Saudagar

Saudagar (transl. Merchant) is a 1991 Indian Hindi-language drama film, directed by Subhash Ghai. It starred two legends of the Hindi silver screen, Dilip Kumar and Raaj Kumar, in lead roles. It was the second film in which the two actors came together after the 1959 film Paigham. It featured the debut performances of Vivek Mushran and Manisha Koirala, the latter becoming a noted Bollywood actress in later years. Amrish Puri, Anupam Kher, Mukesh Khanna, Dalip Tahil, Gulshan Grover, Dina Pathak and Jackie Shroff are also featured in the movie. The story line is influenced by the famous play Romeo and Juliet and Mandhaari's role is parallel to that of Friar Laurence in Romeo and Juliet. The film was a silver jubilee success all over India and the highest grossing Indian film of 1991. It as among the top 10 grossers of the 1990s decade. Saudagar received eight nominations at the 37th Filmfare Awards, and won two awards including Best Director for Subhash Ghai. It was Dilip Kumar's penultimate film and final box office success. Plot The movie starts with Mandhari, an old crippled man, telling a story of two friends to some kids. In the story, Rajeshwar Singh, a rich landlord's son, and Veer Singh, a poor farmer's son, become friends. They are naughty kids, calling each other as Raju and Veeru respectively. As the duo grow up, Raju decides to get his sister Palikanta's marriage arranged with Veeru. Neither his sister nor Veeru have any objections to the marriage. However, as luck would have it, a girl's marriage is disrupted due to her in-laws demanding dowry. Veeru steps in to save the face of the girl and her parents by marrying her. While Raju is shocked by this development, his sister, who was secretly in love with Veeru, commits suicide. Devastated and distraught, Raju now declares that Veeru is solely responsible for everything that happened, making him his mortal enemy.