Roja (TV series)
Roja is an Indian Tamil-language soap opera starring Sibbusuryan, Priyanka Nalkari and Shamilly Sukumar. The series premiered on 9 April 2018 on Sun TV and is produced by Saregama.
Plot
The story starts with Tiger Manickam and Shenbagam on their car with their daughter Anu. A car accident occurs, where Tiger gets into a coma, Shenbagam presumably dies, and Anu is lost. This accident was planned by Tiger's brother Sethu and Sethu's friend Maruthanaayagam. Anu is adopted with the name Roja by Shanthamoorty, who raises her in his orphanage. Many years later, Roja is grown up, but then a criminal named Bhaiya Ganesh enters the orphanage secretly to molest the girls. Eventually, a girl in the ashram called Priya and Maruthanaayagam's daughter Saakshi killed Bhaiya Ganesh and blamed Shanthamoorthy, who is then arrested. Roja is also unaware of her heritage as the daughter of Tiger Manickam and Shenbagam. Priya meanwhile, finds Roja's childhood items which Roja had when she was with Tiger and Shenbagam, and Priya goes to Tiger Manickam and lies to him that she is his daughter. Priya is then named Anu. Anu is also well-affiliated with Shenbagam's family. Roja, to bring Shanthamoorthy back, marries renowned Lawyer Arjun Prathap on a contractual basis for one year who agrees to help Roja. Arjun is the nephew of Shenbagam and belongs to Shenbagam's family. Arjun receives Roja's consent to dissolve the marriage after precisely one year by getting signatures in a mutual consent agreement. Roja accepts this agreement so that Arjun could become involved in a case related to her foster father. Arjun dislikes love and marriage due to his traumatic past involving his friend Venu's demise but indulges in the contractual marriage in an attempt to prevent the friendship between him and Anu.The entire family except for Arjun's mother, Kalpana and his siblings hate Roja because she took Anu's spot. Annapoorani, who is Arjun and Anu's grandmother and Shenbagam's mother hates Roja the most. Anu teams up with Annapoorani's evil daughter Yashoda and son-in-law Balu and tries to get Roja out of the house several times. Yashoda hates Roja because Roja once humiliated her. Roja tries several times to find out her heritage, and Shantamoorthy's case, but Anu stops her. Eventually, Roja and Arjun fall in love with each other and the contractual marriage is forgotten. A police office called Chandrakantha, who has a mysterious past, also decides to help Arjun with the Bhaiya Ganesh murder case. When she is close to figuring the mystery, she is stopped by the Commissioner Gowtham Nath, who is affiliated with Saakshi.
Annapoorani's sister Kamakshi visits from Canada once, and she along with Arjun, Roja, and Kalpana try to find out Roja's past and if Anu is Shenbagam's daughter or not. Annapoorani is very sad that everyone is against Anu, and visits 108 temples and leaves the family. Kamakshi leaves India. Anu and Yashoda plan to kill Roja, but Roja only loses her eyesight. Arjun and Kalpana visit Arulvakku Amuthanayagi and seek help to restore Roja's vision. Arjun, on the advice of Amuthanayagi, does severe penance and brings Roja's eyesight back. After Roja's sight comes back, Annapoorani and Kamakshi return. Annapoorani has developed much more hatred for Arjun and Roja when she returns. Annapoorani decides to make Anu marry Arjun's brother Ashwin, but Ashwin likes a girl named Pooja. Ashwin and Pooja try to marry each other but are stopped by Annapoorani. Annapoorani makes arrangements for Ashwin- Anu marriage and Ashwin agrees reluctantly after Pooja gets kidnapped. However, Arjun saves Pooja in the last minute and stops the wedding. The story unfolds to show how Roja realises her dream of opening the orphanage with the help of Arjun amongst love, betrayal, hate and her past, how Arjun and Roja help Ashwin unite with Pooja, and how they try to find out if Anu is Shenbagam's daughter or not. More twists arrive when it is revealed that Shenbagam is alive, but she has forgotten her past and lives as a nurse named Saraswati. A court case is also filed by Arjun against Anu to prove that she isn't Shenbagam's daughter, but sadly the DNA result is in Anu's favour as the blood samples were changed by her evil friend Sakshi. Later, Sarawasti somehow meets their family astrologer, and she cleverly tells her to follow her heart and search for her blood relations.
Cast
Main
- Priyanka Nalkari as Roja Arjun: Arjun's wife; she is the real Anu.
