The Screen vs. The Streets: The Tragedy of the Siblings

In Raakh, we watch the agonizing spiral of the Arora family when teenage siblings Suman and Sahil vanish into the pouring rain on their way to a national radio station. We sit with the heartbreaking, masterfully acted grief of their mother, played by Sonali Bendre, and watch a rookie cop named Jayprakash Jatav (Ali Fazal) slowly chip away at the bureaucratic rot of late-70s Delhi to catch two human predators.

But on August 26, 1978, the nightmare was real, and the names belonged to Geeta Chopra (16) and her brother Sanjay Chopra (13).

[ Real 1978 Timeline ]
August 26: Geeta & Sanjay miss their bus -> Accept a car ride -> Vanish.
August 28: Bodies discovered in a Ridge forest with extensive defense wounds.
September 8: Ranga and Billa are caught on the Kalka Mail train by alert soldiers.

Geeta was a talented young singer scheduled to broadcast on All India Radio’s Yuavani program, and her younger brother Sanjay—a fierce junior boxer—was accompanying her. Heavy monsoon rains caused them to miss their bus, prompting them to accept a lift from strangers in a stolen car.

They never reached the studio. At 9:00 PM, their parents turned on the radio, expecting to hear Geeta’s voice. Instead, an unfamiliar voice drifted through the speakers. Two days later, their bodies were found discarded in a jungle area near the Delhi Ridge.

The Monsters: Who Were Ranga and Billa?

The show introduces us to the unsettling, depraved killers “Babu” and “Rajjo”. In reality, these characters were modeled after two cold-blooded career criminals from Mumbai: Kuljeet Singh (alias Ranga) and Jasbir Singh (alias Billa).

• The Motive: Ranga and Billa did not originally plan to kill the children. They intended to hold them for a massive ransom. However, when they discovered the children’s father was a high-ranking Naval Officer (Captain Madan Mohan Chopra), panic set in.
• The Fight: What the killers did not expect was the sheer bravery of the siblings. True to his boxing training, young Sanjay fought back furiously, inflicting severe injuries on his captors. Enraged and terrified of being exposed, Ranga and Billa brutally stabbed the children to death. Forensic reports later noted dozens of defensive wounds on Sanjay’s arms.

The Haunting Climax: The Kalka Mail Arrest

While the series turns the chase into a slow-burn psychological chess match, the real-world arrest was a twist of absolute fate.

After evading a massive police dragnet for nearly two weeks, Ranga and Billa boarded the Kalka Mail train to escape. In their desperation, they accidentally sat in a compartment reserved for military personnel. When Lance Naik Gurtej Singh asked the two men for identification, they fumbled nervously.

By a stroke of incredible luck, the soldier was holding a Hindi newspaper featuring the sketches of Delhi’s most wanted fugitives. He looked at the paper, looked up at the passengers, and realized the monsters were sitting right in front of him. The duo was arrested on the spot.

The Lasting Legacy of a Nation’s Loss

The brilliance of Raakh lies in its refusal to give the audience a cheap, triumphant happy ending. It understands a fundamental truth: capturing the killers does not stitch a broken family back together.

Ranga and Billa were convicted and hanged to death in Tihar Jail on January 31, 1982. Yet, their names became synonymous with the ultimate boogeyman for generations of Indian parents.

The case forever changed how the country viewed child safety, stranger danger, and urban vulnerability. To honor the extraordinary courage of the siblings who fought back until their final breaths, the Government of India instituted the National Bravery Awards (The Geeta and Sanjay Chopra Awards), presented every year on Republic Day to children who show exceptional courage.

Raakh turns the ashes of this historic tragedy into a haunting mirror, forcing us to remember that true evil doesn’t hide in the shadows—it often drives by in the rain, offering a lift.