Kaal 2005

Two British nationals are killed by a ferocious tiger in Corbett National Park in India. This incident is followed by several other tiger attacks, and many deaths result, prompting National Geographic to send a correspondent, Krish Thapar, John Abraham to the park to ascertain what really happened. Krish is accompanied by his wife Riya Thapar, Esha Deol.

A group of youngsters—Dev Malhotra, [Vivek Oberoi], his girlfriend Ishika, [Lara Dutta], and his friends Sajid [Kushal Punjabi], and Vishal [Vishal Malhotra]—are on a hunting trip in the hopes of sighting and shooting some big prey. Their car breaks down, and Bagga, [Vineet Sharma], an alcoholic passerby driver, gives them a lift. Bagga’s car accidentally hits Krish Thapar’s car, [John Abraham], which also breaks down, and the two groups decide to travel together in Bagga’s car, leaving a mechanic to repair Krish’s car.

Just a few seconds after they set off, the mechanic disappears and they believe that a wild animal just took him away and decide not to risk their lives to look for him.

Bagga finds them a guesthouse to stay which is owned by a man named DS Pandey, [Daya Shankar Pandey]. Pandey is a guide who agrees to lead them the next day to the core area, where tigers live, for hunting. That very night Pandey disappears and his decapitated body is found in the nearby swamp the next day. Krish starts to get suspicious about the real cause of the recent deaths in the jungle, as he is an animal expert and recognizes that Pandey’s death was not the work of a tiger or any other wild animal.

Warned by a forest officer named Bashir Khan, the group decides to leave the jungle. Before they depart, they realize that Sajid has gone missing. Dev assumes that he has gone by himself to the core area for hunting. However, the group decide to leave without Sajid. Soon they find Sajid’s decapitated body by a lake. The rest are soon confronted by three tigers on the way. The group is saved by a mysterious man who introduces himself as Kali Pratap Singh and Ajay Devgn claims to live in the jungle.

On their continued way out of the jungle, they find the road blocked by rocks due to the landslide caused by rain. Kali shows up again and agrees to lead them out of the jungle.

Kali appears to be very knowledgeable about the jungle and its history. Krish, who is now more curious about the mysterious deaths, asks him if he knows what’s behind those deaths. Kali responds by telling them a story about a crazy tour guide in this jungle, who used to lead tourists to the wrong places just to have them killed by wild animals. The people in the nearby villages later caught him and beat him to death but his ghost remains in the jungle and continues to kill tourists. None of them believe Kali’s story.

Bagga later disappears while repairing his car, raising the fear among the rest. Vishal is decapitated shortly thereafter when a window of their car flies and hits him due to the explosion.

The rest of the group members carry on and reach a deserted guesthouse in the evening, outside which there is a well. They all go to sleep after being warned by Kali not to get close to the well. Riya wakes up thirsty in the night. She decides to get water from the well despite Kali’s warning, and is later accidentally hung by her foot in the well and dies.

The remaining group members figure out that Riya is dead and try to pull her body out of the well, while Dev suddenly notices that Kali does not have a reflection in the well’s water. Dev immediately realizes that the story Kali told them earlier is true and that Kali is the tour guide mentioned in the story. Dev shows the videos to Krish and Ishika, proving Kali is a ghost and is indeed responsible for all the mysterious deaths happening in the jungle. They decide to escape the jungle once and for all. Kali returns to the well with timbers and upon finding nobody there, he realizes that the trio have run away.

Flashbacks reveal that the villagers did not kill Kali but instead, took him to the core area where he was brutally thrashed and then thrown in front of a hungry tiger that mauled him to death. The story shifts back to present day where Kali’s ghost now standing by the well expresses his immense anger and hatred for tourists who come to the jungle to hunt wild animals and disrupt their well being without any regrets. This is the sole reason why he misleads and kills tourists who come to the jungle.

Krish, Dev and Ishika experience several attempts on their lives on their way out of the jungle, arranged by Kali but finally manage to reach the road where Bagga and Khan arrive in a jeep and successfully drive them away from the jungle.

Sometime later, Krish who is now fully aware of what caused those mysterious deaths in that jungle, successfully completes his report in which he deems the deaths to be the result of tiger attacks. He reluctantly decides not to disclose the real cause of those deaths because he knows no one will believe him. Instead he credits Kali as the main contributor to the report. Meanwhile in the jungle, Kali encounters a new group of tourists and has one of them killed by a truck.