Karan Johar is busy prepping for the 9th season of his much-loved chat show, Koffee With Karan. He is also busy promoting his upcoming film Chaand Mera Dil. Amidst all this, the director is also giving multiple interviews, and during a recent media interaction he called out the PR culture of Bollywood, saying even he cannot make out what is true and what is not.
Karan Johar calls out Bollywood’s PR cultureSpeaking during a recent interaction with The Week, the filmmaker-producer responded to a question about the industry’s aggressive publicity machinery. He responded to a question about the increasingly unconventional promotional tactics actors are using today. The query referenced Janhvi Kapoor sporting a “Sundari” shirt to promote Param Sundari with Sidharth Malhotra, and Shanaya Kapoor grabbing attention with crocodile-themed gimmicks for Tu Ya Main.
Talking about this, Karan addressed, “I think Bollywood should stop doing PR. It will be much better. They should let their achievement speak for itself because unfortunately all of the PR is now paid PR. If you want to say ‘You are looking gorgeous’, you just have to pay. If you want to say that you are the best actor on planet Earth, you have to pay."
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He added, “So I think we are on over drive mode when it comes to PR. So whether they are doing method marketing or not is secondary. They should stop marketing themselves and let their work speak for themselves. I don’t mean the people you are talking about I mean everyone in general. Because I think PR’s becoming into overdrive mode. There’s a certain way of doing it. Publicity, marketing- these are very important work categories and this should be treated in that specific way."
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The filmmaker acknowledged that sometimes even he can't guess which is PR and which is real, “Now everything is available at a price and that is something that could be deeply upsetting because then you really can’t gauge what’s connecting and what’s now. Are people liking it or are paid to like it? I don’t know, I can’t tell half the time. Its confusing me because even I am sometimes paying for it."
His comments have sparked up many reactions amid netizens. One wrote that he is targeting Janhvi while not commenting on Alia, “Targeting jhanvi Silence on Alia bhatt 😆 let it be spill all the beans, why keep some few for the jack to climb up, For golden chickens eggs,” while another comment read, “Sly on Shahrukh Khan? Uska PR bhi usko saara time best bolta hai.”
Another netizen wrote, “This is why I believe Alia Bhatt’s popularity is literally paid PR and Deepika Pauline hate campaign is a paid smear campaign.”\
Karan Johar just went completely unfiltered in a recent interview with no sugarcoating, no diplomacy. He openly called out Janhvi Kapoor and Shanaya Kapoor for relying on PR tactics and gimmicks to push their films 🤯#KaranJohar #Dhurandhar2 #DhurandharTheRevenge #Dhurandhar pic.twitter.com/u6tmRpx5Zl
— Aditi (@Aditi289867132) April 26, 2026
On the work front for Karan Johar
Karan is currently busy with Koffee With Karan 9. In the same interview, the director revealed that Koffee With Karan, his famous chat show will be back this Diwali. Karan Johar is also gearing up for the release of Chaand Mera Dil.
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Directed by Vivek Soni and backed by Dharma Productions, the romantic drama features Ananya Panday and Lakshay in lead roles.
Lead and social image credits: Instagram/ karanjohar
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