| Published on 27-09-2006 In National |
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| Karunanidhi's honeymoon with Kollywood |
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Written by
R. Bhagwan Singh |
Kollywood never had it so good. First it was pampered by Ms Jayalalithaa when the AIADMK Amma was the chief minister of Tamil Nadu and granted a whole lot of concessions for the cinewallahs, the most important gift being the anti-piracy legislation to lock up offenders for a year. Crores of rupees were lost every year to the video pirates and a grateful industry got up a glittering celebration in the sprawling Jawaharlal Nehru Indoor Stadium in Chennai in November 2005 to thank the Puratchi Thalaivi, the revolutionary leader of the 21st century Tamils.
And when the government changed, despite all the big support from the stars hitting the hot and dusty campaign road to campaign for Amma, Kollywood crossed over to the cheer-brigade of Kalaignar, the littérateur as the DMK chief M. Karunanidhi is fondly referred to. The film industry is now busy preparing to host even a grander thanksgiving for him on September 23 at the same Nehru stadium. The stars are expected to get so tired jiving to the commemorative song, specially being penned in honour of Mr Karunanidhi by the celebrated cinema poets Vaali and Vairamuthu, that Kollywood has declared holiday for shooting on the following day as well.
Keen on winning back the film industry from Jayalalithaa's stable, the DMK chief announced a slew of concessions soon after assuming office, such as waiver of entertainment tax if the film has a Tamil title (to promote Tamil language, now threatened by a surfeit of English!), slashing of charges for shooting in public places plus single-window clearance for obtaining sanctions, Rs. seven lakh subsidy for quality low-budget Tamil films (they will also benefit for ET waiver for the first four weeks), forming of state and district level committees to solve industry disputes, et cetera.
Chennai is a city flooded with statues, old and new. The chief minister added two more—of Nadigar Thilagam (greatest among actors) Sivaji Ganesan and of the doyen of south Indian cinema A. V. Meiyappan, who had founded the famous AVM Studios over 50 years ago. The Sivaji statue at the busy Marina Beach junction raised a few controversies; even a court case alleging it would obstruct traffic and even amount to insulting Mahatma Gandhi, whose statue was just across the road.
With the Madras High Court refusing to entertain the PIL, the chief minister gleefully went through the unveiling ceremony on July 21, even going emotional recalling his close association with the thespian—they had shared a huge hit in yesteryears called Parasakthi, in which Sivaji had done the lead role and Mr Karunanidhi wrote the electrifying dialogues. The evening beachside reverberated with applause when the DMK chief dramatically declared, "You might have had to erect a statue for me if only the court passed an adverse verdict", meaning he would died of heartbreak.
Being a staunch follower of the rationalist EVR Periyar, Mr Karunanidhi recently announced a whopping grant of Rs.95 lakh for the upcoming film Periyar starring the macho hero Sathiaraj in the lead role and Khushoo as second wife Maniammai. The grant from state funds was meant to match the great social reformer's lifespan of 95 years. Periyar had formed the Dravidar Kazhagam, from which the DMK was born, and was a hardcore atheist, which Mr Karunanidhi too is. An angry citizen filed a public interest litigation in the Madras High Court seeking to halt the wasteful spending to fund movies from public exchequer. The case is still pending in the court but meanwhile, money has been released to the movie makers.
Announcing the Sept 23 felicitations for Mr Karunanidhi, the president of the Tamil Film Directors' Association S. A. Chandrasekhar and the chief of the Tamil Film Producers Council Ramanarayanan recently sang the chief minister's praise and declared that his largesse with state concessions, inspired by close association with the film industry dating back to several decades, was responsible for the revival of Kollywood's health---never mind the identical script enacted at the Jayalalithaa show just six months before.
The September show is being planned on a grand scale—one industry source said that the memento being readied for Kalaignar would be so huge and grand that it would well reflect the special bondage that Kollywood shared with him, starting with his early days as a script-writer. There could be some surprises too at this never-seen-before event.
Such as the presence of the newly elected president of the South India Film Artistes Association, Sarath Kumar, who had crossed over from the DMK to the rival AIADMK camp just before the May 8 state elections. Sarath was a DMK Rajya Sabha member and his wife Radhika was pretty close to the Karunanidhi family, so the parting of ways was quite painful, particularly when the macho hero went to town accusing his political mentor of sabotaging his political career and insulting his Nadar community.
It is said that initially Sarath did not want to associate himself with the function as it would be too embarrassing to face Kalaignar but friends convinced him that the occasion could provide an ideal platform for a patch-up, transition yet again from the opposition to the ruling camp. Besides, politics and cinema being so passionately close in the Dravidian politics, Kollywood has always been a flirting damsel more than willing to be courted by the new ruler in Fort St. George. |
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