'Rana Naidu' Season 2 Ending Explained & Finale Recap: Is Rauf Mirza Dead?

Season 2 of Netflix India’s action-drama series Rana Naidu delivers a highly intense and action-packed experience, staying true to its character and tone, although it is arguably too far-fetched and superficial at times. As Rana has to deal with a new foe this season, Rauf Mirza, he has to once again take on the role of the protector of his family, especially with his children now being targeted. In Rana Naidu season 2’s ending, the protagonist has to face problems on multiple fronts, as Rauf has no intentions to let the Naidus live, while a business negotiation Rana had earlier tried to make now goes horribly wrong.

Spoiler Alert

What was Inspector Naveen’s real plan?

Inspector Naveen, one of the new characters in Rana Naidu season 2, happens to be a police officer planted in the life of Naina Naidu in order to get close to Rana and nab him. Whatever Naveen tells Naina about his personal life seems to be the truth, as he is indeed currently single after getting divorced from his wife, and he is genuinely romantically interested in her. However, Naveen hides the fact that he is a corrupt police officer unlawfully working for the politician, OB Mahajan, who wants to bring Rana down, by hook or by crook. Mahajan had hired Naveen to enter Naina’s life to get information about her husband, since Rana no longer works for Mahajan after having severed ties with him atthe end of season 1. The politician is now desperately in search of any information that he can use to blackmail Rana and bring the fixer back to working for him. But Mahajan does not figure out that Naveen has really started to feel for Naina and that he wants to be with her and therefore protect her at all costs. This is why Naveen lies to Mahajan about Naina not having come to his hotel room, both because he wants to keep the woman out of trouble and also seemingly because he wants to directly deal with the Oberois, the newest partners in Rana’s shady business. The police officer’s only intention is to somehow remove Rana from the scene and be together with Naina officially, and so the Oberois can naturally help him more in this regard than OB Mahajan. 

Therefore, Naveen resumes his role as a police officer and investigates the suspicious disappearance of Paritosh and goes over to the Oberoi’s mansion for more clues. He is obviously a sharp police detective, as is evident from him quickly realizing that the Sultan’s sword is missing from the mantelpiece, and it might very well have been used to do something that is being hidden from the world. Since Rana is the official fixer to the Oberoi family at present, Naveen obviously figures out that his rival in love must be involved in the matter, and he starts to tail Srini, which leads him to the missing sword, and thus an off-screen confrontation follows. It is unclear whether Naveen arrests Viraj Oberoi for further questioning or he makes a deal with the billionaire, but either way, he is left alone with the murder weapon and a story told by Viraj that benefits him. Thus, Naveen’s final plan is to sneak into Rana’s house when the place is empty and plant the murder weapon there in order to make it obvious to the police that the protagonist had killed Paritosh. Once the sword is planted, Naveen sends a team of policemen to raid the house and tells them that a reliable source had told him about its location.

Does Naina realize and rectify her mistake?

Naveen’s plan works perfectly until Naina realizes her mistake and decides to change her allegiance back to her husband at the very end of the series. Naina first started to suspect Naveen’s intentions when she found out he was actually a police officer and not a real estate agent, as he had told her. She was also quite disturbed and wary of the man’s habit of incessantly calling her, even when she was attending public events with Rana. Naina must have realized that Naveen was unhealthily obsessed with her, and when Rana informs her of the plan the police officer and Viraj had made to bring him down, she decides to help her husband.

Naina goes over to Naveen’s house and pretends to be stuck in a difficult situation, claiming that she wants to leave Rana to be with Naveen but also fearing that her husband will come seeking revenge against her and might even kill her. The police officer naturally starts to assure her that Rana will be put away for good this time, and so he will not be able to pose a threat in their relationship. Although he does not say anything in detail at first, Naina’s clever requests to be more precise eventually work, and Naveen reveals how he has planted the murder weapon in her house to frame Rana. This is enough information for Naina, and she immediately shares it with Rana, who then sends his assistant, Lara, to the house to retrieve the sword before the police reach the place. Thus, the police are unable to find anything at the Naidu house, and by the time Naveen realizes that his supposed lover has sold him out, Rana is already there to save her from any trouble. Naveen lands a blow on Naina’s face but is unable to cause her any more harm, as Rana intervenes and shoots his kneecaps as punishment for having manipulated and hurt his wife. 

