Tere Ishk Mein: Aanand L Rai’s woman-hating film doesn’t grant any grace to Kriti Sanon, but allows ‘hero’ Dhanush to burn someone alive

Tere Ishk Mein: Aanand L Rai’s interpretation of love stems out of the understanding that anything that goes wrong in any relationship involving a man and a woman, is the woman’s fault.

With blood dripping down his face and rage in his eyes, Shah Rukh Khan’s Rahul looked into the eyes of a trembling Kiran, played by Juhi Chawla, and proclaimed his love. She, obviously, was trying to get out of this situation alive as she stood in front of a man who had murdered someone to get close to her and she knew that he would do it again in a heartbeat. She couldn’t risk feeding into his obsession for this would only encourage him, so she spent her life in fear, running away from him, until he was dead. No one can deny that with Darr, director Yash Chopra romanticised the idea of an obsessive lover who doesn’t care about consent and consequences, and 32 years later, Aanand L Rai has come up with an even worse version of the same in Tere Ishk Mein. Rai’s interpretation of love stems out of the understanding that anything that goes wrong in any relationship involving a man and a woman is the woman’s fault. It comes from the socially accepted misconception that a fully grown adult man must always be treated like a toddler, who cannot process a ‘no’. Rai and writers, Himanshu Sharma and Neeraj Yadav, might think that is some crazy version of love but like Darr’s Kiran would know, this ain’t love. This is pure toxicity.