- Sibbu Suryan as Arjun Prathap: He is a famous criminal lawyer and is Roja's husband.
- Shamily Sukumar as Priya: She acts as an impostor of Anu
Recurring
- Latha Sabapathi as Canada Kamakshi: Annapoorani's elder sister
- Vadivukkarasi as Annapoorani Vijayakumar: Prathaap, Shenbagam and Yashodha's mother
- Rajesh as Tiger Manickam: Roja's biological father and a famous criminal lawyer
- Dr. Sharmila as Shenbagam Manickam / Saraswathi: Roja's biological mother; Arjun's paternal aunt
- K. Natraj as Shanthamurthy: Roja's foster father. He is an orphanage caretaker
- Sowmya Sharada as Saakshi Marudhanayagam: Priya's best friend
- *Sunitha replaced Sharada
- Shiva as Prathap: Arjun, Ashwin and Deepa's father
- Gayathri Shastry as Kalpana Prathap: Arjun, Ashwin and Deepa's mother.
- Venkat Renganathan as Ashwin Prathap: Arjun's younger brother
- Smriti Kashyap as Pooja Ashwin: Ashwin's wife
- P. R. Varalakshmi as Arulvakhu Amuthanayaki: Family Astrologer
- Kavithalaya Krishnan as Purushotthaman: Pooja's father
- Shanthi Anandraj as Prema Purushotthaman: Pooja's mother
- Dubbing Janaki as Baalu's mother
- S. V. S. Kumar as Baalu's father
- Dev Anand Sharma as Balachandran: Yashodha's husband; Malar and Koushik's father.
- Ramya Ramakrishna as Yashodha Balachandran: Malar and Koushik's mother
- *Kavya Varshini Arun replaced Ramakrishna
- Sumathi Shree as Sumathi: Arjun's housekeeper
- Hussain A. K. as Navaneetha Krishnan: Arjun's assistant
- Rani as Inspector Chandrakantha
- Meenakshi as Chandrakantha's mother
- Sowmiya Ravindran as Shwetha: Roja's friend and housemate
- Sangeetha Balan as Chintamani: Saraswathi / Shenbagam's co-worker
- Girish as Sethu: Known also as "Tiger", Sethu is Manickam's brother
- Shoba Rani and as Theivanai Sethu: Sethu's wife
- *Rekha Suresh replaced Rani
- S. D. Ganesh as Ranjith: Sethu's son
- Sasindhar Pushpalingam as "Bhaiya" Ganesh
- Nishanth as Santosh
- Manoharan Krishnan as Marudhanayagam: Saakshi's father
- Akhila Ramanamoorthy as Deepa Prathap: Arjun and Ashwin's younger sister
- Anand as Santosh's father
- Vimal Raj as Driver Velu
- Surjith Ansary as Rajesh
- Sathish Kumar as Shiva
- Shwetha as Lakshmi
- Vanitha Hariharan as Ponni
- Monika as Mallika
- Saif as Chinnathambi
Guest stars
- Rani as Indrasena
- Anuradha Krishnamoorthy as Judge Sivagami
- Ujjayinee Roy as Chamundeshwari
- Anbalaya Prabhakaran as Vijayakumar: Annapoorani's husband
- Murali Mohan as Mahalingam: Annapoorani's brother
- Nadhiya as herself
- Giri Dwarakish as Pichai Muthu / Dharmadurai: Priya's fake father
- Vinodhini as Patchai Killi / Thangapavanu: Priya's fake mother
- Sesu as TV Serial Director
- Yaashika Aanand as herself
Original soundtrack
Title song
It was written by lyricist Arun Bharathi, composed by the music director X.Paulraj, and sung by M. M. Manasi.Soundtrack
Remakes
Crossover episodes and special episodes
- From 13 May 2019 - 18 May 2019 in Episodes 325 - 330, Roja had a crossover with Lakshmi Stores.
- On 9 February 2020, the serial held a 1-hour special episode from 9:30 PM to 10:30 PM.
International broadcast
- The show's episodes are released on YouTube channel Saregama TV Shows Tamil after the original telecast.
- It airs in Sri Lanka, South East Asia, Middle East, United States, Canada, Europe, Oceania, South Africa and Sub Saharan Africa on Sun TV and Sun TV HD.
- The drama has episodes on the Sun Nxtapp.
- It is also available via the internet protocol television service Lebara Play, Lyca TV and YuppTV.
- It airs on Sri Lanka Tamil channel on Shakthi TV from 18 March 2019 with Sinhala subtitles and PEO TV.