Ek Hasina Thi (2004) Ending, Explained: Is Karan Dead?

Ek Hasina Thi is an Indian neo-noir film predicated on the idea of feminine rage. It features a wronged lover, loads of criminals, and a genuinely sinister revenge climax that leaves the audience with a sense of dread — even if they kind of know what’s coming. So, let’s jump right into it.

Consider yourself warned: Spoilers ahead!

Ek Hasina Thi Plot Overview

Sarika, an innocent girl who works at a travel agency, eventually meets and falls in love with Karan, who hides his criminal activities from her.

One day, Karan’s accomplice comes over to her apartment, leaves a suitcase, and then turns up dead. Sarika unfortunately gets trapped in the police investigation and becomes the prime suspect.

In an effort to save himself, Karan convinces Sarika to plead guilty in front of the judge. Karan’s lawyer also lies to Sarika and says that the judge will let her go due to her clean record and the fact that she has already been in jail for some time.

However, on judgement day, the opposite happens — the judge sentences Sarika to jail for 7 years.

This is where the story picks up.

Sarika, who was once head over heels for Karan, realises just how badly he has deceived her and vows to get her revenge. With the help of a powerful inmate named Promila, a now-changed Sarika escapes from prison and hunts down her former lover.

Ek Hasina Thi Ending

Is Karan Dead?

Yes, Karan dies in an extremely gruesome way that just screams pure evil… Yet, there is a tinge of justice laced into the story.

After Sarika escapes from jail, she searches for Karan and finds him in Delhi with a new girl. It also turns out he is in some deep caca with a local gangster named Sanjiv.

Karan and Sanjiv get into a heated confrontation after which the former leaves. Sarika, who has followed Karan and observed it all, ends up killing the gangster so that the suspicion falls on Karan.

As Karan tries to clear his name, Sarika pretends to run into him at a mall and says that she wants to help him out. But given that she has stolen 11 crores from Karan’s boss, it’s clear that Sarika has other plans for her former flame.

Once again, Karan becomes the prime suspect before the police apprehend him and he learns about Sarika’s true intentions. He physically assaults her when she refuses to tell him where she has hidden the money — before revealing she burnt it.

In order to prove he is innocent, Karan takes Sarika to his boss and tells her to confess to everything. However, Sarika, having wisened up since she first got trapped by Karan, refuses to do so. Instead, she pretends as if she knows nothing about the crime and blames Karan for everything before escaping.

Just then, the police show up and a shootout ensues in which Karan’s boss dies and the ACP also gets gravely injured.

This time around, though, as Karan tries to get away in a car, Sarika holds him at gunpoint and takes him to a secluded cavern before knocking him out.

Karan then wakes up in chains and begs Sarika to let him go.

The seasoned criminal metaphorically comes to his knees and finally accepts that what he did to Sarika was extremely messed up but pleads for his own freedom and life in the bargain.

However, Sarika, who has been hardened due to the very situation Karan put her in, walks away as rats start filling up the cave. Karan, chained and unable to move, cannot do anything about the rats, and all we hear are his pained shrieks as Sarika leaves him to die.

The irony is that in the beginning of the film, it was Sarika who was afraid of rats, and Karan would make fun of her for this. Having lost her innocent nature, though, towards the end, Sarika turns her biggest fear into her strongest weapon, thereby showcasing just how she has changed due to her circumstances.

This act of murder by mice is pure evil, and it takes a certain level of apathy to have conjured it.

But it also signifies how people can break when pushed into extreme situations, especially through no fault of their own. All Sarika did was trust the man she truly loved, but all she found was pain and suffering every step of the way.

From being bullied by other inmates to losing her father after her conviction, Sarika does a complete 180.

From trusting Karan blindly to feigning her innocence when she steals his boss’s money, Sarika has become a ruthless person whose only objective is to seek her revenge.

From being so afraid of mice that she jumped on her countertop to using them as the very tool to kill Karan, Sarika’s vengeance knows no bounds.

And the audience, too, is left with this sense of karmic retribution, unintentionally rationalizing the murder as a tit-for-tat scenario.

Does Sarika Go to Jail?

Having achieved what she set out to accomplish, after leaving Karan to die, Sarika goes to the ACP and gives her the stolen 11 crores. At the same time, Sarika tells the cop to do what she feels is right.

In the final scene of the film, we see Sarika at the jail just looking at other inmates in the jail. She then walks out of the prison as the credits roll.

So, did Sarika end up serving her prison sentence after all?

It’s not very clear what exactly the ACP chose to do, but there is one clue that offers a clue about what actually happened with Sarika — the length of her hair.

When Sarika visits the cop in the hospital, she has short hair.

However, when we see Sarika next, she has a braid.

It’s evident that some time has passed between these two scenes for Sarika’s hair to have grown much longer. Hence, it is quite possible that Sarika has served her sentence and paid her debt back to society.

It also seems like Sarika may not have had to serve 7 years like she was initially sentenced to do.

Now, this is something I actually spent some time researching, and as per both the Model Prisoner Manual by the MHA and the Delhi Jail Manual, women prisoners cannot be coerced into cutting their hair. Of course, there are certain exceptions for hygiene and such, but largely, both manuals make it clear that haircuts aren’t much of a thing in prison.

Furthermore, Sarika’s hair is an extremely important symbol for her character development.

Even the first time around, Sarika was only able to chop her hair off due to the contraband razor Pramila gave her. Plus, slicing her hair off was indicative of how prison had started to change Sarika.

It’s also no secret that women usually switch up their hair after a breakup — and Sarika’s situation is the worst-case scenario.

As Sarika changes, her hair also changes.

However, once she has accomplished her goal and killed Karan, Sarika’s fury leaves her. Moreover, she still has some morality left as she gives the money to the cop and basically turns herself in.

So, what seems the most likely is that the ACP, after learning about Sarika’s circumstances and true motives, could have helped the protagonist get a reduced sentence. Even if she doesn’t serve the 7-year sentence that was initially handed to her, Sarika may have been given a shorter prison term for Karan’s murder.

When we see her in the climax, it seems as though Sarika is taking in final glimpses of the jail… almost in a bittersweet way. She also seems to be more at peace, and that is reflected in her hairstyle and length.