Sarkar (Eng: Government) is a 2018 Indian Tamil-language action drama film written and directed by AR Murugadoss, and produced by Kalanithi Maran under the banner Sun Pictures. The dialogues for Sarkar was co-written by Murugadoss and B. Jeyamohan. Sarkar stars Vijay, Keerthy Suresh, Varalaxmi Sarathkumar, Yogi Babu and Radha Ravi.
Sundar Ramaswamy is a highly successful non-resident Indian businessman based in the United States. He arrives in Chennai to cast his vote in the Tamil Nadu Legislative Assembly election. However, he finds out that someone else had already voted in his name. Sundar approaches the Tamil Nadu State Election Commission and demands a stay on the election result for his constituency, an annulment of the fraud elector’s vote and the ability to legitimately cast his vote, to which they agree. He raises awareness among the public regarding fraud voting and finds that many people too faced a similar problem to his when trying to vote.
Sundar’s actions bring him into conflict with two influential and corrupt politicians, M. Masilamani, who is the Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu, and his brother Malarvannan “Rendu”. Although Masilamani’s party wins the elections, the Election Commission annuls the result based on Sundar’s plea and fresh elections are scheduled to take place within the next fifteen days. After attempts are made on his life by Rendu’s henchmen, Sundar decides to contest the election against Masilamani as an Independent and resigns from his company to avoid any conflict-of-interest.
Initially unpopular among the masses due to his corporate background, Sundar delivers a speech detailing his rise from a humble fisherman background to a businessman, and gains popular support. After Sundar confronts Masilamani regarding his silence on district-related issues, the police brutally beat up Sundar and his supporters. At this juncture, he realises that the entire political system in the state and country needs reform, and decides to contest in all constituencies in Tamil Nadu along with his supporters. Sundar acquires video evidence wherein people who had attempted to expose Masilamani’s corruption were killed under mysterious circumstances, and plans to reveal it to the media to discredit Masilamani and have him arrested.
Meanwhile, Masilamani’s daughter Komalavalli “Pappa”, arrives in Chennai after finding out that her father and uncle have lost support due to Sundar. She decides to spoil Sundar’s reputation and frame him as a corrupt and power-hungry person. She orchestrates a car accident and frames Sundar for it, which causes him to lose considerable public support. She furthers her agenda by killing her father with an overdose of diabetic tablets, so that her party will gain sympathy votes. These crimes ensure that Pappa, the new Chief Ministerial candidate for her party, would likely win the election.
On Election Day, Twitter messages generated from one “Muthukumar” allege Sundar has stashed black money in various locations, which further degrades Sundar’s reputation. However, unknown to anyone, the tweets were sent by Sundar himself, as Muthukumar was one of those activists killed by Masilamani. Further messages lead to Muthukumar’s decomposed body being found, exposing Pappa’s lies. Meanwhile, Pappa finds out that her mother has decided to expose Pappa’s role in Masilamani’s death at the latter’s memorial in front of the media later in the day. She arrives at the memorial with her henchmen to stop the expose, but Sundar subdues Pappa’s henchmen and her mother’s confession is live-streamed, which ensures that the public support is back with Sundar.
Sundar and his supporters win the election, while Pappa and Rendu are arrested for their various crimes. However, Sundar decides against becoming the Chief Minister, and instead chooses one of his supporters, an honest collector, to be the next Chief Minister.
Directed by A. R. Murugadoss
Produced by Kalanithi Maran
Written by A. R. Murugadoss & B. Jeyamohan
Screenplay by A. R. Murugadoss
Story by AR Murugadoss
Starring Vijay, Keerthy Suresh, Varalaxmi Sarathkumar, Yogi Babu, Radha Ravi
Music by Songs: A. R. Rahman Score: A. R. Rahman & Qutub-E-Kripa
Cinematography Girish Gangadharan
Edited by A. Sreekar Prasad
Production Sun Pictures
Distributed by Sun Pictures
Release date 6 November 2018
Running time 164 minutes
Country India
Language Tamil
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