Why does Viraj plan to get rid of Rana?

Viraj Oberoi is a ruthless character who is only concerned about his own financial benefits and who is dearly in love with the social power that he holds. It is revealed that Viraj has reached such a lofty position in life through numerous criminal, shady, and outright preposterous activities, many of which he had carried out with the help of his son-in-law, Paritosh. Therefore, when Alia Oberoi decides to divorce Paritosh, leaving him out of any real chance at inheriting the Oberoi wealth someday, he chooses to pick a fight against his father-in-law by threatening to expose all his crimes. Being a highly influential man (he is close friends with the Home Minister, after all) with a horrible temper, Viraj kills Paritosh with the Sultan’s sword relic that he values so much.

Viraj now obviously needs to get himself out of trouble, which he initially wants to do with the help of the fixer, Rana Naidu, by promising to get Rana’s elder brother, Tej, released from prison. But when Naveen finds out about Paritosh’s death and the Sultan’s sword being the murder weapon, Viraj does not take even a minute to turn against the very fixer who had gotten rid of all the evidence for him. The billionaire’s character is such that he is very used to pitting people against one another for his own benefit, and so he tells the police a false story. He claims that when Paritosh was angered by Alia’s decision to end their marriage, Rana had to be called to speak with the enraged man to try and calm him down.

It was Viraj who had earlier lied to Naina about Rana having an affair with Alia, and so he obviously does not mind spreading such lies about his daughter once again. This gives one more angle of motive for Rana to have killed Paritosh, as the two men could have easily fought over the love of Alia. Viraj knows far too well that Rana has more chances of forming an alliance with his daughter than with him, and so the fixer is of no value to him at all. Thus, Viraj Oberoi tells the police that Rana had killed Paritosh with the Sultan’s sword, had left the house with the dead body and the murder weapon, and then had threatened to kill Viraj and his family if he spoke to the police about the matter. 

How does Rana take advantage of Viraj and Alia’s strained relationship?

The strained relationship between the members of the Oberoi household, particularly the father and daughter, Viraj and Alia, was no secret. Viraj evidently did not think much of his daughter, while Alia was adamant on proving her worth and doing something big in the world of business, irrespective of her father’s validation. Rana had made use of this very distance between the two characters in order to get hold of a 5% stake in the franchise cricket team earlier in the season, and now he once again resorts to the same means to protect himself from legal trouble.

Rana learns from his informant in the police about the claims that Viraj had made against him, and he approaches Alia for a deal once again. Rana tells Alia that he is about to go after Viraj, and if she helps him out in the matter, then it will be incredibly beneficial for both of them, as she will be left to take over the entire family business. Alia does not agree to this deal, but the seeds of doubt about how her father will never value her are already sown in her head. Funnily enough, Rana does not have to do anything more, but the distrust between the father and daughter simply does the job for him.

Viraj tells Alia to lie to the investigators about her having been a witness to Rana killing Paritosh, and he promises to hand over the business to her in exchange, saying that he will soon retire and move to London. But the woman firmly believes that her father is making this promise only to protect himself, and so she tells a very different lie to the police, stating that she had witnessed Viraj Oberoi kill Paritosh. She even makes it a bit convincing by saying that she could not reveal this secret earlier because she wanted to protect her father but then had changed her mind because he had, after all, killed her beloved husband.

In the meantime, Rana has the Sultan’s sword and the dead body of Paritosh planted in Viraj’s car by Srini, meaning that when the police rush in to confirm Alia’s claims, they find Viraj with all the incriminating evidence and even his fingerprints on the murder weapon. Thus, in season 2’s ending, Viraj is arrested for the murder of Paritosh, and Alia becomes the head of the Oberoi family business. Alia’s decision did pay off, for as soon as Viraj felt that he was out of trouble, he stated that she would take charge of the business only after four or five years, for he had changed his mind about retiring just yet.

Do the injured Naidu family members survive?

Although the entire Naidu family reunites towards the end of season 2 to celebrate the marriage between Jaffa and Tasneem, a horrific shootout executed by Rauf and his men mars the occasion. Tej and Tasneem are severely injured by the bullets and have to be rushed to the hospital for immediate treatment. It initially seems like Tasneem is in serious trouble, perhaps because she was also pregnant, while Tej makes a steady recovery. The situation causes a lot of grief and tension for Jaffa, who simply cannot imagine his life without Tasneem, despite having known the young woman for a relatively short period of time. She was the first and only outsider to whom he could completely open up about the traumas from his childhood and also make love without being reminded of the brutal acts committed against him. 

