Shanishwara’s Design of a Superstar

Shanishwara’s Design of a Superstar

A young man, barely out of his teens, is bent forward under the weight of three heavy sacks strapped to his back. The deal is simple – three bags per trip, five rupees per round, just a 500-metre distance. It’s his first day as a coolie. His uncle had got him the job, and he took it without argument – not wanting his uncle to take the trouble himself.

But fate twists the route. An accident ahead forces a long diversion, nearly two kilometres. The traffic is chaos. Buses honk, car drivers curse, passers-by abuse him for blocking their way. Through the noise, only one voice stands by him – a woman named Saroja, who pushes from behind, guiding him through the mess until he delivers the first bag.

When the commotion clears, he delivers the remaining two bags. Exhausted, dripping in sweat, he’s met by his uncle who tells him the employer has three more bags for him. This time, the employer says, “You’ll get two rupees extra – and keep the tips.”

The young man looks up and recognises the voice. It’s a face from his school days at Shivaji School – a boy he once teased and played pranks on. The man smiles bitterly and says, “See… you did so much to me back then. Look at life now.” He lets him keep the money. For the first time in his life, Shivaji cries – not for humiliation, but for the reason he is here at all.

His elder brother works in a corporation. His younger brother serves in the military. When it was time for Shivaji to write his exams, his father had given him 120 rupees for the fees – a respectable sum then. But knowing he would fail, he ran away to Madras, driven by a mad love for cinema. He knew nothing about filmmaking except that he wanted to be in it. The only door he saw open was at the very bottom of the film hierarchy– a lightman’s job.

He tried for days to get it. Slept on empty stomachs. Wandered in the heat. But even the lowest rung wouldn’t take him. Defeated, he returned home, where his uncle deployed him as a Coolie. His father never stopped telling people: “My first son works in an office, my second in the army, and my third – who ran away with 120 rupees – is now a coolie.”

So he did the coolie’s job carrying sacks everyday and never thought of those lights, camera or action. When his elder brother’s marriage came, the whispers stung – “The youngest is a coolie.” He couldn’t ignore it enough as it was embarrassing for the brides family that the sister is going to a house where one is a Coolie. One relative suggested he apply for a conductor’s license exam, but he’ll have to study for that. It was something Shivaji had given up long ago, but he did, as this time he just wanted to shut up and show up. And in time, he became a bus conductor.

It was a level up for him. From being a coolie, he now works for the government. He shut his mouth and showed up everyday, never complaining that he belonged to cinema and should probably give in there. He gave his hundred percent & loved the work of stopping the bus, billing tickets, foloding notes . He was a charm of a bus conductor himself and flipping coins in style. But more than any of this, people loved to ride on his bus because by then, he developed his own style – stopping the bus with a peculiar rhythm of three sharp whistles, a clap, then more whistles – like a hero announcing himself in his own film. He would love to do that everytime he wanted to stop the bus and made sure that was his way of shooting the arrow, the passion towards he had towards his bus conductor’s work -like a hero announcing himself in his own film.

One day, in that very style, he caught the eye of a director – K. Balachander. “I like the way he carries himself like a hero,” the director said. That whistle, that style, became his ticket back into cinema – but not as a lightman. As an actor.

The young man was Shivaji Rao Gaekwad. The world would know him as Rajinikanth.

People think Rajinikanth entered the film industry first as an actor. The truth is he tried long before – as a lightman – and failed. But Shanishwara had other plans. Through the grind of coolie work, the discipline of a conductor’s life, and the simple stubbornness of showing up every day, he rose to where he truly belonged – the highest rank in cinema.

If the lightman’s door was shut, another one would open – straight to the throne.