Maharani Season 1

1998 - Bihar is going through a financial crisis and caste wars are rampant throughout the state. Dileep Ram, a Dalit, is killed by Thakur Saheb, a landlord because Dileep refused to send his wife to work at Thakur’s mansion. In reprisal, Naxal leader Shankar Mahto kills Thakur along with eight of his men. This leads to political unrest in Bihar and brings the factionalism in the ruling party out in the open.

CM Bheema Bharti survives the fatal attack but is bedridden. RJSP central observer Ramjeevan Bohra informs Bheema that due to his ill health, the party has decided to elect a new CM. Bheema agrees to resign with a condition that if he gets maximum votes then he will announce his successor and Bohra agrees. A triangular fight ensues between Bheema Bharti, Naveen Kumar and Party President Gauri Shankar Pandey.

Illiterate and shy Rani Bharti is completely out of depth while taking CM’s oath in cabinet meeting. She feels extremely humiliated as media roasts her and calls her rubber-stamp CM. She decides not to go to the office but when Bheema’s PA Mishra Ji reminds her that her reluctance to take charge as CM could lead to another murder attempt on Bheema, Rani gets the message. She orders DGP to find people who were behind murder attempt on Bheema.

CM Rani Bharti faces the first big crisis in the office when Veer Sena, an army of upper-caste people, massacred 37 lower caste people in Laxmanpur village. Rani Bharti gives a 13-day ultimatum to DGP to catch Mukhiya. DGP nabs Mukhiya’s right-hand man Kunwar Singh in a daring operation but he refuses to divulge Mukhiya's whereabouts. Meanwhile, Rani gets to know from Finance Secretary Parvez Alam that the state has no money to even pay its employees and all state treasuries are empty.

Ranchi DM Manak Gupta pays a visit to Machan Baba, a religious leader, and informs him about the Finance Secretary's visit to Ranchi treasury for audit. Machan baba asks him to be alert. Parvez Alam and his Deputy Anjani Srivastav visit the treasury office in the night and find suspicious bills. Parvez reports to CM Rani that Animal Husbandry Dept (AHD) has done fraudulent withdrawals in millions from Ranchi treasury. CM orders him to investigate AHD withdrawals from all 48 treasuries of Bihar.

Parvez Alam interrogates 4 AHD officials of Ranchi and gets to know withdrawals were done by submitting fake bills of supply of seeds, fodder, medical equipment by companies such as VC Foods. He also gets to know fraud was happening with AHD minister Prem Kumar’s approval. Rani confronts Prem and asks for his resignation. Prem reminds her that if he goes, her govt will fall too.

Mukhiya with help of SP Nishikant traps and kills ASI Ranjana Kumari, a Naxal sympathizer, who had helped DGP to arrest Kunwar Singh. Shankar Mahto vows revenge. Rani Bharti dismisses Prem Kumar and orders CID investigation into the scam. Infuriated Prem Kumar, on the advice of Gauri Shankar Pandey, leaves RJS party and joins hands with Naveen Kumar along with 8 more MLAs from RJS on the occasion of Makar Sankranti. This brings Rani’s Govt into a minority.

Bheema, who could now walk with the help of a stick, meets Governor and asks him why did he try to kill him? After all, Machan baba couldn’t do anything without Governor’s approval. Governor reminds him that he had gone back on his words. Bheema offers Governor a deal - that he won’t touch Machan Baba and in return, Governor won’t call Rani Govt, which was in minority, for floor test as demanded by Naveen. Bheema, true to his word, stops Rani from arresting Machan baba.

Rani meets Governor at midnight and demands an explanation. Governor drops a bombshell, tells her Bheema Bharti too was part of the Seed Scam. In fact, 3 years ago, post elections, his party RJSP was short of a majority in the Assembly and Bheema became CM only after he agreed to make Virender Thakur, Governor Protégé, and Animal Husbandry Minister in the previous govt, as AHD minister in his government too.

Rani confronts Bheema about the scam, death of Virendra Thakur and his association with Naxal leader Shankar Mahto. Bheema says Virender had joined hands with Mukhiya to kill backward caste people and destabilize his govt, so he asked his college friend Shankar Mahto to kill him. Later he made Prem Kumar as AHD minister with approval from Governor. Bheema adds he did nothing wrong as these are small prices to pay for the social change he brought in Bihar.