Jaffa’s decision to marry Tasneem and help raise her baby established the strong bond between the two characters, and this development did give hopes of a bright future to both of them. On the other hand, though, Tej’s purpose in life seems to have been served in every way, although he could not accomplish most of his dreams. His only chance of settling down with Ana and moving to Portugal had sailed away after Ana decided to leave him once and for all following his arrest. Tej’s only other passion, his stunt studio, was also no longer his, as he had just (very happily) gifted the property to Jaffa, knowing well that the younger brother will need the money to raise his family. Therefore, in Rana Naidu’s ending, Tasneem makes a sudden and rather unexpected recovery, as she comes back to her senses and the treatment starts to work rapidly on her. However, Tej’s condition worsens, and he cannot keep up the fight long enough, meaning that the eldest of the Naidu siblings passes away from the injuries sustained in the shootout.

What does Rauf reveal before his death?

Tej’s death further pushes Rana to take direct action against Rauf Mirza, which he had already been contemplating, but there is a real sense of vengeance in the decision now. Rana, Srini, and Lara roll into Rauf’s neighborhood like an army, carrying sniper rifles and miniguns, and they are eventually helped by Naga as well. When the final confrontation between Rana and Rauf takes place, the latter solves the one last piece of mystery that had not yet been addressed. 

Rauf had decided to wipe out the Naidu family in the end in order to protect himself from the police, as he had found out that a security camera on the road had recorded him murdering Toofan and Rehaan. While Rauf had secured this footage, meaning that it could no longer be found and used to incriminate him, the video also showed Nitya running away from the car a few minutes later. Unbeknownst to him, Nitya had witnessed Rauf’s double murder, which meant that she was now finally targeted by him. How exactly Rauf had found out about his video, for it had initially been kept a secret from him by one of his henchmen, remains a mystery until the man himself reveals the information right before being killed by Rana. Rauf tells Rana that ‘his father’ had given him the video of Nitya, and although the protagonist (along with us) feels that Naga was the main perpetrator, this was not really the case. Although Naga was Rana’s biological father, Rauf had referred to another, political ‘father,’ or guide, who had helped Rana reach his current position in life.

After his arrival at Mumbai, Rana had been thoroughly helped and supported by the corrupt politician, OB Mahajan, obviously for his own motives. Therefore, Rauf refers to this ‘father’ in his last words, as it was Mahajan who had handed over the video to him, as the politician had made one last-ditch effort to blackmail Rana Naidu into working for him. Once Rana kills Rauf, he asks to meet Mahajan and confronts the man, making it very obvious that there is no way for the politician to escape. However, he does not kill Mahajan, out of respect for their long-standing relationship, and instead coerces Mahajan into killing himself, since his political career and his personal life are now completely destroyed.

What happens to Rana and Naga?

Rana Naidu season 2 ends with the Naidu family gathering once again, this time for the unfortunate funeral of Tej. Rana and Naga cremate their beloved Tej’s body together, which is the first hint at the relationship between the son and the father finally recovering. But before the family can settle with their loss, another shock comes their way, as the Mumbai Police reach the cremation grounds to arrest Rana for the murder of Rauf Mirza. Thus, Rana cannot escape the law after having killed Rauf, as the villainous criminal was a much-loved politician in his neighborhood as well. As Rana is taken away in the police van, it is Naga who immediately assumes the role of the protector of the family, and he also promises to soon come and rescue his son from prison.

What to expect from season 3?

Netflix will naturally want to continue Rana Naidu, and season 3 will be more focused on Naga’s contributions to the family. Although Naga has been around for quite some time now, he has still been overshadowed by his son, which is about to change soon. We will get to see more of Naga, as the man plans and executes a prison break for Rana, which might once again have difficult consequences for the protagonist. Alia Oberoi will also hang around, waiting to make use of Rana’s alliance, and it will be interesting to watch how she takes control of her family business. Viraj might also manage to get out of prison and cause trouble for the protagonist. Finally, Rana might also have to deal with more situations in his personal life, as Naina, and eventually his children, will surely grow tired of his actions having terrible consequences on all their lives. 

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