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Rakhi Aur Hathkadi (राखी और हथकड़ी)

Rakhi Aur Hathkadi (राखी और हथकड़ी) is a 1972 Hindi-language Indian film directed by S.M. Sagar and produced by S. Noor under the banner Kala Enterprises, Bombay, starring Ashok Kumar, Asha Parekh, and Vijay Arora, with music by Rahul Dev Burman.¹^•² The title translates as "Rakhi and Handcuffs", and the film belongs to the action, drama, and family genres.³ It is one of several Hindi films of the period built around the rakhi, the thread tied by a sister on her brother's wrist at the Rakshabandhan festival; Hindi-language reference works on the festival list it alongside the 1976 film Rakhi Aur Rifle as films with rakhi in the title.⁴

Key fact	Detail
Release	Listed as 1 January 1972 by Bollywood Hungama, TheTVDB, and Letterboxd; the Times of India's eTimes page gives 1 August 1972¹^•³
Director / producer	S.M. Sagar; produced by S. Noor for Kala Enterprises, Bombay¹^•²
Writers	B.C. Mahor (story), Ramesh Pant (dialogue), Aziz Quaisi (screenplay)⁵
Music	R.D. Burman; lyrics Majrooh Sultanpuri; playback singers Asha Bhosle and Kishore Kumar¹
Principal cast	Ashok Kumar (Thakur Virendra Singh), Asha Parekh (Janki/Kiran), Vijay Arora (Prakash V. Singh), Sulochana Latkar (Ratna), Kabir Bedi (Suraj), Danny Denzongpa (Raja)⁵
Runtime	90 minutes per Rotten Tomatoes, TheTVDB, and IMDb; a 145-minute DVD version was classified in Quebec in 2012⁶^•⁷
Censor certification	Passed by the censor board on 10 November 1972; rated U in India⁸^•³

Spoilers

Story

The film is set in the household of Thakur Virendra Singh, a wealthy and compassionate landowner who lives with his wife Ratna and their two sons, Suraj and Prakash.⁹ Suraj falls in love with Shobhna, the daughter of the family's munshi (manager), Din Dayal, and Ratna opposes the match because she wants her son to marry into a much wealthier family and cannot accept a mere employee's daughter.⁹

Prakash, by contrast, falls in love with Kiran, a girl from a poor family who lives with her widowed mother Janki, and Ratna approves of her at once.⁹ What Ratna does not know is that Janki had been a courtesan in the same city, and that her brother Vikram had paid a large sum of money to spend nights with her.⁹

The film's own press booklet, preserved in the Tuli Research Centre's archive of song-synopsis booklets, gives a fuller backstory: Janki was born to a humble pujari (priest), kidnapped in her sleep at the age of six, and sold to a prostitute; she grew into a nautch girl (courtesan entertainer performing dance for patrons) whose first mujra (performance) was arranged by Panna Bai under a deal with Thakur Vikram Singh, and she was rescued at the last moment by Ramesh, a bangle seller, whom she then married under the patronage of Munshi Din Dayal.¹⁰^•² When Janki later approached Prakash's mother to arrange the marriage, Vikram Singh appeared and recognized her as the nautch girl, and the booklet leaves the outcomes for Kiran and Prakash's marriage and for Suraj's reunion with his original mother and sister unresolved until the film itself.² A Quebec classification record describes the film as a family drama, punctuated with songs and dances, about what happens when a mother is too strict with her children.⁷

Cast and crew

Ashok Kumar, a leading figure of Hindi cinema, played Thakur Virendra Singh, and Asha Parekh played the double role of Janki and Kiran, with Baby Kalpana as young Kiran.⁵^•¹ Vijay Arora played Prakash V. Singh, and Kabir Bedi played Suraj, in an early screen role for the actor later known internationally.⁵ The supporting cast included Sulochana Latkar as Ratna, Raj Mehra as Munshi Din Dayal, Danny Denzongpa as Raja, Nazima as Shobhna Dayal, Helen as Mrs. Reen, Indira Bansal as Pannabai, Sudhir as Ramesh, and Anoop Kumar as Vikram.⁵ C.S. Dubey played the pandit who kidnapped Janki, a role noted in a retrospective filmography of the character actor.¹¹

Behind the camera, Dara Engineer was the cinematographer, Wamanrao the editor, and A. Khaliq the art director, with S. Azim handling the fight sequences.¹²^•⁵ The choreographers credited were Gopi Krishna and Surya Kumar.¹ According to a trivia note on IMDb, Asha Parekh said she dabbled in choreographing the film's dance sequences "to a certain extent," even though her name is not listed as choreographer in the credits.¹³

Music

Rahul Dev Burman composed the score, with lyrics by Majrooh Sultanpuri; the songs were sung by Asha Bhosle, with Kishore Kumar also appearing as a playback singer.¹ Songs listed on Bollywood Hungama include "Aa Phir Main Kahaan Phir Tu Kahaan Hoga Re Sanam", "Aaja Aaja Sanam", "Achhi Nahin Sanam Dillagi", and "Bahiyan Dhar Ke Lipta".¹⁴ The Gramophone Company of India issued the soundtrack on HMV records with catalog numbers BOE 2718, BOE 2719, and BOE 2720, all dated 1972.¹⁵ The film was one of eighteen films released in 1972 for which R.D. Burman composed the music, and the song archive Atul's Song A Day notes that "Achhi Nahin Sanam Dillagi" was the only well-known song from the film.⁸

Release and reception

The film was passed by the Indian censor board on 10 November 1972.⁸ Databases disagree on the release date: Bollywood Hungama, TheTVDB, and Letterboxd list 1 January 1972, while the Times of India's eTimes page gives 1 August 1972.¹^•³ Rotten Tomatoes lists the film with no critic reviews and no audience ratings on its Tomatometer and Popcornmeter.⁶ IMDb records a rating of 6.6 out of 10 from about 33 votes.¹³ A DVD version was classified in Quebec on 16 March 2012 with a general-audience rating, at a listed 145 minutes, and the record notes that no distributor held a visa for public projection there.⁷ The film has remained available on home video and television; a rights registry lists it as licensed to the Sony MAX 2 channel, and a restored high-definition version with English subtitles circulates on YouTube.¹⁶^•¹⁷

References

Initially written Oct 3, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 3, 2026; Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 3, 2026; Oct 25, 2026; Nov 1, 2026