Nitesh Tiwari’s two-part adaptation of the Ramayana will open worldwide on 6 November, two days before Diwali, producer Namit Malhotra and the director have confirmed. An English-language trailer was released alongside the date.
Ranbir Kapoor plays Rama, Sai Pallavi plays Sita and Yash plays Ravana. Part two is scheduled for Diwali 2027.
What is in the English trailer?
Running just under four minutes, it follows the Hindi cut released a week earlier. Rather than dubbing over the performances, the cast deliver their lines in English themselves.
It opens with Ravana declaring dominion over the heavens, the earth and the underworld, before moving to Rama and his father Dasharatha, the fourteen-year exile, and the encounter with Surpanakha that sets the story in motion.
| Detail | Information |
|---|---|
| Part one release | 6 November 2026 |
| Part two | Diwali 2027 |
| Director | Nitesh Tiwari |
| Score | Hans Zimmer and A.R. Rahman |
| Combined budget | About $500m |
When does Ramayana release?
Ramayana, directed by Nitesh Tiwari, releases worldwide on 6 November 2026, two days before Diwali. It is the first of two parts, with the second scheduled for Diwali 2027. The film adapts Valmiki’s Sanskrit epic, with Ranbir Kapoor as Rama, Sai Pallavi as Sita, Yash as Ravana, Sunny Deol as Hanuman and Ravi Dubey as Lakshman. It is produced by Namit Malhotra’s Prime Focus Studios in association with the visual effects house DNEG and Yash’s Monster Mind Creations. The score is composed by Hans Zimmer and A.R. Rahman, and both parts have been shot for IMAX. Variety reports a combined budget of approximately $500m, which would make it among the most expensive productions in Indian cinema. Part one is expected to conclude with Sita’s abduction, leaving the war with Ravana for part two.
Why that date?
Diwali marks Rama’s return to Ayodhya after fourteen years in exile and his defeat of Ravana. The lamps that define the festival represent the lighting of the city on the night he came home, so a release two days before it places the film directly against the story it tells.
The date is also the birthday of Ranbir Kapoor and Alia Bhatt’s daughter, though the makers have not commented on that.
How big is the production?
Variety puts the combined budget for both parts at approximately $500m, with both shot for IMAX. Indian outlets have reported figures between 1,400 and 1,500 crore rupees.
The ensemble runs deep: Sunny Deol as Hanuman, Arun Govil as Dasharatha, Lara Dutta as Kaikeyi, Kajal Aggarwal as Mandodari, Kunal Kapoor as Indra and Vivek Oberoi among them. Tiwari previously directed Dangal, still the highest-grossing Indian film.
The trailer was first shown at San Diego Comic-Con, with Kapoor, Yash, Tiwari and Malhotra appearing.
Adapting a sacred text
The Ramayana is scripture as well as story, and screen adaptations of it carry a weight commercial films do not. Malhotra has framed the project as an attempt at a faithful and reverent version rather than a reinterpretation, describing it as more than a decade in development.
Casting reflects that. Arun Govil, who plays Dasharatha here, played Rama in the Ramanand Sagar television serial of the late 1980s, a version that shaped how a generation pictured the epic.
The film is in Hindi and will be dubbed into several other languages in addition to the English version.
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Sources for this report
The Redline News Desk
The Redline News desk files and edits world reporting. Every story carries the sources it was built from, and corrections are published on the story itself.
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