Megastar Chiranjeevi is a legend in Indian cinema, but his path to the height of Tollywood wasn't without its hiccups that continued far beyond the silver screen. Although today the world knows his fame and wealth, the younger generations are not too familiar with a frightening event that happened almost 40 years ago – a mortal brush with death which shook the whole country. A sinister assassination attempt, involving poison, was tried against the star in 1988, a tale that is one of the most chilling in film legend.
An Up-and-Coming Star and a Sinister Plot
The year was 1988. Chiranjeevi was quickly reinforcing his position as Tollywood's "Number One" hero, churning out back-to-back blockbusters. During this time, Nandamuri Taraka Rama Rao (NTR) was the Chief Minister of Andhra Pradesh. Chiranjeevi was in Madras (now Chennai) shooting for Marana Mrudangam, a high-octane action movie.
As was customary of a Megastar shoot, thousands of fans gathered near the court premises to catch a glimpse of their idol. Noticing the crowd and its panic, an unnamed man approached the actor. Spouting fan-speak, he implored Chiranjeevi to cut a cake, noting that it was his "lifetime's greatest wish" to celebrate the actor's birthday (which happens to be August) on the set. A man of vast love and who was open to his fans, Chiranjeevi gracefully acquiesced without realizing the trap it was driving.
The Moment of Peril
Once the cake was cut, the stranger tried hard to shove a big chunk into Chiranjeevi’s mouth. The actor instinctively resisted, aware that something was wrong, and the cake tumbled to the ground. When the cake crumbled, the film crew noted something ghastly: a malicious brown envelope contained in the sponge.
There was an even more horrifying immediate physical reaction. A tiny piece of the cake had been caught on Chiranjeevi’s lip and, just moments later, his skin slowly started to look unnatural. Acknowledging that this had been an intentional poisoning scheme, his panicking crew rushed him to a nearby hospital. Medical examinations confirmed that the substance was toxic in fact. Chiranjeevi had escaped a death by a whisker by refusing to nibble the whole piece.
The following morning, stories about the "Poison Plot" soon gripped every single national and state newspaper and covered news everywhere in mass media. The industry was in shock and fans were all out for blood. It was rumoured that rivals or “evil forces” in the industry, which failed to savor Chiranjeevi’s meteoric ascent, had set the act off. It wasn’t until mediation by film industry veterans that the controversy settled after blocking a line, but the case changed everything for the actor.
The 1988 effort remains hauntingly reminiscent that, far from simply being an encounter of dance and dialogue, the Megastar’s journey had been one of survival. Since then, many of the safety guardrails around the actor have really been put in place. Yet, astonishingly enough, Chiranjeevi never let this trauma sour him towards his fans. He still receives his own fans with the same love, and in doing so, proved that as much as conspiracies sought to take his life, his ties to the people kept him alive in millions’ hearts.
