Ajay Devgn’s Drishyam 3 is finally out in cinemas. Before you head out to watch it, let’s quickly recap what happened in Parts 1 and 2.
Drishyam 1
The story revolves around Vijay Salgaonkar, who runs a cable TV network in a town in Goa. From outside he looks like a very simple and straightforward man and he is a fourth class failure. However, like the rest of us, he is an avid movie buff.
He lives a happy, contented life with his wife and two daughters.
One day, his elder daughter, Anju, goes on a school trip. During the trip, she encounters a boy named Sameer—known to everyone as Sam—who happens to be the son of Goa’s IG Meera Deshmukh and Mahesh Deshmukh.
That scoundrel—or rather, that spoiled brat—conspired with a friend to secretly record a video of Anju in the bathroom.
After the camp ends, Sam blackmails Anju by showing her the video; he tells her he will come to the back of her house tonight and intends to get physical with her—threatening to leak the video otherwise.
Anju tells her mother, Nandini, about the situation.
Sam comes to Anju’s house that night. Vijay is away—heavy rain has prevented him from returning—so only the mother and daughter are home.
Anju’s mother, Nandini, earnestly pleads with Sam to delete the video and forgive them. However, being an unruly young man, Sam instead attempts to behave insolently toward Nandini; he tells her he will delete the video only if she gives him what “he” wants.
At that moment, Anju picks up a metal rod. She has no intention of killing Sam; she simply wants to smash the phone he is holding. However, the rod accidentally strikes Sam on the head, resulting in his death.
For the time being, the two of them bury the body in the garden behind the house.
When Vijay returns home, the whole situation is explained to him, and he is given a clear account of what transpired.
That is the point where the movie really begins to get interesting.
Vijay devises a plan to navigate the aftermath of the incident; he coaches his entire family on exactly what to say should anyone question them later.
His first move is to properly dispose of the body; he drives Sam’s car to a remote location far from the city to ensure no link can be traced back to them.
However, a complication arises: Constable Gaitonde spots him driving the car—and Vijay has a long-standing rivalry with this police officer.
Sam’s parents become frantic over his disappearance and take a direct hand in the case. It has become personal for them; given that his mother is an IG, they possess both the authority and the anguish to drive the investigation forward with great aggression.
Here Vijay starts erasing all the evidence the very next day of the murder. Makes the mobile disappear. He collects the bus ticket, withdraws money from the bank and smiles looking at the CCTV installed there.
Butt family doesn’t know anything. It says just do as I say.
The next day, Vijay takes the entire family to Swami Chinmayanand ji’s satsang and on the way, he becomes friends with all the people he met very closely because he knew that these people will be useful in his interrogation in future.
Here they also eat pav bhaji, watch a movie and then return to their home.
Our Gaitonde was handling this entire case on the ground.
Sam’s mother was frantic, wondering where her son had gone. A friend of Sam’s revealed to her that her son was no saint; he had been blackmailing Anju after recording a private video of her. He laid out the entire situation for Sam’s parents, explaining exactly what had transpired.
This deepened Meera Deshmukh’s suspicions. She became convinced that Vijay was behind the foul play—that he was the reason her son was missing.
With these suspicions aroused, Vijay and his entire family were taken into custody for questioning.
However, since Vijay had already coached them all beforehand, their answers were consistent.
The family gave nothing away; there were no slips or leaks regarding the murder.
After such an extensive investigation yielded no evidence, the only remaining option was to extract a confession.
Gaitonde takes charge of extracting the confession. He brutally beats the entire family—not even sparing Anu, Vijay’s youngest daughter. However, just as he moves to strike Anu again, she reveals that the body is buried in the garden behind their house.
The police set off for the house with the entire family in tow.
A crowd of people and media personnel had already gathered there.
They start digging in the garden and pull out a dead dog. The media, police, and even the mother and daughter are all in shock.
The public turns against Gaitonde, furious that he subjected them to such torture—and, above all, that he had even beaten a young child Anu
But the question still lingering in everyone’s minds is: where exactly did that body go?
A fourth-grade dropout managed to outsmart the entire police force.
Following this, Gaitonde is suspended. Meera Deshmukh resigns, but before leaving, she asks Vijay to at least reveal whether her son is alive or dead.
Vijay doesn’t tell her directly but drops a hint through a story that Sam is dead.
In the final scene, we see Vijay—who remains a suspect—visiting the police station to sign the register. As he steps out after signing, the movie reveals that Vijay had buried Sam’s body right beneath that very police station.
This was possible because construction work on the station was underway during the incident on October 2nd and 3rd, and the flooring work was about to begin; seizing this opportunity, Vijay buried Sam’s body there.
