General · EdgepediaOctober 3, 20264 min read

Vijeta (विजेता)

Vijeta (विजेता) is a 1996 Hindi-language action film directed by K. Muralimohana Rao, produced by Anil Rathi under the Shree Ganesh Productions banner, and starring Sanjay Dutt, Raveena Tandon, Paresh Rawal, and Amrish Puri. It was released in India on 26 January 1996.¹^•² The film is a remake of the 1991 film Sathruvu.³

Key fact	Detail
Release	26 January 1996 (India), Hindi language, action genre¹
Director / producer	K. Muralimohana Rao; produced by Anil Rathi, Shree Ganesh Productions¹
Lead cast	Sanjay Dutt as Ashok, Raveena Tandon as Inspector Vijayalaxmi, Paresh Rawal as Vidhya Sagar, Amrish Puri as D.I.G. Jagdish Chaudhary²
Music	Anand–Milind, lyrics by Sameer⁴
Runtime	156 minutes¹
Box office	Declared a flop; budget ₹25,000,000 against a total nett gross of ₹30,900,000¹
Earlier title	Mera Kartavya, changed during production²

Spoilers

Cast and characters

Sanjay Dutt plays Ashok, a junior advocate, and Raveena Tandon plays Inspector Vijayalaxmi, a police officer who is Ashok's beloved.²^•⁷ Paresh Rawal plays the corrupt builder Vidhya Sagar, and Amrish Puri plays D.I.G. Jagdish Chaudhary.² The supporting cast includes Alok Nath as the advocate Durga Prasad, Reema Lagoo as his wife Laxmi, Asrani as the landlord Lallan, Annu Kapoor as Constable Chamanlal, Deep Dhillon as Satyamurti, Shiva Rindani as Pratap Sharma, Mahesh Anand as George, Guddi Maruti as Rani, Viju Khote as Vidhya Sagar's lawyer, and Ananth Narayan Mahadevan as the Inquiry Officer.⁵^•⁸

Plot

The story is set in Bangalore. Advocate Durga Prasad was to have received a file from Chote Thakur concerning a case pending in a court there, but Chote is killed, the file never arrives, and the court's decision goes against him.⁹ Durga Prasad is then approached by a former government employee, an inquiry officer, who claims he was wrongly dismissed and framed by corrupt officials; before the case can even be filed, the inquiry officer is killed.⁹

When Durga Prasad resolves to take the matter to court, he and his wife Laxmi are murdered in broad daylight outside the courthouse.⁹ His junior Ashok promises to avenge the killings, traces the killers, and finds that they all work for Vidhya Sagar, whom he then kills one by one.⁹ The press-booklet synopsis adds that Ashok, once an apprentice under the honest Durga Prasad, comes to believe that law is a farce and wants to punish criminals by taking the law into his own hands, while his beloved Vijaya, an honest police inspector, believes in punishing culprits within the constraints of the law; their differing means set them on a collision course.⁷

The police DIG, Jagdish Chaudhary, assigns Inspector Vijayalaxmi to apprehend Ashok, not knowing that she and Ashok are in love. She questions him, and he provides an alibi for each killing, but when the Mayor of Bangalore is murdered she catches him red-handed, leaving open the question of whether Ashok killed the mayor, and if not, who did.⁹

Production

The film was written by Santosh Saroj, who handled both the screenplay and the dialogue.⁴ The credited crew includes cinematographer P.S. Prakash, editors Prashant Khedekar, Vinod Nayak, and J. Narasimha Rao, action director Ravi Dewan, and art director Nitin Chandrakant Desai; the choreographers were Saroj Khan and Bhupi, and the costume designers were Manish Malhotra, Rocky S, and Allan Gill.⁵ Shooting took place in India.⁵

According to trivia recorded on IMDb and Moviebuff, the film was earlier titled Mera Kartavya. Because of Sanjay Dutt's time in jail, the producers changed the title to a more positive one, with Vijeta (meaning "victor") chosen to show support for him.²^•⁶

Box office

Box Office India classifies Vijeta as a flop. It opened on 125 screens and earned a first week of ₹13,450,000 on its way to a total nett gross of ₹3,09,00,000, against a budget of ₹25,000,000.¹ The India gross was ₹51,800,000 and the worldwide gross ₹5,25,35,000, with overseas gross of $20,000; the site records 3,809,000 footfalls.¹ Mumbai was the strongest territory at ₹9,350,000 nett, followed by Delhi/UP at ₹7,050,000.¹

Reception and availability

The film holds a 4.4/10 rating on IMDb from about 120 user votes.² A retrospective fan review describes it as a relatively concentrated and compact production by the standards of its time, though average within Sanjay Dutt's filmography, and notes Amrish Puri appearing in unusual comic situations in the song "Neend Aati Nahin".¹⁰ In India the film was certified A (adults only).⁶ It has been available for streaming on SonyLIV and VZY.¹¹

References

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) › Hindi films of the 1990s › Action and thriller films › Released 1996 to 1999

Initially written Oct 3, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 15, 2026; Oct 25, 2026; Nov 1, 2026 · Last review: Oct 25, 2026

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