Majboor (1974 film)

''Majboor'' () is a 1974 Indian suspense thriller film directed by Ravi Tandon and written by Salim-Javed. The film stars Amitabh Bachchan, Parveen Babi, Pran and Satyen Kappu with Farida Jalal, Sulochana Latkar, Iftekhar, Jagdish Raj and Rehman in supporting roles. The story revolves around Ravi Khanna (Bachchan), a terminally ill man who frames himself for a murder which he did not commit in order to help his family collect the reward money. After a successful operation, he escapes the police custody and sets out to search for the real killer.

The movie is loosely inspired by two English movies of 1970 – ''Zig zag'' and ''Cold Sweat''. The film was later remade in Telugu by director K. Raghavendra Rao as ''Raja'' (1976) starring Shobhan Babu and Jayasudha. It was also remade in Tamil as Naan Vazhavaippen (1979) with Sivaji Ganeshan and K. R. Vijaya , in Gujarati as ''Naseeb No Khel'' (1982) and in Malayalam as ''Ee Kaikalil'' (1986). The movie was also an inspiration for the 2008 movie ''Jimmy''.

Plot

Ravi Khanna (Amitabh Bachchan) is a middle-class simpleton working for a travel company, and living with his widowed mother Sulochana (Sulochana Latkar), wheelchair-user sister Renu (Farida Jalal
) and younger brother Billu ( Alankar Joshi), who all are a happy family despite their financial problems and Renu's disability. Ravi is even planning to marry his wealthy girlfriend Neela Rajvansh (Parveen Babi). Six months ago, late millionaire Surendra Sinha (Rehman) had visited Ravi's office and had even dropped him off to his friend's house. On the same night, he was abducted by some unknown person, who demanded ransom to Surendra's younger brother Narendra Sinha ( Satyen Kappu). Surendra was subsequently killed and six months later, the police found his dead body in a street gutter. As Surendra had met Ravi before his abduction, Ravi is interrogated by CID Inspector Khurana (Iftekhar) and Inspector Kulkarni (Jagdish Raj) about Surendra, although the information given by Ravi turns out to be trivial.

Few days later, Ravi begins experiencing terrible headaches and dizziness while walking on the streets, and visits his regular physician Dr. Shah ( Sajjan). After a medical checkup, he is horrified to learn that he has a fast-growing brain tumour in his head and has only six months to live. Ravi is even more horrified to learn that although this disease can be treated via brain surgery, it can result in side-effects as well like he can become either blind or mentally disabled, or his limbs can be permanently damaged. Stuck in a dilemma, he worries about his family and Neela while thinking about their future.

One fine day, Ravi gets to know that Narendra has announced that he will give a reward of ₹500,000 to the person who traces Surendra's murderer for him. Hatching an unexpected plan, he anonymously calls up the police and claims that he knows the person who has killed Surendra. He makes them send the reward money to his friend Advocate Rane ( Shiv Kumar), who is also anonymously told by Ravi to hand over the money to his family, so that they will be able to live a peaceful future after his demise. Meanwhile, Ravi finds an abandoned place where he establishes fake evidences regarding he, "himself" having committed the murder, thinking that he will as it is die of brain tumour.

The police find the evidences and arrest Ravi, believing him to have killed Surendra. Ravi confesses his "crime" in the court, saying that he kidnapped Surendra and asked for ransom for the sake of his family, and that he was forced to kill Surendra when he freed himself and tried to escape. On a basis of reasonable doubt, the court announces a verdict of death sentence for Ravi, devastating his family and Neela. Ravi's family begs Narendra not to have Ravi hanged but in vain, much to their sadness.

While under police custody, Ravi suffers a tumour attack and collapses in prison. He is taken to the hospital where he undergoes a successful surgery with no side-effects. However, it is too late as Ravi is now a convicted criminal of abduction, ransom and murder. Feeling guilty over his actions, he reveals to Neela and Advocate Rane how he unnecessarily created his life problematic. They agree to do whatever they can to help them but lack evidence to prove his innocence. Now, Ravi can only be proved innocent after the real murderer of Surendra is tracked down.

