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Paal
Paandi alias Bharathiraja, Bhairavi alias Namitha,
Rasaiah alias Ilayaraja.
Find out the real name of
all your favorite celebrity. |
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“What’s
in a name?” said Shakespeare. A lot
would be the answer of several folks in
filmdom. Cinema creates magic in the minds
of the audience by making them stay glued
to the happenings on the screen. Away from
the arc lights, the stars enjoy immense
popularity thanks to their screen magic.
Everything about them is hyped up and presented
in a glamorous fashion. It is quite understandable
that the stars crave for and enjoy the adulation
as far as it goes. Their shelf life is quite
short and therefore they seek maximum mileage
in the minimum duration. It is also a vindication
of the grind that they have to pass through
to become popular. |
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The
most important thing about a person is of course
his or her name. If you have a plain sounding
name, you cannot hope to be remembered by many.
In an industry which thrives on networking and
word-of-mouth promotion, you cannot reach far,
if people who matter have to jog their memory
to get your name. Competition in cinema demands
that you package yourself attractively to grab
public attention. For some others there are sentimental
reasons too. |
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The
most important instance of a name change
becoming the raison d’etre for enduring
popularity is of course that of Shivaji
Rao Gaekwad aka Rajinikanth. The superstar
was a lanky, self-conscious fresher from
the Film Institute, when Iyakkunar Sigaram
took him under his wings. He christened
him Rajinikanth taken from Sivaji Ganesan’s
popular character Barrister Rajinikanth
from the film Gauravam. It was a period
of great social churning in Tamilnadu and
this name reflected a unique personality
without overtones of caste, creed and social
status. Similarly, a couple of years after
Rajinikanth, a young man called Paalpandi
wanted to make it big in films. |
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He called himself Bharathraja after the great
poet probably owing to the poetic frames he created
in his romantic fantasies. Rasaiah had the burning
desire to make his music heard all over the world
and he was sure that if he had to make it in films,
he had to have a unique name. Thus was born Ilayaraja. |
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Sometime
ago, there was a huge popularity for names
prefixed or suffixed with Sri and Jaya…
Vanisri, Sridevi, Jayalalitha, Jayasudha,
Jayachitra and so on. Director Bharathiraja
has a penchant for naming his heroines with
R…Radhika, Radha, Revathi, Ranjitha.
This was supposed to bring good luck. Two
important exceptions were of course, Sridevi
and Sukanya. Now the trend is to choose
names with a twirl or tang with a dash of
Oriental mystique….Maalavika, Sruthika,
Sridevika, Jyothika, Asin, Trisha…..
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In
the case of Dilip Kumar, the name change
is because of conversion to another religion.
Dilip Kumar is today A R Rahman. Some guys
change names merely because there is someone
else already with that name. Suhasini is
a senior actress and so the other one changed
her name to Sneha. Similarly, the other
Revathi got a new name as Sandhya of Kadhal
fame. There are two Kumaresans and so one
became Ramarajan while the other became
Napoleon.
Stars take extreme care in choosing their
names because they believe that their fortune
depends on it. |
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They
consult astrologers and numerologists to get the
correct combination of syllables. Film folks,
may their tribe increase and give us many more
ideas for names for newborns! Here is a list of
popular stars and their (actual) names. |
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