In 1971, explorer Rangachari goes to
Daulatabad to research the fourteenth century sultan
Muhammad bin Tughluq, who had an arrogant attitude, indifferent view towards his kingdom and subjects, treated his guests poorly and introduced absurd plans that backfired. Rangachari unearths a coffin that contains two men alive. They claim to be Tughluq and his accomplice
Ibn Battuta, buried several centuries ago along with a herb that has
kept them alive all the while. Tughluq becomes a national sensation and is welcomed in all grandeur to Rangachari's house. He is interviewed by many journalists to whom he answers in a sarcastic attitude. He learns the changes of the past centuries in almost four days and mocks that the advancements are no more than four days' advancement. He decides to contest independent in
by-elections of
North-Madras Constituency to become the
MP so that he can become
Prime Minister (PM). Thanikachalam, an ageing
freedom fighter and his daughter Gandhimathi volunteer to help taking part in his political rallies. In his political campaigns, Tughluq mocks all the other political contestants and in a satiric tone asks the people to vote for him. Tughluq eventually wins the elections and become an MP. He goes to
Delhi and meets with MPs from all small parties. He makes them very big offers. A total of 324/545 MPs join his party and all of them want themselves to be made
Deputy Prime Ministers (DPM), and confusion ensures. The MPs threaten him to take back their support. Finally, Tughluq announces that all MP's who had joined his party will be made DPMs. Everyone agrees and the existing cabinet is dissolved. Tughluq is sworn in as the new PM, with 450 MPs supporting him and made as new DPMs. Tughluq appoints Gandhimathi as one of his DPMs. She initially does not understand the street-smart nature of politics and shows an innocent face to the people she meets. Tughluq shows a self-opinionated attitude to the cabinet ministers and refuses to listen to all their proposals. He instead makes plans to tackle the country's problems that neither make sense nor solve the problems in question. When there is a calamity for his decisions he makes a direct speech to the people through radio, to request peace and falsely promises to look into the problem. Gandhimathi slowly learns all the trickery of politics and gets indulged in bribery. She rises to a pompous lifestyle from her previous poverty-ridden one, and starts taking good care of a few children in her care. On his deathbed, Thanikachalam hands Gandhimathi a letter and asks her to deliver it to Tughluq or Battuta on 31 December 1971, adding that no one else must read this letter; she agrees. Unknown to anyone, "Tughluq" and "Battuta" are actually Thanikachalam's disciples Mahadevan and Raghavan who indulged in this charade to reform the country. They took an oath that they would publicly surrender for their charade on 31 December, hid in the coffin in Daulatabad, and began their charade soon after Rangachari unearthed them. They believed that after this incident, people would contemplate on this matter and cause a revolution that would change the state of affairs to come. However, Mahadevan suggests that they maintain the status quo and live prosperously. Corrupted through his exposure to politics, he refuses to accept that he is Mahadevan and still calls himself Tughluq. Raghavan, however, is now stubborn on revealing their true colours. Raghavan approaches Gandhimathi to get Thanikachalam's letter, which is a
written confession of the details of the trio's plan signed by Mahadevan himself and posted to Thanikachalam. It is the only proof of Tughluq's true identity. Gandhimathi, now equally corrupt herself and for the sake of the children she takes care of, refuses to hand over the letter because she would get into trouble for supporting Mahadevan and Raghavan, and burns it. Raghavan attempts to explain everything to the cabinet ministers and later to the masses; however, "Tughluq" lies that "Battuta" has gone insane and asks everyone not to believe him. He further tricks the masses, through his words, into killing Raghavan, with whom dies their secret. == Cast ==