The other day, Actor Suriya met the media in Chennai to brief on ‘Herovaa Zerovaa’, an educational awareness campaign. He explained how his NGO Agaram came into existence. His father was looking after the education of one rural boy Rajani. The boy used to be first in his class. When he completed his eighth standard, again getting the first rank, Suriya’s father Actor Sivakumar presented him a purse of Rs 8000. Young Rajani told him that he needed only Rs 1200/- for his books and that he would present the remaining Rs 6800/- to a brilliant girl student in the Xth Standard, who was reluctant to come out of her home since all she got was a pair of torn clothes. This was the spark that ignited Agaram. Thank you, Rajani.

"I look upon those days of struggle sentimentally. I was in a small room, paying a monthly rent of Rs 100. It was a tenement structure, where all the residents had to share a toilet. …At that time, I felt I had to prove a point. I thought I was someone great, an Uday Shankar being wasted in a small room. Then, hunger. The prospect of finding a square meal got the better of me and I became an assistant dance master to Thangappan, who had a thorough knowledge of classical dance. He was very proud of his antecedents. He was a railway porter once. Then R C Shakti noticed me; he believed I had the potential to become an actor. Meanwhile I was ghostwriting for the Christian Arts and communication Centre. I was spreading the word of Jesus. I wanted to do so much, at the age of 18 I wanted to direct, I was itching to take off. I wrote a script about a village boy’s affair with a widow, a kind of desi 'Midnight Cowboy'. At 18, one is obsessed with the idea of unorthodox relationships."....
Guess whose biography is this passage from? Yes, you guessed it right. That was Kamal Haasan, as told to Khalid Mohamed. I found this as I was casually going through Cinema India’s Annual number, 1992 (Reflections On Acting).

The same issue has some reflections of India's Clark Gable - Sivaji Ganesan. I quote: His friends believe that as a politician, perhaps he lacks manipulative skills. After all, he is highly emotional, both on and off the screen. He confesses, “ No star should be a politician”..Asked about his future plans recently, Sivaji Ganesan said, “There is no question of future plans. I take each day as it comes. I don’t worry about tomorrow. Tomorrow’s problems are for another day.”

I saw an interesting catch-phrase on a Youth’s T-shirt. It read: 'We blog – therefore we are'.

H Ramakrishnan