Thursday, August 25, 2011
Telling the time with Captain
CHENNAI: Keychains, photographs, rings and t-shirts are passe. The latest item on the stands is wristwatches. The stall at the DMDK headquarters in Koyambedu now sells watches with pictures of party chief Vijayakanth and his wife Premalatha on the dial.
"The watches are a new addition to the existing memorabilia of flags, badges, reflectors and caps. We don't sell much in the city. Sales are huge when the cadres come for functions from places like Vellore and Tiruvannamalai," says Kannan, the shopkeeper, as he shows off the watches which come with either a leather strap or a gold link chain. Kannan says he has already sold a couple of watches costing between Rs 150 and Rs 650 since he took charge two weeks ago.
"Only rich cadres can afford to buy watches. Others will go for small items like badges and reflectors," says Selvaganapathi, a DMDK cadre from Avadi, who is saving up to buy a watch. "It'll be something special to have a watch with Captain's face on it."
"The watches are a new addition to the existing memorabilia of flags, badges, reflectors and caps. We don't sell much in the city. Sales are huge when the cadres come for functions from places like Vellore and Tiruvannamalai," says Kannan, the shopkeeper, as he shows off the watches which come with either a leather strap or a gold link chain. Kannan says he has already sold a couple of watches costing between Rs 150 and Rs 650 since he took charge two weeks ago.
"Only rich cadres can afford to buy watches. Others will go for small items like badges and reflectors," says Selvaganapathi, a DMDK cadre from Avadi, who is saving up to buy a watch. "It'll be something special to have a watch with Captain's face on it."
Vijaykanth's son the new hero
DMDK president and Tamilnadu opposition leader Vijaykanth's younger son Shanmuga Pandian is all set to make his onscreen debut soon.
Shanmuga has completed his XII Standard and is taking dance classes and martial arts training now.
Vijaykanth's wife Premalatha was busy looking for a apt script for her son's debut. Now the latest news is is that Vijayakanth was highly impressed with a comedy entertainer narrated by director Bhoopathy Pandian.
There are reports that the Vijayakanth's son may soon start shooting for Bhoopathy Pandian.
Tamil Nadu calls for sanctions against Sri Lanka
Chennai, June 8 (IANS) The Tamil Nadu assembly Wednesday unanimously passed a resolution urging the Indian government to impose economic sanctions on Sri Lanka and approach the United Nations to declare those responsible for the "genocide" in the island country as war criminals.
The resolution said India and other countries should impose sanctions to force the Sri Lankan government to rehabilitate the internally displaced people urgently.
Moving the resolution, Chief Minister J. Jayalalithaa said Tamils in Sri Lanka were being treated as second grade citizens.
She said that instead of providing a political settlement, the Sri Lankan government killed innocent people by bombing residential areas and hospitals.
Jayalalithaa said India, along with other nations, should impose economic sanctions so that the Tamils living in rehabilitation camps can go back to their homes and live with the same political rights being enjoyed by the Sinhalese.
In her reply to the debate on the resolution, Jayalalithaa said that protesting against the discrimination, the Sri Lankan Tamils have been demanding "self rule", or a separate Tamil Eelam, since the 1980s.
She said that killing of Tamils in Sri Lanka reached its zenith with the assassination of former Indian prime minister Rajiv Gandhi by the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) in 1991 in Tamil Nadu.
She said it was on her insistence that the Indian government had banned LTTE in 1992 and it was her government in 2002 that passed a resolution urging the central government to demand extradition of LTTE leader V. Prabhakaran to face trial in the Rajiv Gandhi assassination case.
Jayalalithaa said the situation in Sri Lanka changed with Mahinda Rajapakse becoming the president in 2005.
Citing news reports about the Indian Army training around 100 Sri Lankan Army personnel in Haryana and India supplying sophisticated arms to the country, Jayalalithaa said the Sri Lankan government started attacking Tamils in 2008-end and the beginning of 2009.
She accused the DMK of betraying the interests of Sri Lankan Tamils by staging several dramas instead of exerting pressure on the central government to ensure ceasefire in the island by threatening to withdraw its support.
The DMK members, while extending their support to the resolution, objected to the comments by Leader of Opposition and DMDK founder A. Vijayakanth.
Senior DMK leader Duraimurugan sought the chair's permission to counter Vijayakanth, which was denied, leading to a walkout by the party.
The resolution said India and other countries should impose sanctions to force the Sri Lankan government to rehabilitate the internally displaced people urgently.
Moving the resolution, Chief Minister J. Jayalalithaa said Tamils in Sri Lanka were being treated as second grade citizens.
She said that instead of providing a political settlement, the Sri Lankan government killed innocent people by bombing residential areas and hospitals.
Jayalalithaa said India, along with other nations, should impose economic sanctions so that the Tamils living in rehabilitation camps can go back to their homes and live with the same political rights being enjoyed by the Sinhalese.
In her reply to the debate on the resolution, Jayalalithaa said that protesting against the discrimination, the Sri Lankan Tamils have been demanding "self rule", or a separate Tamil Eelam, since the 1980s.
