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The 2026 Sankranthi season turned out to be a money-spinner for Tollywood, with Megastar Chiranjeevi’s Mana Shankara Vara Prasad smashing all existing regional records. Anaganaga Oka Raju and Nari Nari Naduma Murari also emerged as commercial hits, giving the year a solid start.
However, post the festive season, no film managed to perform well in theatres. Forget good collections, occupancies dropped to alarming levels across both Telugu states, with most theatres struggling to even recover operational costs. Exhibitors incurred massive losses for several days, and some theatres even shut down voluntarily.
At such a critical juncture, Ranveer Singh’s Dhurandhar: The Revenge arrived with a bang, offering a huge sigh of relief to the exhibition sector. The Telugu version’s release didn’t go as planned, but despite repeated delays, Dhurandhar 2 sustained its buzz and pulled audiences to theatres in large numbers, resulting in packed houses everywhere.
After the Sankranthi season, theatres once again witnessed houseful boards, with many moviegoers returning disappointed due to lack of tickets. Generally, dubbed films tend to lose momentum after the first weekend, but Dhurandhar 2 is defying the trend. The film opened on a solid note this morning, and here’s the surprising part: All matinee shows in Vizag went houseful, while occupancies in other regions of Andhra Pradesh and Telangana remain impressive too.
Achieving such occupancies during a non-festival window is a mammoth feat even for a straight Telugu film. Here, however, a Bollywood film has single-handedly revived theatres from a crisis, bringing back audiences to cinemas. Aditya Dhar’s film once again proves that audiences crave good content, irrespective of language.
A section of the trade and some industry insiders had predicted that Dhurandhar: The Revenge would have a limited impact in Andhra Pradesh, but the actual results have turned out to be quite the opposite. The summer season has begun on a bumper note, and exhibitors now hope the momentum continues with upcoming releases like Biker, Dacoit, and Peddi.
