The film follows the story of a young landless Telangana peasant named Ramayya (Sai Chand) from Siripuram, Nalgonda, a region under foreign rule. The British have appointed the Nizam as the region's governor. The Nizam, in turn, has appointed the Reddys and the Patils as the Zamindars (known locally as Doras) of the region who collect taxes among various other things for the Nizam. Further, the Nizam has granted them with titles, Jagirs and judicial rights enabling them to seize thousands of acres of land from the peasants, turning them into tenants.
Ramayya's newly married friend Ramulu is aghast when his wife is taken by the Dora's men and raped. Ramayya falls in love with a Lambadi girl. When he finds out that she also has to service the Dora sexually, he gets upset and leaves the village. He later repents his anger at her. Ramayya then moves to Suryapet where he works with a seth. The seth's wife attempts to molest him in secrecy. When he rejects her advances, she accuses him of theft. He leaves Suryapet and ends up in Hyderabad where he works as a rickshaw puller.
In Hyderabad, while pulling the rickshaw one day, he coughs a lot. The passenger asks him to stop and walks along with him the rest of the way. He asks Ramayya to get his cough checked. He also advices him to join a union. Ramayya is told to stop rickshaw pulling by a doctor and is asked to find other temporary work. Ramayya joins a factory as a labourer. One day his coworker comes and tells him that there is a speech being given at the gate and asks him to attend. He attends the speech which calls for a strike and unionizing. He recognizes the speaker as the same passenger and goes up to speak to him. Ramayya slowly becomes a part of the union and with the encouragement of his mentor educates himself.
Ramayya eventually moves back to his village and joins the movement against the landlords. The peasants formed various paramilitary groups and launch guerilla warfare attacks across the region with country-made weapons. They raid and take over regional Dora bases across rural Telangana at night and burn all the land documents found in the bases in the open yard symbolising their triumph. Eventually, they take over the village after the Indian Independence.
The Doras manage to escape to Hyderabad reporting the events to the Nizam leadership. The Nizam commands the Razakars, a private Islamist militia, which perpetrates a massacre of the Telangana peasants. After months of burning, looting, rapes and killings, the Indian army marches into Hyderabad and suppresses the Razakars and the Nizam with Operation Polo in September 1948 and annexes the Telangana region back into the Indian Union.
