Pistha

Pistha (English : Crook) is a 1997 Tamil language film directed by K.S. Ravikumar and starring Karthik Muthuraman and Nagma in the lead roles. The movie completed a 100-day run in theaters and turned out to be a profitable venture for Pyramid Natarjan.

Manigandan is a server in a hotel who is a devotee of Lord Ayyappan (the bachelor god.) He follows a fasting for Ayyappan and is very sincere and honest. One day a businessman, named Dharmaraj, visits the hotel where Manigandan works. He admires Mani's sincerity and offers him the General Manager job in his factory at Ooty. Dharmaraj takes Mani to his factory and office to introduce him to his employees who do not do any work but play games, sit idle, watch TV etc. Innocent Mani does not understand why employees does not work but gets scared that he must manage all of them, a task which was impossible for 419 managers before him.

Mani sees a girl who breaks everything she sees, and yet Dharmaraj pays for everything she broke. He finds out that she is Vennila, daughter of Dharmaraj who is a spoilt young lady who cannot be controlled even by her father. Mani and Vennila fight frequently. Vennila makes every attempt to get rid of him, but a spark develops between them.

Vennila visits the home of her sister's lover to give money for their expenses. She finds out that she must inherit all her grandfather's property if she can continue to afford money for them. The only way to inherit the property is to get married as per his will. She wants to help her sister, so decides to marry Manigandan and attempts to win his heart. Manigandan also declares his love for Vennila but Dharmaraj objects to the match as Vennila is very dangerous girl and she might spoil his life. He is reluctantly persuaded to accept the marriage, and Mani and Vennila get married. On the day of the marriage, to everybody's surprise, Manigandan is revealed to be an ex jail convict. Vennila is shocked by this. It is now Manigandan's turn to overpower Vennila and he begins his game. The rest of the story follows with the fight between Mani and Vennila and how Mani surpasses Vennila's arrogancy. In the end, it is revealed that the sister's lover is actually a crook who killed her and pretended to be handicapped to steal her property. In a fight ensuing, Manikandan pushes him and makes him really handicapped, Vennila forgives Manikandan for mistakes. The film ends with Manikandan turning into Ayyappan devotee again.

Soundtrack was composed by S. A. Rajkumar and lyrics for all songs were written by Kalidasan.