Saala Khadoos

Prabhu Selvaraj (Tamil version)/Adi Tomar (Hindi version) (R. Madhavan) is a failed boxer who, despite being very talented, falls victim to the dirty politics in the boxing association. Ten years later, he is a coach for the womens boxing teams but is extremely angry and frustrated with the partiality in selection. Due to his rift with the association head Dev Khatri (Zakir Hussain), he is falsely charged with sexual harassment and transferred to Chennai. Despite the very poor infrastructure, Prabhu/Adi manages to find talent in a roadside fish seller Madhi (Ritika Singh), who he notices while she is thrashing the judges during her sisters tournament.

Ignoring Madhis elder sister Lakshmi (Mumtaz Sorcar) who has been boxing for 8 years, Prabhu offers to train Madhi for a few hours daily. But the two dont get along due to Prabhus/Adis ruthless training methods and Madhis aggressive nature. As a result, Madhi intentionally loses a local match. Prabhu later asks Luxmi and Madhis parents, Saamikannu (Kaali Venkat) and Damayanthi (Baljinder Kaur), to send them to stay in hostel with him so their daughters can work hard on training. Madhi misunderstands him, but later regrets when she finds out that Prabhu has sold his bike to buy new training equipment for her.

Madhi then dedicatedly starts training with Prabhu and develops feelings for him. On the day of a qualifying match, she reveals her feelings to Prabhu and he promptly rejects her. During the warm-up before the match, a now jealous Luxmi injures Madhis hand causing Madhi to lose. Angry, Prabhu thinks that Madhi lost intentionally again and throws her out of training camp.Dev takes advantage of the situation by calling Madhi to Delhi for a cultural exchange tournament and makes her fight with a heavy weight Russian boxer, who knocks out Madhi in a few seconds.

A demotivated Madhi is then approached by Dev with an indecent proposal, to which she reacts by injuring him. Dev takes revenge by getting her arrested on false theft charges.Prabhu comes to the rescue and bails her out. He later takes Madhi to Delhi to get her a wild-card entry into the World Boxing Championship. Many people in the association, including Lakshmi, accuse Madhi of offering sexual favours to Prabhu.

Ignoring all the accusations Madhi works hard and goes on to win the semifinal. On the day of finals, Dev removes Madhis name from the list and asks Prabhu to resign immediately if he wants to see Madhi in the final, with the same Russian boxer who knocked her out in Delhi. Madhi gets to fight in the final round but is dejected after learning about Prabhus resignation. She keeps losing points in the early rounds and gets badly injured before Prabhu shows up at the stadium and indicates her to attack her opponents arms to make her weak. Madhi follows the game plan and knocks out the opponent with seconds to go in the final round.

Dev quickly jumps into the ring to take the credit for training Madhi but she punches him and runs to Prabhu. Madhi and Prabhu hug each other, showing emotional reunion of a coach and student.Malini Mannath from The New Indian Express stated that Irudhi Suttru had a finely crafted screenplay, deft treatment and some fine performances which make it an engaging watch, while giving particular praise to Madhavan and Ritika Singhs performances. Similarly, Business Standard stated that Madhavan breathes life into the role of a grumpy coach with ease and élan, while the extremely impressive newbie Ritika Singh steals the show with a knockout performance, adding that theres no way any other actress couldve done a better job than Ritika in this role. Behindwoods noted that Sudha's Irudhi Suttru has all the emotional elements in it to strike a chord with the audiences and the lady renders a match winning performance and particularly praised the apt casting and performance stating that everyone from Madhavan to Ritika Singh to the supporting cast, has rendered their best performances.

Sify stated that the film was a perfect sports drama, which should not be missed and added that this inspirational effort has a superb screenplay with all the typical elements of a good sports film in place, while Rediff.com agreed that the film was not to be missed, adding its refreshing characters, enjoyable plot, great music and visuals keeps you hooked. IndiaGlitz.com rated the film 4.3 out of 5 and wrote it is a must watch for lovers of good cinema which entertains and engages through out, while Baradwaj Rangan of The Hindu stated it was a heart-warming boxing drama.

Saala Khadoos received primarily mixed reviews. Bollywood Hungama described it as a euphoric and electrifying film with amazing performances from the lead cast and is definitely engaging, and inspiring. The critic added it truly deserves an ovation and is worth your time and money, while stating Madhavan delivers an extraordinary and extremely realistic performance, while Ritika Singh is definitely a revelation and a find of Bollywood. Critic Subhash K. Jha wrote Saala Khadoos promised a rugged sports film and it delivers, while adding the film itself doesn't match up to the glory of its stunning visual velocity or its leading man towering performance.

Other critics felt that the film failed to rise above the clichés of a sports film, though CNN-IBN stated it succeeds in creating a credible world and, thanks to affecting performances from its principal players, gives us characters that we can care about. Similarly, NDTV wrote it has enough heart, it's the heat that is missing. Following the success of the film, Sudha Kongara confirmed that she would remake the film in the Telugu language with Venkatesh in the lead role alongside Ritika Singh.