Nilay Chotai

Chhello Divas released on 20 November 2015 with eight producers listed on it: Vaishal Shah, Aayush Mehta, Bhaumik Gondaliya, Sharad Patel, Nilay Chotai, Pranay Kabra, Sandil Dang and Krunal Vyas. Krishnadev Yagnik wrote and directed it for Belvedere Films. It carried a reported budget of Rs 2.8 crore and reported a gross of Rs 18 crore.

Eight people on a Rs 2.8 crore film sounds like disorganisation. It was arithmetic. In 2015 nobody in Ahmedabad had proved that a Gujarati film could return its money, so nobody was going to put the whole number in on their own. The film worked, and the method survived the film.

Karsandas Pay & Use in 2017 is the shortest credit block on his record. Two producers, Chotai and Vaishal Shah, on an estimated Rs 1.5 crore budget that reported a Rs 8 crore gross, with Belvedere Films and Ananta Production in the studio field. It is the closest he has come to backing a film by himself.

Then the stack widened again. Naadi Dosh, released 17 June 2022, named four producers, Chotai with Munna Shukul, Harshad Shah and Bhaumik Gondaliya, and three companies, Ananta Businesscorp, Shukul Studios and Big Box Series. It reported Rs 11.85 crore and went out through Panorama Studios. That shape, several producers and several banners feeding one Panorama release, became the default for the next three years.

Vash arrived on 17 February 2023 with four producers, Kalpesh Soni, Krunal Soni, Nilay Chotai and Dipen Patel, and four production companies, KS Entertainment, Ananta Businesscorp, Patel Processing Studios and Big Box Series. Krishnadev Yagnik wrote and directed a psychological horror film in a market that had spent a decade on college comedies.

It won the National Film Award for Best Gujarati Feature Film at the 71st ceremony, and Janki Bodiwala won Best Actress in a Supporting Role. The prize is usually read as a director's win, and it is. It is also the moment the shared credit block stopped looking like a compromise and started looking like a working system.

Kasoombo, released 16 February 2024 in Gujarati and 3 May 2024 in a Hindi version, is the largest thing his name sits on. Vijaygiri Bava directed it from Vimalkumar Dhami's novel Amar Balidan, a set was built across 16 acres, and the reported budget was Rs 15 crore. Eight producers signed for it: Vijaygiri Bava, Twinkle Bava, Nilay Chotai, Dipen Patel, Krishnadev Yagnik, Jayesh Pavra, Pravin Patel and Tushar Shah.

Nine years after Chhello Divas the number of names on the page went straight back to eight, and the reason is the same as it was in 2015. What changed is what the eight signatures were willing to buy. A builder can wait several years for a return because that is what building is. Film money usually cannot, and that difference is why the most ambitious Gujarati productions keep arriving with a property business somewhere in the studio field.

His verified Instagram bio names Chhello Divas, Karsandas Pay & Use, Naadi Dosh, Raado, Vash, Danny Jigar and Kasoombo. The public film record does not line up perfectly with that list, and this page counts six rather than seven. Raado, released 22 July 2022, names Munna Shukul and Jayesh Patel as its producers, with Ananta Businesscorp appearing in the studio field rather than his name in the producer field, so the credit sits with the company and not with him personally.

Danny Jigar cuts the other way. The film's infobox names Nikunj Patel and Dipen Patel while the article's own text says the film was produced by Nilay Chotai and Dipen Patel. That is a contradiction inside a single source, and it is resolved here in his favour only because his own verified account claims the film. Both wrinkles are stated rather than smoothed, because a producer's credit count is the one number on a page like this that people actually check.