When Pawan Kalyan and Harish Shankar announced their reunion in 2020 with Ustaad Bhagat Singh, the excitement in Tollywood was genuine. Their 2012 collaboration Gabbar Singh had worked. The two knew how to make a crowd feel something. Years later, that announcement finally became a film. Ustaad Bhagat Singh released on March 19, on Ugadi, one of the best festive windows a Telugu film can get. By the second day, the numbers had already told a grim story. According to Sacnilk, by day four, the film had collected an estimated Rs 60 crore net at the Indian box office, and hitting the Rs 100 crore mark was looking like a serious challenge. To put that in context, Pawan Kalyan’s previous release, OG, had made over Rs 140 crore gross on its opening day alone. Ustaad Bhagat Singh hadn’t matched that figure even after four days. The more telling story, though, was not the numbers. It was what happened in the Telugu market itself. A Bollywood film, Dhurandhar: The Revenge, posted housefull boards in B and …