Inspired from the Arunachalam Muruganantham's life Pad Man also has some aspects purely fictional. The film starts with a song "aaj se teri' by Arjit Singh, it gives the background to the entire story setting the foundation within minutes. 

 

Lakshmikant Chauhan (played by Akshay) a loving and caring husband is shown happy in their newly married life with Gayatri (played by Radhika). When he finds out about Gayatri using rags during menstruation, he does the best he can at the moment to help her and brings her sanitary pads from the local medial shop. 

 

Laxmi's is shown to be the only guy in the entire village who considers rituals to be superstitious and suggests its better to live without following them. And this behavior makes it reasonable for him to freely discuss about periods and menstruation openly. 

Balki in a very clever manner has also told the audience that he has suggested the same for other women in the family but they refuse to take him seriously. 

 

Gayatri who is a simple and melodramatic women refuses to use the sanitary pads due to its expensive nature. Laxmi's fear for Gayatri's life fuels his drive to create affordable pads for her.  When he fails to get help and feedback from women he tries the test product on himself. The one scene where he stains his pants with animal blood and runs to jump in the river, is easily one of the best scenes in the film. That scene alone shows Akshay's amazing acting skills. Due to this adversity, the village casts him as a pervert and a madman. 

 

With smart and witty dialogues Balki makes the film easier to digest. He easily strikes a balance between preaching and entertaining in the 140 minutes long film. Pad Man takes a faster momentum in the second half and breezes through learning about the materials he needs, the machine he creates and the praise he receives all thanks to Pari (played by Sonam ) an MBA student who gets influenced by Laxmi's heavy heartwarming dialogues. 

 

Pari the fictional character could have just supported the story better without the love angle between the 2. But the supposed love angle between Laxmi and Pari takes place with an old style 'hide a lip kiss with the head title'.

 

The story touches more than women hygiene but also the way they are treated the rural thoughts, believes, the true meaning of being a man. The film has used the word Pad so many times that by the end of it your brain just accepts it which would work as a great strategy if the film is highly circulated among villages like Toilet Ek prem katha was. 

 

The only other thing I hated more than Pari's and Laxmi's love interest is the makers not talking about the real Pad Man, Arunachalam Muruganantham. The makers could have taken more than a sec to actually showcase him. Granted people don't really read but effort is always appreciated. 

 

Verdict: Akshay uses a great marketing strategy to make a taboo topic a household discussion. Period!

**** stars