Not knowing what to do, Ravi hesitantly escapes from the hospital and unites with Neela. The duo travels to Khandala for safety as both Ravi and Neela's house is surrounded by the police. Over there, Ravi meets a one-time acquaintance Mahipat Rai (Madan Puri), who has come to the hotel with a prostitute despite being married. While trying to hide from him, Ravi discovers Mahipat's ring and remembers that it is the same one, which Surendra had worn during his visit to his office.

Upon being confronted by Ravi, Mahipat tells him that he had bought the ring from a man called Prakash (Mac Mohan), a black market businessman. Ravi traces Prakash to his shop and confronts him too over the ring until he reveals that a small-time thief named Michael D'Souza ( Pran) sold him the ring. He takes him to Michael and Ravi believes him to have killed Surendra. However, Michael reveals to Ravi how he obtained the ring. Six months ago, he had stopped a car at midnight and showed his gun to the chauffeur, who ended up handing over his asleep owner's ring to Michael.

Learning this, Ravi has the realisation that the owner of the ring was none other than Surendra, who was already dead in the car, and that the chauffeur must be the one having killed him. He asks Michael to reveal the truth to Narendra and even offers him the reward money. Michael agrees and visits Surendra's house to inform Narendra that his chauffeur is the killer. However, he is shocked to see Narendra's face and realises that the chauffeur who had given him the ring was none other than Narendra, himself.

It is then revealed that Surendra had expelled Narendra from the house upon learning about his wife's extramarital affair with him. In retaliation, Narendra killed Surendra by breaking glass bottles on his head and hid his body in the street gutter, faking his brother's abduction in order to cover up his crime. Narendra offers Michael ₹250,000 to shut up and tells him to hand over Ravi to him with the additional ₹500,000. Micheal agrees while telling Ravi that he will bring the real killer before him.

The next day, Michael visits Ravi's house to extract the reason behind his self-framing for the murder. On seeing his family's love and concern for him, he has a change of heart and promises them that Ravi will return home safe. Later, Michael meets Narendra at the given remote place where the exchange is going to happen. However, Ravi arrives with Neela and learns about Narendra's crime, just as he shoots Michael fatally with his revolver, fearing he might expose his crime.

Ravi rushes to bring a doctor while a gravely injured Michael holds Narendra at gunpoint along with Neela. Eventually, Ravi succeeds in bringing a doctor (Pinchoo Kapoor) and calling in the police to the scene on time and catches Narendra when he tries to escape. Meanwhile, the dying Michael gives his statement to the police regarding Ravi's innocence and Surendra's murder, before succumbing to his serious injuries. As a result, Narendra is arrested by the police and sent to prison for his crimes, while all charges against Ravi are dropped.

Cast

* Amitabh Bachchan as Ravi Khanna
* Parveen Babi as Neela Rajvansh
* Pran as Michael D'Souza
* Satyen Kappu as Narendra Sinha
* Rehman as Surendra Sinha
* Sulochana Latkar as Mrs. Khanna (Ravi's mother)
* Farida Jalal as Renu Khanna (Ravi's sister)
* Alankar Joshi as Billu Khanna (Ravi's brother)
* Iftekhar as CID Inspector Khurana
* Jagdish Raj as Inspector Kulkarni
* Mac Mohan as Prakash (Michael's friend)
* Madan Puri as Mahipat Rai (Ravi's one-time acquaintance)
* Shiv Kumar as Advocate Rane (Ravi's friend)
* D. K. Sapru as Mr. Rajvansh (Neela's father)
* Sajjan as Dr. Shah (Ravi's physician)
* K. N. Singh as Prosecuting Attorney
* Sudhir as Ravi's co-worker
* Pinchoo Kapoor as the doctor brought by Ravi to treat Michael
* Rehana as Singer (Kabhi Sochta Hoon)
* Ashoo as Mona Sinha (Surendra's widow)

Soundtrack

Success

The film was a Hit at the box office.

Awards and nominations

23rd Filmfare Awards:

Nominated

* Best Supporting Actor – Pran
* Best Supporting Actress – Farida Jalal

References

External links

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{{Salim-Javed

1974 films
1970s Hindi-language films
Films scored by Laxmikant–Pyarelal
Hindi films remade in other languages
Films with screenplays by Salim–Javed
1970s Urdu-language films
Urdu films remade in other languages
Indian remakes of American films
Indian films about cancer
Fratricide in fiction
Films directed by Ravi Tandon
Urdu-language Indian films