Actor #Rajinikanth, fondly known as Thalaiva by his fans, will receive the 51st #DadaSahebPhalke award, India's highest film honour, on May 3, 2021.
He had also been honoured with the Padma Bhushan & Padma Vibhushan in the past.@rajinikanth @MIB_India pic.twitter.com/kCyrgLb358
— PIB India (@PIB_India) April 1, 2021
This year, South actor Rajinikanth will be honoured with the prestigious Dadasaheb Phalke Award. Union Minister Prakash Javadekar made the announcement today, April 1. Rajinikanth made his Kollywood debut in 1975 with K Balachander’s Apoorva Ragangal and has spent over 45 years in the industry.
Rajinikanth will receive the Dadasaheb Phalke Award on May 3, 2021. PIB India took to Twitter to share a video showcasing the actor’s journey. The actor was originally born on December 12, 1950, as Shivaji Rao Gaekwad to Ramoji Rao and Jijabai, worked as a bus conductor in Karnataka before embarking on his film career. He was so interested in acting during his school days that he participated in plays and then enrolled in an acting course at Madras Film Institute.
The actor made his film debut in K Balachander’s Apoorva Ragangal, where he initially played character roles before sharing screen space with Kamal Haasan in several films. Director M Bhaskar’s Bairavi was the first Tamil film to showcase Rajinikanth as a solo hero. It was with this film that Thalaiva earned Superstar status in Kollywood. Some of his hit films includes Mullum Malarum, Allauddinum Albhutha Vilakkum, Ninaithale Inikikum and Aarilirunthu Arubathi Varai. In the 1970s, Rajinikanth experimented with multiple genres and excelled as an actor.
In the 1990s, Rajinikanth proved himself as a commercial entertainer and most of the films released in the decade were blockbuster hits..
Rajinikanth had a major health scare in 2011 which required him to be hospitalised multiple times. After recovering, he made Enthiran with Shankar, which took the box office by storm. From then on, Rajinikanth went from strength to strength with back-to-back hits such as Kaala, Petta and 2.0.
Though Rajinikanth announced his political entry in 2017, in December 2020, he had a minor health scare, after which he decided not to enter politics due to his ill health.
Stalwarts like Satyajit Ray, Nagi Reddy, Raj Kapoor, Lata Mangeshkar, Akkineni Nageswara Rao, Dilip Kumar, Sivaji Ganesan, Asha Bhosle are some of the recipients of this award.
