'They projected only Hindi cinema as Indian cinema, it was humiliating for me'

Telugu superstar Chiranjeevi felt heartbroken at an award ceremony as he recalled a miserable and humiliating incident when the South film fraternity wassidelined and only Hindi cinema was projected as Indian cinemaIn a viral video trending on social media the star was seen emotional delivering a speech at an award function recounting his trip to Delhi to receive a national award for Rudraveena 1988 feeling proud breaking language barriers and overcoming discrimination by crediting films such as Baahubali Baahubali 2 and RRRIn 1988 I made a movie called Rudraveena with Naga Babu It recieved the Nargis Dutt Award For Best Feature Film On National Integration We went to Delhi to receive the award he said in Telugu He added that the awards ceremony was in the evening and it was preceded by high tea in the hallThe walls around us were decorated with posters showcasing the grandeur of Indian cinema There were some brief notes There were photos of Prithiviraj Kapoor Raj Kapoor Dilip Kumar Dev Anand Amitabh Bachchan Rajesh Khanna Dharmendra and so on They showed their pictures they described them beautifully They praised various directors and heroinesAnd we thought they would also talk about South Indian cinema in such great detail But they just showed a still image of MGR M G Ramachandran and Jayalalithaa dancing They described it as South Indian cinema And Prem Nazir who played a hero in a record number of films in the history of Indian cinema they showed his picture and that was it the actor said eyes filled with tearsWhile the language debate goes on Telugu star Chiranjeevi recalled the time South Indian cinema was sidelined at an awards function pictwittercomsMALFJTldlmdash Brut India BrutIndia May 1 2022The Khaidi No 150 star then mentioned the names of other renowned actors from the industry such as Dr Rajkumar Vishnuvardhan N T Rama Rao A Nageswara Rao and Sivaji Ganesan who did not get any mention at the event They were demigods to us And there were no pictures of them For me it was humiliating I felt very sad They projected only Hindi cinema as Indian cinema And they dismissed other industries as regional language cinema They didnt even bother to acknowledge its contribution he saidThe actor continued his speech by praising movies like Baahubali Baahubali 2 and RRR directed by SS Rajamouli which received massive panIndia success andmbrought pride to Telugu cinema After so many years today I feel so proud I can thump my chest Our industry proved that we are no longer a regional cinema Telugu cinema has removed these barriers and becomes part of Indian cinema Everyone is amazed at our success We have overcome the discrimination Thanks to Baahubali Baahubali 2 and RRR he expressedChiranjeevis inspiring speech came a few days after the heated argument between Hindi actor Ajay Devgn and Kannada actor Sudeep Sanjebe Sudeep pointed out that Hindi is not our national language but Devgn questioned why South Indian language films are dubbed into HindiThe controversy ignited discussions on social media with politicians joining I argued as a BJP mouthpiece said Davegan who is reportedly part of the Karnataka leader Meanwhile on the work front Chiranjeevis upcoming movie includes a venture directed by Bobby in which he plays a cop and also will be joining hands with director Meher Ramesh for the film Bholaa ShankarThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever