# Khaidi
**Khaidi** (ఖైదీ; "Prisoner") is a 1983 Indian Telugu-language action drama film directed by A. Kodandarami Reddy and starring [Chiranjeevi](https://www.edgepedia.org/chiranjeevi) as Suryam, a poor farmer's son who falls in love with the daughter of the feudal lord who destroys his family. It opened in theaters on October 28, 1983, became a big commercial hit, and is generally credited with turning Chiranjeevi, until then a promising leading man, into a top star of [Telugu cinema](https://www.edgepedia.org/telugu-cinema).[1](https://telugucinema.com/nostalgia/40-years-of-khaidi-a-film-that-made-chiranjeevi-a-star/2) • [2](https://indianexpress.com/article/entertainment/telugu/the-making-of-chiranjeevis-khaidi-the-film-that-created-a-mega-star-10605072/)
| Key fact | Detail |
|---|---|
| Release | October 28, 1983, in Telugu, color, 157 minutes[1](https://telugucinema.com/nostalgia/40-years-of-khaidi-a-film-that-made-chiranjeevi-a-star/2) • [3](https://indiancine.ma/documents/DSP/Encyclopedia%2520of%2520Indian%2520Cinema.pdf) |
| Director and production | A. Kodandarami Reddy; Samyuktha Movies, produced by K. Dhananjaya Reddy, K. Narasa Reddy, and S. Sudhakara Reddy[3](https://indiancine.ma/documents/DSP/Encyclopedia%2520of%2520Indian%2520Cinema.pdf) |
| Writers and music | Story and dialogues by the Paruchuri Brothers; music by Chakravarthy; lyrics by Veturi Sundararamamurthy and Rajasri[1](https://telugucinema.com/nostalgia/40-years-of-khaidi-a-film-that-made-chiranjeevi-a-star/2) |
| Lead cast | Chiranjeevi (Suryam), Madhavi (Madhulatha), Sumalatha (Dr. Sujatha), Rao Gopala Rao (Veerabhadraiah)[1](https://telugucinema.com/nostalgia/40-years-of-khaidi-a-film-that-made-chiranjeevi-a-star/2) |
| Origin | Producer M. Tirupathi Reddy saw the American film *First Blood* (1982) and asked the Paruchuri Brothers to develop a story inspired by it[4](https://telugucinema.com/nostalgia/40-years-of-khaidi-a-film-that-made-chiranjeevi-a-star?amp=1) |
| Budget and pay | The film sold for 2.5 million rupees (25 lakh rupees); Chiranjeevi was paid Rs 175,000, Madhavi Rs 40,000, Sumalatha Rs 20,000, and the director Rs 40,000[4](https://telugucinema.com/nostalgia/40-years-of-khaidi-a-film-that-made-chiranjeevi-a-star?amp=1) |
| Box office | Grossed around Rs 80 million (Rs 8 crore); Chiranjeevi's first film to cross the one crore mark[2](https://indianexpress.com/article/entertainment/telugu/the-making-of-chiranjeevis-khaidi-the-film-that-created-a-mega-star-10605072/) • [4](https://telugucinema.com/nostalgia/40-years-of-khaidi-a-film-that-made-chiranjeevi-a-star?amp=1) |
| Remakes | Remade in 1984 in Hindi as *Qaidi* and in Kannada under the same title, with Madhavi reprising her role both times[5](https://play.google.com/store/movies/details?id=3F975765EBEF24F8MV) |
## Spoilers
### Plot
Suryam (Chiranjeevi) is a hardworking college student, the son of the farmer Venkateswarlu (P.L. Narayana), who falls in love with Madhulatha (Madhavi), daughter of the village's feudal lord Veerabhadraiah (Rao Gopala Rao).[6](https://d1f72a6kha0tf8.cloudfront.net/khaidi-1989-telugu) When Veerabhadraiah learns of the relationship, he asks Venkateswarlu to stop his son from seeing his daughter; Venkateswarlu refuses. Veerabhadraiah kills him and demands repayment of the money he had lent him. Suryam raises a crop with his elder sister's help to repay the debt, but just before harvest Veerabhadraiah and his henchmen destroy the crop and try to sexually abuse the sister, who commits suicide.[6](https://d1f72a6kha0tf8.cloudfront.net/khaidi-1989-telugu)
Veerabhadraiah, as village head, implicates Suryam in his sister's death, and Suryam is arrested. The rest of the film follows his escape from jail and, with the help of Dr. Sujatha ([Sumalatha](https://www.edgepedia.org/sumalatha)), his revenge on the feudal lord.[6](https://d1f72a6kha0tf8.cloudfront.net/khaidi-1989-telugu) The film opens with Suryam returning to the village after an escape from police custody, a sequence that a scholarly study of Telugu cinema describes as freezing the narrative to establish a pact between star and spectator without deferring plot development.[7](https://igmlnet.uohyd.ac.in/docs/hi-res/hcu_images/TH2253.pdf)
