Daayra has walked out of the censor board almost untouched. The Meghna Gulzar-directed investigative thriller got its A certificate on September 11 with no visual cuts whatsoever, according to an exclusive report by Bollywood Hungama. Every violent frame stays as shot. Every line of dialogue, including what the report describes as heavy-duty, hard-hitting stretches, made it through.

The Examining Committee at the Central Board of Film Certification asked for exactly one change. It concerns a dialogue delivered by Kareena Kapoor Khan's character Aajuni, roughly two hours into the film. A single word in that line was swapped out for 'Minister.' Bollywood Hungama, which first broke news of the A certificate on September 12, says that was the only modification sought.

The certified runtime comes in at 143 minutes and 16 seconds, which works out to 2 hours, 23 minutes and 16 seconds. That's a proper theatrical runtime for a thriller of this kind, and one that suggests the film hasn't been trimmed down for time either.

An A rating isn't new territory for Kareena. Daayra is her tenth film to land the adults-only tag, following Ajnabee, Chameli, Dev, Omkara, Kurbaan, Heroine, Udta Punjab, Veere Di Wedding and The Buckingham Murders. That's a two-decade spread, and it tells you something about the kind of material she keeps signing up for even as the industry around her leans safer.

Daayra also stars Prithviraj Sukumaran, who's had his own run of dark, procedural roles in Malayalam cinema before this one. Gulzar's filmography, meanwhile, has largely stayed away from watered-down endings, and the fact that the CBFC let the film through with a single word-level fix rather than trims fits that track record.

What exactly triggered the word change hasn't been detailed beyond the fact that it involved Aajuni's dialogue and that 'Minister' was the replacement term used. Neither the makers nor the CBFC have said more publicly, and Bollywood Hungama's report doesn't specify what the original word was.

Daayra opens in cinemas on September 18. With no visual cuts and a runtime that's held its shape, the film that reaches audiences that Friday should be close to what was actually shot. Whether the story lives up to that intact form is the only question left before release.