A young Malayalam actress was verbally abused and trolled on a social media platform earlier this week, for expressing a harmless wish to act as the daughter of a 65-year-old superstar
In a recent programme aired on a private television channel, actress Anna Rajan – who played a popular role, Lichi, in Angamaly Diaries, and appeared in the recent Lal Jose film, Velipaadukalude Pusthakam – was asked whom she would like to act with.
Mammootty or Dulquer?
The 25-year-old actress replied that she would like to play Dulquer’s love-interest, and Mammootty’s daughter.
But little did Anna know that mega-stars like Mammootty are immune to the phenomenon of ageing. The actor’s fans soon mercilessly attacked her using the most derogatory language, for failing to see that their star was not yet ready to play a father on screen. The actress, later, appeared on Facebook Live and expressed regret for having said what-must-not-be-said, and broke down in tears.
The superstar’s ‘fan warriors’ were delighted to see her cry, but were in no mood to ‘pardon’ her completely. “You were such a fool to think our ‘lord’ would want to act with a second-rate actor as you. We have, anyhow, forgiven your mistake. Never repeat it,” read one of the moderately civil comments to her live video, while the rest of the ‘fan’ responses were highly sexist and abusive.
The superstar in question, Mammootty, is yet to make a public statement on the violent attack that his fan boys unleashed on Anna Rajan.
Mammootty, once a reigning superstar who delivered consecutive hits and critically-acclaimed films in Mollywood, enjoys one of the biggest fan bases in the industry. He has acted in six Indian languages, and has bagged numerous awards, including five National Awards for Best Actor. Although the actor’s poor choice of films has led to his career coming to a grinding halt in recent years, he continues to be one of the two most influential personalities in south Indian cinema. His son, Dulquer Salmaan, who is in his early thirties, is a busy actor with films in Malayalam, Telugu, Tamil and Hindi.
On Tuesday, September 26, Anna Rajan posted a happy note on Facebook, stating how grateful she was to actor Mammootty who called her on the phone and consoled her. The actress wrote, “I was nervous about how to speak to Mammookka, and now he has called me and talked to me. It all seems like a dream… The power that his words have given me will help me endure any adverse situation!”
Did Mammootty also call up the heads of his fan clubs, and give them a tip or two on how to be civil on a public platform? We don’t know yet. He has not, however, released a public statement on the highly condemnable issue. Dulquer Salmaan, who has an active presence on social media, has not commented on the incident either.
Actress-danseuse Rima Kallingal was the only cine-colleague of Anna Rajan to speak up for her on social media.
“Lichi was trolled for saying a 65-year-old actor could play her father’s role? Why?? These people don’t think Mammootty can carry that role? I think he can rock it.. like a boss.. remember Kouravar? I think he is a super brilliant actor and we will accept him playing a 70-year-old or a 30-year-old just like we will accept super brilliant actors like Shobhana, Urvashi and Revathy playing 70-year-olds or 30-year-olds… alle? How absolutely non-hypocritical, non-sexist, non-ageist lovely beings we are. Who is ruining our name by trolling lichi? What is the problem here? And why and what is Lichi apologising for?” wrote Rima.
The responses to Rima’s post weren’t any different. She was called an ‘aunty’, a ‘femi-nazi’, and even a ‘drug abuser’ by the superstar’s fans. Curiously, it is not just Mammootty’s fans who are abusing Rima Kallingal and Anna Rajan, but fans of actors such as Dileep, who is one of the accused in a high-profile sexual abuse case, and also, Mohanlal.
In his last release, Pullikkaaran Stara, Mammootty played lover to Deepti Sati, who is in her early twenties. In White, he pretended to be a chic metro-sexual, a young grandson of KPAC Lalitha, and a lover to Huma Qureshi. Both films were panned by the critics, and sank at the box-office without a trace. In media and social media platforms, Mammootty is termed as the ‘most handsome’ Malayali man. Plenty has been written about his flawless fair skin that has bizarrely defied age, and his near-perfect physique. Even as his films were bombing at the box-office one after another, and critics were panning his performance in asinine films like Thoppil Joppan and White, tributes to his handsomeness flooded the media. To top it all, he formerly endorsed Indu Lekha ‘white soap’ that claimed to have the capacity to make anyone ‘fair’. “Beauty will come in search of you,” he’d earnestly said in the TV advert. (Last year, a 67-year-old villager from Wayanad, Chathu, earned Rs 30,000 as compensation from the soap company, after he filed a complaint against the company and Mammootty for using a misleading advertisement. He said the soap didn’t make him fair as the actor had promised.)
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This isn’t the first time the fans of male stars have joined hands to attack actresses and women who speak up about unpleasant things. In October 2016, Mohanlal’s fans verbally abused a woman on Facebook for posting a negative review of the star’s Pulimurugan. Some of them even threatened to rape her for ‘insulting’ their idol. There was, however, no public statement from the star who is known for writing blog posts on nationalist issues. In several instances, actresses like Sreelakshmi and Rima have been subjected to abuse on Facebook for their remarks on Mollywood, which is ruled by the male stars.
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But, young male stars like Fahadh Fazil have consciously refrained from encouraging a fan frenzy, even at the risk of commercial success of their films. On several occasions, Fahadh has declared that ‘fan associations adversely affect the youth’. Actor Prithviraj, recently, wrote an open letter to his fans, requesting them to stop ‘spreading negativity’ on social media. While there are fan associations for budding stars like Tovino Thomas and Unni Mukundan, who has been around for some time, sans a commercial hit to his name, none of the actresses in the industry have the backing of a fan club. Manju Warrier, who has a considerable fan base in the state, is also one of the most bullied and trolled actors in the industry, thanks to her failed marriage with actor Dileep, and her involvement in women-oriented films and the recently formed Women In Cinema Collective. But, there aren’t many male actors who dare to speak against cyber-bullying and trolling of their female colleagues, and their silence is nurturing a community of dangerously unreasonable – and abusive – fans.
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Read: Who Are Tamil Cinema’s Abusive Fans On Twitter? An Inside Look