Chennai: Remembering photographer who clicked MGR's iconic picture

Chennai: This, perhaps, is the most famous photograph of MGR, the darling of the Tamil masses. But then, not many would know the photographer; or the many sufferings he had to undergo for no fault of his, and how he was hit by near-penury in the evening of his illustrious career as one of the best news chroniclers of his black-and-white era.

If only there was strict enforcement of copyright laws, Subha Sundaram might have been a millionaire as this picture of his, shot from close quarters with the hero striking his charming pose with that killer smile, became the official picture of the Tamil Nadu Government and the AIADMK party, while this one along with a twin with a slight variation, became hot favourite for use a million and more times by various people in various places.

Sundaram died a shattered man after being accused of involvement in the Rajiv Gandhi assassination and suffering incarceration for several years; he escaped the gallows by the skin of his teeth as the Supreme Court set aside the death sentence slapped by the TADA court, Poonamallee.

I used to visit him at the Poonamallee jail to pep up spirits and to let him know there weren’t many outside who believed the SIT story about his being part of the LTTE plot to kill the former Prime Minister. His only ‘sin’ was that he had innocently loaned his camera to Hari Babu, his darkroom boy whom the Eelam Tigers had recruited for taking pictures of their woman cadre Dhanu garlanding Rajiv at his election rally in Sriperumbudur.

Sundaram and Hari Babu-so did a whole lot of people-had bought the Tiger story that Velupillai Prabhakaran had made peace with Rajiv and regretted his war with the IPKF, and that his negotiators were talking to Rajiv at Delhi, and that Dhanu was presenting Prabhakaran’s peace garland at the Congress leader’s poll rally. And it’s because they all believed the story, poor Sundaram loaned his camera to Sivarasan, the ‘one-eyed jack’ who was in charge of the kill assignment, for the use of Hari Babu.

As the punishment for that flaw in trusting the Tigers, Hari Babu was killed in the blast-his final frame in a roll of some 13 pictures showed just an orange ball of fire and that showed how close that innocent kid had got to the blast hoping to capture the ‘garlanding’ shot-and Sundaram landed in jail as one of the 26 convicted by the TADA court and awarded death sentence. Lucky for him, he was among the 19 acquitted by the Supreme Court on appeal.

His famous ‘Subha Photo Studio’ in Royapettah crumbled as the man languished in jail and his two bright kids were forced out of school for want of funds. While daughter Chitra died in tragic circumstances, son Arun struggled against heavy odds and landed the job of a camera person at the NDTV, rising to be one of the main content producers for the nation’s premier news channel. Shifting back to native Chennai, he is presently at a senior position in News18.