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Soundharya: The Queen with Real Beauty

I am conveying my deep condolence towards the sad demise of popular South-Indian actress “Smt. Soundharya”, who lost her life in a plane-crash while campaigning for a political party here in Bangalore. To add to the sorrows, the aircraft also carried three others, including her brother, another party-activist and the pilot, who were all burnt-alive.

I haven’t followed Soundharya’s life or film-career thoroughly, but I know few things about her. She was an awesome actress. She got recognition when she acted in a Kannada film called “Thooguve Krishnana”, where she acted brilliantly in a mentally-challenged role and consequently in emotional sequences. That’s what fetched her big roles in Telugu filmdom and made her superstar there. 

It so happens always... Our Kannada film industry has been deprived from the services of so many such great talents. Whom to blame, I don’t know. Soundharya’s career was dedicated dominantly towards Telugu filmdom. 

But she was on her way of doing some fabulous works in Kannada filmdom. She had done a film with Girish Kasarvalli called “Dhweepa” which fetched national awards. She also had few more plans such as making some TV serials with stories from popular novelists. She acted in few Kannada films here and there, to keep her presence felt in Kannada filmdom. She also has done few good things towards community. 

She was a perfect role-model for today’s artistes, especially actresses. Bollywood actresses have plenty to learn from Soundharya. She maintained a fine balance between glamour and acting. We have very few examples of actresses who had long-term success in their film-career. So in this regard, hats-off to her achievement. Alas, the career was curtailed. 

So many things have been said about the facts behind this incident that - an aircraft which basically was used for air-sport shouldn’t have been used for commercial flying, the pilot was inexperienced and failed to handle the drastic atmospheric parameters, etc. After all, today’s world is full of such dangers and we have to live between these. Anything can happen any day to anybody. 

But the actual quandary is, why the popular film-stars are forced to get into politics or whether the film-stars themselves force their way into politics? Havoc has happened in states like Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh with popular film-stars getting into politics. 

Although, one may argue that this might have led to the emergence of strong regional parties with good administration, but this has certainly set bad examples to film-artistes. People without the ABC-knowledge of politics are entering politics with the fame they gain from films. This is killing both the fields. The popularity of film-stars is being misused. 

Not that the film-stars need to boost up their earnings by entering into politics or by campaigning, certainly not for an actress who claimed 50 lakhs for a film. There should be something else behind it. Let it be. But my sincere request to both the politicians and the film-stars is that, “Please don’t jumble up these two huge and different fields of work”. This year’s general election has been a big marketing of film-stars entering into politics. Hope next time we don’t see this. 

But the charming face of Soundharya haunts in the minds of all good people. The disheartening thing is that, she was just about to execute her actual plans. Among the mushrooms (innumerous glam-dolls), she stood tall like an Oak, but it just took a single-chop to uproot it. No one knows the secrecy behind her death. 

Soundharya was good enough to take care of herself without any major hiccups or gossips, as she was not just a beautiful and talented actress, but also an intelligent and well-behaved human being. As the name suggests, she was the “Queen with Real Beauty”. 

Wish her soul acquire peace in the heavens. And let God provide strength to her family and relatives to withstand the intense pain.

 Somashekar T
Bangalore
somashekart@yahoo.com

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