Chor Nikal Ke Bhaga

Chor Nikal Ke Bhaga is a 2023 Indian Hindi heist thriller film directed Ajay Singh produced by Amar Kaushik. It stars Yami Gautam and Sunny Kaushal with Sharad Kelkar, Indraneil Sengupta and Barun Chanda appears in pivotal roles. The film released on 24 March 2023, directly for streaming, on Netflix.

Plot
In the fictional Middle Eastern city of Al-Barkat, Ankit Sethi is the owner of a diamond insurance company who owes a huge debt as the company's workers had misplaced a client's diamonds worth ₹20 crores. He meets Neha Grover, a flight attendant, on a flight and is instantly attracted to her. They later go out on a date and Neha starts liking him as well. They begin a relationship and sometime later, Neha announces that she is pregnant. Ankit proposes to marry her and she accepts. They both are attacked by a pair of goons working for the client to whom Ankit owes the debt. Neha is severely injured, which leads to her miscarriage. Seeing no other way to pay back the huge debt, they both decide to pull off a robbery.

Minister, Harish Sanyal would be smuggling diamonds from Al-Barkat to India by plane, which would be carried by a courier appointed by him and Ankit would accompany him. A cellphone with its back cover laced with the diamonds would be kept inside a briefcase which would be locked by a code number. Ankit strikes a deal with Sanyal's secretary to reveal the code number to him and in return he would give him half the diamonds. Once on the flight, Ankit and Neha put their plan on motion - Neha deliberately spills food on the courier's clothes while serving the passengers, and he heads to the washroom to clean up the mess. Seizing the opportunity, Ankit goes to retrieve the diamonds from the briefcase, but just then a group of masked terrorists arrive, announcing that they have hijacked the flight, and hold all the passengers hostage.

The hijackers order the pilots to land the plane on Kullu and demand that Adil-Mir, a terrorist who is held up in a prison in Manali, be released immediately. Ankit pretends to be suffering from asthma and requests the hijackers to allow him to get his inhaler from the other compartment, so that he can secretly steal the diamonds. But before he can steal the diamonds, one of the hijackers senses that he is lying, and beats him up. When government officials contact the hijackers, they head towards the cockpit to talk to them on the telephone and Ankit again sneaks into the other compartment to steal the diamonds. He takes out the diamonds from the briefcase and puts them in his own bag. Just then, one of the hijackers arrives and discovers the diamonds. Before he can shoot Ankit, he knocks the gun out of his hand and they both engage in a brutal fist fight. The other hijackers also arrive and together beat Ankit and lock him up in the washroom. Just then, a man named Sudhanshu Roy, who claims to be the Flight Marshal, picks up the gun dropped by one of the hijackers, and shoots all of them down, supposedly killing them. The passengers are safely evacuated from the plane.

The hijackers had attached a bomb to Ankit's body and the bomb squad arrive to diffuse it, but the bomb turns out to be fake. Moreover, the dead bodies of the hijackers are not found on the plane and Sudhanshu is found to be missing as well. It is revealed that the real Flight Marshall is Bhanu Yadav, who was unconscious throughout the flight, and that Sudhanshu was an impersonator. RAW officer Parvez Shaikh arrives with his team to investigate the matter and interrogates all the passengers. Bhanu reveals that he was served a glass of orange juice on the flight, and that he may have fallen unconscious after drinking it. Ankit finds out that the diamonds stolen by him are fake. It is revealed that Ankit had pretended to be in love with Neha so that he can receive her help in pulling off the robbery on the flight.

It is also revealed that Neha had discovered the truth that Ankit was only using her for his own benefit after the miscarriage from a conversation Ankit had with the attackers. She had contacted her old accomplice, Sudhanshu, and they had together hatched the plan to carry out a fake hijacking of the flight and steal the diamonds themselves, to take revenge on Ankit. They had brought together a team including Jinu, Nikki and Abbas, who would board the flight posing as passengers and later wear masks and act as the hijackers, and Gaffar, who would make artificial guns for them. Neha would spike the drink of Bhanu, making him fall unconscious, and Sudhanshu, pretending to be the Flight Marshal, would replace the diamonds with fake ones, pretend to kill the hijackers by firing a blank bullet, and escape, while the hijackers would blend in with the passengers after removing their masks.

Neha makes an anonymous phone call to Sanyal and pressures him to order Parvez to stop the investigation and cover up the matter, or else she would bring out the truth of him smuggling diamonds. The case is closed and it is brought in front of the media and the general public that there had indeed been a hijacking and Bhanu is hailed as a national hero for killing the hijackers. Neha forwards a text message to Sanyal's phone, which shows that Ankit had received the code number to the briefcase on his phone. Realizing that he had tried to steal the diamonds, Sanyal brutally tortures Ankit. Neha comes to visit Ankit at the hospital, where he is recovering from his injuries, and reveals all the truth to him, saying that her revenge is complete. Sometime later, Neha receives a phone call from Ankit, hinting that he is also planning to take revenge on her, hinting at a sequel.

Release
The film was released on Netflix on 24 March 2023.

Music
The music for the film is composed by Vishal Mishra.

Reception
The film overall received mixed response from critics as well as audience. Dhaval Roy of The Times Of India rated the film 3.5 stars out of 5 and wrote "The plotline and the double jeopardy situation of a heist and a hijack make Chor Nikal Ke Bhaga an exciting watch. The story may not seem convincing, and the events often get convenient, but the slick treatment and direction will keep you hooked throughout."

Saibal Chatterjee of NDTV rated the film 2.5 stars out of 5 stars and wrote "Chor Nikal Ke Bhaga, despite its taut and precise screenplay, is at best passable fare. The film takes some time to take off. When it does, it avoids deviations and stays firmly focussed on its course."

Shubhra Gupta for The Indian Express rating the film only 1.5 stars out of 5 wrote "The quick-fire romance between our lead pair leads to hot dates, and rumpled sheets. Having got the preliminaries out of the way, the film dives into its real business, and for a while we stay with it."