{
  "id": 14457876,
  "title": "Kamal Haasan’s ex girlfriend was first to predict Rajinikanth’s stardom: ‘Everyone ignored him’",
  "url": "https://urgent.news/2026/10/14/kamal-haasans-ex-girlfriend-was-first-to-predict-rajinikanths-stardom",
  "topic": "world",
  "section": "World",
  "published": "2026-10-14T13:19:52.000Z",
  "source": {
    "name": "The Indian Express",
    "slug": "the-indian-express",
    "url": "https://indianexpress.com/article/entertainment/tamil/srividya-predicted-rajinikanth-superstardom-apoorva-raagangal-kamal-haasan-10921330/"
  },
  "original_language": "en",
  "account": "Kamal Haasan's former girlfriend, legendary actress Srividya, was the first to foresee Rajinikanth's rise to stardom, predicting that he would become a superstar one day. Despite this early warning, the media and others largely ignored Rajinikanth, who was just a newcomer in the Tamil film industry when he appeared in director K Balachander's Apoorva Raagangal (1975). Balachandra Menon, a veteran actor and director, met Rajinikanth for the first time at a hotel in Chennai while working as a journalist. Impressed by the aspiring actor, Menon intended to publish an article about him in his newspaper but was later told the story was pointless. When Rajinikanth appeared again on the set of Apoorva Raagangal, Balachander informed him about Srividya's prediction. Rajinikanth responded that he had secured a good role in the film and requested Menon to drop the story.",
  "summary": null,
  "key_points": [],
  "editors_take": null,
  "illustration": null,
  "coverage": {
    "outlets": 2,
    "also_reported_by": [
      {
        "outlet": "The Indian Express",
        "title": "Why Madhavan chose characters over stardom like Vijay, Ajith: ‘Kamal Haasan taught me…’",
        "url": "https://urgent.news/2026/10/14/why-madhavan-chose-characters-over-stardom-like-vijay-ajith-kamal",
        "published": "2026-10-14T14:52:57.000Z"
      }
    ]
  },
  "ai_generated": true,
  "disclaimer": "Summaries, key points and the editor’s take are written by software from other outlets’ reporting and may contain errors — always check the linked original."
}