Jalsa: Vidya Balan says the film is not trying to make any social commentary

Vidya Balan and Shefali Shah’s thriller Jalsa will soon hit Amazon Prime Video. In a recent interview, Balan said her film is not trying to make any social commentary but assured that it’s a thrilling story with lots of drama.

“I think it will leave you feeling, ‘Oh, my god, this could be me’,” Balan told ETimes.

The Jalsa trailer does hint at themes of class divisions, freedom of the press and the unchecked power the privileged few in this country have that lets them get away with even the most heinous of crimes.

Balan plays a journalist named Maya, while Shah plays her house-help Rukshana. This is the first time the two are joining hands for a feature.

In an interview with OTTplay, Shah had spoken about why she chose to play Rukshana and had even clarified that the class divide does not form the crux of the story: “I thought it was because it was so layered and so nuanced and it just struck me. more than the fact that they're too different. They’re very different. They come from a different class altogether. But that's not the story, and the kind of complexities a human mind has when put in a situation so that struck me hard.”

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Jalsa is directed by Suresh Triveni, who has previously collaborated with Balan for the slice-of-life comedy Tumhari Sulu. In a recent interview, Triveni had revealed that he admired Balan and Shah as actors so much that he had to make a film with both of them.

The cast of thriller also has Manav Kaul, Rohini Hattangadi, Iqbal Khan, Vidhatri Bandi, Shrikant Mohan Yadav, Shafeen Patel, and Surya Kasibhatla.

Jalsa is jointly produced by Bhushan Kumar and Krishan Kumar (T-Series), Vikram Malhotra and Shikhaa Sharma (Abundantia Entertainment), and Triveni.

Amazon Prime Video will premiere the film on March 18.