Tiger Zinda Hai Was Anyway Unbelievable. What Watching It In A Post-Pahalgam World Is Like

NDTV

04-06-2025

Quick Read
Summary is AI generated, newsroom reviewed.
Tiger Zinda Hai, starring Salman Khan and Katrina Kaif, is about India and Pakistan fighting a common enemy.
In the film, India's RAW and Pakistan's ISI agents rescue nurses from an Iraq-based terrorist group.
Despite its positive reception, the film's premise of unity feels unrealistic in today's geopolitical climate.
Eight years ago, the promise of the two neighbours joining forces against a common enemy was unbelievable. But Salman Khan's RAW agent Tiger and Katrina Kaif's ISI agent Zoya, also a married couple, made it possible in Tiger Zinda Hai.
But over a month after the Pahalgam attack and India's retaliatory air strikes under Operation Sindoor, it sounds ludicrous.
While its part one Ek Tha Tiger (2012) took the classic enemies-to-lovers approach, Tiger Zinda Hai asks us to believe in insaaniyat and unite with Pakistanis against a common enemy, an idea that's now impossible even in movies.
The 2017 film was reviewed better than most of Salman Khan's last string of releases and managed to collect over Rs 550 crore in reported earnings from what now looks a meagre Rs 120-130 crore budget. It also saw Katrina reprise her role of ISI agent Zoya, the first woman spy in the Yash Raj Films' ambitious spy verse.
Even though it was released over a year after the deadly 2016 Uri attack on an Indian Army base in Jammu and Kashmir's Uri, Tiger Zinda Hai - based on a real incident - wasn't interested in taking stock of recent history. It, instead, offered us a promise. Scratch that, it was more like a far-fetched dream.
In Tiger Zinda Hai, director Ali Abbas Zafar makes India and Pakistan join forces to rescue a group of nurses from both the countries from the clutches of ISC, an Iraq-based terrorist organisation obviously modelled on the much-feared terror group ISIS, in the fictional city of Ikrit which stood in for the real Tikrit where the incident happened in 2014.
Before their fateful encounter with the terrorists, these nurses are shown sharing a working women's hostel in Ikrit. They discuss issues back home, use the same tiffin service, and sing Mehndi Laga Ke Rakhna from Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge for a would-be-bride (Anupriya Goenka) among them, just before they get caught in the crosshairs between the terrorists and troops of the Iraqi Army.
Anupriya Goenka, as one of the captive nurses, in a still from Tiger Zinda Hai.
Cut to Tiger and Zoya's home in Innsbruck, Austria, where table flags of India and Pakistan are kept next to each other on a bookshelf. There's India on the right, Pakistan on the left.
Karan, one of Tiger's RAW colleagues played by Anant Vidhaat, however, is a true patriot. He has heard stories about Tiger and they finally meet when he and RAW Chief Shenoy (essayed by the late Girish Karnad) track down the star spy after five long years.
As Shenoy and Tiger catch up and talk about the latter's famous kaali daal, in one of the film's blink-and-you-will-miss-it moments, Karan quietly rearranges those table flags on the shelf. He puts them at a certain distance, marking this invisible LOC between the neighbouring countries.
Now, Karan is a much younger and more 'serious about his task' agent than Tiger. He is perhaps the new Indian who wants to deliver justice Uri style or more recently, Operation Sindoor style in the aftermath of the Pahalgam terror attack.
He is telling the viewer that it may all be like Hum Saath Saath Hain in the world of Tiger and Zoya, but where he lives, back in New Delhi, Pakistan is THE enemy. Twenty six people, mostly tourists, were killed on April 22 by Pakistani terrorists, and Karan from 2017 serves as a reminder to us, there in the movie and today in 2025.
Family Man Tiger, now a father, doesn't want to go for the mission. But Zoya convinces him, reminding him that loves his country more than he does her and she "respects him" for that.
Salman Khan in a still from Tiger Zinda Hai.
So, Tiger is back on the prowl, and so is Zoya, as it's not just that Indian nurses need rescuing but Pakistanis also.
An emphatic Zoya says, " Aam Pakistani bhi toh aman hee chahta hai." She is on a mission to restore respect for her country and tell the world that Pakistan stands for peace.
In a Eureka moment, Tiger suggests, "Let's do it together. There are many problems between our two countries and they may never get resolved. But this is about humanity."
Salman Bhai, after all, is all for being human (no advertisement plug).
That's how India's RAW and Pakistan's ISI embark on their first joint mission in the history of bhai -kind.
RAW and ISI on a joint mission - The cast of Tiger Zinda Hai in a still from the film.
From there ensue many LOL moments.
Paresh Rawal, who also stars in the film as RAW's undercover agent in Iraq named Firdaus, is puzzled when he finds out about the joint mission.
" PM ko pata hai ISI aur RAW saath mein kaam kar rahe hain?" FYI - Prime Minister Narendra Modi has been India's head of state since 2014, Tiger Zinda Hai released in 2017, and Rawal almost played the PM in a biopic.
Even the main antagonist Abu Usman (Sajjad Delafrooz) is impressed by Tiger's charisma. He says, " Aapne woh kar diya jo aapki governments tak nahin kar paayin."
Abu Usman is eventually killed and together, of course, Tiger and Zoya save the nurses, both Indian and Pakistani.
The 'India on the right, Pakistan on the left' is repeated like a callback towards the end of the film.
Azaan, the good Indian Muslim who wanted to hoist the tricolour in Iraq after the mission was successful, is shot protecting ISI agent Abrar. Just before he's fatally wounded, he asks his Pakistani counterpart to raise the tricolour on his behalf in case he doesn't make it.
It's a Salman Khan film, so there will be bhai -hood.
Abrar's fellow ISI agent Javed reminds him of his farz towards his saviour. The viewer then sees Abrar raise the Indian national flag high up in the sky through the bus's window.
Then, Indian bomb and explosion expert Namit asks Javed to also hoist the Pakistani flag. Sweet, pretty much like the exchange of sweets between the Border Security Force (BSF) and the Pakistan Rangers at the Attari-Wagah border on festivals and events of national importance.
The flags of India and Pakistan are together again, up in the sky, at a distance. And that distance shall remain, at least for the foreseeable future.