Kota Factory

Production

Saurabh Khanna, who worked on The Viral Fever's Yeh Meri Family, started the scriptwriting process of his another project for TVF after the release of Yeh Meri Family in July 2018. It was reported that the series is based on a teenager who joins a coaching institute that prepares students for the Indian Institute of Technology entrance examination (JEE Advanced), and deals with intense academic pressure and a colourful hostel experience. Khanna compared the script to Biswa Kalyan Rath's Laakhon Mein Ek and the documentary An Engineered Dream, by Hemant Gaba, but stated the script is distinctively different as this show is set in India's coaching hub of Kota. Khanna drew inspiration as he and the creative team of TVF (Arunabh Kumar, Amit Golani, and Biswapati Sarkar) were IIT graduates.

Jitendra Kumar, an ex-IIT graduate who studied in Kota, plays Jeetu Bhaiya, founder of AIMERS Institute. Khanna stated about his role: 'Teaching is a very humble, underrated profession... Teachers are heavily paid and they are, consequently, under pressure to extract the best from students. Jeetu is one such teacher... When Vaibhav requests to be allowed to move up to the elite students’ batch, Jeetu snaps at him to not beg.' Alam Khan, who plays Uday, also appeared in Laakhon Mein Ek with a similar storyline, but Khanna conveyed it as unintentional. Kota Factory was shot in colour and graded into monochrome later during post production.

Shooting started in January 2019 and ended within 30 days. After the second season was renewed, writing began in July 2019. Shooting was delayed due to the COVID-19 pandemic lockdown in India, then started in September 2020 and was filmed across two to three months in and around Madhya Pradesh under COVID-19 protocols. Shooting wrapped in January 2021.

Soundtrack

The first season's soundtrack is composed by Karthik Rao and Simran Hora, and was produced by Ankur Tewari. It features twelve original compositions with two songs 'The Gentleman' sung and written by Simran Hora and 'Main Bola Hey!' sung by Abhishek Yadav, Manish Chandwani and Karthik Rao. The soundtrack album was released on 23 May 2019. Additional songs composed by Ankur Tewari, Karsh Kale and his rock band The Ghalat Family were released on 3 June 2019.

The second season's soundtrack is also composed by Karthik Rao and Simran Hora. It features nine original compositions with two songs 'Tere Jaisa' sung by Vaibhav Bundhoo and Kamakshi Khanna and 'Umbilical' sung by Jazim Sharma. The soundtrack album was released on 24 September 2021.

Release

Kota Factory was sponsored with Unacademy. In December 2018, TVF released the official teaser. The official trailer of the first season was unveiled on 28 March 2019.

The series consisting of five episodes was released simultaneously through TVF Play and YouTube from 16 April 2019, with each episode being aired per week. The series finale premiered on 14 May 2019. After the second season being renewed, Netflix acquired the distribution rights. On 30 August 2021, Netflix announced that the second season will premiere on 24 September 2021.

On 26 September 2021, Raghav Subbu confirmed that the third season was in the works. It was confirmed in Feb 2024 when Netflix dropped a first look teaser on their Instagram page. It was released on 20 June 2024.

Reception

Devasheesh Pandey of News18 praised the cinematography, art direction, sound design and acting performances, giving it 3.5 out of 5, saying 'Kota Factory maintains an edge over other shows in the genre, courtesy of its on-point, deadpan humour and a relatably bittersweet aftertaste of existential battle that the protagonist is facing.' Ishita Sengupta of The Indian Express found the show engaging, applauding 'The ingenuity of Kota Factory lies in its ability to deal with different narrative strands and coalesce them effortlessly,' and felt performances of Mayur More and Ranjan Raj add value. Rahul Desai of Film Companion praised the writing, saying 'Kota Factory’s biggest asset is its writing which somehow maintains a semi-dramatic progression without compromising on the factual tone of the series.' Gautam Batra of Koimoi gave it 4 out of 5, praising direction and acting.