She said that killing of Tamils in Sri Lanka reached its zenith with the assassination of former Indian prime minister Rajiv Gandhi by the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) in 1991 in Tamil Nadu.
She said it was on her insistence that the Indian government had banned LTTE in 1992 and it was her government in 2002 that passed a resolution urging the central government to demand extradition of LTTE leader V. Prabhakaran to face trial in the Rajiv Gandhi assassination case.
Jayalalithaa said the situation in Sri Lanka changed with Mahinda Rajapakse becoming the president in 2005.
Citing news reports about the Indian Army training around 100 Sri Lankan Army personnel in Haryana and India supplying sophisticated arms to the country, Jayalalithaa said the Sri Lankan government started attacking Tamils in 2008-end and the beginning of 2009.
She accused the DMK of betraying the interests of Sri Lankan Tamils by staging several dramas instead of exerting pressure on the central government to ensure ceasefire in the island by threatening to withdraw its support.
The DMK members, while extending their support to the resolution, objected to the comments by Leader of Opposition and DMDK founder A. Vijayakanth.
Senior DMK leader Duraimurugan sought the chair's permission to counter Vijayakanth, which was denied, leading to a walkout by the party.
Vadivelu targets Rajinikanth!
After campaigning for the DMK during the recent elections to Tamil Nadu assembly, Vadivelu had become a national phenomenon.
The English news channels has made him out to be the 'real hero' of DMK campaign machinery as he was able to demolish the credibility of 'Captain' Vijaykanth .
Now after meeting Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M Karunanidhi today (April 29) morning, he has taken on Superstar Rajinikanth.
The buzz is that initially Vadivelu was offered a role in Rajinikanth's KS Ravikumar directed Rana, but at the last minute he was dropped.
It seems he was replaced by Ganjakarupu, which irked the senior comedian.
So when a reporter asked Vadivelu about him being removed from Rajinikanth's film, the comedian shot back: "I just don't care,whether it is Rana or Gana! Everything will change once the results
are out on May 13 and Kalaingar comes back as the CM."
‘Political’ channels on EC radar
The Election Commission is considering new guidelines to regulate TV news channels run by persons affiliated to political parties during elections in a bid to check malpractices. The decision was taken after complaints of misuse of news channels to woo voters was reported from Tamil Nadu
and Kerala, where all major parties run a TV channel.
Some of the measures being considered is to divide the cost of running these channels in election expenditure of all candidates of the party supported by the channel. In case, individual candidates are promoted, the cost of that campaign will be automatically added to the expenditure of that candidate.
According to officials, the job of monitoring the new guidelines will be of district-level electronic and print media monitoring committee, which the EC set up during elections. The committee will have powers to issue notices to TV channels violating the new guidelines.
Even though I&B ministry guidelines prohibit a party to run a TV news channel there is no ban on persons with political affiliations to run them.
Therefore all news channels said to be of political parties are owned by individuals.
For instance, Tamil Nadu, which has the maximum number of such channels including Kalaignar TV, owned by DMK chief K Karunanidhi’s family members and Jaya TV is owned by Jayalalithaa herself, not by their respective political parties. Captain TV is owned by actor-turned-politician Vijaykanth besides Mega TV. Congress also joined the bandwagon with the launch of Vasanth channel.
In Kerala, the CPM-backed Malayalam Communications have several channels while Congressmen have their Jaihind channel. MK Muneer of Muslim League recently started India Vision.
In Andhra, the late YSR’s son Jaganmohan Reddy owns Sakshi TV and newspaper while Reddy brothers of Karnataka also own a news channel.
“News channels owned by politicians are a new tool to manipulate electoral system....It is paid news of another kind,” a senior EC official said.
Sarath Kumar trashes rumour
The industry folks, especially the producers, were jumping with joy when the rumours of Nadigar Sangham launching a TV channel spread like wildfire.
The buzz was that Sarath Kumar, the current president of Nadigar Sangham and Vijayakanth, the opposition leader in the state assembly and former president of Nadigar Sangham, had met and discussed the possibility of launching a new television channel to help Tamil film producers.
It was also reported that Nadigar Sangham would buy the satellite rights of all films, irrespective of whether they were big or small, at a fixed rate. Another option was of sharing the revenue after airing the said movie.
In the present scenario, movie audiences are very smart and only films with good content run, while the rest are rejected.
The only avenue for producers to retrieve their money is through FMS and satellite rights. The latter, in particular, does help them recover a major chunk of their investment. With a mere handful of big TV channels currently buying only big flicks, this news seemed to come as a boon to small and medium film producers.
Sadly their joy was short-lived. When Sarath Kumar was contacted by DC he dismissed the rumours, saying that such a venture would be a Himalayan task for Nadigar Sangham.
“It is not an easy task to start a TV channel. Given the present situation, Nadigar Sangham does not have any such agenda,” he said firmly. And that’s where things stand for now.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
