committed suicide, and Sivakami moved to another village. Sivakami says she had lied to the public that the zamindar's son had died, and that the zamindar currently lives nearby as a mystic nomad. Raja, realising his mistake, decides to go meet the zamindar and bring him back. Kaali, having overheard this conversation, reports to Ambalathar, who decides to murder Raja and frame Muthu so that he can take over the property. Kaali beats Raja, throws him into a waterfall and informs everyone that Muthu killed Raja. Muthu beats Kaali and makes him reveal that Ambalathar asked him to kill Raja. The villagers chase Ambalathar until Raja arrives with his bride Padmini. Raja was rescued by the zamindar and decided to marry Padmini. He forgives Ambalathar. Raja tells Muthu of his true identity, and Muthu rushes to meet his father, only to find that he has already left the place. Muthu becomes the new zamindar but prefers to identify as a worker. Cast Rajinikanth as Muthu and his father Meena as Ranganayaki Sarath Babu as Raja Malayasimman Radha Ravi as Ambalathar Senthil as Thennappan Vadivelu as Valayapathy Jayabharathi as Sivakamiyammal Subhashri as Padmini Ponnambalam as Kaali Vichithra as Rathidevi Raghuvaran as Rajasekhar Tiger Prabhakar as S. P. Pratap Rayudu Ganthimathi as Poongavanam Pandu as Pallavarayan Jyothi Lakshmi (special appearance in the song "Kokku Saiva Kokku") Kumarimuthu as Kamalakannan K. S. Ravikumar as the Tamil-speaking Malayali Production Development Rajinikanth wanted K. S. Ravikumar to direct a film for him, and Ravikumar agreed to do so once he finished work on Periya Kudumbam (1995). After buying the rights to remake the 1994 Malayalam film Thenmavin Kombath, Rajinikanth narrated the outline of that film and so told Ravikumar to develop a screenplay of the remake, but he did not let Ravikumar watch the film. The project did not initially have a producer, so Rajinikanth offered to take care of financial matters, but Ravikumar refused. Ravikumar developed the screenplay at the Woodlands Hotel with help from his assistant directors including Ramesh Khanna, while occasionally going to Rajinikanth's office. The film was initially titled Velan before being retitled Muthu. This also marks Rajinikanth’s first collaboration with the director. Although Ravikumar was the primary dialogue writer, Rajinikanth wrote certain "punch" dialogues like "Kedaikkaradhu kedaikkama irukkadhu. Kedaikkama irukardhu kedaikadhu" (). After completing three-fourths of the script, Ravikumar got permission to watch Thenmavin Kombath and was shocked to see