Coinciding with the Akshay Kumar-starrer Toilet-Ek Prem Katha’s international release, Zonta Club of Kathmandu held a charity premiere show for the movie at QFX Kumari in the Capital on Friday evening. The movie is a satirical romantic-comedy in support of the Indian governmental campaign to improve the sanitation conditions, with an emphasis on the eradication of open defecation, especially in rural areas.

Zonta Club Kathmandu, a NGO which has been working for the advancement of the status of women in Nepal, has been active in bringing to light the deprivation Nepali girls attending school have to go through due to the lack of basic sanitation infrastructure at educational institutions. “Toilets play a crucial role in creating a strong economy, as well as improving health and protecting people’s safety and dignity, particularly women’s and girls’,” the organisers said, issuing a press release at the event.

Zonta Club, which has so far helped build over a dozen toilets in schools, in places including Sindhupalchowk and Pyutar (Lalitpur), said that the funds raised from the movie premiere would be funneled into building more basic sanitation infrastructures in other parts of the country.

Toilet Ek Prem Katha made an above average debut at the box office on the first day of its release on Friday, collecting INRs 13.10 crore. Released across 3200 screens all over the world, the numbers are expected to rise in the coming weeks with the movie picking up generally positive reviews from critics.