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On This Day

02 May, 2021

Cinemaazi remembers Satyajit Ray on his birth anniversary

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films

Pratigyabadh (1991)

Ravi Chopra

Release Date19/07/1991
GenreDrama
FormatColour
LanguageHindi
Run Time162 min
Length4716.75 meters
Number of Reels18
Gauge35 mm
Censor RatingU
Censor Certificate NumberU-15806-MUM
Certificate Date17/05/1991

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The family of Baburam Yadav is thrown on dire circumstances when burdened with debts. Baburam Yadav goes to try his luck in the city. His wife Laxmi (Bina) and elder son Shanker (Mithun Chakravorty) try their best to keep hunger away by tilling the land, but they are not allowed to live in peace as the moneylender Sukhilala (Girija Shanker) of the village has an evil eye on Laxmi who spurns all his advances. Laxmi has to approach the Lala for some more money. The Lala does agree to lend the money provided Laxmi agrees to pawn her youth to him. As Lala advances towards Laxmi, Shanker jumps on him with his sickle. The attendants of Lala beat Shanker to submission. Laxmi goes to the village Panchayat with the complaint that Lala had tried to molest her. Here the cunning Lala is able to turn the tables and Laxmi with her family of two sons and a daughter is forced to leave the village, but not before Shanker takes a pledge that he will take his revenge and one day settle his score with Sukhi Lala.

Forced to tread their way to the City they hail a truck going in that direction. The Truck Driver (Anupam Kher) allows them to have the ride. But as the children were sleeping at the back of the truck driver makes a vicious bid to rape Laxmi. Her cries did bring Shanker to her aid, but the small boy could not match the strength of the truck driver. The worst happens and Laxmi dies in the process of the cruel rape. Shanker takes another vow on the dead body of his mother that he will burn the pyre of the Truck Driver with his cigarette lighter which is left behind.

On reaching the City he learns that his father also had died a few days back. He is given shelter by a kind lady Gangubai - the mother of Phulrani (Sujata Mehta). He toils hard to earn enough to educate his brother and sister who are put in a hostel. During this struggle for existence, he runs into Pascal, a smuggling Don and in due course becomes his right-hand man. Shakti now is in Law college and Sheila is Studying in B.A. Both of them regard their brother as a God not knowing about the shady business he is engaged in. This shady business lands him into a lot of money and Shanker is able to provide a palatial house to his brother and sister.

After settling his brother and sister, he returns to the village to settle his score with Sukhilala. He succeeds in throwing him out of the village. But he still has to settle his score with the Truck Driver whom he had been searching all these years. He learns that he was in smuggling business and possibly he has changed his name. He is now a very big Don in the underworld and goes under the name of Tej Bahadur.

One day Shanker meets Tej Bahadur, but he is not able to recognize him as he has changed his appearance. How ultimately he comes to know his identity and how in the process he comes into an emotional conflict with his brother and sister for whom it is a shock to learn that their brother was a smuggler and how in the end he takes his revenge is the rest of the story.

(From the official press booklet)