was 35 lakh (worth 13 crore in 2021 prices). Music The film had no songs, only background score. Rao wanted a composer who could work as per his demands and requirements for the scenes, for this L. Vaidyanathan was chosen to compose the score. Sitar exponent Janardhan Mitta contributed to the re-recording using two other instruments apart from minimal orchestration. Themes Rao called Pushpaka Vimana a personal film because "that's the life I lead. I don't want to amass wealth. At the same time, I am not a person who romanticises poverty. Money is important, but that is not everything." Anjana Shekar of The News Minute said the film satirises unemployment, an issue that was prevalent in India in the 1980s. She compared it to Mark Twain's novel The Prince and the Pauper because of the concept of identity switching, with the difference being that in Pushpaka Vimana the switching is not mutually agreed upon and the two men do not look alike. Anjana said that the climax in which the graduate is shown standing in a long queue of job seekers indicates that nothing has changed for him "except that now, he's willing to take the metaphorical stairs to succeed in life." Historian Bhagwan Das Garga noted similarities between the graduate and Walter Mitty, because of how the former "fantasises about riches". Rao named The Inspector General (1949), where a civil servant is mistaken for a high-ranking inspector, as an inspiration on Pushpaka Vimana, and also took inspiration from his personal experiences in the 1950s. Writing for India Today, Madhu Jain described Pushpaka Vimana as "the story of the modern Indian male Cinderella. But with a different end – and moral: Money is not everything though pursuing it is entertaining." She noted the contrast in the name of the graduate's lodge, Anand Bhavan (Abode of Bliss). Film critic Naman Ramachandran said the film gives the message that "money is the root of much evil and honesty is the best policy". Ravi Balakrishnan of The Economic Times said that though it eschews formulaic Indian cinema conventions like songs and dialogue, it has "all the elements that make a great mainstream entertainer – a love story, a crime caper, a thriller and a comedy – with plotlines blending together seamlessly", while comparing its primary narrative to Charlie Chaplin's City Lights (1931), and the graduate to Chaplin's character The Tramp. Release Pushpaka