Gadar and Lagaan released twenty years back and below are the opening day collections from some centres. Obviously they do not compare much with the collections seen today but both films opened to more or less full occupancy depending on the centre and could not do much more.

Lagaan did manage to compete in Mumbai city and even lead in Pune city and South but it was Gadar all the way in the rest of India. The gaps were huge in the Hindi circuits and this was despite at some places Gadar having the weaker cinema but that did not matter as the audience was not coming for the cinema but for the film.

Both films had a rural setting though that setting was presented more for the classes in Lagaan. Today the industry has a huge problem as are unable to make big films with a rural setting and tend to go the Hollywood way for action depending on high scale action and money shots. History says the bigger HITS are always likely to have a rural setting.  The collections of Gadar and Lagaan on day one at some centres are below. The number of cinemas is in brackets.

Mumbai

Gadar - 18,51,000 (26)

Lagaan - 16,13,000 (21)

Ahmedabad

Gadar - 4,50,000 (8)

Lagaan - 3,95,000 (5)

Delhi

Gadar - 16,25,000 (16)

Lagaan - 14,00,000 (16)

Kanpur

Gadar - 1,32,000 (2)

Lagaan - 75,000 (3)

Lucknow

Gadar - 71,000 (1)

Lagaan - 58,000 (1)

Agra

Gadar - 80,000 (1)

Lagaan - 64,000 (1)

Jalandhar

Gadar - 1,02,000 (1)

Lagaan - 65,000 (1)

Nagpur

Gadar - 1,88,000 (4)

Lagaan - 1,32,000 (4)

Jaipur

Gadar - 2,50,000 (3)

Lagaan - 1,45,000 (3)

Hyderabad

Gadar - 4,50,000 (10)

Lagaan - 5.80,000 (13)