With 'Dahan: Raakan Ka Rahasya', the makers promised a supernatural thriller rooted in Indian mythology. The Disney+ Hotstar offering may have received a tepid response, but Tisca Chopra believes director Vikranth Pawar has deftly questioned several beliefs and superstitions through it. In fact, Pawar was the primary reason the actor came on board. “As time passes, I am more and more interested in working with certain kinds of people. Vikranth is a solid, stable director who is making the show, not to make a project, but to tell a good story. That was important to me,” says Chopra, who is at the centre of the horror offering. She plays IAS officer Avani Raut who leads a mining expedition in Shilaspura despite the villagers warning her that it will unleash a deadly curse.

Avani and Saurabh Shukla’s godman character Pramukh represent the conflict between the two ideologies — rationality and superstition. Chopra explains, “Where do you draw the line between science and superstition? What is provable, and what is not? Nobody can tell you for sure that there is nothing supernatural. That, to me, is a [fascinating] space.”