Gangubai Kathiawadi teaser: Meet Alia Bhatt as the queen of Kamathipura

The teaser of Sanjay Leela Bhansali's Gangubai Kathiawadi, starring Alia Bhatt in the titular role, was released on Wednesday. Watch it here.

The teaser of the much-awaited Alia Bhatt-starrer Gangubai Kathiawadi was unveiled on Wednesday. The film has been directed by Sanjay Leela Bhansali.

Alia Bhatt as Gangubai Kathiawadi.

Alia is seen in a never-seen-before avatar - as the owner of a brothel in Kamathipura, the red light area of Mumbai. She spells power, unafraid of the police or politician. She champions the right to live with respect, irrespective of any labels that may be attached to a person.

The teaser shows her dressed in white saris with a coin-sized red bindi as she arrives in her Bentley. She kicks and slaps her opponents. She also has a sense of humour. In one scene, she introduces herself as president of Kamathipura and says declares: "Kumari kisi ne chhoda nahin, aur shrimati kabhi kisi ne banaya hi nahin (no one spared my innocence, and no one honoured me with marriage either)."

The film is based on a chapter from Hussain Zaidi's book Mafia Queens of Mumbai about Gangubai Kothewali, the madam of a brothel in Kamathipura.

Towards the end of 2019, Alia began shooting for the film. She had shared an Instagram post as well. However, the shoot came to a grinding halt after the coronavirus lockdown was announced in March last year. The shoot of the film resumed only in October last year.

Speaking about a source had revealed to Mid Day: "To maintain continuity, Sanjay sir picked up the shoot exactly from where he had left it. Since October 1, Alia and the team have been reporting to the set by 7 pm, and the stint goes on till the wee hours of the morning. Although a part of the grand set had been pulled down ahead of the monsoons, the portion resembling Kamathipura had been left untouched. So, the director has been able to shoot without any hiccup.”

The strenuous schedule reportedly resulted in Alia getting hospitalised. It was said that she reported to work the next day. Speaking about it, her co-star in the film, Seema Pahwa had told Bombay Times in an interview, “I wasn’t a part of the shoot that day. However, I must say that she might have got exhausted for some other reason than the film’s shoot. Sanjay Leela Bhansali is someone who doesn’t rush you with work. He knows what he wants. He is very clear and hardly shoots one scene a day. Things have worked smoothly as far as the film’s shoot is concerned.”