Abitha

Abitha Biography

Abitha is a film actress of Tamil cinema best known for playing the female lead in 1999 cult classic – Sethu, which made the actor Vikram an overnight star. Though she has done a few movies in Tamil, Malayalam and Kannada, she is still remembered for the college girl role in Sethu. The movie won the National Film Award for Best Feature Film in Tamil and many other awards and Abitha received a nomination at Filmfare for best Tamil actress. She is also a successful television actress, the most memorable role being the protagonist Archana in Thirumathi Selvam aired on Sun Network during the period - 2007–2013. She played lead heroine in Malayalam 1999 movie – Devadasi.

Her real name is Jenila and she is also known as Janeesha from Thiruvottiyur. She used to go to her neighbour’s home where the shooting of a tele-serial Nancy was going on. The director of the show roped her for one of the supporting roles for the series – Criminal. Later she appearing in character roles for Tamil serials and got her first film role through – Golmaal, where she played heroine Monica Nerukkar’s sister role. In 1999, she got her first lead role through Malayalam movie Devadasi, where she was paired with Nishanth Sagar. Then Sethu happened to her. She was offered the lead role when Keerthi Reddy and Rajshri, moved out and Vikram was only a struggling actor then. The movie was one of the highest grossers of the year and the movie was later made to Hindi titled ‘Tere Naam’, which revived Salman’s career too.  

Though she was flooded with film offers, she chose to complete her studies. She completed PG in Sociology from Annamalai University. But it was already late and she couldn’t get good roles later. She even played sister roles. Thus ‘Sethu’ remains her solo hit in the film industry. Then she moved towards small screen, where she earned popularity. She got married to T. George, a Chief Accountant in a Chemical Company in Kottayam in 2009 and continued with serials and was last seen in Ponnunjal, playing title role.

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Updated: December 05, 2015