Chennai is a mega construction site but GCC can ease pain points
Strange as it may seem, the bustling traffic on Arcot Road, a State Highway feeding into Porur, has been redirected since May 6 via densely populated residential neighbourhoods in Kodambakkam and K.K. Nagar, among other places, to facilitate work on the 118 km Phase...
Farhana: An opportunity missed
Recent films such as Kashmir Files, Kerala Story and Burqa have courted controversy because of their anti-Muslim bias. The trailer of the Tamil film Farhana which also had stereotypical visuals of people praying five times-a-day, women in burqa, and religious curbs,...
Anti-BJP battle: Congress has miles to go and promises to keep
Congratulating the Congress on its landslide victory in the Karnataka Assembly elections, Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M.K. Stalin has noted, “They have taught a fitting lesson to the BJP for its vindictive politics, establishing their Kannadiga legacy and pride. The BJP...
Shadow of hooch tragedy hangs over TN govt.
Barely a month after the Tamil Nadu government stated in the Assembly that there had been no hooch tragedies in the state for 14 years, two incidents of illicit liquor, claiming 22 lives so far have put paid to these official claims. The two simultaneous incidents...
The real Kerala Story on Love Jihad
While The Kerala Story purports to claim that tens of thousands of women were converted to Islam in Kerala to be sent to ISIS territory, the true figure is three. Only three women have been documented to have been duped into converting to Islam for the purpose of...
Elections: Karnataka sub-regions a pointer for Tamil Nadu
In some ways, the recently concluded Karnataka elections are a return to the state’s history of a multi-cultural society with distinct regions and caste equations. The BJP had tried to push Karnataka society towards uniformity and unipolarity but it has been defeated...
How politics created much drama around mediocre Ulagam Sutrum Valiban
One of the all-time blockbusters of MGR, Ulagam Sutrum Valiban (1973), was just yet another characteristic pastiche of song, dance, fight and emotional overkill. Yet it was in the eye of a political storm in the early 1970s well before its release; no stone was left...
Here’s why we need more people like PTR in politics
Chief Minister M K Stalin has taken away the finance portfolio from Palanivel Thiagarajan and given it to Thangam Thennarasu. PTR will handle IT and he has thanked chief minister M K Stalin for the move. Earlier Stalin had dismissed the PTR tapes as cheap politics....
Cyclone Mocha puts focus on coastal areas again
All the eastern coastal states are bracing themselves for the fallout of a weather system, dubbed Cyclone Mocha, which is slowly making its way north in the Bay of Bengal. The India Meteorological Department (IMD) on Tuesday said a well marked low pressure area...
TN Governor Ravi’s broadsides baring chinks in Dravidian armour
This column had made the point that Governor R N Ravi was not just an administrative choke point for the government but was seeking to amplify the nationalist narrative as a counter to Dravidian ideology and the DMK. Governor R N Ravi was not just a tough customer who...
Carnatic music’s pulse Karaikudi Mani’s mridangam falls silent
Mridangam maestro Karaikudi R Mani passed away at 12.30 pm on May 4, 2023. He was 77. Mani was credited with creating a tradition in mridangam playing that was innovative and featured his unique style. His demise has left a vacuum in the world of music. Karaikudi...
Ponniyin Selvan takes the shine off Kalki’s novel?
Novel and cinema are always strange bedfellows. There have been instances of writers pushing back against filmmakers’ tendency to tweak their stories. For instance, when J D Salinger’s short story Uncle Wiggily in Connecticut was adapted into the film My Foolish Heart...
A partial victory for people with disabilities in TN cities
Something is better than nothing, the Madras High Court noted, and ordered the Tamil Nadu government to procure 499 low-floor buses suitable for use by people with disabilities in cities and suburbs. With its order of April 18, the Madras High Court has for now...
PS 2: A beautiful silver screen phantasmagoria
It takes a combination of a director, technicians, actors, theme of the story and the politics it speaks about to attract the audience in droves to the theatres. When Mani Ratnam’s Ponniyin Selvan 1 was released, the major draw was the curiosity to know how he had...
Yaathisai breaks new ground in historical fiction
It’s a given that historical fiction or a film always harks back to a dynasty and a king in the lead, glorifying his exploits, sacrifices and valour, depicting magnificence and mesmeric charm of palaces, jewels, battles, traditions, temples, arts and so on. The genre...
PS-2 songs out of tune with the essence of a period film?
It is customary for a historical film to take the audience across the centuries back to the period concerned with the magnificence of its visuals and the background music appropriately capturing the spirit of the period. In that respect, Ponniyin Selvan-1 passed...
Will PS-II name Adita Karikalan’s killer unlike the novel?
Tamil iconic writer Kalki’s historical fiction Ponniyin Selvan serialised in the Tamil magazine Kalki for three-and-half years in 1950s still retains its appeal for countless readers in Tamil Nadu. Drawing heavily on historical accounts of the Chola regime from the...
CMDA must plan well for Chennai expansion
The appointment of P K Sekar Babu as the Minister in-charge of the Chennai Metropolitan Development Authority (CMDA) in February 2023 was seen by the real estate sector as a focused attempt by the DMK to get someone with core knowledge of the city to help steer its...
