'Rape case ruined my career, truth should come out': actress Kannur Sreelatha opens up

Kannur Sreelatha dominated Malayalam movies with significant roles during the 80s era. Any director would have no qualms handing over crucial roles to her as Sreelatha came from a theatre background, and had already mastered the nuances of acting. However, her heydays ended fast and Sreelatha slipped into the realm of television serials never to climb back into cinema again. Sreelatha has a reason for her ‘fall from grace’ and blames one false rape case that stunned the industry back in the late 80s, to have ruined her career.

Kannur Sreelatha:

“I was in Ernakulam shooting for the movie ‘Thammil Thammil’ when the news broke out. Madhupal was interviewing me when a paper published this news. I was traumatized and it affected my family deeply. I don’t know who brought the news and why I was targeted. I have reasons to believe that someone would have been too jealous of my career back then and wanted it killed.

The news was published just for one day and I haven’t heard about any follow-ups or anything about the newspaper since then. The members of the theatre community conducted a protest march in Kannur expressing solidarity with me. Despite all this, I failed to file a case against them. The incident forced me to take a hiatus from acting and I stayed away for 10 long years. If not for my husband’s support, I would have shattered by then.

The news broke my life. Soon, I started appearing in serials but failed to get great roles, unlike earlier times. My career saw a downfall and even today I yearn to unearth the conspiracy behind the news.

I was introduced to the film by a production executive named KR Shanmukhan. Even Mammootty used to fear him and always talked to him with respect. Having the label of getting introduced by Shanmukhan, nobody dared to approach us with ill intentions and I faced no harassment in any of the movie sets I worked on. I mostly acted in movies where Mammootty played the hero role.