New Delhi: Actor Kamal Hassan has come out in support of national award-winning director Vetrimaaran, who had spoken about king Raja Raja Chola’s religious identity and its misrepresentation. He had said that Raja Raja Cholan was not a Hindu king.
During an event in Chennai, Vetimaaran spoke about filmmakers protecting historical identities. “Our identities are already being erased. Be it cladding Thiruvalluvar in saffron, or presenting Rajaraja Cholan as a Hindu king, such things keep happening (in our society). This will also happen in cinema and many identities are (already) removed from the cinema. We should protect our identities," he was quoted as saying by Indian Express.
Kamal Hasaan while addressing the media after watching a special screening of 'Ponniyin Selvan: I', said that there was no term as Hinduism during the Chola era. “There was no such thing as ‘Hindu religion’ during Rajaraja Cholan’s period. There was Vainavam, Shivam and Samanam, and the Britishers gave us that name (Hindu) as they didn’t know how to refer to us collectively. It is similar to how they changed Thuthukudi into Tuticorin”, said Kamal.
“We had different religions. It was Adhishankarar in the 8th century who established Shanmata Sthapana. That’s all history and we should not talk about that here. Because here we are celebrating a historical film. Let us not exaggerate or twist history or bring language issues into this,” he added.
He also praised the film and said that it marked the beginning of the golden era in Tamil cinema.
The film ‘Ponniyin Selvan 1’ was released on September 30 in several languages, including Tamil, Telugu, Hindi, Kannada, and Malayalam. The film is based on Kalki Krishnamurthy's 1955 historical fiction book. The film depicts the early years of Arulmozhi Varman, who would grow up to become the famous Raja Chozhan. The first part of the movie tells the tale of his childhood, which is followed by the rest of the events of the film.