From Dil Chahta Hai to Prem Keetanu, How Bollywood’s Campus Film Has Changed With Every Generation

Mumbai: There was a time when a college film in Hindi cinema was not just about college. The campus was a backdrop for friendship, first love, ambition, rebellion, failure and the peculiar freedom of being young. Over two decades, Bollywood has kept returning to that world, but each generation has brought its own idea of what being a student means.

Dil Chahta Hai (2001) changed the grammar of buddy movies, practically creating a genre. Farhan Akhtar’s film was ostensibly about three friends, but its real subject was growing up. College was a space where friendships were forged before life pulled people in different directions. The film made male friendship aspirational without making it sentimental, and established the gang as one of the most important ingredients of the modern campus film.

Eight years later, 3 Idiots (2009) took that friendship and placed it inside a pressure cooker. The campus became a battleground between students and an education system obsessed with ranks, careers and conventional ideas of success. Rancho, Farhan and Raju were friends, but their friendship was also their rebellion against the expectations placed on them.

With Student Of The Year (2012), the campus film moved in another direction. Karan Johar transformed college into a glossy Bollywood playground of designer wardrobes, sprawling campuses, romance and competition. It was less interested in the anxieties of student life and more invested in the fantasy of it. The campus became aspirational entertainment in its purest form.

Then came Fukrey (2013), which turned the formula upside down. Its protagonists were not toppers or campus stars. They were boys with questionable plans, limited prospects and an abundance of confidence. The film found comedy in their failures and made the chaotic male gang its biggest attraction. College wasn't about achievement; it was about surviving the next ridiculous scheme.

Chhichhore (2019) brought another evolution. Here, college was remembered from the distance of adulthood. The film used its campus years to examine failure, peer pressure and the fear of being labelled a loser. Friendship remained central, but nostalgia gave the genre a more emotional dimension.

Now comes Prem Keetanu (2026), which appears to be pulling several of these strands together while returning the campus film to its most uncomplicated pleasure: being young. Its world is populated by hostel rooms, friendships, naughty banter, crushes, jealousy and heartbreak. Veer Pahariya plays a young man hopelessly lost in love, while Aparshakti Khurana brings a more assured, dapper energy into the equation. With Aafiya Sayed caught between their affections, romance becomes another complication in an already chaotic friendship ecosystem.

What makes the film particularly interesting is its commitment to the commercial Hindi-film vocabulary. The music isn't incidental; four released songs — Undi Bundi, Kaho Toh, Tu Mera Raiyyo and Ishq Ka Ghulam — move through friendship, attraction, romance and heartbreak. The trailer, too, leans into colour, comedy, songs and heightened emotion.

If Dil Chahta Hai asked what happens when friends grow up, 3 Idiots questioned what happens when ambition takes over, Student Of The Year sold the fantasy of campus life, Fukrey celebrated its lovable losers and Chhichhore looked back at the people we were, Prem Keetanu is interested in something simpler: what happens when you are young, your friends are your entire world, and falling in love threatens to mess all of it up?

That may be the campus film’s most enduring evolution. The classrooms change. The clothes change. The anxieties change. But the gang, the crush and the heartbreak remain.

Directed by Apoorv Singh Karki, Prem Keetanu looks like a film that wants to put innocence back into love stories and colour back on your screens with Veer's lover boy act tugging at your heartstrings and enough laughs, songs, chemistry and masala to make the journey thoroughly theatrical.

Prem Keetanu marks both Verma’s debut as an independent producer and the maiden production of his newly launched studio, Avanika Films. Co-presented by Phars Film in association with Bhavana Studios, Prem Keetanu releases worldwide in cinemas on October 2, 2026.