## Origin and production
**A borrowed starting point.** Producer M. Tirupathi Reddy, a financier from Nellore working in Madras, had seen the American film *First Blood* (1982) and asked the Paruchuri Brothers (Gopalakrishna Paruchuri and Paruchuri Venkateswara Rao) to write a story based on it. In the initial script the protagonist was a villager; changing him to a student, Tirupathi Reddy said, made the story click, and he chose the title *Khaidi*.[4](https://telugucinema.com/nostalgia/40-years-of-khaidi-a-film-that-made-chiranjeevi-a-star?amp=1) Director Kodandarami Reddy later noted that while the lead character's physical appearance drew from *First Blood*, the story itself was entirely different.[2](https://indianexpress.com/article/entertainment/telugu/the-making-of-chiranjeevis-khaidi-the-film-that-created-a-mega-star-10605072/)
Production began on May 10, 1983 at Prasad Labs, with the muhurtam (ceremonial first shot of an Indian film shoot) shot on Chiranjeevi and Madhavi, a continuation scene of the Menaka-Vishwamitra song "vEdam, naadam…". The film was completed in three shooting schedules over forty days and forty film rolls.[4](https://telugucinema.com/nostalgia/40-years-of-khaidi-a-film-that-made-chiranjeevi-a-star?amp=1) Most filming took place in the village of Rebala near Nellore, with climax portions shot at Porur near Madras and house-blasting scenes performed on a specially constructed set; Madhavi's scenes used her own house at Talakona.[4](https://telugucinema.com/nostalgia/40-years-of-khaidi-a-film-that-made-chiranjeevi-a-star?amp=1)
**The costume.** The black sleeveless T-shirt and trouser combination that became one of the most recognizable looks in Telugu cinema was Chiranjeevi's own creation, assembled at the last minute from a black trouser and a black T-shirt whose sleeves he cut off, with the belt placed above the shirt.[4](https://telugucinema.com/nostalgia/40-years-of-khaidi-a-film-that-made-chiranjeevi-a-star?amp=1) • [2](https://indianexpress.com/article/entertainment/telugu/the-making-of-chiranjeevis-khaidi-the-film-that-created-a-mega-star-10605072/)
## Cast and crew
Chiranjeevi played Suryam, Madhavi played Madhulatha, and Sumalatha played Dr. Sujatha. Rao Gopala Rao played the feudal lord Veerabhadraiah, with P.L. Narayana as Suryam's father, Nutan Prasad as the village munsif Raghava, Ranganath as the sub-inspector of police, Sangeetha as Suryam's sister Bhagyam, and [Chalapathi Rao](https://www.edgepedia.org/chalapathi-rao) as the forest officer.[1](https://telugucinema.com/nostalgia/40-years-of-khaidi-a-film-that-made-chiranjeevi-a-star/2) The actress Nitya was cast as Rosy and renamed Samyuktha after the production banner, under which she continued to appear in films such as *Sirivennela*.[4](https://telugucinema.com/nostalgia/40-years-of-khaidi-a-film-that-made-chiranjeevi-a-star?amp=1)
The Encyclopedia of Indian Cinema credits the screenplay and direction to A. Kodandarami Reddy, cinematography to V.S.R. Swamy, and music to Chakravarthy.[3](https://indiancine.ma/documents/DSP/Encyclopedia%2520of%2520Indian%2520Cinema.pdf) The TeluguCinema retrospective lists Lok Singh as photographer, Vellaiswamy as editor, and playback singers S.P. Balasubrahmanyam, [P. Susheela](https://www.edgepedia.org/p-susheela), and Anita Reddy.[1](https://telugucinema.com/nostalgia/40-years-of-khaidi-a-film-that-made-chiranjeevi-a-star/2) Songs such as "RagulutOndi mogalipoda" and "idEmiTabbaa…?" were hits, which the director attributed to their being staged differently from convention.[4](https://telugucinema.com/nostalgia/40-years-of-khaidi-a-film-that-made-chiranjeevi-a-star?amp=1)
## Box office and reception
Although the film had just been announced, it sold for 2.5 million rupees (25 lakh rupees). The producers spent their money to make it look grand and did not earn much on the first run; they made a profit of 2 million rupees (20 lakh rupees) after five years as rights were resold to exhibitors, and more in subsequent years.[4](https://telugucinema.com/nostalgia/40-years-of-khaidi-a-film-that-made-chiranjeevi-a-star?amp=1) The film went on to gross around Rs 80 million (Rs 8 crore) at the box office.[2](https://indianexpress.com/article/entertainment/telugu/the-making-of-chiranjeevis-khaidi-the-film-that-created-a-mega-star-10605072/) Moviebuff records it as the second highest grossing Telugu film at the time of its release.[8](https://www.moviebuff.com/khaidi-1983-telugu) Kodandarami Reddy said it was Chiranjeevi's first film to cross the one crore mark in box office receipts, granting him star status.[4](https://telugucinema.com/nostalgia/40-years-of-khaidi-a-film-that-made-chiranjeevi-a-star?amp=1) The film's impact on audiences was immediate; the producer recalled an elderly woman in Tirupathi crying out in the theater that Chiranjeevi's character should not be hanged.[4](https://telugucinema.com/nostalgia/40-years-of-khaidi-a-film-that-made-chiranjeevi-a-star?amp=1)
