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Dhurandhar: Propaganda or not?

This article attempts to find an answer to whether Dhurandhar a propaganda film or not? For a film so highly acclaimed and criticized, Dhurandhar has managed to become a topic of debate in almost every Indian household.

Published:April 16, 2026 at 08:05 PM6 min read
Dhurandhar: Propaganda or not?
Correspondent: Shubhangi Sarkar

A pounding heart, an adrenaline rush, and a strong adhesion to the seat’s edge, were a few symptoms that a significant majority of the Indian audience experienced while watching the latest Bollywood blockbuster directed by Aditya Dhar—Dhurandhar.

Divided into two parts, Dhurandhar is a raw, gory, gripping and thoroughly entertaining film in the Indian espionage genre, that has gotten the entire country talking about its brilliance and possibly propagandic nature, both. Whether it be in terms of appreciating its cinematographic feat, or in terms of digging into any political framing hidden behind the film’s presentation.

Dhurandhar tells the tale of Hamza Ali Mazari (later on introduced as Jaskirat Singh Rangi), an Indian intelligence asset who is deployed into Pakistan with the single goal of infiltrating Pakistani terrorist networks from their very root levels.


And what follows beyond the infiltration is a series of events that essentially serve the role of a visual, and chronological hypothesis of India’s counterterrorism efforts from within Pakistan.

Even after becoming the highest grossing film domestically, and its sequel part ‘Dhurandhar: The Revenge’ crossing ₹1,671 crore by April 2026, worldwide—the film faces both negative and positive reviews and opinions.

But a LOT of opinions nonetheless.

Opinions on this blockbuster film remain severely polarised. As one side of the audience considers the film to be a visually hooking, all-rounder package of entertainment blending with facts; while the other side of the audience calls the film a propagandic, and overly violent slop of politics and islamophobia.

Critics who consider the film to be a propagandic, or a politically inclined piece of fiction have raised multiple points to justify their beliefs. Such as how chants of the sacred Islamic words ‘Allah-hu-Akbar’ while ISI orchestrates the 26/11 Mumbai attack is an extremely Islamophobic choice of direction, and how this focus on violence leads to anti-muslim majoritarianism and bigotry.

While enjoyers describe it to be ‘unapologetic’ in terms of its exploration of Pakistan-backed terrorism and Indian intelligence capabilities, they also appear to shed a considerable amount of light upon the technical, cinematographic and artistic nuances of Dhurandhar as a piece of visual media that has earned considerable praise from the Muslim majority within India too.

“Aditya Dhar has provided to Indians a solution with Dhurandhar.” shared first year Mass Communication
student, Arnav Kapse, a fellow enjoyer of Dhurandhar. “He has touched upon the soft spots of every Indian's heart where they might have gotten hurt with regards to terrorist attacks, and has thus provided a solution to those Indians. And when solutions are combined with brilliant cinematography, crisp music, conclusions and plot twists that stay with you till the end- it naturally builds repeat value that leaves you wanting to go back to it again and again.” The freshman added.



Dhurandhar’s emotional appeal thus indeed becomes a strong plus point for its reputation. However, one can also not ignore the blatant representation of a particular political ideology that the director himself seems to hold, leading to the usage of the Hon’ble Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s speech footage from the 2016 demonetization saga. And while Dhurandhar as a film has already challenged multiple cinematographic
norms—using recorded footage of the head of state to build a certain narrative, certainly is the first of its kind in the Bollywood film industry, which the informed audience has not taken too kindly towards.

Dr. Rekha Pachauri, Assistant Professor at the Times School of Media commented on this segment of the film.
“Since Dhurandhar showed clips of our PM, and some event timelines do not match with their real-life occurrence, this narrative combined with both the film and political party's popularity- if not directly as a propaganda, it does place Dhurandhar under the category of a politically inclined film franchise”.

The question that hence arises in this debate of ethics, politics, limits and propaganda is- who is actually correct on their stance?

Whereas in reality, the search for a correct stance essentially refers to a single objective conclusion of these events that everyone can be satisfied with. Which means, condensing the entire 7-8 hours’ worth of content from Dhurandhar, and Dhurandhar: The Revenge, into a singular and straightforward answer that can satisfy the masses. Something that the franchise does not aim to do at all.

But as Dr. Gauri Chakraborty, a Professor at Times School of Media states, “Art is, and always has been political. And
Dhurandhar has brought conversation back into Indian households, while also giving the people, and youth especially, a chance to look up from their screens and discern between patriotism and nationalism”.

Diving deeper into her opinion, Dr. Chakraborty also added that “One cannot simply reduce an entire film’s demanding audience down and reduce focus on its layering, performance and socio-cultural representation of another
country—because the film has cinematographically managed to touch the audiences at such a mass scale at a certain point.”

So, while multiple fans are starting to rather blindly defend real policy using the logic that the film has presented, and as some critics are choosing to jump onto the hatred bandwagon for the love of the game, that is even beginning to blur out actual, constructive criticism—one thing becomes obvious.

Dhurandhar is a film that leaves you thinking deeper about the state of Indian governance.

“The movie expects you to pay attention and sit with their characters and think about it'. It’s a sincere and ambitious
film. You can see the effort behind it and that is what counts for cinema.” said second year Mass Communication student, Vanshika Chauhan.

Ultimately, Dhurandhar is a film whose nationalistic appearance remains masked with a cloak of patriotism. And it is the paradox- that whether people can focus beyond that cloak and appearance, and look at its true core as a piece of fiction heavily inspired by true events, which has led to Dhurandhar becoming one of Bollywood’s highest grossing films. Whether it bethrough good publicity, or bad alike.

To conclude, one cannot simply categorise Dhurandhar as a propaganda, or non-propaganda film. Because it is this entire discourse related to one single movie—that has contributed to Dhurandhar’s severe popularity. Hence, proving that we now live in a period where 'truth' is defined by what people consider, or feel to be correct, based on their existing beliefs.

The author is a second year BA Mass Communication student. She is extremely passionate about international relations, linguistics, cultures and anime. And she likes to indulge in digital art in her free time.
Tags
#dhurandhar#rekha pachauri#jaskirat singh rangi#aditya dhar#hamza ali mazari

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