Ghatak: Lethal

Ghatak: Lethal
Ghatak: Lethal
Soundtrack album by R. D. Burman and Anu Malik and Vanraj Bhatia
Released	20 October 1996
Genre	Feature film soundtrack
Label	Venus Records & Tapes

Ghatak
Ghatak
Directed by	Rajkumar Santoshi
Starring	Sunny Deol; Meenakshi Seshadri; Amrish Puri; Danny Denzongpa;
Cinematography	Ishwar R. Bidri
Edited by	V. N. Mayekar
Music by	Songs:; R. D. Burman; Anu Malik (1 song); Score:; Vanraj Bhatia
Production; company	Santoshi Productions
Distributed by	B4U Entertainment
Release date	15 November 1996;
Running time	158 min
Country	India
Language	Hindi
Budget	6.2 crore
Box office	est. ₹32 crore

Ghatak: Lethal is an Indian 1996 Hindi-language action thriller film directed by Rajkumar Santoshi, starring Sunny Deol, Meenakshi Seshadri, Amrish Puri, and Danny Denzongpa. It earned 32 crore worldwide to become the 2nd highest-grossing Bollywood film of the year, and won three awards including Best Supporting Actor for Puri at the 42nd Filmfare Awards, where it was also nominated for three other awards: Best Director for Santoshi, Best Actor for Deol, and Best Villain for Denzongpa. Ghatak is Seshadri's last film to date. The film was later remade in Telugu as Aapthudu (2004) starring Rajasekhar and Anjala Zaveri. The film's dialogues emerged as a cult over the years.

Plot

Kashi Nath is a kind-hearted wrestler and the dutiful adopted son of Shambhu Nath, living in Banaras. Shambhu Nath, who was a freedom fighter awarded with the Tambra Patra, is an honourable and respectable man in town. Kashi, along with Shambhu, comes to Mumbai for medical treatment for Shambhu and stays with his brother, Shiv Nath. Kashi meets Gauri in the colony and starts liking her. He learns that the colony is being terrorized by the tyrannical gangster, Katya, along with his six brothers. Before Kashi's arrival, a resident named Sachdev tried to initiate a revolt against Katya, but got ruthlessly killed by him, thereby making Malti, Sachdev's wife, go mad. Katya and his brothers become enemies with Kashi when he beats up their goons in the process of roughing up Malti.

Shambhu is later diagnosed with terminal throat cancer and only has a few days to live. When Kashi refuses to join Katya's gang, Katya becomes furious and humiliates Shambhu before the entire colony, by making him bark like a dog. After a series of dramatic events, Shiv is run over to death by Jeena, one of Katya's brothers. In retaliation, Kashi then kills Antya, another one of Katya's brothers, and gets arrested. Meanwhile, Shambhu passes away. When Kashi tries to disperse his father's ashes at the Ghat with the police, the police van gets attacked by Katya's brothers and goons. Kashi kills all of them, including Katya's three brothers, and reaches Katya's home. There he kills Jeena, thereby causing only two brothers to survive, including Katya; however, Kashi is captured in the process.

As Katya had Shambhu bark like a dog, he tries to make Kashi behave like an ox in front of the colony, to re-establish his supremacy. Gauri however stands up, arousing the audience to attack as well. Kashi frees himself from the shackles and beats Katya to death. Katya's entire gang is attacked by the residents. Katya's sixth and the last remaining brother, Bhiku, is killed by the mob. For retribution, Kashi makes Katya bark like a dog just like Shambhu. He then kills him in front of the residents, but loses control over himself as he keeps beating Katya's corpse. His nephew then brings him Shambhu's ashes from crematory rites which brings him back to senses. The ending is a bittersweet one, where Kashi loses every one he loved, but the colony has its freedom at last.

Cast

Actor	Character	Role	Notes
Sunny Deol	Kashi Nath	Wrestler from Benaras
Meenakshi Seshadri	Gauri
Danny Denzongpa	Katya	Main Antagonist
K. K. Raina	Shivnath	Elder Brother and Sister in Law of Kashinaath	Shop Owner
Sheela Sharma	Sheela	Elder Brother and Sister in Law of Kashinaath
Om Puri	Sachdev	Shop Owners	Special Appearance
Viju Khote
Anjan Srivastav
Suresh Bhagwat	Gopal
Deep Dhillon	Antya	Brothers of Katya
Mukesh Rishi	Jeena
Tinu Verma	Bhiku
Harish Patel		Brother- In- Law of Katya
Amrish Puri		Shambu Nath	Kashi's Father
Ponnambalam	Akram Khan Pakhtuni	Ring Fighter	Special Appearance
Makrand Deshpande		Goon of Katya
Ila Arun	Malti	Wife of Sachdev
Navni Parihar		Elder Sister and Brother- In- law of Gauri
Shiva Rindani	Chandru	Elder Sister and Brother- In- law of Gauri
Tinnu Anand		Police Inspector	Husband and Wife
Rohini Hattangadi	Savitri		Husband and Wife
Ahmed Khan		Doctor	Hospital Staff
Ghanashyam Nayak		Receptionist
Santosh Gupta		Ward Boy
Madhav Moghe		Taxi Driver
Amitabh Bachchan	Himself	Friendly Appearance
Atul Tiwari	Batuk/Munna	Friendly Appearance
Mamta Kulkarni		Special Appearances and Dancers in the Song "Koi Aaye Toh le Jaye"
Ganesh Acharya

Production

Kamal Haasan was originally signed to play the lead role and an advertisement was commissioned to appear in Screen magazine noting "Welcome back to the Hindi screen", pointing at the actor's return to Hindi films after 1985's Dekha Pyaar Tumhara. However, due to no producer willing to back the actor in the film, Rajkumar Santoshi changed the star cast.^[2]

Soundtrack

The music for the movie was mainly composed by R. D. Burman. The song "Koi Jaye To Le Aaye" was the only song composed by Anu Malik, and it became popular.

#	Song	Singer(s)	Length	Music Director	Lyricist
1	"Koi Jaye To Le Aaye"	Alka Yagnik, Shankar Mahadevan	04:09	Anu Malik	Rahat Indori
2	"Nigahon Ne Chheda"	Suresh Wadkar, Sadhana Sargam	06:24	R.D. Burman	Majrooh Sultanpuri
3	"Badan Mein Chandni"	Kavita Krishnamurthy	05:55	R.D. Burman	Majrooh Sultanpuri
4	"Aaki Naaki"	Asha Bhosle	08:57	R.D. Burman	Majrooh Sultanpuri
5	"Ek Dil Ki Diwani"	Suresh Wadkar, Sadhana Sargam	07:29	R.D. Burman	Majrooh Sultanpuri
6	"Theme of Ghatak" (Instrumental)	shadmehr aghili	02:28