Hindi Medium

Raj Batra (Irrfan Khan) is a boutique owner who lives in Delhi with his wife Mita (Saba Qamar). They have a 5-year-old daughter, Pia (Dishita Sehgal). The couple want Pia to be admitted to a prestigious English-medium school in Delhi as they feel that this will enable her to become a part of the elite of society. Raj and Mita are introduced to a consultant called Shikha (Tillotama Shome), who helps them to prepare for the interview required for admission to various top schools. However, Raj and Mita fail to deliver their tutored answers in the interview, and their application gets rejected due to their limited knowledge of English.

The Batra family moves to Vasant Vihar in order to apply for Delhi Grammar School, a top school, that has a condition that all applicants have to live within three kilometres of the school. Raj and Mita learn from an employee that his daughter has been admitted through the Right to education (RTE) quota, a scheme that helps children from poor families to be admitted to prestigious schools. Raj and Mita decide to apply for Pia's admission through that scheme. They move to a poorer area of the city, and pretend to be impoverished. They form a friendship with Shyam (Deepak Dobriyal) and Tulsi (Swati Das), who also apply for their son Mohan (Angshuman Nandi) to study in Delhi Grammar School through the RTE quota.

Pia eventually gets admission, but Mohan's application is rejected. The Batra family return to Vasant Vihar. Raj and Mita make a donation to the Bharat Nagar Government School, where Mohan studies, to renovate it and get new books. After watching their son become fluent in English, Shyam, and Tulsi search for the identity of the anonymous donor to thank them. Shyam obtains the address of the donor and visits Raj's house in Vasant Vihar, and finds out the truth about Raj pretending to be poor to enable Pia's admission. Shyam leaves to tell Delhi Grammar School's principal (Amrita Singh) of Raj's deceit.

Before he can meet the principal, Raj and Mita go to meet her. Raj asks for Pia's admission to be revoked and tells the truth. The principal rejects doing so. He gives a speech about education rights in the school's auditorium, and leaves the school. Later, both Raj and Mita send Pia to the government-run Hindi-medium school where Mohan studies.

Credits adapted from Bollywood Hungama:[4]

Made on a production budget of ₹14 crore, Hindi Medium was produced by Vijan of Maddock Films and Bhushan Kumar of T-Series. The film was directed by Chaudhary, his third after romantic comedy films Pyaar Ke Side Effects (2006) and Shaadi Ke Side Effects. He came up with the idea of making a film about India's education system with his co-writer Zeenat Lakhani during the development of the latter film. They found the idea too extensive to include in Shaadi Ke Side Effects, so after its release, they decided to incorporate the idea into a separate film. Stating the reason to make Hindi Medium, Chaudhary said, "The subject is so relevant. We realised that today irrespective of the background of the parent, they still want to have the best education for the children."[5]

Pre-production work began after the release of Shaadi Ke Side Effects. Chaudhary began working on the story at that time, and he chose Delhi as the film's key location.[6] The production crew consisted primarily of people Chaudhary had worked with on Pyaar Ke Side Effects and Shaadi Ke Side Effects, with the exception of production designer Mustafa Stationwala—they are editor A. Sreekar Prasad; dialogue writer Amitosh Nagpal; and cinematographer Laxman Utekar. The score was composed by Amar Mohile.[4]

It was Khan's choice to cast Qamar in the film

On 29 May 2016, News18 reported the casting of Saba Qamar in the film, which marked her Bollywood debut.[7] Khan had recommended the casting of Qamar to the makers of the film. He said, "When I saw her YouTube videos, I recommended her to the director and producer and they really liked her".[8] Speaking about her role, Qamar said, "I play a person who didn't get an opportunity to fulfil her dreams so she comes up with a scheme about giving the daughter a life that she didn't have". Khan commented that he had accepted the role as it tackled the realistic subject of the challenges of obtaining a good education in India.[9]

Qamar arrived in Mumbai from Pakistan in July 2016, and the film's principal photography began in the same month.[10][11] The film was shot in Chandni Chowk, Anand Lok, Karol Bagh, and Sangam Vihar.[6] The shooting was completed in October 2016.[12] A song sequence was also filmed in Georgia.[13] Qamar commented that she enjoyed working with Khan, and felt safe while shooting in Delhi. In the same interview with Pakistani newspaper Dawn, she commented that her experience wasn't affected by the nationalist far-right political party Maharashtra Navnirman Sena's hostility towards Pakistan at the time.[14]

Hindi Medium
Soundtrack album by Sachin–Jigar
Released	21 April 2017
Recorded	2016–2017
Genre	Feature film Soundtrack
Length	21:20
Label	T-Series
Sachin–Jigar chronology
Meri Pyaari Bindu (2017) Hindi Medium (2017) A Gentleman (2017)
External audio Official Audio Jukebox on YouTube

