The Neem Karoli Baba biopic finally cooled off six weeks in, but trade watchers still expect it to clear Rs 300 crore before its run ends.
Six weeks into its theatrical run, Hanuman Ansh has finally hit a normal Wednesday dip. According to trade estimates reported by Pinkvilla, the devotional biopic added somewhere between Rs 5.75 crore and Rs 6.25 crore nett on its sixth Wednesday, the outlet's own figures varying slightly within the same report. Either way, the total now sits at roughly Rs 225 to 226 crore nett, and this is being read as the film's first genuine sign of slowing down.
Context matters here. A film running six weeks without a real drop is unusual for Hindi cinema in 2026, a year that's mostly been about films opening big and vanishing by week three. Hanuman Ansh has done the opposite, building steadily rather than exploding.
The geography of the drop tells its own story. Maharashtra and the southern circuits are still holding the film up, while the northern markets are where the natural fall has shown up first. That's consistent with how the film has tracked through its run, with the Hindi belt cooling faster than the rest.
Trade projections put Thursday's total at around Rs 230 crore nett, and there's talk of the lifetime number stretching to Rs 300 crore if the current hold pattern continues into a seventh week. Pinkvilla has already called it one of the biggest hits of the year, and on current numbers that's hard to argue with, though it's worth remembering these remain trade estimates and not certified figures.
For those who haven't caught up, Hanuman Ansh is directed by Vishal Chaturvedi and follows a boy's search for God after his mother's death, a journey that eventually turns him into the saint Neem Karoli Baba. It's a niche premise on paper, devotional cinema doesn't usually run this deep into a Wednesday without a serious fall. That it has stayed this steady for six weeks says something about the audience it's found, largely outside the metros where trade trackers usually take their temperature.
Online chatter has been oddly split. Some viewers are still asking why the film hasn't performed better, a question that doesn't quite match what the numbers actually show. Others are just trying to figure out if it's worth a watch at all, going by the volume of people asking for reviews well after release.
What happens next depends on whether the northern drop steepens or stabilises. A clean run to Rs 300 crore would put Hanuman Ansh in rare company for a devotional biopic, and the next few Fridays will decide if that number is realistic or optimistic trade talk.
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