Gadar 2, Jailer, OMG 2 and Bhola Shankar leads the Second biggest Weekend ever at the Indian box office

Gadar 2, Jailer, OMG 2 and Bhola Shankar led a Rs. 379 crores weekend at the Indian box office, selling 1.90 crores tickets. This marks second biggest weekend ever in India.

By Jatinder Singh

Updated on Sep 06, 2023 | 01:13 PM IST | 193.4K

Jailer, Gadar 2, OMG 2 and Bhola Shankar (image courtesy of Sun Pictures, Zee Studios, Viacom 18 and AK Entertainments)

Going into the weekend, I filed a story on how Gadar, Jailer 2, OMG 2 and Bhola Shankar are going to power the weekend to gross over Rs. 300 crores at the Indian box office. The weekend did deliver on that and then some more. Let’s jump to numbers first.

The top films at the Indian box office during the weekend were as follows:

Gadar 2: Rs. 157 crores
Jailer: Rs. Rs. 111 crores (Rs. 161 crores 4-days)
OMG 2: Rs. 47 crores
Bhola Shankar: 31.50 crores
Rocky aur Rani Kii Prem Kahani: Rs. 11.50 crores
Oppenheimer: Rs. 5 crores
Meg 2: Rs. 1.80 crores
Mission: Impossible - Dead Reckoning: Rs. 1.40 crores
Byomkesh O Durgo Rohosyo: Rs. 1.25 crore Approx
Barbie: Rs. 1 crore

The cumulative earnings from the top ten films at the Indian box office stood at Rs. 368 crores. The rest managed to gather another Rs. 10 crores approx, for a grand total of Rs. 379 crores approx at the Indian box office during the weekend. Including the Rs. 50 crores opening day of Jailer on Thursday, that amount exceeds Rs. 400 crores mark, for Rs. 427 crores approx. For earning these monies, 1.90 crores tickets were sold during the weekend plus another 30 lakhs for Jailer on Thursday.

The gross amount is a bit lower than April 15-17 last year, when KGF 2, Beast and RRR grossed Rs. 378 crores in between them for an overall market gross of over Rs. 382 crores approx. However, it is possible that actuals for some of the above films come a bit higher and it may ascend to the top spot. The difference between the two is barely Rs. 3 crores. Unfortunately, there is no centralised box office reporting system in India, the existence of one could have given a clear winner. In terms of admits, however, the recent weekend is clearly ahead by around 10 lakhs more tickets sold. The record for the most tickets sold over a weekend still belongs to April 28-30 2017, when Baahubali 2 alone accounted for a staggering 2.60 crores tickets.

The biggest weekends at the Indian box office are as follows:

Apr 15-17, 2022: Rs. 382 crores (1.80 crores admits)
Aug 11-13, 2023: Rs. 379 crores Approx (1.90 crores admits)
Mar 25-27, 2022: Rs. 372 crores (1.60 crores admits)
Apr 28-30, 2017: Rs. 363 crores (2.65 crores admits)

The above are the four weekends that grossed over Rs. 300 crores at the Indian box office. The rest of the list would need some more number crunching to compile, probably next time, hopefully soon. While the previous three Rs. 300 crores weekend benefited from the release of significant pan-Indian films, the recent weekend's success was attributed to multiple films captivating their respective markets. Gadar 2 and OMG 2 posted the biggest-ever numbers in the Hindi belt box office while Jailer did near-record business in Tamil markets. Unfortunately, Bhola Shankar's underperformance acted as a dampener; had it performed decently, the weekend's earnings could have potentially reached even greater heights. The potential exists for a weekend to go over Rs. 500 crores. There are some big films releasing in the next two years, hopefully, one of them is big enough on its own and gets something else playing a supporting role to realise the potential.

You can read about our coverage of these films here: