Gehraiyaan
Storyline
The whole story, ending included.
An affair with a cousin's fiancé on a yacht off Alibaug; for its sex scenes the production worked with an intimacy director.
Alisha Khanna is thirty, a yoga instructor in Mumbai trying to find investors for an app while supporting Karan, her boyfriend of six years, who quit his job to write a novel. She lives with anxiety. Her mother took her own life when Alisha was a child, and she blames her father, Vinod, for her mother's unhappiness. Her cousin Tia invites them to the family beach house at Alibaug with her fiancé, Zain. Zain and Alisha recognise each other's damaged childhoods, and when she finds out that Karan let Tia read the draft he never showed her, they begin an affair.
Zain has his company invest in her app. Karan proposes; Alisha ends the affair to try again, then leaves Karan on learning he hid the rejection of his book. Zain promises to leave Tia once he has repaid her father's stake in his firm, and the affair resumes. Alisha becomes pregnant just as an investigation into one of his investors threatens to sink him. Tia agrees to mortgage the beach house for him; he sells it instead. Alisha tells him to confess to Tia, or she will.
He invites her onto his yacht, lies that he has left Tia and slips pills into her drink. She sees. In the struggle he tries to push her overboard, slips, hits his head and drowns. Alisha gets back to shore and miscarries. Zain's partner Jitesh, who knew what Zain intended, makes her fetch the sale papers from Tia's house and in return has the death recorded as suicide. Then Tia tells her a family secret: Alisha's mother had an affair with Tia's father, Alisha is his daughter, and the beach house was left to her. Devastated, Alisha harms herself, and her father discovers it. She sees that she has repeated her mother's life, and makes peace with him; he kept the truth from her so that one mistake would not define her mother.
Two years later, at Karan's engagement party, Tia and Alisha agree to begin again. Then the grandmother of Karan's bride-to-be greets Alisha by name. On a boat during the affair, Zain had introduced Alisha to her as his fiancée.
Starring
Deepika Padukoneas Alisha Khanna
A yoga instructor living with anxiety and her mother's suicide, who begins an affair with her cousin's fiancé.
Alisha Khanna’s story
Alisha is thirty, paying the bills while Karan writes, and still blaming her father, Vinod, for her mother's unhappiness. Drawn to Zain at Alibaug, she begins the affair when she learns Karan showed Tia the draft he never showed her. She leaves Karan and trusts Zain's promise to leave Tia; pregnant as his business sinks, she tells him to confess, or she will. On his yacht she sees him slip pills into her drink; he tries to push her overboard, falls and drowns. She miscarries, and fetches Tia's sale papers for Jitesh, who has the death recorded as suicide. Then Tia reveals they share a father. Alisha harms herself; Vinod finds her, and they make peace. Two years later, reconciled with Tia, she is greeted by a woman who once met her as Zain's fiancée.
Siddhant Chaturvedias Zain Oberoi
Tia's fiancé, a property developer who ran from a violent home and whose business depends on her family's money.
Zain Oberoi’s story
At Alibaug, Zain and Alisha recognise the damage in each other's childhoods, and the affair begins. He has his company invest in her app, gives her a studio and promises to leave Tia once he has paid her father back. Then an investor is charged with money laundering, his company comes under investigation, and Alisha is pregnant. Tia agrees to mortgage the family beach house to save him; he sells it instead, sure he can buy it back. When Alisha threatens to tell Tia, and his partner, Jitesh, suggests drugs to end the pregnancy, he lures her onto his yacht with a lie and slips pills into her drink. She sees. He tries to push her overboard, slips, hits his head and drowns. His death is recorded as suicide.
Ananya Pandayas Tia Khanna
Alisha's wealthy cousin and childhood companion, engaged to Zain and trusting him with her family's beach house.
Tia Khanna’s story
Tia brings everyone together, inviting Alisha and Karan to the family house at Alibaug to meet Zain; Karan trusts her with the draft he has never shown Alisha. While she is in America on family legal business, Alisha and Zain begin their affair. She finds Alisha's anxiety pills in Zain's jacket and confronts him, and he talks his way out. When his company is in trouble she agrees to mortgage the beach house; at Alibaug she accuses him of an affair, he shows her his phone, and, ashamed of doubting him, she signs. Zain drowns. Tia then tells Alisha the family's secret: her father and Alisha's mother had an affair, Alisha is his daughter, and he left the beach house to her. Two years later, still not knowing about Alisha and Zain, she agrees to begin again with her.
Dhairya Karwaas Karan Arora
Alisha's boyfriend of six years, who left his job to write a novel and keeps his setbacks from her.
Naseeruddin Shahas Vinod Khanna
Alisha's estranged father, blamed by her for her mother's unhappiness, who has kept the family's secret for years.
Why it matters
Gehraiyaan treats infidelity less as a sin than as an inheritance. Alisha starts the affair to escape a relationship that feels like her parents' marriage, and ends up repeating her mother's life almost exactly; the film is interested in how damage passes between generations and how little of it anyone can see from inside. It also shows money bending intimacy, as Zain's need for Tia's family's capital turns both women into assets to be managed. For its sex scenes the production worked with an intimacy department, led by the intimacy director Dar Gai. Critics were divided, and its climax drew the most criticism. The unease it leaves is in its final scene: a past can be forgiven by the people inside it and still be waiting across the room.