Are 'Dhurandhar' box office collections fake? Bollywood trade analysts expose alarming booking scam on social media

Ranveer Singh's latest film Dhurandhar released this Friday (December 5) to moderate reviews from audiences. The action thriller, directed by Aditya Dhar, also features Sanjay Dutt, Arjun Rampal, Akshaye Khanna and R Madhavan in key roles. While majority of the viewers have applauded Dhar's vision, his storytelling and the last-minute call to split the film into parts has divided the audience feedback.

Meanwhile, the film is also in hot water for its box office collections. Trade analysts in Bollywood have accused the film's makers of manipulating the box office numbers through block booking to build a fake perception among the public. While corporate booking does happen for most big films, some of them go out of the way to exploit this to fudge box office numbers, and this is the allegation against Dhurandhar.

Prior to the release of the film, Dhurandhar reported lukewarm advance booking, which was shocking for a big-budget action film in Bollywood. Early estimates suggested a first day of Rs 15-20 crore nett in India. For instance, Dhanush's Tere Ishk Mein opened to Rs 15 crore nett in India despite being a romantic drama. Therefore, Dhurandhar was staring at an embarrassing opening day number.

According to a reputed trade website 'Addatoday', there was significant block booking done by the film's producers, which meant that first day numbers eventually ended at Rs 23-24 crore nett. Meanwhile, another veteran Bollywood trade website Boxofficeindia openly called out the manipulation done by Dhurandhar's producers.

"Dhurandhar has collected around 24 crore nett at the box office but this with all the block bookings across the country which is feeding in actual context." wrote the website. Films in Bollywood have previously used this strategy to promote their films but very few projects have done so at an alarming level, especially so early in the theatrical run.

Veteran trade analyst and distributor Raj Bansal is surprised at this strategy by Dhurandhar's producers, given that the ground report for the film from the viewers is more than decent. Another analyst Navneet Mundhra has put up screenshots on X, proving how the PR team of Dhurandhar is trying to influence the film's reviews and box office.

When there is a variance as big as almost 30 percent to the film's box office collection, there is bound to be an outrage from the Bollywood trade. The coming days will give us a clearer picture on this but for now, it is fair to say that these allegations are taking some sheen off the audience reviews on the film.