Daler Mehndi croons a ballad for his CRED audition…

CRED’s struggle to find a star for its Dream11 IPL ads continues. All the credit card bill payment rewards app wanted was a celebrity who could laugh at himself/herself and praise the app a bit. But alas, it’s easier said than done.

We saw Bollywood stars Anil Kapoor go into his ‘jhakaas’ mode, Madhuri Dixit dance her heart out, music composer Bappi Lahiri pen a new song, and playback singers Alka Yagnik and Udit Narayan evoke serious 1990s nostalgia. Even Baba Sehgal sent his adution tape.

But the three-member CRED jury is tougher to please than Simon Cowell (‘The X Factor’) or Anu Malik (‘Indian Idol’). Their “Let’s do a simple voice-over that says ‘Download CRED’” is more popular than the stars themselves.

The latest one to turn up for the audition was popstar Daler Mehndi and that too with two backup dancers/singers. We expected him to electrify the room with his roaring voice reminiscent of ‘Tunak Tunak’ and ‘Rang de Basanti’, but he chose a ballad for his audition, instead.

In a first, the jury was almost moved to tears, but did it deter them from discussing if they still want to stick to a voice-over. The answer? No.

Unfortunately, we don’t know the result of Mehndi’s audition, but we did hear someone yell, “Next”.

We will keep you updated.