Jo Jeeta Wohi Sikandar () also abbreviated as JJWS is a 1992 Indian Hindi-language coming-of-age sports film, directed and co-written by Mansoor Khan, and produced and co-written by Nasir Hussain. The film stars Aamir Khan, Ayesha Jhulka, Deepak Tijori, Pooja Bedi, Mamik Singh and Kulbhushan Kharbanda, whilst Aamir's brother Faisal Khan makes a special appearance. The music was by Jatin–Lalit.
Jo Jeeta Wohi Sikandar was inspired by the 1979 American film Breaking Away. It won two Filmfare Awards, including Best Film. It was remade in Telugu in 1999 as Thammudu which in turn was remade in multiple languages.
Plot
In the hills of Dehradun, a marathon cycle race is the main event at the annual inter-school sports meet. Ratan Lal of Model College, the main contender to Shekhar Malhotra, of the elite Rajput School, narrowly loses to him at the finish line. Ratan's father, Ramlal, an ex-champion himself, vows to buy Ratan an expensive new cycle so that he can compete better next year.
Ramlal saves money for Ratan's cycle from the income at his town square cafe, which Ratan also helps to run. Meanwhile, Shekhar, a rich playboy, sets his eyes on a new entrant to Queens College, Devika. He asks her out but is caught romancing her classmate, Richa. Ratan's younger brother, Sanjay, witnesses all this, and offers a ride to Devika to escape from Shekhar. He pretends to come from a wealthy family to befriend Devika, then helps her plot her revenge against Shekhar. Soon, Devika and Sanjay start going out and he starts buying her expensive gifts from his father's saved money for Ratan.
At an inter-school dance competition event, Devika learns of Sanjay's actual background after seeing him participate with the group from Model College, a modest local school. She dumps him the next day by showing up at his cafe with Shekhar. Following this, a fight breaks out between Sanjay and Shekhar's friends. One of Shekhar's party gets injured when Ratan intervenes on Sanjay's behalf. To exact revenge on him, Shekhar's friends confront Ratan the next morning, while he is out training alone. The fight ends with Ratan falling off the cliff, and landing up in the hospital with severe injuries and a coma. He awakes eventually, but will not recover in time to compete in the annual sports event.
Ramlal is dejected after already having bought the new cycle for Ratan. Sanjay starts taking more responsibility at the cafe, and also announces his intention to compete in that year's race. He is aided by Anjali, who helps him train and prepare for the race. Seeing her dedication to him, he starts reciprocating her romantic feelings for him and they fall in love.
During the race, Shekhar leads out from the field and is out by himself with his group from Rajput. Sanjay catches up and stays with them, but eventually, tangles with Shekhar to fall off-track. The two engage in another fight and fall behind. Resuming the race, Shekhar catches up with the others and emerges in the lead again. Sanjay chases everyone else down, and at the final turn, catches up to Shekhar. He overtakes him at the finish line to win the race. Ratan feels vindicated as Sanjay celebrates Model's first victory in decades.
Cast
Production
The film was directed by Mansoor Khan, and written and produced by Nasir Hussain. Akshay Kumar had auditioned and Milind Soman was signed for Shekhar Malhotra's role, before Deepak Tijori played the role. Aditya Pancholi was selected to play the role of Ratan, but the role went to Mamik Singh, as confirmed by DNA.
The plot has similarities to the 1979 American film Breaking Away. However, Mansoor Khan stated that he only became aware of Breaking Away after the likeness was brought to his attention, some time after the release of Jo Jeeta Wohi Sikander. Both films have several similarities, including friendship, class barriers, bicycle racing, and parental relationship, but otherwise have different narratives, characters, motivations, treatment and racing rules.
Filming
Though it is clearly mentioned in the introductory voice over that the movie is based in Dehradun (in fact, the first word spoken in the movie is "Dehradun"), it is mentioned twice in the movie (both times by the commentator during the cycle race) that it takes place in Kodaikanal. The movie has been shot predominantly in various locations in the south of India, primarily Kodaikanal. Soman had completed 75% of his scenes before being replaced by Tijori.