How Jaideep Ahlawat made Ajay Devgn's Vijay sweat in Drishyam: The Conclusion

Jaideep Ahlawat's Ranveer Singh Tomar finally gave Vijay Salgaonkar a worthy adversary. Drishyam: The Conclusion may have underused him, but his impact was impossible to miss.

In Short

• Vijay faces an investigator who studies evidence with patience, precision and restraint
• Jaideep Ahlawat's quiet menace turns stillness, glances and pauses into dramatic tension
• Devgn and Ahlawat build their conflict through controlled performances, not loud theatrics

Jaideep Ahlawat brought a balance to the scale against Ajay Devgn with Drishyam: The Conclusion, the third and final instalment of the franchise. That is not simply a punchline but, in many ways, the audience verdict. Ahlawat’s Ranveer Singh Tomar was menacing, always in the game and, most importantly, the perfect match for Vijay Salgaonkar.

For two films, Vijay Salgaonkar has had one major advantage: he has been underestimated, despite proving that he was most likely the smartest person in the room.

In Drishyam and Drishyam 2, Ajay Devgn’s Vijay did not survive because he was stronger, richer or more powerful than the people chasing him. He survived because he could anticipate them. He understood how investigators thought, how evidence worked and, more importantly, how people remembered things. Vijay’s greatest weapon was not his ability to destroy evidence. It was his ability to construct a believable version of reality and make everyone else live inside it. As the film itself puts it, “The hero doesn’t have to be real, it just has to seem like he is.”

That is what makes Jaideep Ahlawat’s Rajveer Singh Tomar such a fascinating addition to Drishyam: The Conclusion.

For the first time in the series, it seemed like someone not only measured up to Vijay but could actually overshadow him, both in physical presence and intelligence. Ajay Devgn very rarely seems small in front of his adversaries. But Ahlawat’s imposing physical stature immediately changes that equation. There is something about the way he occupies the frame that makes Vijay look like he has finally bitten off more than he can chew.

For the first time, Vijay Salgaonkar is not simply being chased by an investigator. He is being challenged by someone who understands that the only way to beat Vijay is to think like Vijay.

Ahlawat plays Rajveer, a Crime Branch SP who enters the story with the kind of confidence that immediately changes the balance of power. He is not another police officer following a trail of evidence and hoping Vijay makes a mistake. He is sharp, observant and, crucially, patient. Most importantly, he does not underestimate Vijay simply because he is an uneducated cable operator. Finally.

Rajveer arrives with a fresh perspective and a determination to reopen questions that everyone else thought had already been answered. The loose ends left behind by the previous instalment become the very threads he begins to pull. That gives Drishyam: The Conclusion its most important dramatic ingredient: uncertainty. For perhaps the first time, there is a genuine possibility that Vijay might not have an answer for everything.

That tension is amplified by Ahlawat’s performance.

The actor has a particular ability to make stillness intimidating. He does not need to turn Rajveer into a loud, stereotypical cop. His confidence comes through his body language, pauses, glances and the sense that he is constantly processing what is happening around him. Even when Rajveer is not speaking, there is the suggestion that he is working something out.

That quality becomes particularly effective opposite Devgn.

Devgn has spent two films perfecting Vijay’s controlled exterior. He barely needs to raise his voice. A look, a pause or the slightest shift in expression can communicate that Vijay has either figured something out or is desperately trying to hide the fact that he has not.

Ahlawat meets that performance without trying to overpower it. Instead, the two actors create a battle of restraint.

One man knows how to hide information. The other knows how to look for what is being hidden.

One has spent years constructing an airtight narrative. The other refuses to accept that narrative at face value.

“You might see the cigarette in my hand, but I see it as evidence for DNA traces.” That one dialogue perfectly captures what kind of hunting dog Rajveer is. He does not simply see things; he looks for what they can prove. Every object, every inconsistency and every seemingly insignificant detail can become a piece of the puzzle.

That also explains why Ahlawat’s presence feels so refreshing in a franchise that already has a well-established rhythm.

A new actor entering a beloved franchise can easily feel like an intrusion. Here, he feels like an escalation.

Ahlawat stepped into the role after Akshaye Khanna, who played the investigator in Drishyam 2, exited the project. But rather than attempting to recreate Khanna’s performance, Ahlawat gives the franchise a completely different kind of adversary. Rajveer is more physically imposing, more openly confident and carries the sense of someone who genuinely enjoys the intellectual contest.

The brilliance of the Drishyam franchise has always been making the audience root for a man who is technically on the wrong side of the law. The third film makes that equation even more complicated.

We know Vijay. We know what he is capable of. We have watched him manipulate the system twice. But it is worth remembering that all of this started because of one terrible incident involving Meera Deshmukh’s (Tabu) son, Sameer. Had Sameer not behaved like a scum with Vijay’s daughter and wife, the entire chain of events may never have begun.

Yet somewhere along the way, the original cause of the crime has been buried beneath years of investigations, cover-ups and institutional embarrassment. By the time Rajveer enters the picture, his motivation is not personal revenge, unlike in the first two instalments. At least in the first half, he comes across as a cop who simply wants to do his job — catch the man who has made a mockery of the Goa Police for nearly a decade.

That is also why the pre-interval confrontation works so well. Rajveer is positioned as an antagonist without immediately turning him into a caricature of one. He is not abusing his power or looking for an easy scapegoat. He is simply determined to solve a case that has refused to die.

And then comes the biggest problem with the character: the screenplay does not always know what to do with him.

If Rajveer is the strongest opponent Vijay has faced, he should have been allowed to remain fully occupied with the hunt. Instead, the second half pulls him away from the central conflict, leaving him to attend meetings and perform other responsibilities that may make sense for a police officer but do little for the film’s central Vijay-versus-Rajveer battle.

That is where Drishyam: The Conclusion loses some of the momentum it builds so effectively in its first half.

The film had a genuine opportunity to make Vijay Salgaonkar face an opponent who was every bit as prepared, calculating and relentless as he was. Ahlawat had already established that possibility. His physicality made Vijay look vulnerable. His performance made him feel intellectually capable of cracking the Salgaonkar code. And his restrained menace gave the confrontation a seriousness that the franchise needed in its final chapter.

If the second half had given Rajveer more room to work the case, rather than sidelining him with other responsibilities, Drishyam: The Conclusion could have transformed Vijay Salgaonkar versus the State of Goa into a truly memorable final battle — perhaps even one capable of matching the near-flawless first instalment.

It does not quite get there.

But the impact created by Ahlawat cannot be discounted. In a franchise built around the genius of one man, he became the first actor to make us seriously consider the possibility that Vijay might have finally met his match.

And perhaps that is the biggest victory of Jaideep Ahlawat’s Rajveer Singh Tomar.

He did not need to defeat Vijay Salgaonkar to make the scales feel balanced.

For the first time, he simply had to make us believe that Vijay could lose.

- Ends