It was like making seven different films," says director Ali Abbas Zafar, the ambitious scale of Bharat not lost on him. The central plot of the Salman Khan-starrer — that of tracing India's journey from the Partition to the present day through the protagonist's point of view — may be simple, but executing it was a different ball game altogether.

The director, along with production designer Rajnish Hedao and stylists Alvira Agnihotri and Ashley Rebello, dedicated one-and-a-half years to research the different eras before taking the Katrina Kaif and Disha Patani film on floors.