Drishyam 3 hits Rs 489.74 cr; cop is antagonist, not villain

Drishyam 3: The Conclusion is inching towards the Rs 500-crore club, but its writer wants one thing cleared up before the celebrations: Jaideep Ahlawat’s crime branch officer is not the villain of the piece.

Writer Aamil Keeyan Khan, in an exclusive conversation with India Today, said SP Rajveer Singh Tomar should be understood as an antagonist, not a villain. The distinction is not just wordplay; it is the engine that has powered the Drishyam franchise.

A cop doing his job

Tomar is the officer determined to pierce Vijay Salgaonkar’s carefully guarded secrets. For a section of the audience, that makes him the bad guy. Khan pushed back, with a smile: “I didn’t even know he was the villain! I mean, he’s a cop trying to catch a criminal. How terribly villainous of him!”

His argument is that fans have fallen so hard for Vijay that they have stopped questioning his choices. “Just because we’ve grown emotionally attached to Vijay Salgaonkar doesn’t automatically make him a saint. He’s done some pretty morally questionable things himself,” Khan said. “The beauty of Drishyam is that nobody is entirely right or wrong. It depends on whose side of the story you’re watching.”

So Tomar, in Khan’s reading, is a man doing his job. Khan also compared writing to composing music, and said Ahlawat “hit every note perfectly” — praise the performance has earned, judging by audience reaction.

Why the franchise is ending at its peak

A hit this size usually invites a fourth film. Khan said the writers felt the story had reached its natural conclusion. He joked that Vijay has already outsmarted practically the entire police department, and that extending the saga would mean sending him after the CBI, the FBI and Interpol.

“There’s a certain dignity in knowing when to say goodbye,” he said. That restraint is rare in Indian cinema: when a franchise is earning, the instinct is to stretch it. Here the team chose to leave the audience wanting more.

That decision becomes even more striking against the box office background. Most franchises would read Rs 489.74 crore as a reason to continue; the Drishyam team read it as permission to stop. For a series built on Vijay’s ability to out-think everyone, the smartest move may be knowing that every puzzle has to end.

The box office milestones

• Worldwide gross: Rs 489.74 crore after Day 11
• India gross: Rs 378.24 crore
• Overseas gross: Rs 111.50 crore
• India nett: Rs 315.25 crore

Those numbers have already rewritten Ajay Devgn’s personal record book. Drishyam 3 has overtaken Tanhaji: The Unsung Warrior to become the highest-grossing film of his career, and it is the first Ajay-led film to cross Rs 300 crore in India nett collections.

For fans, the reframe is liberating: you can admire Tomar’s intelligence without feeling guilty. He is not evil; he is the formidable opponent Vijay has always needed. And with the story choosing to close on this high, there will be no stretched-thin sequel — only a conclusion that respects both the audience and the characters.

Source: India Today