If one was to walk through the street of Subburayalu Nagar in Cuddalore, one cannot miss a small house, where a washerman is seen ironing, and the wall opposite him bedecked with posters of the actor and former chief minister M G Ramachandran.
Mani (61), a diehard fan of MGR since his childhood, covered the walls of his small shop with posters that he cut out from monthly magazines Idhayakani and Urimaikkural. Despite being illiterate, he has been regularly subscribing to the magazines for several years.
If any of the pictures fade or starts pealing off the wall, he immediately replaces it with a new one.
Mani said, “Since I was 11, I have been engaged in the business of washing and ironing clothes. Earlier, I used to earn less than a rupee per day, but I never missed any of MGR’s movies. Those days, I used to spend almost all my earnings on MGR movies. MGR is everything to me.”
On being asked the reason for pasting the numerous MGR portraits on his work area wall, Mani said,
“MGR’s pictures motivate me. If I feel tired while ironing, I look at Vathiyaars’ pictures on the wall and I get encouraged to continue my work energetically. When I look at his face, I have a sense of happiness. I do not know how to read and write, but I buy these two MGR magazines every month without fail.”
His wife Vijaya said, “My husband is such a huge fan of MGR that once when a customer, accidentally tore off one of the pictures pasted on the wall, he got angry and scolded him. Besides, he refused to accept the customer’s clothes.”
“Twenty eight years ago, MGR came to Cuddalore and distributed land pattas to our community (dhobi) people. A total of 31 persons were given lands by him. I was one among the three persons to get the land pattas directly from his hands. Each person was given 3.5 cent of land at Kuppagkulam. After that I saw him in Cuddalore three times during public meetings,” he added.
Even today at 10 pm, after he finishes work, Mani listens to songs of MGR on his radio or watches movies of MGR on the TV, a habit which has not left him from his younger days.