Reclaiming Agency: Interrogating Disability, Justice, and Legal Subjectivity in Kaabil and Neru

Author(s)	Dr. SURYENDU CHAKRABORTY
Country	India
Abstract	This paper critically examines Kaabil (2017) and Neru (2023) through the intersecting frameworks of Disability Studies, Crip Theory, and Legal Theory to explore how Indian cinema portrays blind protagonists not as passive victims but as agents of legal and moral transformation. Challenging traditional representations steeped in pity or cure narratives, these films reimagine blindness as a site of epistemic authority and juridical resistance. Kaabil enacts a form of extrajudicial justice through vigilantism, while Neru affirms legal advocacy within the courtroom. Together, they interrogate normative legal subjectivity, foreground intersectional experiences shaped by disability and gender, and advocate for a radical jurisprudence that centres embodied vulnerability and ethical agency. Through their aesthetic strategies and narrative arcs, the films do more than represent disabled characters—they invite viewers to reimagine justice itself. This paper argues that both films provide a cinematic blueprint for disability justice in both legal and cultural spheres.
Keywords	Disability Studies, Crip Theory, Legal Subjectivity, Indian Cinema, Blindness, Justice, Vigilantism, Courtroom Drama
Field	Sociology > Linguistic / Literature
Published In	Volume 7, Issue 3, May-June 2025
Published On	2025-06-03
DOI	https://doi.org/10.36948/ijfmr.2025.v07i03.46915
Short DOI	https://doi.org/g9m27s

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