Dasara box office collection day 1: Nani's film earns twice as much as Ajay Devgn's Bholaa, mints Rs 38 crore worldwide

Dasara, the new Telugu action entertainer starring Nani and Keerthy Suresh, has taken a running start at the box office. The film, which was released on Thursday, registered exceptional numbers and made Rs 17 crore net in the domestic market as per trade insiders. This makes it the highest-opener for Nani in his career.

Interestingly, the film has done well overseas as well. As per figures shared by the film’s producers, Dasara made Rs 38 crore gross worldwide on its first day. These figures have not been verified by trade insiders so far though. However, the figure is easily the best in Nani’s career so far. In fact, only two of Nani’s films have ever crossed Rs 50 crore, a benchmark Dasara will almost certainly cross in two days.

Dasara registered a very healthy occupancy of 66% across all Telugu shows on day one. Dasara did this stupendous business despite the fact that the dubbed versions did not fare too well. In Hindi, the performance was subpar with only 7% occupancy across India. However, despite all that, Dasara was able to trump Ajay Devgn’s Bholaa, which released on the same day.

Bholaa earned Rs 20.50 crore on Thursday and Dasara made almost twice as much, although a bulk of that earning is from overseas. In India too, Dasara (Rs 17 crore) beat Bholaa (Rs 11.20 crore) by a substantial margin. How the film holds over the extended weekend will determine its lifetime earnings. Although given the strong opening, a Rs 150-crore run should be easy for Dasara.

With over 1300 screens across Andhra Pradesh and Telangana, Dasara is Nani’s biggest ever release. Directed by Srikanth Odela, Dasara also stars Keerthy Suresh in the lead. Produced by Sudhakar Cherukuri on SLV Cinemas Banner, it is being billed as Nani’s first pan-India project.