Chaithanya

Nagarjuna plays Chaitanya, a gifted mechanic working on a high-profile car rally from Chennai to Goa, a route that, it turns out, also suits smugglers running drugs and arms. When his journalist friend Sudhakar witnesses the murder of a senior police officer, the killers come after Sudhakar too, and Chaitanya, who tries to save him, ends up beaten senseless and framed for the crime. With the police convinced of his guilt, he has to break out and slip back into the rally in disguise, because the photographs that could clear him are hidden in one of the competing cars. One of those cars is driven by Padmini (Gautami), daughter of the event's chief guest, a retired army major. Actor-director Pratap Pothen wrote and directed this road thriller, with dialogues by Singeetam Srinivasa Rao and songs by Ilaiyaraaja. Girish Karnad, Kota Srinivasa Rao, Raghuvaran and Silk Smitha fill out the cast, and Ravi Teja turns up early in his career as one of the racers. Released in May 1991, the film was also dubbed into Tamil and Malayalam as Madras to Goa.