From UK Savings to ₹190 Crore: How a 21-Year-Old Produced Bollywood’s Biggest Sleeper Hit

At just 21 years old, Anupriya Nagar invested her savings from part-time jobs in the UK into a devotional drama called Hanuman Ansh, which was made on a budget of between ₹1.5 crore and ₹2 crore. An economics graduate from the University of Bath, Nagar entered film production without a conventional filmmaking background. Today, that modest investment has transformed into an astonishing box office phenomenon—the film’s India gross is already nearing ₹193 crore, delivering returns that would make any venture capitalist envious.

The Unlikely Journey to Filmmaking

Anupriya Nagar’s path to film production reads like a story written for cinema itself. While studying in the UK, she worked part-time and had secured a job in Zurich, but instead of taking that route, she returned to India in 2025 and eventually became a co-producer of Hanuman Ansh. The catalyst for this pivotal decision came through an academic research project. While pursuing her master’s in economics, Nagar stumbled upon articles mentioning the influence of Hanuman devotee and spiritual guru Neem Karoli Baba on Steve Jobs, and intrigued by why she was being introduced to an Indian saint via a foreigner, she began researching more.

As luck would have it, she came to India around the same time and her path crossed with a producer-friend who was making a film on the sage. According to her, the project needed investment at that point, and she told the team: “Whatever I have, I’m ready to give you guys.”

A Slow Start That Defied Expectations

The film’s theatrical journey began quietly. Hanuman Ansh, inspired by the life of spiritual figure Neem Karoli Baba, earned only about ₹10 lakh on its opening day and around ₹1.08 crore in its first week. The film initially opened across 300 screens and reportedly dropped to just 30 screens by its eighth day. By conventional industry standards, this would have been a death sentence. Theater chains typically pull films that underperform in their opening weeks, and most audiences move on to the next release. But something shifted.

The film’s fortunes changed sharply in its third and fourth weeks. The film, which opened with little buzz and modest numbers, steadily found its audience through word of mouth and continued to grow even weeks after its release. The film expanded its presence to more than 1,500 screens. This kind of sustained growth is extraordinarily rare in modern cinema, where opening weekend numbers typically determine a film’s fate.

Why Budget Constraints Became a Strength

The financial limitations ultimately became part of the film’s identity—it was originally intended to be made on a considerably smaller budget, and if the same film had been made for ₹10 crore, it wouldn’t have come out the same way. This observation reveals something profound about filmmaking in an era dominated by big-budget productions. Sometimes limitation breeds authenticity. The rawness and simplicity came from the low budget.

The filmmaking approach prioritized storytelling over spectacle. Written, directed, and produced by Dr Vishal Chaturvedi, the film is the first installment of a trilogy based on his book, which chronicles the life of Neem Karoli Baba. Rather than a conventional cradle-to-grave biopic, Hanuman Ansh is structured around Maharaj-ji’s inner life and the effect he had on the people who came near him, which is why the film works on viewers who had never heard the name Neem Karoli Baba before walking in.

The Spiritual Subject Matter That Resonated

Neem Karoli Baba (born Lakshmi Narayan Sharma; c. 1900 – 11 September 1973) was a Hindu guru and devotee of the Hindu deity Hanuman. Neem Karoli Baba’s influence eventually reached some of the biggest names in technology—Apple co-founder Steve Jobs visited Kainchi Dham during his India trip in the 1970s, although Baba had already passed away. One of Baba’s most influential devotees was American spiritual teacher Ram Dass, a former Harvard psychologist who travelled to India where his meeting with Neem Karoli Baba profoundly influenced his life, and his bestselling spiritual book ‘Be Here Now’ helped introduce Baba’s teachings to audiences across the world.

The timing of Hanuman Ansh’s release coincided with a growing cultural appetite for spiritual content and authentic storytelling. In an era saturated with franchise blockbusters and recycled plots, a genuine exploration of spiritual philosophy—told through a personal lens rather than a preachy sermon—captured audiences’ imaginations. Religious and devotional themes increasingly attract mainstream viewers, particularly younger generations seeking meaning beyond conventional entertainment.

An Unprecedented Return on Investment

Hanuman Ansh has become the highest theatrical return on investment of all time, along with another devotional film, “Jai Santoshi Maa” (1975)—the film was made on a budget of approximately ₹2 crore and crossed ₹100 crore at the domestic box office, earning more than 50 times its production budget, making it the most profitable Indian film of all time.

Driven by faith, Nagar invested her savings to share the guru’s story and preserve culture, not for profit. This distinction matters. While the film’s financial success is extraordinary, the producer’s initial motivation appears to have been rooted in something deeper—a desire to preserve and share spiritual knowledge with contemporary audiences, particularly younger generations who might otherwise never encounter these teachings.

What Comes Next

The film was planned as a trilogy, and the first film ends with an indication that the story of Neem Karoli Baba will continue—in August 2026, the director confirmed that work on the second installment had already begun, which will cover the periods associated with Agra and Mathura, while the first installment covered Neem Karoli Baba’s early life, starting in Firozabad.

Hanuman Ansh represents a rare convergence of personal conviction, artistic authenticity, and audience hunger for meaningful cinema. A 21-year-old economics student’s decision to bet her UK savings on a spiritual biography has not only paid dividends in rupees but has also demonstrated that theatrical audiences still crave stories with depth, purpose, and genuine spiritual resonance—even when those stories arrive quietly and without fanfare.