On paper, it should have worked! People love small town movies made as a commercial entertainer with big stars in lead and have a good social message to deliver. Last year, director Shree Narayan Singh used this formula to deliver a big hit in Akshay Kumar and Bhumi Pednekar's Toilet Ek Prem Katha. This year, he tries to attempt the same with Shahid Kapoor and Shraddha Kapoor's Batti Gul Meter Chalu. Shahid Kapoor had given a Rs 300 crore hit in Padmaavat earlier this year, while Shraddha has also given a Rs 100 crore hit a couple of weeks back in Stree. Ranbir Kapoor's Sanju, Deepika Padukone's Padmaavat, Salman Khan's Race 3 or Rajkummar Rao's Stree -Ranking 15 Highest Grossing Films of 2018 From Most Profitable to The Least!

Batti Gul Meter Chalu came out on September 21, and even though there were other releases (Manto, The Equalizer 2, The House With A Clock In Its Walls), it was the biggest film of them all. And yet, Batti Gul Meter Chalu has delivered disappointing box office returns. In its four day run, the movie has only collected Rs 26 crore. Batti Gul Meter Chalu is reportedly made on a budget of Rs 49 crore.

So what went wrong here? Here are five factors that affected the box office collections of the film -

Shahid Kapoor's dubious record as a solo lead

Shahid Kapoor has signed Batti Gul Meter Chalu after the Rs 300 crore success of Padmaavat. But if we have to be objective here, the blockbuster success of the film was more of a group thing and the controversy it generated than attribute it to one person. Shahid Kapoor's own box office pull has been very dicey these days with the last proper hit he had delivered was 2013's R...Rajkumar (2016's Udta Punjab, thanks to its many controversies, was an average grosser). Shraddha, herself, is coming after the Rs 100 crore success of Stree, but how many trade pundits are crediting her with its success?

Cricket and Ganpati

While Batti Gul Meter Chalu has been the biggest release of September 21, the timing was a questionable one. For it came out on during the last leg of Ganesh Chaturthi celebrations, especially since Sunday is the day Mumbaikars were more focussed on visarjan. Also, the ongoing Asia Cup has got the attention of cricket fans, especially the India-Pakistan match that happened on Sunday.

The mixed reviews

Batti Gul Meter Chalu had met with mixed reviews. While the regional reviews have praised the movie for its performances and the message it wants to say, the English reviews were more critical of the treatment and how the courtroom scenes have been picturised. While people don't really care for reviews for such potboilers, TEPK being a big example of this, Shahid is more of a multiplex hero and therefore, the unfavourable reviews did play a hand in affecting the BO collections. Batti Gul Meter Chalu Movie Review: Shahid Kapoor Tries Too Hard in This Farcical Social Drama.

The spoiler-ish promos

Although it held back a couple of surprises (the love triangle, the fate of Divyendu's character), Batti Gul Meter Chalu's trailer was quite straight-forward when it came to its main theme - how it will handle the whole electricity corruption drama. The surprises of the movie ended up being the movie's drawbacks so there's that.

Too long to make an impact

Batti Gul Meter Chalu's runtime goes to two hour forty-one minutes. Now we have had longer movies becoming big hits so runtime is never a constraint. However, Batti Gul Meter Chalu actually spends a lot of time away from its core issue - the electricity board corruption - in a love triangle that doesn't make much of an impact in the bigger picture.

Have you seen Batti Gul Meter Chalu? Do you agree with our reasons listed here? Share your thoughts in the comments section below.

(The above story first appeared on LatestLY on Sep 25, 2018 02:49 PM IST. For more news and updates on politics, world, sports, entertainment and lifestyle, log on to our website latestly.com).