Batti Gul Meter Chalu trailer: Shahid Kapoor, Shraddha Kapoor cannot afford to pay this bill

Shahid Kapoor, Shraddha Kapoo shared the trailer for Batti Gul Meter Chalu on Friday. The film, about India’s struggle with power outages and incredibly flawed bills, also stars Yami Gautam.

In the film, Shahid plays a man who could not care less about his town’s troubles with electricity. He pees in the dark, eats in the dark, romances Shraddha Kapoor in the dark and entertains the whole town in the dark, thereby romanticising a problem that should have been solved long ago.

Everything goes swimmingly until his friend, played Divyendu Sharma, decides to open a factory. Soon, the factory is struck by lightning when the electricity company sends a bill of ₹54 lakhs to his door. Unable to figure out a solution, he dives into the Beas river, killing himself. Heartbroken Shahid decided to teach the electricity company a lesson and drags them to court.

Almost everyone in Batti Gul Meter Chalu seems to be speaking a very strange accent, repeating the word ‘Thehra’ in every sentence. Shraddha fails to raise her game and the comedy bits feel forced. Of course, the crying bits are no good either.

Shahid and Yami play lawyers in the film and fight for people’s right to electricity. The film is directed by Shree Narayan Singh who previously made Akshay Kumar’s Toilet Ek Prem Katha.

Shahid did an Instagram live before the launch from his car on his way to the venue, Juhu PVR in Mumbai. “This is an extremely relevant issue and I think right to electricity is a fundamental human right,” he said. Shahid also revealed that they will soon launch a competition in which fans can submit videos about their struggles with the electricity problem all over India.

“The issue is bigger then the film...the film is just a method to bring it to forefront,” he said in the live video. Shahid revealed that Yami could not join them for the trailer launch as she was unwell. The film’s shooting was earlier delayed due to a tussle between Prernaa Arora’s KriArj Entertainment and Bhushan Kumar’s T-Series. After the shooting being stalled for a few months, the film went on floors in February this year.

Batti Gul Meter Chalu releases on September 21.

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