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The trailer for Dhurandhar: The Revenge dropped on Saturday, gaining over four million views on YouTube in the first couple of hours of its release. That isn’t really surprising, given that the first film in the duology became India’s highest grossing Hindi film after just 24 days in theatres.

What is surprising, however, is just how blatant this trailer has turned out to be with its propagandistic intent. Let us explain.

For those of our readers lucky enough to have not seen the first Dhurandhar, which released in January, it’s a film based very loosely on the gang war in Karachi’s Lyari. Gangster Rehman Dakait (Akshaye Khanna) plays a central role as the reigning mafia boss of the area.

In the film, Hamza Ali Mazari (Ranveer Singh), an Indian spy who climbs the ranks of Dakait’s criminal empire to become one of his closest aides, kills him after he ‘facilitates’ the 2008 Mumbai terror attacks. The film suffered from a hyper-nationalistic tone and a simplistic plot, which filmmaker Aditya Dhar chose to mask with enough violence to make Quentin Tarantino squirm.

Now, coming to the new trailer — it starts with a scene from the last film with hijackers aboard an Indian Airlines plane in Kandahar talking to Ajay Sanyal (R Madhavan) — a fictionalised version of Indian National Security Adviser Ajit Doval — followed by Mazari beating the daylights out of somebody.

The scene then shifts to Lyari on fire after Dakait’s death with a news report asking — in imperfect Urdu — “The biggest question is, who will become the king of Lyari in the aftermath of Rehman Dakait’s death?” We see shots of Singh’s character, hinting that he might become the aforementioned king.

After a few more shots of gratuitous violence, we’re introduced to Jaskirat Singh Rangi — Mazari after a haircut and shave — who will be continuing his alter-ego’s mission of wreaking havoc in Pakistan.

We see a scene of Sanjay Dutt as SSP Chaudhry Aslam Khan threatening and then finishing off someone in the back of a van — his acting weirdly reminiscent of Munna Bhai MBBS — followed by ever more bloodshed and explosions.

The trailer ends with Mazari saying “Pakistan ka mustaqbil ab Hindustan tae karey ga (India will now decide Pakistan’s future).”

Judging by the trailer, the masks are fully off for this one. While the last film tried to portray some semblance of real-world accuracy, Dhurandhar: The Revenge seems to have done away with any notion of being “based on true events”, as the last film claimed to be.

It also carries a lot of the love for the current government in Delhi, with Sanyal appearing in the trailer — and presumably the film — more frequently than last time. He even gives Mazari/Rangi a mantra to repeat, “Honsla, Eendhan, Badla (Courage, Fuel, Vengeance).” Yeah, we don’t get it either.

While we’re at a juncture in history where propaganda sells out Indian theatres, its negative impacts must be acknowledged. Where art can and often does act as a bridge between two divided peoples — just look at the comments under any video from Coke Studio Pakistan — films like the Dhurandhars go a long way towards entrenching hatred and division in people’s minds.

They clearly aren’t the first examples of this practice either. Indian cinema is full of examples of films whose entire purpose is the demonisation of Pakistan.

Dhar is a serial offender, with his film Uri: The Surgical Strike presenting Pakistan as the force behind a 2016 terrorist attack in India-occupied Kashmir. Pakistan has denied the claim, but that made no difference to the filmmaker, whose movie showed Indian special forces conducting a mission deep inside Pakistani territory.

The unfortunate truth is, the damage films like these do to peace in the region is very long lasting. Filmmakers like Dhar, while chasing ticket sales and applause, have poisoned thousands, possibly millions of mind into hating their neighbours.