Konidela Ram Charan Teja (born 27 March 1985), known as Ram Charan, is an Indian actor and film producer who works mainly in Telugu cinema. The son of the actor Chiranjeevi, he is one of the highest-paid stars in India. He is known for Magadheera, Rangasthalam and S. S. Rajamouli’s RRR, whose song “Naatu Naatu” won an Academy Award.
Quick Facts
| Full name | Konidela Ram Charan Teja |
| Born | 27 March 1985, Madras (Chennai) |
| Age | 41 |
| Occupation | Actor, producer |
| Years active | 2007–present |
| Notable films | Chirutha, Magadheera, Dhruva, Rangasthalam, RRR, Peddi |
| Awards | Filmfare Awards South; Nandi Awards |
| Father | Chiranjeevi |
| Spouse | Upasana Kamineni (m. 2012) |
| Children | 1 |
Early Life
He was born in Madras, the only son of the Telugu film star Chiranjeevi and Surekha, the daughter of the comedian Allu Ramalingaiah. He is thus part of the largest film family in Telugu cinema: the actor and politician Pawan Kalyan is his uncle, and the actor Allu Arjun his cousin. He went to schools in Chennai, at Lawrence School, Lovedale, and in Hyderabad, and trained at an acting school in Mumbai.
Career
Debut
His first film, Chirutha (2007), directed by Puri Jagannadh, was a commercial success and won him awards for best debut.
Magadheera
Magadheera (2009), directed by S. S. Rajamouli, a story of lovers reborn after four hundred years, was at the time the most expensive and the most successful Telugu film ever made, and made him a star.
The 2010s
A run of action films followed, some successful, Racha, Naayak and Yevadu, and some not, and a Hindi venture, Zanjeer (2013), failed. He changed direction with Dhruva (2016), a thriller, and then Rangasthalam (2018), in which he played a partly deaf villager in the 1980s. It was his most praised performance and won him the Filmfare Award for Best Actor.
RRR
In Rajamouli’s RRR (2022) he played Alluri Sitarama Raju, a historical revolutionary imagined as a police officer in British service, opposite N. T. Rama Rao Jr. The film earned more than a thousand crore rupees worldwide and found a large audience abroad. “Naatu Naatu”, the dance he and his co-star perform, won the Golden Globe and, in March 2023, the Academy Award for Best Original Song.
After RRR
Game Changer (2025), directed by Shankar, did poorly. Peddi, a rural sports drama directed by Buchi Babu Sana and released in June 2026, was a major success, becoming the highest-earning Telugu film of the year so far.
Producer
In 2016 he founded the Konidela Production Company, which made his father’s comeback film, Khaidi No. 150, and the historical epic Sye Raa Narasimha Reddy.
Other Interests
He owns a polo team and has invested in aviation and sport. He observes the Ayyappa vow of austerity most years, going barefoot and dressed in black for forty-one days before the pilgrimage to Sabarimala.
Personal Life
In June 2012 he married Upasana Kamineni, a businesswoman and the granddaughter of Prathap C. Reddy, the founder of the Apollo Hospitals group. Their daughter, Klin Kaara, was born in June 2023. They live in Hyderabad.
Vels University in Chennai gave him an honorary doctorate in 2024, and Madame Tussauds has made a wax figure of him.
Featured image: Ram Charan at the trailer launch of Game Changer, 2025. Photo by Bollywood Hungama, licensed under CC BY 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
