Dishoom is a story about two Indian spies, John Abraham and Varun Dhawan, who are sent on a mission to Abu Dhabi. The situation is complicated and the journey is full of shocking twists and turns. Saqib Saleem is seen as a cricketer in the film. It is like a buddy-cop film and harps back to the genre of Main Khiladi Tu Anari, Andar Bahar and Bad Boys. During a cricket tournament in the Middle East, India's top cricketer Viraj Sharma (Saqib Saleem) goes missing. Indian authorities get a video tape of an unknown Pakistani Fan, claiming to have abducted Viraj till the India vs Pakistan cricket match two days later and warning them not to cancel the match. To avoid media outrage the Defence Minister of India sends special task force officer Kabir Shergill (John Abraham) to U.A.E for a 36-hour man hunt. Kabir who is a no-nonsense cop bump into a rookie Emirates police officer Junaid Ansari (Varun Dhawan), who has never solved a case but has a good knowledge of the town.

Both Kabir and Junaid start their investigation with CCTV footage of Viraj's hotel and find out that on the night of his disappearance, Viraj went out with an unknown girl (Nargis Fakhri). On confronting her, she reveals that she took Viraj to a friend's party but he left soon. Kabir and Junaid roam around the town to meet a local goon (Vijay Raaz) and a Gay playboy (Akshay Kumar) who met Viraj in the same party, but still could not get any clue. Finally, the duo gets a breakthrough by tracking down Viraj's cellphone from a pick-pocketer's home, Ishika (Jacqueline Fernandez) who claims to have stolen the cell phone from a stranger. They also manage to capture the person in the video but discover that he is just a struggling actor being used as the face in the video by the real kidnapper.

Meanwhile, it is revealed that the real kidnapper is a cricket bookie Wagah (Akshaye Khanna), who along with his assistant Altaf (Rahul Dev) has abducted Viraj and offered him 50 million rupees to under play in the final. But when the deal didn't work out they kidnap him permanently till the final match is played. In the current time Kabir, Junaid and Ishika go to an underground Arabian club full of goons and guns. Kabir spots Altaf and both try to chase him down but before they could succeed, a sniper kills Altaf. Wagah calls and confesses to Kabir that he got him killed and they should stop searching for Viraj.

On returning to Abu Dhabi, Kabir and Junaid are taken off the case and Kabir ordered to fly back to India. But at the 11th hour Junaid gets a clue of Viraj's whereabout, as Wagah has hidden him in a yacht near the team's hotel. Both reach the location only to discover that Wagah has fled leaving behind Viraj tied with a time bomb. With minutes to blast Kabir negotiates with Wagah to stop the bomb in return of 5 billion rupees from Indian Government. Wagah takes the money but refuses to stop the bomb. After witnessing the blast from a distance Wagah walks into the cricket stadium expecting the match to begin without Viraj. But to his shock Viraj is alive and walks in to the ground all ready to play as Kabir and Junaid helped Viraj to get out of the jacket by dislocating his shoulder and all three had jumped into water just before the blast. After seeing his plan failed, Wagah tries to run away only to be apprehended by the duo. Kabir returns to India along with Ishika, while Junaid gets a marriage proposal from an Indian girl Muskaan (Parineeti Chopra) and he also plans to fly to India to meet her.