Anurag Kashyap’s gritty social thriller Bandar has triggered massive critical acclaim for Bobby Deol's powerhouse performance. However, alongside the rave reviews, the internet has been flooded with jaw-dropping and wildly inflated reports regarding the film's budget and cast salaries.

Let's look at what the cast reportedly received—and separate the internet hype from reality.

According to viral reports circulating from entertainment portals, the supporting cast received vastly different remunerations based on the scope of their roles:

• Sapna Pabbi (playing Gayatri): Emerged as the highest-paid actress on the project, reportedly taking home ₹1.3 crore for her pivotal role as the accuser.

• Jeetendra Joshi: The versatile actor reportedly commanded a solid ₹1 crore fee.

• Saba Azad (playing Khushi, Samar's girlfriend): Reportedly paid ₹70 lakh for her appearance.

• Sanya Malhotra (playing Samar’s sister): Reportedly received ₹60 lakh. Observers note this is lower than her usual market rate of up to ₹1 crore, indicating a compromise made for a content-driven project.

• Raj B. Shetty: The acclaimed actor-director was reportedly paid ₹40 lakh.

The same reports allege that Bandar was mounted on a massive budget of ₹130 crore, with leading man Bobby Deol taking home a staggering ₹45 crore paycheck.

The Reality Check: These figures are highly improbable and heavily exaggerated.

What Bobby Deol Said: Deol himself addressed these rumors ahead of the release, explicitly stating that he did not hike his fees for this project, choosing instead to focus entirely on the quality of the script.

Bandar is an intense, niche, non-commercial crime thriller targeting a specific audience—it even had a controlled release rather than a massive commercial rollout. Industry insiders estimate that a realistic budget for an Anurag Kashyap film of this scale sits far lower (closer to ₹25 crore), with Bobby Deol's actual fee likely resting in the ₹5–10 crore range following his post-Animal resurgence.

Additionally, the viral reports suffered from severe currency conversion errors—hilariously miscalculating ₹130 crore as "$1.3 billion" and ₹45 crore as "$1.5 billion" (which would make Bobby Deol wealthier than the entire global box office of Avatar!).

While Bandar started slow on Day 1 due to limited screening times and a direct clash with Varun Dhawan's mass entertainer Hai Jawani To Ishq Hona Hai, it is heavily leaning on strong word-of-mouth. Critics are calling Bobby Deol's portrayal of the fading, accused star Samar Mehra the finest performance of his entire career.