Chicken or Egg?

The incredible has happened!

The spat between the DMK's first family and Maran's family has opened up lot of If's and But's. To me, from what I have observed since Murasoli Maran days, it's basically a Chicken or Egg story. Both sides were complimenting each other well enough to create an impression that the SUN Group was the unofficial bandwagon of the DMK. On the other hand, It is indeed difficult to say that the SUN Group could have emerged as such a large media house in India without MK's political backing.

Following Murasoli Maran's death in late 2003, Dayanidhi Maran, with absolutely no prior political experience was fielded by the DMK from Thousand Lights constituency in Chennai in the following central elections in 2004 May and eventually made the Central Minister of the plum portfolio, IT & Telecommunications. What SUN TV managed out of the ministry is a different ball game. Just a blog post cannot detail the nitty-gritty's of it and I ain't Dr.J.Jayalalitha to dig to the history and geography of the subject and have it on top of my head ;-)

In-turn to thank grandpa, the Maran brothers let use of their SUN Group as extensive as possible for him to return to power during the 2006 state elections. DMK led alliance crushed the AIADMK alliance and made it to the power. With DMK in power in the State and virtually controlling the Centre, DMK's point man was identified as Dayanidhi Maran and he was seen shoulder to shoulder, sometimes like a walking stick for MK. I could hardly remember of any ocassion with MK involved not having Dayanidhi besides him. There have been instances when MK.Stalin was missing at time ;-) This definitely irked Stalin and Big Brother, MK. Azhagiri and definitely many others within DMK who were waiting for the right opportunity. The burning of Dinakaran office in Madurai was what probably everyone against the Maran's were waiting for. I shoudl say that all of them have used the opportunity very well to outst Maran's and create a sense of uncertainity for the SUN Group which is planning to venture into Aviation, publish English tabloid with Media baron Rupert Murdoch and what not?

With all the history behind us, it would only be interesting if the family feud will settle (I wish not!) or will create more surpises.

Copy Cat

I should really say that Sun TV is becoming a copy cat or probably running out of ideas as once blogged by Kaps. First it was the poaching of the Kalakka Povadhu Yaaru from Vijay TV and it was also rumoured that the comedy show Lollu Sabha was also targetted. While Lollu Sabha team did not succumb, it later ran into troubled waters, thanks to the Sun TV's creativity in finding ways to tone down the show's originality, etc.

Latest in the list is the copy of the Airtel Super Singer show on Vijay TV (again!). As always, they have gone a step ahead and roped in Rahman to judge the finals of their show, Ooh La La La. While the Vijay TV's show is the hunt for an individual event, Sun TV's one is for a band. Big deal? Huh!

I am sure there would be plans, probably already drafted, to copy out the other interesting shows like Neeya Naana, Koffee with Anu and Jillunu Oru Jodi which feature on Vijay TV.

Who can forget the curtailing of the Vijay News (no prizes for guess which channel instrumentalized it), which probably was the only unbiased news channel with superior quality amongst the others sometime back?

Posted on 6th May >> I just realized that the Koffee with Anu is also copied, hosted by my all time favorite actress Gowthami as "Anbudan" on Sun TV and BTW, my wife disagreed that the Ooh La La La is not a copy of the Super Singer...I hate my wife ;-)