Firdaus (Pranutan Bahl) and Kabir (Zaheer Iqbal) are two teachers who fall in love without having seen each other in the Salman Khan production Notebook. The film’s first song, Nai Lagda, which was released on Thursday, conveys the pain of separation in a ballad composed and sung by Vishal Mishra and written by Akshay Tripathi.
Nitin Kakkar’s film introduces newcomers Bahl, Hindi screen legend Nutan’s granddaughter, and Iqbal, who worked as an assistant director to Sohail Khan on Jai Ho (2014). The plotline of Notebook closely resembles Nithiwat Tharathorn’s Thai film Teacher’s Diary (2014). The film is “a story about a former wrestler who takes up an unusual position as a class teacher in an isolated rural spot”, where “he draws inspiration from the diary left behind by a particularly dedicated predecessor”, according to Variety. It was Thailand’s official entry in the foreign-language category at the Oscars in 2014.
In Notebook, Kabir, a former army officer, takes up a teaching job in Kashmir, where he chances upon the diary of Firdaus, a former teacher at the school. The video for Nai Ladga depicts the love story as it unfolds at various photogenic locations in Kashmir. The film is scheduled to be released on March 29.
