Maanu

Maanu Biography

Maanu is a noted dancer who has acted in two Tamil films - Kadhal Mannan (1998) and Enna Satham Indha Neram (2014). Though she had a promising film career ahead after the box office success of her debut opposite Ajith Kumar, she chose dance over acting and set up a performing arts company and associated with dance shows in India and abroad. "Unnai Paartha" from the movie Kadhal Mannan, featuring Maanu was a chartbuster song of 1998. The romantic track was sung by S. P. Balasubrahmanyam. In 2014, she made a comeback to the industry with Enna Satham Indha Neram in 2014, where she played the pivot role of the mother of the Quadruplets.

Maanu is an Assamese, born and brought up in Guwahati, Assam. She started her formal training in dance at the age of 4. She learnt both Manipuri and Kathak under the guidance of Gurumoni Sinha Singh, Guru Arabinda Kalita and Guru Hajuwari by mid 1990s. She also took formal training in Bharatnatyam under Padma Hargopal and did her arangettam in 1995. By that time itself she has started performing dance forms and reached Chennai as a part of her show. She reached Chennai to get trained from accomplished dancers – Dhananjayans.

She was spotted by actor Vivek during one of her performances in Chennai and recommended her name to director Saran, who offered her the lead role in his debut flick - Kadhal Mannan. Initially she turned down the project, but later accepted it following her parents’ encouragement. She was paired with Ajith for this romantic flick and the movie was a box office hit. But she preferred to continue with her stage shows and started her own dance company, Maanu Artz. She got married to a cancer surgeon and settled in Singapore. She came to limelight once again in 2011, when she got involved in aiding Rajinikanth's recovery from his illness and later made a comeback to Tamil cinema in 2014.

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Updated: January 30, 2016