The soundtrack consists of four compositions — two original: "Hoor" and "Ek Jindari", and two recreated: "Suit Suit" and "Oh Ho Ho Ho". Sachin–Jigar has composed the original songs. "Suit Suit", the first song, is written and sung by Guru Randhawa and Arjun and composed by Randhawa and Rajat Nagpal. The second track "Hoor" was composed by Sachin–Jigar and sung by Atif Aslam with lyrics by Priya Saraiya. The track "Oh Ho Ho Ho", was composed by Sukhbir and Abhijit Vaghani, sung by Sukhbir, rapped by Ikka Singh and written by Kumaar. The fourth, "Ek Jindari" was written by Kumaar and composed by Sachin–Jigar. It was sung by Taniskaa Sanghvi. The album rights of the film were acquired by T-Series, and it was released on 21 April 2017.[15][16]

The film was released worldwide on 19 May 2017.[19] Hindi Medium was declared 'tax-free' in Gujarat, Maharashtra,[20] Madhya Pradesh[21] and Delhi.[22]

In February 2018, following the success of Dangal (2016) and Secret Superstar (2017) in China, it was announced that Hindi Medium was to be released in China.[23] Hindi Medium released in China on 4 April 2018 to coincide with the Qingming Festival.[24] The film's Chinese title is 起跑线 (Qi Pao Xian), which means The Starting Line.[25]

Qamar (pictured) and Khan received praise for their performances

Hindi Medium received a generally positive reception from critics, with particular praise for Khan's and Qamar's performances.[29]

Rohit Bhatnagar of Deccan Chronicle called the film a "masterpiece" and praised Khan's and Qamar's acting.[30] Rachit Gupta of Filmfare rated the film 4.5 out of 5 stars and said that it was a "refreshingly funny and brilliantly insightful film on parenting and education."[31] Madhureeta Mukherjee of The Times of India highlighted the script, and the comedic elements of the film as its strengths.[32] Rohit Vats of Hindustan Times giving 3.5 stars out of 5 stars, commented that "Khan asks the viewers to take a stand against faulty Indian education system".[33] Samrudhi Ghosh of India Today gave 3 out of 5 stars, praising Khan's and Qamar's performances, said "Hindi Medium may use over-dramatised events to make its message hit home, but in spite of its hiccups, the film is not bogged down because of the performances and the humour".[34] Smrity Sharma of India.com rated the film 2.5 out of 5 stars, and wrote: "Decent story, humour, a few heart tugging moments and effortless performances by Irrfan Khan, Saba Qamar and Deepak Dobriyal make the movie watchable."[35] Shubhra Gupta of The Indian Express giving 2 out of 5 stars, praised Khan's acting however felt that the writing was "flat", and that some of the supporting characters were "more caricature than real".[36]

Hindi Medium received a generally positive reception from critics outside of India.[37] A reviewer for Time Out gave it 4 (out of 5) stars: "With all its merits, though, the film stumbles near the end with its overly sentimental conclusion." The reviewer concluded that "the film is one of the best Bollywood films".[38] James Marsh of South China Morning Post rated it 3.5 stars out of 5 stars, calling it "a classical comedy of manners full of humour and playful performances".[39] Sadaf Siddique of Dawn observed: "Chaudhary gets full marks for novelty, he fails to adequately flesh his ideas out".[40]

The film emerged as a sleeper hit at the box office.[41] Its worldwide gross was ₹108.55 crore (US$15 million) by July 2017.[42] Within three days of its April 2018 release in China, Hindi Medium crossed ₹100 crore (US$14 million) at the Chinese box office, crossing the ₹200 crore (US$28 million) mark worldwide,[43] becoming Khan's highest-grossing Hindi film, surpassing his 2013 release The Lunchbox.[44] By April 16, 2018, Hindi Medium had crossed the ₹300 crore (US$42 million) mark worldwide, becoming one of the top 20 highest-grossing Indian films of all time.[45]

At the 63rd Filmfare Awards, the film garnered six nominations, winning for Best Film and Best Actor for Khan. Chaudhary won Best Director and Khan won for Best Actor at the 19th IIFA Awards. It received six nominations at the Zee Cine Awards.

After the success of Hindi Medium, a sequel to the film was planned. Regarding the success of the film, producer Vijan told Mid Day, "The response we have got is phenomenal. The entire unit of Hindi Medium, including Irrfan and Saba, who look cool as a couple on-screen, should be repeated in a film. There is definitely scope for a sequel. We would certainly explore it."[57] On 24 January 2018, Vijan confirmed the sequel to Times Now. He said, "We have just finished typing the second part", with "Just finishing touches are being put", however, "I think you will have to wait for an official announcement for that."[58]

On 30 March 2019, it was announced that Kareena Kapoor has been added to the cast of the sequel to play the role of a police officer and filming will start from April.[59] On 5 April, the sequel's title was announced as Angrezi Medium and filming began in Udaipur. This was completed in July.[60][61] On 17 February 2020, the film's release date was changed to 13 March 2020 from the earlier release date of 20 March.[62]

• List of Bollywood films of 2017

• Hindi Medium on IMDb
• Hindi Medium at Rotten Tomatoes