It’s a bit shocking to Tamil movie industry. In a short gap, two great personalities have faded away. First one to go was lyricist Vaali and now it’s Manjula. Vaali passed away on July 18 and Manjula died on July 23, 2013 following a brief illness. She has acted alongside many leading heroes of yesterdays of whom M.G. Ramachandran’s name comes first. She died at a comparatively younger age of 58 when the ‘show has not ended yet’.

Manjula has been active in the industry for three decades. Manjula’s brief introduction to Malayalam is through three super hit movies. She started her film career in 1969 with the movie ‘Shanti Nilayam’ as the daughter of Gemini Ganesan, fondly called ‘Kathal Mannan’. But the rest is history. Later she became the heroine of Gemini in many movies. But it was through the movie ‘Rikshawkaran’ opposite MGR that Manjula reached stardom. It was for the brilliant performance in Rickshawkaran that MGR won National awards. When Malayali director Sethu Madhavan directed this movie in Tamil, this movie broke several collection records in the year 1971. Thus Manjula became overnight star.

Apart from Rickshawkaran, Manjula has been successfully paired with MGR in 4 more movies – Ninaythathu mudippavan, Ulakam chuttum vaalipan and Anpe aaruyire. All movies were mega hits. When Vaali, Soundar Rajan and Kannadasan formed a group, it gave birth to many memorable songs as well. Manjula has delivered a few hits with Sivaji Ganesan too. Dr.Siva and Enkal Thanka raasa were the major hits. ‘Malare kurinji malare’ is still a popular duet pairing these two great actors.

Kundukili is the only movie where Sivaji and MGR acted together and Manjula acted as the bridge between these two. She was the favourite of both camps. It’s widely believed that due to personal indifferences with co-star Lata, MGR uplifted Manjula’s career and she has acted alongside Jaya Shankar and Muthuraman too.

She has acted in 3 Malayalam movies too. First one was mega blockbuster Abhimanyu where she played villain’s role with name ‘Madam’. Alongside Mamooty, she has acted in Inspector Balram and Jackpot and both are mega blockbusters. In short, she has played a significant role in the success of all these movies.

During yesterdays, she was a popular star among youth and has worked in all south Indian languages. She has done 100 movies till now. She was married to famous Tamil actor Vijayakumar and have three daughters. All the three daughters are film stars as well – Vanita, Preeta and Sreedevi. Except Preeta, the other two have worked in Malayalam movies also. It’s my tribute to the lady who played a few roles in Malayalam movies, yet remembered for those characters always!     

Article Posted By : Sandhya Rani  On August 08, 2013lView All Articles

All her malayalam roles are powerful

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http://www.veethi.com/articles/a-tribute-to-tamil-actress-manjula-article-2618.htm

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brief summary of Manjula , Manjula Tamil actress , Manjula death