India, March 31 -- It's not Eid unless a Salman Khan film releases. That was the meme going around about a decade back on Facebook, in the glory days of the social media network. And even though exaggerated, it did make sense. Eid meant Salman Khan fans going to the theatre and being regaled by a variant of his larger-than-life bhai persona in some action film or the other. From the early 2000s, when Tumko Na Bhool Payenge started the trend, to his unstoppable run in the 2010s, the superstar was synonymous with Eid.

The pandemic stopped that juggernaut, though. And since then, Salman has struggled to dominate his favourite festival as he once had. A few years ago, Salman could have sleepwalked through an Eid release, which would still br...