) operation to end them. Produced by Contiloe Pictures as the company's first digital series, it premiered on the ZEE5 streaming platform on 20 March 2020 and runs for eight episodes of roughly 30 minutes each.¹^•² The screenplay by Joshua Caldwell is based on the book Black Tornado: The Three Sieges of Mumbai 26/11 by Sandeep Unnithan, and the series was directed by the American filmmaker Matthew Leutwyler.³^•⁴

Key fact	Detail
Premiere	20 March 2020 on ZEE5; Contiloe Pictures' first digital series¹
Format	8 episodes, about 30 minutes each; action, crime, thriller²
Source material	Black Tornado: The Three Sieges of Mumbai 26/11 by Sandeep Unnithan; screenplay by Joshua Caldwell³
Director / creator	Matthew Leutwyler (director); Abhimanyu Singh (creator)⁴
Lead cast	Arjan Bajwa, Arjun Bijlani, Vivek Dahiya, Mukul Dev, Tara Alisha Berry²
Languages / rating	Hindi, Tamil, Telugu; U/A 16+⁵
Historical basis	The 26 November 2008 Mumbai attacks, in which ten Lashkar-e-Taiba gunmen held the city under siege for about 60 hours⁶

Spoilers

Plot and structure

The series opens before dawn on 26 November and covers the three days of the attacks. Colonel Kunal Sahota (Arjan Bajwa) struggles to obtain upgrades for the NSG while the terrorists make their way toward Mumbai; the gunmen then strike the CST station, Leopold Café, Taj Hotel, Oberoi Hotel, and Chabad House simultaneously. Later episodes follow Kasab and Ismail's attack on Cama Hospital, Kasab's capture after the killing of the ATS chief, the NSG's evacuation of the Taj, a helicopter-borne attempt to enter Chabad House through the roof, and a final battle titled "Black Tornado."⁵ The eighth episode, "The Making of a Terrorist," is devoted to Ajmal Kasab's background, covering indoctrination and weapons training.²^•³

Unlike many screen treatments of the attacks, the story is told largely from the perspective of the NSG.¹⁰ It covers every major location hit, from the Leopold Café and Nariman House to the two hotels, and it depicts the role of news channels whose live reporting may have kept the handlers in Pakistan informed of the forces' movements.³^•¹¹

Cast and characters

The leads play officers modeled on real participants. Arjan Bajwa's Colonel Kunal Sahota is based on Col. (now Brigadier) Sunil Sheoran; Arjun Bijlani's Major Nikhil Manikrishnan is based on Major Sandeep Unnikrishnan, the NSG officer killed during the Taj operation; and Vivek Dahiya plays Captain Rohit Bagga.³ Mukul Dev plays the Lashkar-e-Taiba handler Zaki-ur-Rehman Lakhvi, in contact with the gunmen from Pakistan.³^•² The supporting cast includes Tara Alisha Berry as a journalist, Sid Makkar as her channel boss, Suzanne Bernert as Yocheved Orpaz, and Avinash Wadhawan as JCP Sidana.²

Historical background

The series depicts the attacks that began on the evening of 26 November 2008, when ten members of the Pakistan-based militant group Lashkar-e-Taiba came ashore from the Arabian Sea in small boats and attacked high-profile targets across Mumbai with automatic weapons and explosives.⁷^•⁶ The targets included the Taj Mahal Palace and Oberoi-Trident hotels, the main railway terminal (Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Terminus), a Jewish cultural center (Nariman House/Chabad House), the Leopold Café, a cinema, and two hospitals.⁷

The siege lasted about 60 hours. Accounts of the death toll differ by source and counting method: a Congressional Research Service report put it at about 165 people plus nine terrorists killed, with hundreds injured;⁷ the Modern War Institute case study gives 174 people killed by the attackers;⁶ and an Associated Press retrospective states at least 175 dead including nine of the attackers.⁸ Nine of the ten attackers were killed and one, Ajmal Kasab, was captured alive.⁶

Several factors prolonged the response. The terrorists were better armed and equipped than the Indian security forces that first responded; they stayed in constant contact by satellite telephone with handlers in Pakistan who monitored live Indian news coverage; and gaps among Indian security agencies delayed and uncoordinated the response.⁶ According to a RAND report cited by TIME, it took nearly 10 hours for India's elite NSG commandos to reach Mumbai, in part because the rapid-reaction force was based near Delhi, hundreds of miles away; the siege of the Taj Hotel ended on the morning of 29 November.⁹

Production

The tactical sequences drew on the involvement of actual NSG "Black Cat" commandos and Army officers during production, which reviewers cited as a source of the operation's accurate depiction.³ Dialogue moves among English, Urdu, Hindi, Punjabi, and Hebrew, with music by Kartik Shah.¹² The series was released in Hindi, Tamil, and Telugu audio with English and Hindi subtitles.⁵

Reception

Reviewers generally praised the restraint of the retelling. The Hindustan Times described it as an unflinching portrayal that neither over-dramatizes the attacks to pump up patriotism nor fictionalizes them, and noted its questions about communication lapses among task forces and the media's live coverage.¹¹ The Envoy Web called it a stellar rendition and highlighted the ensemble performances and authentic tactics.³ Scroll.in praised the decision to give weight to many participants rather than one heroic figure, and its criticism of the system's preparedness and of newsroom behavior, while finding some non-dramatic scenes weak and noting production compromises such as hotel interiors that do not match the real Taj.¹² PeepingMoon rated it 3 of 5, crediting the lead performances but faulting the handling of hostages' family members and hotel staff.¹³ On IMDb the series holds a rating of 7.9 from about 3,000 users.²

Availability

In India the series streams on ZEE5, which holds the streaming rights.¹⁴ In the United States it is available free with ads on The Roku Channel and Tubi.²

References

Initially written Oct 3, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 15, 2026; Oct 21, 2026; Oct 25, 2026; Nov 1, 2026