RASHMI ROCKET is the story of a girl who's accused of being a man. The year is 2014. Rashmi Vira (Taapsee Pannu) is from Bhuj, Gujarat and is a tour guide. She's a great runner but quit running after she lost her father, Ramnik (Manoj Joshi), in the 2001 earthquake. At that time, she was participating in a running tournament when the earthquake struck. She was so lost in the running that she didn't even realize the pandemonium around her.

Sex verification is said to the cause of acute mental trauma among female athletes. In 2001, swimmer Pratima Gaonkar reportedly committed suicide after disclosure and public commentary on her failed sex verification test. Santhi Soundarajan, who won the silver medal in 800 m at the 2006 Asian Games in Doha, Qatar, failed the sex verification test and was reportedly stripped of her medal.

Taapsee Pannu starrer 'Rashmi Rocket' has finally launched and has been streaming on Zee5. The film holds a very strong and prominent story of the human rights of female athletes. 'Rashmi Rocket is been directed by Akarsh Khurana and produced by Ronnie Screwvala, Neha Anand, and Pranjal Khandhdiya. Apart from Taapsee, the film also features Abhishek Banerjee, Priyanshu Painyuli, Supriya Pathak, Supriya Pilgaonkar, and Manoj Joshi.

Little Rashmi runs so fast that she earns for herself the sobriquet "Rocket". Rashmi Rocket does fly high. As the trailer gives us a sneak peek, we know she is exceptionally gifted. She sets new records, is made a part of the national team, and goes on to win medals for the country. However, everything comes to a screeching halt when she fails a gender test.

In a recent interview, Rashmi Rocket Director Akarsh Khurana said, 'As a viewer, I've always been fond of courtroom dramas, mature romances, and sports films....This film gave me the unique and exciting opportunity to work on something that had all of these elements.' That much is right. Rashmi Rocket, which releases on ZEE5 on October 15, is eminently undecided on whether it wants to be a sports movie, romantic film or courtroom drama.

In a patriarchal society like ours, every sphere is ridden with added struggles for women and there is hardly any space we can claim is free of gender biases. In Akarsh Khurana directorial Rashmi Rocket, Rashmi Vira (Taapsee Pannu) a resilient athlete from Gujarat finds her world crashing after she is falsely indicated in a gender verification test in a space where she was at the top of her game.

The questions that Rashmi Rocket, a social-issue sports drama, raises are absolutely valid. The methods that scenarist Aniruddha Guha and director Akarsh Khurana employ in the search for answers go a tad awry. Authenticity is jettisoned and hokey hysteria allowed a free run. Too much drama, not enough heft - that is the sum total of Rashmi Rocket.

It's hard to imagine a feel-good movie about hyperandrogenism among women in sport. The messy and evolving debate about whether female athletes who have higher than stipulated testosterone levels have an unfair advantage over their competitors isn't what we might associate with an upbeat and neatly ordered fairy tale.

At an interesting juncture in the film, a testy judge asks a lawyer with a tinge of sarcasm, 'Aap Hindi film bahut dekhte hain kya? Asliyat mein courtroom mein itna high drama nahin hota.' (Do you watch too many Hindi films? In reality, there's not so much drama in courtrooms). The statement is an exact match for the tone of 'Rashmi Rocket', a film about a female athlete who runs the gauntlet of peer jealousy, institutional patriarchy, and an archaic gender test in her quest for the top.

Growing up in a small town of Kutch Bhuj, Rashmi (Taapsee Pannu) is a firebrand from the word go. She gets into fights with the boys and is a rebellion at heart. Her dark skin and boyish mannerisms instantly set her apart from the other girls of her age, but beyond all of that the one thing that makes her special, is her ability to sprint like a cheetah.

During a courtroom sequence in Rashmi Rocket, the judge tells the beleaguered sprinter's lawyer that she doesn't know whether to get irritated or impressed by his arguments. One gets a similar feeling after watching director Akarsh Khurana's cosmetic ode to sportswomen.

In Taapsee Pannu's Rashmi Rocket, the heroine gets a shocking slap on her face. Now if you, like myself, could not stop gushing about her after watching Anubhav Sinha's Thappad, let me tell you that the similarities between the two movies end right there. While Thappad makes for textbook reading on addressing a woman's right to respect with subtlety and consistent writing, Rashmi Rocket runs miles away from it.