Vijayashanti: Of guts, glory and chequered politics

Vijayashanti: Actress, politician. A career spanning four decades in 175 films, she was the "Lady Amitabh Bachchan" for her women-oriented action roles. Her iconic character Ramulamma catapulted her into Telangana politics, where she has been a member of BJP, TRS and Congress.

It’s hard to fathom if a reel life portrayal influences an actor’s real life traits, especially if the characters are activists, politicians, cops or lawyers. Vijayashanti played all these roles with elan in her career spanning over four decades in 175 films including Telugu (121), Tamil (39), Kannada (5), Malayalam (4) and Hindi (6). Called ‘Lady Amitabh Bachchan’ for garnering women-oriented action roles when heroines were mere glam dolls in hero-dominated films, Vijayashanti held her own with directors scripting stories for her and creating characters that celebrated righteousness and womanhood.

The revolutionary film ‘Osey Ramulamma’ catapulted her into a new fame level with the character of Ramulamma. To this day, her role as Ramulamma is etched in people’s memory. That film made her entry into Telangana electoral politics a bit easy.

Ms. Vijayashanti, who was one of the Bharat Rashtra Samiti (BRS) member when the historic Telangana bill was passed in the Parliament in 2014, has a unique political career spanning over 25 years that started from the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and now ending up in Congress.

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She made her debut at the age of 13 in PS Nivas-directed Tamil movie Kallukkul Earam in 1979, where Bharati Raja played himself. Soon after, she debuted in Telugu with actor Krishna in Khiladi Krishnudu. The 1983 film Neti Bharatam, directed by T Krishna, was a turning point in her career, and with Pratighatana (1985), Vijayashanti became the go-to actor for roles that define women’s emancipation. Mohan Gandhi’s 1990 film Kartavyam was a landmark film for Vijayashanti where she played a cop who vows to bring a sexual assaulter to book.

Vijayashanti acted with most of the heroes in the Telugu films, but her pairing with Chiranjeevi (19 films) and Balakrishna (17 films) brings to mind the most memorable and popular movies.

Among her films where she peaked in her comic act, Mondi Mogudu Penki Pellam (1992) comes first. Vijayashanti aced the role of a newly married girl from Karimnagar who also made speaking the Telangana dialect cool long before the new-age leading ladies started using that dialect. Her innocent and charming portrayal of a young Telugu girl who travels to the US and falls in love with a white American in Jandhyala’s Padamati Sandhyaragam will be one of her career-high points, along with her role as a cobbler’s wife in K Viswanath’s Swayamkrushi and a rape victim who rebels against her perpetrators in Osey Ramulamma.