And this is where we encounter one of the most shocking twists in the history of Indian cinema.
Drishyam 2
The story of Drishyam 2 now jumps forward by seven years.
Vijay’s life has been upgraded. He used to be a cable TV operator, but now he owns his own cinema hall. On top of that, he has developed a passion for screenwriting.
He wants to make a film, but the climax of the story hasn’t been decided yet.
Outwardly, his life appears quite settled and normal, but deep down, the entire family still lives in fear, haunted by memories of that fateful night.
His elder daughter, Anju, has yet to recover from the trauma, and as a result, she has begun to suffer from various health issues.
People in the neighborhood continue to gossip about them, and everyone suspects that Vijay is hiding something.
As for the police, they haven’t let the matter rest even after seven years; they are still quietly investigating the case.
The police have acquired the land that Vijay had previously sold to fund his cinema hall and film ventures. They have stationed two undercover officers—Jenny and Shiv—on that very plot; the duo has been living there as Vijay’s neighbors for the past two years.
One night, they finally discover that the murder was actually committed by Vijay’s elder daughter, Anju.
Meanwhile, we see that a man named David has finally been released from prison. He is the same individual who, at the very beginning of Drishyam 2, had fled after unintentionally killing someone. He is also the only person who witnessed Vijay burying the body on the night of October 3rd or 4th.
David is in need of money. Vijay’s case is notorious throughout the city, and the police have announced a reward of five lakh rupees for anyone providing concrete evidence related to it. However, David demands 24–25 lakh rupees instead of five; in exchange, he reveals the truth to the police—that Vijay had buried Sam’s body right beneath the very police station where they are standing.
Then, as expected, the excavation begins, and the police actually find the skeleton.
The Salgaonkar family is remanded to police custody for a day. And just like the first part, all four of them had the exact same storyline. Hearing this story again drives Meera Deshmukh out of control, and she gets even more aggressive.
Gaitonde is unleashed on Vijay’s family; acting like a beast—much like in the first part—he brutally beats Vijay’s wife, Nandini, and his two daughters, Anu and Anju, right in front of Vijay.
Unable to bear the immense pressure, Anju suffers an epileptic seizure right then and there.
Vijay cannot bear to see his daughter in such a state; he is completely shattered from within and finally decides to confess.
Vijay finally confesses that he was the one who murdered Sam. Although Meera wanted to put the entire family behind bars, she decides to deal with Vijay first—to get him locked up immediately.
He is summoned to court the next day, but once there, Vijay retracts his confession. Vijay claims that the confession was recorded under duress. He further states that the entire story the lawyers are narrating is actually inspired by a novel titled Drishyam.
Meaning that the film that Vijay wanted to make whose climax was not fixed was based on his life and he had got this story published in a book in the name of a screenwriter to avoid copyright and script theft.
Well, after all this, the only hope left for the police was the skeleton which they had taken out from the police station.
But when the DNA test is done, it is revealed that the skeleton that they had taken out does not belong to Sam at all and it does not match his DNA.
Now the same question arises again: where did Sam’s body go? He had buried it right there at the police station, but that isn’t Sam at all.
So, we learn that Vijay was certain the police would eventually find the body and conduct a DNA test; consequently, he began planning for this scenario—specifically, about five or six years prior.
He studies the local procedure in his district regarding what happens if a corpse or a skeleton is found.
Having befriended the graveyard watchman, he eventually obtained a skeleton—that of a young male—whose injuries bore a resemblance to Sam’s.
Vijay even befriended the security guard at the forensic lab.
On the very night Sam’s actual remains were sent to the forensic lab, he swapped the two skeletons.
Vijay takes Sam’s skeleton and places the other skeleton—which he had retrieved from the graveyard—into Sam’s box.
As a result, when the forensic team analyzed the DNA of the skeleton, it did not match Sam’s DNA—simply because it wasn’t his skeleton to begin with.
In the final scene, we see Vijay disposing of Sam’s skeleton. However, he also secretly ensured that some bone fragments reached Sam’s parents, allowing them to perform their son’s last rites.
And that concludes the story of Drishyam 2.
I hope you enjoyed this recap. Please feel free to let me know if you think anything was missing.
With Drishyam 3 now in cinemas, another sequel is also on the horizon: Jailer 2! If you’re planning to watch it but can’t remember what happened in the first movie, I’ve got you covered. I’ve already recapped the entire first Jailer movie, including all its twists, betrayals, and shocking ending. Read my complete Jailer 1 recap before Jailer 2!
See you soon.