Rakta Charitra (Rakht Charitra in Hindi) (transl. History of blood) is a 2010 Indian political action thriller film based on the life of Paritala Ravindra. The film was directed by Ram Gopal Varma and written by Prashant Pandey. The film was nominated for Stardust Readers Choice Award for Best Direction — Action/Thriller. The film starred Vivek Oberoi as Pratap Ravi in the lead role, while Sudeep, Shatrughan Sinha, Abhimanyu Singh, Kota Srinivasa Rao, Sushant Singh, and Radhika Apte play supporting roles. Oberoi makes his debut in Telugu cinema through this film.
Plot
Narasimha Reddy, a local politician, is a powerful man in the area. His close associate Veera Bhadra (Rajendra Gupta) is his trustwothy ally for his political work, to the extent that Narasimha Reddy gives him freedom to contest Jilla Parishad polls with his men. Veera Bhadra champions the causes of the poor and oppressed and they look up to him like their leader. Nagamuni Reddy (Kota Srinivasa Rao), who is the local MLA of the district and close to Narasimha Reddy, becomes jealous of the budding trust between Veera Bhadra and Narasimha Reddy, and starts poisoning Narasimha Reddy against Veera Bhadra. Narasimha summons Veera Bhadra and asks him not to contest the polls with his contestants, but rather support Nagamuni Reddy’s. Veera Bhadra lashes out at Narasimha Reddy for being unfair to the underprivileged communities and storms out. Nagamuni Reddy calls for Manda (Ashish Vidyarthi), a close follower of Veerabhadra, and manipulates him into killing Veerabhadra, giving him the assurance that if he does it, people will suspect the policies of Veera Bhadra as his own follower killed him and he will be the next in line as the leader of the poor people, else take his life. Manda reluctantly agrees to it. Veerabhadra and his wife (Zarina Wahab) travel in a bus with 40 people to a wedding. Manda and Nagamani’s men stop the bus, kill Veerabhadra’s guards, and tell him to step out of the bus or else he will be killed along with the other innocents on the bus. Veera Bhadra comes out, looking at Manda, and dares him to kill. Nagamani’s henchman Durga shoots at Veerabhadra, making it look like Manda shot at him; prompting Manda about the deal he made with Nagamani, he tells him to kill him in front of everyone. Manda takes a boulder and crushes Veerabhadra’s skull and kills him.
This results in an agitation led by Shankar, who wants to avenge his father’s murder by killing all the men of Nagamani and Narasimha Reddy. Enter Nagamuni’s son Bukka Reddy (Abhimanyu Singh), described as a ruthless man who enjoys raping women and killing men in brutal ways. He starts killing Shankar’s men in gory ways: drilling a hole into their skull, chopping off their heads with a sugarcane chopper, burning them alive and feeding them to ravenous rats.
Pratap Ravi (Vivek Oberoi), who is in college in the city of Anantapur, gets the news of his father’s murder and rushes to the village. Nagamani Reddy orders the local police inspector to kill Shankar in a fake encounter. When Pratap Ravi goes to the police station to ask about his brother, the inspector shows him Shankar’s dead body and mocks him. Infuriated with his brother’s murder, Pratap Ravi and Veerabhadra’s men kill all the police officers and the inspector.
Pratap Ravi hides in the jungle with his father’s associates and vows to kill Narsimha Reddy, Nagamuni Reddy and Manda one by one, instilling fear of death in each one of them. He starts by busting in the house of Narasimha Reddy, killing his guards and finally killing him with a scythe in front of his wife as she looks on in horror. Next is Manda; as he roams in the market, Pratap’s men follow him, and before he can defend himself, they chop his hand off. Manda begs for his life but Pratap stabs him in front of everyone. They plan to kill Nagamuni Reddy, but they are cautious as there is heavy police security in his house. As Nagamani Reddy is sitting on his lawn conversing with a police officer, he is shot at by Pratap, who is dressed as the cop, and his men, dressed as cops as well, kill most of the policemen.
The story progresses as famed filmstar-turned-politician Shivaji Rao (Shatrughan Sinha) targets Anantapur for contesting elections. The day he enters Anantapur for the rally, Bukka Reddy’s men throw bombs, which makes Shivaji Rao get back inside the car and go back. This insults him greatly and he asks his secretary for the one who can stop Bukka Reddy. Immediately, his secretary mentions Pratap Ravi’s name; Shivaji Rao sends for him and puts down a proposal of joining his party and ticket for contesting elections. On the other hand, Bukka Reddy makes his brother Puru Reddy contest for elections and tries to sabotage the voting process by stealing the ballots. Pratap starts his rampage by eliminating, one by one, every rival of his party. Eventually, he comes across a man named Babu Qadri who seeks Pratap’s help in avenging his sister’s death. Bukka Reddy had raped his 16-year-old sister, because of which she immolated herself, and Bukka had then broken Babu Qadri’s leg. Pratap assures him his vengeance but asks him to forget everything for some time.
As Bukka Reddy’s men fail in rigging the election process, Pratap Ravi wins by a majority. Immediately, Bukka Reddy is arrested. Bukka, inflamed with the desire to avenge his father’s death, hides out in an apartment with his men, and plots to kill Pratap Ravi. Pratap comes to know about his hideout devises a plan to execute him. He immediately gathers his men and calls Babu Qadri, who had sought Pratap’s help in avenging his sister, to lead the execution of Bukka Reddy. He calls for the servant of Bukka Reddy and bribes him with 500,000 to aid in the execution. Babu Qadri and Pratap’s men rush into the apartment, killing all Bukka’s men; then killing Bukka Reddy with an axe.
Cast
Vivek Oberoi as Kattula Pratap Ravi
Radhika Apte as Kattula Nandini
Shatrughan Sinha as Konda Shivaji Rao
Kota Srinivasa Rao as Rajidi Nagamani Reddy
Zarina Wahab as Gajula Jayalakshmi
Sudeep as DCP Dasari Mohan Prasad
Sushmita Mukherjee as Bolla Gomati
Anupam Shyam as Recharla Omkar
Vishwajeet Pradhan as Rajidi Puru Reddy
Tanikella Bharani as Padalaneni Ramamurti
Subrat Dutta as AK
Abhimanyu Singh as Rajidi Bukka Reddy
Sushant Singh as Thota Shankar Ravi
Ashish Vidyarthi as Mandha
Rajendra Gupta as Gajula Veerabhadra
Ashwini Kalsekar as Ashwini Sinha
Kitty as Nalla Narasimha Reddy
Darshan Jariwala as SP Kanoonga
Pragathi as Harita
Chetanya Adib as Tella Durga
Sukhwinder Singh (special appearance)
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