Bad guy Raees Alam (Shah Rukh Khan) surpassed differently-abled Rohan Bhatnagar (Hrithik Roshan) in terms of first-day collections with their respective films that released in Patna on Wednesday.

Released on the eve of Republic Day, Shah Rukh's Raees directed by Rahul Dholakia collected more compared to Hrithik's Kaabil directed by Sanjay Gupta.

Running 18 shows in the city theatres that include Regent Fun Cinemas, Cinepolis Mona, Elphinstone and Sushil Plaza, Raees witnessed better occupancy compared to Kaabil that was slotted for 14 shows. They collected Rs 21.4 lakh and Rs 16.2 lakh respectively on the day of release.

The two movies' collections are, however, was nowhere near to Salman Khan's Id release Sultan, which had collected Rs 28.2 lakh on the first day in Patna.

Movie lovers were spoilt for choice on Wednesday as two industry biggies fought it out at the box-office.

Exhibitors, however, said had the two movies released on separate dates, it would have been better for them.

"Both the actors are extremely good and both are big stars. As an exhibitor, I would have preferred that the two movies had released in a gap of at least a week. The footfall of Raees is more because it has been slotted for afternoon and evening shows, whereas Kaabil has been pushed to the last shows. This is affecting its footfall," said Suman Kumar Sinha, the chairman-cum-managing director of Regent Theatre Private Limited.

Shah Rukh fan and a Boring Road resident, Nalin Kumar, said he was waiting for Raees for a long time because it has relevance with Bihar. "Liquor is prohibited in our state and bootlegging is rampant in districts. I will suggest chief minister Nitish Kumar to watch the movie. He will get some idea on how bootlegging is done in dry states. This way he can catch illegal breweries."

Shah Rukh's last film as lead, Fan, had collected Rs 25 lakh on is its opening day. Less number of shows has affected the collection of both Raees and Kaabil because most of the films of Salman Khan and Shah Rukh are slotted for more than 35 and40 shows.

"Because of huge fan following of Shah Rukh, the footfall of Raees is better than Kaabil. One good thing is that we have extended weekends because the movie released on Wednesday and Thursday is Republic Day. Offices, schools and colleges will remain closed. In the long run, however, Kaabil may surpass Raees," said Cinepolis manager Manoj Pramanik.

The two movies also have competion from previous releases - Dangal and Ok Jaanu... - which are still running in theatres.