The accusations by Malayalam actresses against senior artists in the movie industry that they were sexually harassed and abused which have become daily headlines of newspapers and topics of evening debates in TV channel shows are nothing new. A glance over the history of Malayalam and Tamil filmdom will show that many female artists have died mysteriously over the last five decades which the cops just write them off as unnatural deaths or suicides.
All these deaths have their roots in the shadow boxing between artists, directors, producers and film financiers over “casting couch” and refusal of actresses to share bed with their predators.
The first such death to hog the limelight was that of Vijayasree, the Thiruvananthapuram born actress who was a heart throb of movie goers in late 1960s and early 1970s.
The prima donna of South Indian film industry, she was known more as the Marilyn Monroe of Malayalam and Tamil films. Her beauty added to her physique and the then super stars were vying with one another to be case wither as heroes. But she was found dead at the peak of her career in 1974 at the age of 21.
Those were the days when it was impossible to imagine a Malayalam movie which has no Vijayasree.
Though it was claimed that she committed suicide, nobody could give any reason for her decision. Though names of producers Kunchako, Azim Bhai and actor Prem Nazir were linked with her death, investigators stood their ground that it was a suicide.
The death of Shoba, who became the youngest star in the history of Indian cinema at 18 to win the national award for best actress (1979) for her realistic depiction of a wayside worker which demolished the age-old concept of female artists as decorative pieces in films is another tragedy of movies. The Urvashi Award turned out to be Shoba’s swan song.
Within days of the honour being bestowed on her, the artist was found dead in the bed room of her rented house. Balanathan Benjamin Mahendra (known by the screen name Balu Mahendra), a Sri Lankan movie maker who was 25 years senior to her was cited as the cause for Sobha’s “suicide”.
Mahendra had married Sobha and by the time she won the national award, had dumped her and went after another artist. Later he married a child artist whom he met during the making of his movie Yatra.
“Shoba’s life should have been an eye opener for other youngsters and aspiring stars and their parents. Even today we can see many mothers accompanying their daughters to sets and directors’ bungalows in the hope of making their children the future Hema Malinis and Nayan Tharas,” said P K Sreenivasan, chronicler of South Indian films who has authored many books about the unseen and unheard wannabe stars who burnt out before they venture out to the studio floors.
Srinivasan said that Sobha’s death was enmeshed in mystery and he would not describe it as suicide.
Silk Smitha (1960-1996) who took Malayalam, Tamil , Telugu and Kannada films like a storm was another martyr of the world of glamour.
Hailing from a poor family in rural Andhra Pradesh, Smitha was the ‘most and she was known for wanted” artist at the time of her demise as directors, male super stars and technicians waited for her dates.
“Smitha was not the kind of conventional artist who would resort to the extreme measure even in the toughest situation. I strongly believe there was foul play in these deaths,” said Sreenivasan.
He pointed out that there were super mega stars in South India who would go to any extent to get rid of their eyesores.
“There is an actor who ditched her South Indian wife to marry a Punjabi star and then tried to murder her by pushing her doen from the balcony of their house. The third wife ran away for fear of death even as he was wooing the fourth and fifth preys,” said Mankombu Gopalakrishnan, lyricist and story writer.
There are many other stars who have fallen by the wayside. The names Mukesh, Ranjith, Siddique, Raju, Babu Raj, Idavela Babu and Jayasoorya are just tip of the iceberg.
