Vikas Bahl

Vikas Bahl is an Indian filmmaker, best known for directing Chillar Party (2011), Queen (2013), Super 30 (2019), and Shaitaan (2024).^[1]

Vikas Bahl
Bahl in 2014
Born	1971 (age 53–54) New Delhi, India
Occupations	Film director Film producer screenwriter
Years active	2005–present
Spouse	Richa Dubey (divorced)

Early life and education

Bahl was born and brought up in Lajpat Nagar in Delhi, his father worked with the Indian Oil Corporation. After his schooling from Sardar Patel Vidyalaya and graduation from Ramjas College, Delhi, he moved to Mumbai to pursue an MBA degree from SVKM's NMIMS.^[2]

Career

Bahl started his career with advertising, working for several years in client servicing, before joining UTV Spotboy. In 2011, he started Phantom Films, along with Anurag Kashyap, Vikramaditya Motwane and Madhu Mantena. Over the years as a director he has worked with film directors such as Vishal Bhardwaj, Anurag Kashyap, Rajkumar Gupta and Vikramaditya Motwane.^[3]

In 2011, Bahl made his directorial debut under UTV Spotboy alongside co-director Nitesh Tiwari with Chillar Party and won the National Film Award for Best Screenplay, with Vijay Maurya. The film also garnered the National Film Award for Best Children's Film.^[4] In 2014, he launched his independent directorial venture Queen, starring Kangana Ranaut, which received critical and popular acclaim.^[2][5]

Bahl's 2015 film Shaandar, a destination wedding film, was a flop and received neutral to negative responses.^[5][6] In October 2014, he directed a short film Going Home, featuring Alia Bhatt, on women's safety, which went viral on social media.^[7][8][9] Bahl next directed a biopic on mathematician and IIT-JEE coach Anand Kumar called Super 30,^[10] which featured Hrithik Roshan as Kumar.^[11][12]

Bahl then directed Tiger Shroff starrer Ganapath (2023), which he co-produced with Pooja Entertainment.^[13] It was released on 20 October 2023 to highly negative reviews. Bahl’s direction was also received mixed to negative remarks. Bollywood Hungama in their review wrote "Vikas Bahl's screenplay is unexciting and direction is not up to the mark. To give credit its due, he has handled a few dramatic moments well."^[14] Saibal Chatterjee of NDTV gave 1.5/5 stars and wrote "Ganapath is painfully pea-brained pulp that makes a meal of a terribly thin storyline."^[15] Bhavna Agarwal of India Today gave 1.5/5 stars and wrote "'Ganapath' offers absolutely no respite. If you expect it to get better in the second half as Gen Z are often heard saying ‘you are in delulu’."^[16] Hiren Kotwani of Mid-Day gave 1.5/5 stars and wrote "What makes Ganapath different from the saviour-hero films of yore is that director Bahl has tried to make it look like the desi Mad Max of sorts, albeit with unimpressive design and poor packaging".^[17]

Sexual harassment allegations

See also: MeToo movement in India

In October 2018, in an interview with Huffington Post India, a former employee of Phantom Films accused Bahl of sexually harassing her on the set of the 2014 film Queen.^[18] Later, the film's lead actress Kangana Ranaut, in support of the former employee, also accused Bahl of sexual misconduct.^[19][20] Following this, Nayani Dixit, Ranaut's co-star in the movie, leveled similar accusations against Bahl.^[21] As a result, Phantom Films announced its dissolution on 5 October 2018,^[22] largely in response to the sexual assault allegation against Bahl by another former Phantom employee, which was reported in 2015.^[23] The other three founders, Kashyap, Motwane, and Mantena, all issued statements on Twitter confirming the company's disbanding and moving on to independent projects.^[24] After, Phantom Film subsequently disbanded, and founders Anurag Kashyap and Vikramaditya Motwane made formal statements against Bahl and his sexual misdemeanors. Bahl, in turn, sent them legal notices, citing defamation of character.^[25]

Filmography

Films

Year	Title	Functioned as			Notes
		Director	Producer	Writer
2008	Aamir	No	Yes	No
	Welcome to Sajjanpur	No	Yes	No
2009	Dev.D	No	Associate	No
	Ex Terminators	No	Associate	No
2010	Udaan	No	Associate	No
2011	No One Killed Jessica	No	Creative	No
	Thank You	No	Creative	No
	Chillar Party	Yes	No	Yes	Co-directed with Nitesh Tiwari; also lyricist for song "Liar Liar"
2013	Lootera	No	Yes	No
	Hasee Toh Phasee	No	Yes	No
2014	Queen	Yes	No	Yes
	Ugly	No	Yes	No
	Going Home	Yes	No	Yes	Short film[26]
2015	NH10	No	Yes	No
	Hunterrr	No	Yes	No
	Masaan	No	Yes	No
	Shaandaar	Yes	No	Yes
2016	Raman Raghav 2.0	No	Yes	No
	Wrong Side Raju	No	Yes	No	Gujarati film
	Udta Punjab	No	Yes	No
2017	Trapped	No	Yes	No
2018	Mukkabaaz	No	Yes	No
	High Jack	No	Yes	No
	Manmarziyaan	No	Yes	No
2019	Super 30	Yes	No	No
2020	Ghoomketu	No	Yes	No
2022	Goodbye	Yes	Yes	Yes
2023	Ganapath	Yes	Yes	Yes
2024	Shaitaan	Yes	Yes	No
2025	Dil Ka Darwaaza Khol Na Darling †	Yes	TBA	TBA	Post-production[27]

Television

Year	Title	Functioned as				Notes
		Director	Producer	Writer	Creator
2021–present	Sunflower	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes	Co-directed season 1 with Rahul Sengupta
2022	Good Bad Girl	No	Yes	Yes	Yes

Awards and nominations

Award	Year	Category	Nominated work	Result
BIG Star Entertainment Awards	2014	Most Entertaining Film Director	Queen	Won
Bollywood Hungama Surfers' Choice Movie Awards	2015	Best Director	Queen	Nominated
Filmfare Awards	2015	Best Director	Queen	Won
		Best Screenplay		Nominated[a]
	2017	Best Film	Udta Punjab	Nominated
Ghanta Awards	2016	Worst Director	Shaandaar	Won
IBNLive Movie Awards	2015	Best Director	Queen	Won
IIFA Awards	2015	Best Director	Queen	Nominated
		Best Screenplay		Won[a]
		Best Story		Won
	2017	Best Film	Udta Punjab	Nominated
National Film Awards	2011	Best Screenplay	Chillar Party	Won[b]
		Best Children's Film		Won
	2014	Best Features Film in Hindi	Queen	Won
Screen Awards	2015	Best Director	Queen	Won
		Best Screenplay		Nominated[a]
	2017	Best Film	Udta Punjab	Nominated
Stardust Awards	2014	Best Director	Queen	Won
Star Guild Awards	2015	Best Director	Queen	Won
		Best Story		Won
		Best Screenplay		Won[a]

1. Shared with Chaitally Parmar and Parveez Sheikh
2. Shared with Nitesh Tiwari and Vijay Maurya