## Remakes and legacy
In 1984 the film was remade in Hindi as *Qaidi*, produced by Padmalaya with [Jeetendra](https://www.edgepedia.org/jeetendra), and in Kannada under the same title with Vishnuvardhan; Madhavi was the female lead in all three languages.[4](https://telugucinema.com/nostalgia/40-years-of-khaidi-a-film-that-made-chiranjeevi-a-star?amp=1) • [5](https://play.google.com/store/movies/details?id=3F975765EBEF24F8MV)
**The making of a Megastar.** The scholar Shweta Rajamani, a researcher of popular Telugu cinema, writes that *Khaidi* cast Chiranjeevi as a young lower-class, lower-caste man seeking revenge against the zamindar (landlord-like feudal village lord under colonial land systems) of his village and a system of injustice, and that the film has retrospectively gained iconic status as the one that made Chiranjeevi a "Megastar" and a trendsetter for the Telugu "mass film", a genre of anger, revenge, and action-centered entertainment with the male star as a heroic social underdog that dominated the industry into the mid-1990s.[9](https://pure.mpg.de/pubman/item/item_2422715_4/component/file_3569895/Rajamani_Feeling_2017_VerlPDF_final_LS.pdf) Chiranjeevi himself said the film made him "a permanent prisoner (Khaidi) in the hearts of fans" and called its reception unforgettable.[4](https://telugucinema.com/nostalgia/40-years-of-khaidi-a-film-that-made-chiranjeevi-a-star?amp=1)
The title returned with Chiranjeevi's 2017 comeback film *Khaidi No. 150*, a remake of the 2014 Tamil film *Kaththi* dealing with farmer suicides and water scarcity, produced by his son [Ram Charan](https://www.edgepedia.org/ram-charan) and directed by V.V. Vinayak. [The Indian Express](https://www.edgepedia.org/the-indian-express) describes the three Khaidi films, spanning Chiranjeevi's career, as an accidental autobiography in which the title came to stand for a man who is wronged, fights back, and does not ask permission to do so.[2](https://indianexpress.com/article/entertainment/telugu/the-making-of-chiranjeevis-khaidi-the-film-that-created-a-mega-star-10605072/) The film remains available on streaming platforms including Amazon Prime Video and Sun Nxt in India.[10](https://www.justwatch.com/in/movie/khaidi)
## References
1. [40 Years of 'Khaidi': A film that made Chiranjeevi a star, TeluguCinema Desk (28 Oct 2023)](https://telugucinema.com/nostalgia/40-years-of-khaidi-a-film-that-made-chiranjeevi-a-star/2)
2. [Rs 1.75 lakh, a First Blood-inspired script, and a DIY T-shirt: The making of Chiranjeevi's Khaidi, The Indian Express](https://indianexpress.com/article/entertainment/telugu/the-making-of-chiranjeevis-khaidi-the-film-that-created-a-mega-star-10605072/)
3. [Encyclopedia of Indian Cinema entry for Khaidi (1983), indiancine.ma](https://indiancine.ma/documents/DSP/Encyclopedia%2520of%2520Indian%2520Cinema.pdf)
4. [40 Years of 'Khaidi' retrospective with statements from Chiranjeevi, the director, and the producer, TeluguCinema](https://telugucinema.com/nostalgia/40-years-of-khaidi-a-film-that-made-chiranjeevi-a-star?amp=1)
5. [Khaidi (1983), Google Play Movies listing](https://play.google.com/store/movies/details?id=3F975765EBEF24F8MV)
6. [Khaidi (1983) synopsis, Moviebuff](https://d1f72a6kha0tf8.cloudfront.net/khaidi-1989-telugu)
7. [Scholarly study of popular Telugu cinema, University of Hyderabad thesis](https://igmlnet.uohyd.ac.in/docs/hi-res/hcu_images/TH2253.pdf)
8. [Khaidi (1983) trivia, Moviebuff](https://www.moviebuff.com/khaidi-1983-telugu)
9. [Shweta Rajamani (2017). Feeling anger, compassion and community in popular Telugu cinema. The Indian Economic and Social History Review 54(1): 103–122.](https://pure.mpg.de/pubman/item/item_2422715_4/component/file_3569895/Rajamani_Feeling_2017_VerlPDF_final_LS.pdf)
10. [Khaidi streaming options, JustWatch India](https://www.justwatch.com/in/movie/khaidi)
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*Topic: Encyclopedia › Arts and culture › Screen and stage › Film and television › Films and standalone screen works › Individual films by title and year › Indian films (individual works) › Telugu films before 2000*
*Initially written Oct 3, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 15, 2026; Oct 25, 2026; Nov 1, 2026 · Last review: Oct 25, 2026*
*Copyright 2026 EdgeChat AI, a subsidiary of Biostate AI.*
License: Edgepedia Community License 1.0, https://www.edgepedia.org/edgepedia/license