The most ambitious and much awaited mythological saga in the history of Indian cinema, 'Ramayana Part 1' has made its unique power felt at the box office as soon as it was released. This grand film, made under the vision of National Award winning director Nitesh Tiwari, hit the theaters across the world on 5 November. After registering a solid opening on the first day, the film showed a phenomenal surge at the ticket window on its second day i.e. Friday 6th November and became the fastest to join the Rs 100 crore club at the Indian box office. According to Sacknilk's early trend report, till 10:30 pm on the second day, the film registered a huge net collection of around Rs 48.35 crore at the domestic box office. With this tremendous business, the total domestic net collection of two days of 'Ramayana Part 1' has crossed Rs 113.20 crore. The film's state-of-the-art visual effects (VFX), lavish sets and authenticity of characters are being widely praised on social media by audiences and critics. The calm and dignified look of Ranbir Kapoor as Lord Shri Ram, the divinity of Sai Pallavi as Mata Sita and the powerful aura of superstar Yash as Ravana have acted as a major catalyst in drawing the audience to the theatres. Although in the initial trade predictions, it was being estimated that the film could cross the magical figure of Rs 100 crore on the first day, but despite not achieving this figure on the opening day, the way the film doubled its pace on the second day, it has proved that positive word-of-mouth has started showing its true power at the box office. Talking about the official and final figures of the first day of the film, 'Ramayana Part 1' opened its account with a total net collection of Rs 64.85 crore including all Indian languages. This opening day figure took the total first day gross collection of the film to the level of Rs 77.50 crore. Linguistically, the biggest and unprecedented support for the film came from Hindi speaking states, where the Hindi version alone registered a huge collection of Rs 47.50 crore on the first day. From multiplexes to single screen theaters in North India, Central India and the western belt, a huge crowd of spectators was seen. The film has also established a strong presence in the major film markets of South India. The Kannada version did a remarkable business of Rs 7.25 crore in Karnataka on the first day due to the huge fan base of superstar Yash. Whereas in Telugu states i.e. Andhra Pradesh and Telangana, the film collected Rs 6.00 crore. With this, the Tamil version collected Rs 2.60 crore nett and the Malayalam version collected Rs 1.50 crore nett in Kerala. Due to its simultaneous pan-India release in all South Indian languages, the film is being loved by all sections of the audience, which has provided a strong base to its global business. On Friday, the second day of its release, an extraordinary level of screen distribution was seen across the country for 'Ramayana Part 1'. The film is running uninterrupted in more than 23,266 daily shows in theaters across the country. Despite Friday being a working day, audience participation was very encouraging and the total theater occupancy for the day was recorded at around 28.0 percent. While the occupancy remained stable around 20 to 22 percent in the morning and early afternoon shows, this figure jumped to above 40 percent in the evening and late night shows. Trade experts say that the toughest test for any big film is to maintain its momentum on the first Friday. 'Ramayana Part 1' not only passed this test with ease, but also showed a sharp increase in ticket sales on Friday evening as compared to Thursday. The increasing presence of family audiences and senior citizens in theaters is a clear indication that the story and cultural presentation of the film has directly touched the hearts of the public. The foundation of the film's strong earnings on the second day had already been laid through its explosive advance booking. For Friday 6 November, the film had registered a total gross advance booking of Rs 30.63 crore from across the country. Even if seats blocked by theaters are removed, the film had directly added Rs 25.16 crore to its account from actual pre-sales. A total of 8.51 lakh tickets were booked in advance for 24 thousand 550 shows scheduled for the second day, of which the actual number of tickets sold was 7.03 lakh. If we analyze the advance booking data at the regional level, the National Capital Region i.e. Delhi-NCR stood at the top position in the entire country. From Delhi-NCR alone, the film garnered an impressive advance booking of Rs 3.98 crore (actual Rs 3.26 crore) on the second day. After this, a huge craze for advance ticketing was also seen in major metropolitan centers like Mumbai, Bengaluru, Hyderabad and Pune. Looking at the upcoming Saturday and Sunday weekend, advance booking trends are already skyrocketing, making it completely clear that 'Ramayana Part 1' is all set to destroy many old historical records of box office earnings in its first weekend.
