Devasthanam (film)

Cast

Plot

The movie begins with the introduction of two characters Srimannarayana (K. Viswanath) and Samba Murthy (S. P. Balasubrahmanyam). Srimannarayana is a trustee of a local Hindu temple in Chittoor who helps anyone with love all motto by calling everybody "Bangaru" (Gold) and clarifies philosophical doubts of a young girl (Niharika) who regularly visits the temple. For him temple is the home. One day he happens to see how an orphan dead body is being ill-treated and cremated. That incident shatters his peace and he starts panicking about how will he be cremated as he is an orphan too.

Samba Murthy is a middle aged man who works as sales person in a big saree retail outlet. He leads a simple life with his wife Saraswathi (Aamani). The couple love each other and live happily even though they have no children. Samba Murthy wants to learn classical dance to lose weight from the dance teacher (Sri Sandhya) in the temple but fails to go by postponing it. Generally, Saraswathi drops Samba Murthy to his shop on her bike and then goes to get vegetables. Sridevi (Kovai Sarala) is a regular customer to his shop but never buys a single saree. Talented Samba Murthy tricks her to buy a routine red saree lying that it is specially made as rare piece for MLA's wife.

One day in the temple Srimannarayana happens to see Samba Murthy and his devotion to God. He gets impressed with Samba Murthy's happy go life attitude and approaches him for a help. He requests Samba Murthy to light his pyre and perform his funeral rituals post his death. Samba Murthy gets shocked and furious with Srimannarayana's request. He tells him that he will think about it and leaves angrily from there. Next day morning, Srimannarayana directly comes to Samba Murthy's home for answer. Samba Murthy asks Saraswathi to lie that he is not home and manages to send Srimannarayana back. From then, Srimannarayana starts following and persuading Samba Murthy everywhere. Saraswathi convinces Samba Murthy that it is another chance given to him by God to fulfill the old man's wish because he failed to light the pyre of his own father. She reminds the incident when Samba's father died and he couldn't obey a son's responsibilities because he was stuck in Mumbai Bomb attacks.Samba Murthy finally accepts Srimannarayana's wish and Srimannarayana gives rupees two lakhs for his funeral expenses including flight fare to Kasi for immersing his ashes in Ganga river. He tells Samba and Saraswathi that he will visit them every morning and if he did not arrive any day, it means he is no more.

Samba Murthy gets to know from the temple priest (Nayar Raman) that Srimannarayana is a great artist who performs Harikatha and is not performing for some reason now. Samba Murthy promises the priest to arrange Srimannarayana's performance for coming temple Dasara festival celebrations. Srimannarayana accepts Samba Murthy's request on a condition that Samba Murthy will write Harikatha script by studying all the old scripts. Upon incorporating repetitive review comments from Srimannarayana, finally Samba Murthy comes up with a beautiful script. From then, they perform Harikatha everyday and answer philosophical questions after Harikatha in the temple.

A fine day in the temple, Lawyer Purushottama Rao (Dr. K. V. Ramanachary IAS) invites both of them home and asks way to attain peace. He confesses that he has earned lot of money by undertaking false cases and he is not happy with that money anymore and wishes to get rid of all his sins now. Upon the advice of Srimannarayana, Purushottama Rao sacrifices all his wealth, transforms himself into to a good man and starts a new trust called "Sarve Jana Sukhinobhavanthu". He requests Srimannarayana and Samba Murthy to be trustees of the foundation. Samba Murthy who is astonished to see that change in the lawyer, returns 2 lakhs given by Srimannarayana to him saying that he now realised how lucky he is to find an elderly person like Srimannarayana as his guide. Srimannarayana returns those 2 lakhs to the trust saying that he was so foolish about his cremation on who performs his last rituals but is not concerned about it anymore. Slowly, they both become great companions and perform Harikatha not only in temples but also in schools, colleges, orphanages etc., Then the story takes a tragic twist in the climax and ends with a message that "All the life's a stage. Nothing remains forever, only good deeds will."

Soundtrack

The soundtrack of the film was composed by Swara Veenapani. The audio was launched on 31 Dec 2011 under Leo Music Company label.