A section of trade lobby and media allegedly acting in coordination have been issuing commentary on Sarkar Raj not being a 'super hit'. While it may not do a Sholay or Muqaddar Ka Sikandar, it is also true the film has recovered well over cost and far more than the projected box office 'hits' in the trade. The contrast is highlighted when the same lobby has recently gone on to proclaim limited view films like Jannat, as well as some much more expensively sold movies which crashed upon release, as 'Super Hits' while applying different standards to Sarkar Raj.

As it so happened, while there were rumors floated of poor opening,  it was revealed that Sarkar Raj broke opening week collection records in theaters in Nagpur in Maharashtra upto Gurgaon in East Punjab, and almost cracked the top 10 chart in USA where such Maharashtra-flavor political films hardly even release.  If the opening was not so big, the film clearly would not have been able to put up the kinds of theater collections it did over India (Rs. 25 crores net).

However a few odd Punjab individual distributors who have absolutely nothing to do with Sarkar Raj, were recently quoted in a paper talking about the film using incomplete, negative picture of the returns. One such detracting rival individual distributor of Dolly Films was quoted in Hindustan Times, "Delhi,UP and Punjab...[Sarkar Raj] will only be able to recover 3 crore.".  Which of course is false. In reality, Sarkar Raj has netted 4-5 crores in opening week alone in DUP and almost 2 crores in Punjab.  That means the shares were such that the film recovered 3 crores not in the future but just after the opening weekend alone and will be an earning proposition to say the least in this market where RGV's themed films don't fare so strong historically. In Delhi city Sarkar Raj collected close to 2.5 crores and in Gurgaon, which falls under the East Punjab circuit, the Amitabh Bachchan-Abhishek Bachchan-Aishwarya Rai starrer broke the opening collection record with 63 lakhs week net collection. In Noida, Sarkar Raj registered net of 40 lakhs from 3 prints. In Lucknow, Uttar Pradesh the opening week was 32 lakhs. These opening figures were all higher than most of the recent big grossers over the last several years.

Says a well placed distribution source, "This is all part of the lobby that was trying to derail the movie. They were zeroing in for another Aag, even trying to stop the movie from releasing. Instead Sarkar Raj recovered the entire cost in less than a week.  Ignore the genre and caliber of the film and look at only the costs. This is not some record shot movie filmed in France or Switzerland or with elaborate sets. It was shot right here in India in Hyderabad over just few weeks in July/August last year. A major part of the budget is just the actor cost not on huge sets or fancy locales. Even if it were to stop screening with zero collections from second week forward, it already has made money and will generate business over twice its cost. In pure trade terms with a projected gross of 60-70 crores, Sarkar Raj is a box office hit with full potential still to be seen over the next 6-7 weeks."

SARKAR RAJ BOX OFFICE
PRODUCTION
	Cost	Recovery	Source
Film Production	25 crores
Overhead	3 crores	38 crores	Worldwide theatrical and satellite right to Balaji
		2.5 crores	Audio and Home Video rights to T-Series
Production Total	28 crores	40.5 crores
Producers's Sarkar Raj profit			Rs. 13 crores
DISTRIBUTION
	Cost	Recovery	Source
Worldwide Distributors Balaji	38 crores
		8 crores	Overseas Theatrical Rights
		14 crores	Satellite rights sold to Studio 18
Distributor total	38 crores	22 crores
Theatrical Box Office left to be recovered for profit			Rs. 16 crores
EXHIBITION - THEATRICAL BOX OFFICE
	Cost	Recovery	Source
Theatrical Cost	16 crores
		21 crores (estimated projections subject to final collections)*	Theatrical box office
Theatrical Box Office Profit			Rs. 5 crores+
PROFIT SUMMARY
Production Profit			Rs. 13 crores
Distribution Profit			Rs. 5 crores
Total Profit Generated by Sarkar Raj across all sectors			Rs. 18 crores
*Revised after week 4 **Some revenue streams still not exploited