The film is set in Delhi, where four "Fukrey" (a colloquial Punjabi term for slackers) boys,^[8] come together to make easy money.

The group includes two school backbenchers, Hunny (Pulkit Samrat) and Choocha (Varun Sharma), who are perpetually dreaming of making it big. They want to get into the local college but don't have the grades. The college guard Pandit (Pankaj Tripathi) tells them that he can leak to them the class XII papers at a rate of Rs. 50,000 per subject. Through Pandit (Pankaj Tripathi) they meet Zafar (Ali Fazal), a former student of the college and a struggling musician. The fourth character is Lali (Manjot Singh), whose father runs a sweet shop. Lali is currently pursuing his degree through correspondence and like Hunny and Choocha also wants to get into the same college but doesn't have the marks. Pandit tells Lali to donate Rs. 250,000 in the college development fund to get a seat in return. Zafar's girlfriend, Neetu (Vishakha Singh), has broken up with him and his father is critically ill and needs money for his treatment.

The four meet up at Pandit's office where Hunny explains his scheme. Each night Choocha has a dream, which Hunny later interprets as a lottery number, which they buy and win. And for every rupee invested, they get ten rupees (basically ten times) back. However since now they all together need a lot of money, they need someone to invest lakhs. So, on Zafar's insistence, Pandit takes them to meet a local gangster, Bholi Punjaban (Richa Chadda) where Hunny tells them their scheme. Bholi is ready to invest and Lali also gives his shop papers as mortgage. Bholi tells them to come the next day with the number. However, the same night everyone except Choocha falls asleep.

The next morning, Choocha narrates a fake dream which Hunny interprets and gets a number. They go to Bholi and tell the number. But it backfires and Bholi loses her money. Now to recover her money, she gives them a packet containing drug pills which Zafar, Hunny and Lali have to sell at a rave party the same night. She keeps Choocha as security with her. At the party, Police and Narcotics teams conduct a raid and Lali escapes with packet with the police chasing him. Lali manages to fool the police and reaches Neetu's place. He also sees Zafar there. Neetu throws the drugs down the drain just as the police are about to search her home. The police leave her place warning Lali. Zafar in the meanwhile tells the whole story to Neetu. Lali also calls Choocha telling him to run from Bholi's house which he succeeds in doing.

The next morning, all the five land up at Bholi's place. She gives them 24 hours to pay all the money due otherwise she would take the money by selling Lali's shop. The four are fighting at Zafar's place where Choocha tells them the truth about not seeing the dream. However, he tells them that he slept last night and he saw a dream. Zafar is not interested while Lali, Hunny and Neetu are. Hunny interprets the dream but they are short of cash even after Neetu is ready to give her savings. However, next morning Lali is able to borrow cash from a homeless man who used to remove parts from Lali's motorbike. They invest and win a huge amount.

They go to Bholi's house and give her the money. Then Hunny tells Bholi that he wants to sell those drug pills again and gives her an advance. Impressed Bholi goes inside and returns with the pills only to be caught red handed by the police and Narcotics who have raided her home. In a flashback, it is shown that while Hunny, Choocha, Lali and Neetu were investing the money, Zafar met the Narcotics division and made a plan to catch Bholi. Now with Bholi behind bars, the police pardon the four and they are free.

Three months later, it is shown that Hunny and Choocha are entering the same college on horses as they had planned in the beginning of the film while Pandit is shocked and Lali, Zafar and Neetu are having a good laugh.

Shashi Godbole (Sridevi) is a housewife who makes and sells laddoos as a home-run business. Her husband Satish, (Adil Hussain) and daughter, Sapna (Navika Kotia) take her for granted, mock her poor English skills and generally treat her with disrespect, making Shashi feel negative and insecure. However, her young son, Sagar (Shivansh Kotia) loves her as she is, and her mother-in-law (Sulabha Deshpande) offers her words of sympathy.

Shashi's older sister Manu (Sujatha Kumar), who lives in New York, invites Shashi's family to her daughter Meera's (Neeju Sodhi) wedding to Kevin (Ross Nathan). It is decided that Shashi will go to New York alone to help Manu organize the wedding, and her husband and children will join her as the wedding approaches. During her flight to America, Shashi is given inspirational advice by a fellow passenger (Amitabh Bachchan). While Shashi is in New York, she has a traumatic experience at a coffee shop due to her inability to communicate in English. Using the money she made from selling laddoo's she secretly enrolls in a conversational English class that offers to teach the language in four weeks, showing her resourcefulness at navigating an unfamiliar city alone. The class comprises: David Fischer, the instructor (Cory Hibbs); Eva, a Mexican nanny (Ruth Aguilar); Salman Khan, a Pakistani cab driver (Sumeet Vyas); Yu Son, a Chinese hairstylist (Maria Romano); Ramamurthy, a Tamil software engineer (Rajeev Ravindranathan); Udumbke, a young African-Caribbean man (Damian Thompson); and Laurent, a French chef (Mehdi Nebbou). Shashi quickly becomes a promising and committed student, earns everyone's respect with her charming behavior and her cuisine, and gains self-confidence. Laurent becomes attracted to Shashi. When he tries to kiss her at the rooftop of a building, Shashi pushes him away and runs off, but fails to explain that she is married.

Meanwhile, Shashi's niece Radha (Priya Anand) who is Meera's younger sister finds out about her secret English classes and is supportive of her pursuit. Shashi starts watching English films at night and does her homework assiduously. To complete the English-speaking course and get a certificate, each student must write and deliver a 5-minute speech. Shashi's family joins her in New York earlier than expected. Shashi tries to continue attending class, but decides to quit because of schedule conflicts, and asks Radha to inform David Fischer. The test date coincides with that of the wedding, and Shashi is forced to miss the test.

Radha invites David and the entire class to the wedding, where Shashi's husband Satish is taken aback at being introduced to a diverse group of people by his wife. Shashi gives a touching and enlightening toast to the married couple in English, surprising everyone who knew her as a typical, conservative, Indian housewife. In her speech, Shashi extols the virtues being married and having a family, describing the family as a safe space of love and respect where weaknesses are not mocked. Shashi's husband and daughter regret treating her with disrespect. Her teacher David declares that she has passed the course with distinction and issues her the certificate. Shashi thanks Laurent for "making her feel better about herself". Shashi's family return to India; during their flight home, Shashi asks the flight attendant in fluent English whether she has any Hindi newspapers in Hindi version.