I have not seen world classics, neither am I a filmmaker who has studied the intricacies of filmmaking. I am a simple man born and brought up in Chennai and studied only up to Std 10, in Tamil medium.

”The new Yahoo! messenger has UTF-8 support, so while sending the text in Hindi or Tamil you don’t have to worry about the font being available on your friends desktop. You just send it and your friend will be able to see it independent of the font.”

A poster that appeared in some parts of Chennai likening film star Kamal Haasan to “Prophet Nabi” has infuriated the city’s Muslim community, but tempers were quickly calmed after the sensitive star disowned responsibility and issued a stern warning to the “miscreants” responsible for the blasphemous comparison.

Celebrating the star’s birthday falling on November 7, a small group of Kamal’s die-hard fans pasted posters in a couple of movie theatres on the busy Anna Road hailing him as the “Prophet Mohammed of the acting world”. The posters angered a section of the Muslims, who complained to the Tamil Nadu Muslim Munnetra Kazhagam (TMMK), which took up the issue with Kamal’s office in the city. “We were shocked when we heard of these posters. There were many threatening phone calls to our office last night. We immediately informed Kamal Sir shooting in Andhra. He was very upset and issued a statement sternly warning these miscreants against misusing his name,” said a Kamal associate. He said the star’s staff also went around the city and tore down all the offending posters.

In his statement, the actor not only distanced himself from those responsible for the offensive posters, but also issued a stiff warning asking the persons responsible to apologise and give an undertaking that they will not repeat such deeds. “That is a service these miscreants could do to TN, a state known for its communal peace and religious amity,” said Kamal, recalling that he had for long kept away from all religious and communal divides.

“My fans converted themselves into welfare associations to do social service 20 years ago,” said the star. Fortunately, the TMMK realised that the miscreants masquerading as Kamal’s fans did not have his blessings. The Muslim outfit accepted Kamal’s statement and withdrew its complaint to the police. “We did not want to precipitate a crisis, a communal problem. We found that Kamal had nothing to do with the posters nor were handiwork of his official welfare associations, so we dropped the protest plan,” said a TMMK spokesperson.

A poster that appeared in some parts of Chennai likening film star Kamal Haasan to “Prophet Nabi” has infuri- ated the city’s Muslim community, but tempers were quickly calmed after the sensitive star disowned responsibility and issued a stern warning to the “mis- creants” responsible for the blasphemous comparison. Celebrating the star’s birthday falling on Novem- ber 7, a small group of Kamal’s die-hard fans past- ed posters in a couple of movie theatres on the busy Anna Road hailing him as the “Prophet Mohammed of the acting world”. The posters angered a section of the Muslims, who com- plained to the Tamil Nadu Muslim Munnetra Kazhagam (TMMK), which took up the issue with Kamal’s office in the city. “We were shocked when we heard of these posters. There were many threatening phone calls to our office last night. We immediately informed Kamal Sir shooting in Andhra. He was very upset and issued a statement sternly warning these mis- creants against misusing his name,” said a Kamal asso- ciate. He said the star’s staff also went around the city and tore down all the offending posters. In his statement, the actor not only distanced himself from those responsible for the offensive posters, but also issued a stiff warning asking the persons respon- sible to apologise and give an undertaking that they will not repeat such deeds. “That is a service these mis- creants could do to TN, a state known for its commu- nal peace and religious amity,” said Kamal, recall- ing that he had for long kept away from all religious and communal divides. “My fans converted them- selves into welfare associa- tions to do social service 20 years ago,” said the star. Fortunately, the TMMK realised that the miscreants masquerading as Kamal’s fans did not have his bless- ings. The Muslim outfit accepted Kamal’s state- ment and withdrew its com- plaint to the police. “We did not want to precipitate a crisis, a communal prob- lem. We found that Kamal had nothing to do with the posters nor were handiwork of his official welfare asso- ciations, so we dropped the protest plan,” said a TMMK spokesperson.

“I am surprised that I have been expelled from the party. In reality, I am not even a member of the AIADMK,” Ms Radhika told ET.

“I was actually shocked when she (Ms Jayalalithaa) gave the card to me. However, out of respect for my husband and Jayalalithaa, I accepted it. But I am not a member of the AIADMK or any party for that matter. I am not into politics.”

P. Chidambaram will give an address on the Stanford campus on Tuesday, October 24, 2006 at 4:30pm. The Stanford Center for International Development (SCID) and the Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research (SIEPR) are hosting the event which will take place in Bechtel Conference Center, Encina Hall.

In justification of all the gore and violence in his latest movie, `Vettaiyadu Vilayadu’, the director said that the film was meant to disturb the people.

On why the relationship between the two young doctors in the film was not explicitly shown, he confessed that they did not have the guts to show certain sequences on screen.

The students told Goutham Menon that while his heroes in `Minnale’ and `Kaakha Kaakha’ were projected as normal people, the director had ended up hero-worshipping Kamal Hassan in `Vettaiyadu Vilayadu’. “I guess the fan of Kamal in me could not be suppressed,” responded the director.

One of her finest Tamil movies, a major box-office success was `Thangapadhumai’ (1959), a brilliant adaptation of the Kannagi epic by A.S.A.Sami who directed the movie. Her spirited delivery of jaw-breaking dialogue, recalled Pasupuleti Kannamba’s classic `Kannagi,’ was a masterpiece in movie acting.

According to Sami, Padmini virtually scored hands down over the hero Sivaji Ganesan. He recalled that while the climax sequence was being shot, Padmini worked on her dialogue not even taking a break for lunch.