It was a star-studded evening when Vijay TV, for the first time in its 18 years, hosted an award ceremony to exclusively honour its television stars. Held last week at the YMCA grounds, Nandanam, the Vijay Television Awards function attracted a crowd comprising largely of the channel’s viewers who felicitated their favourite artistes.
Vijay TV, part of the STAR network, caters to a Tamil audience and its diverse programmes — innovative comedy shows such as Lollu Sabha and Athu Idhu Edhu , daily soaps such as Saravanan Meenatchi and Office reality shows such as Super Singer that encourages youn talent, religious and talk shows — have helped it garner a huge fan base worldwide.
The Awards function opened with a salsa number by Sonali Das from Bengaluru, followed by ‘Fictitious Girls’, an all-girl dance ensemble from Mumbai. Actress Esha Thalwar’s entertaining dance medley left the audience screaming for more. Dance India Dance contestants, Suresh Varma and Nicy Joseph performed an aerial act which enhanced the celebrations.
This event was hosted by multiple anchors – Bhavna, Ma Ka Pa Anand, Robo Shankar, Balaji, Erode Mahesh, Ramya and Jegan.
Awards were given under a variety of categories and the winners were chosen by the viewers through a voting process. Some of the category winners were Divya Dharshini (aka DD) and Gopinath of Neeya Naana fame who won the Favourite Anchor award, female and male, respectively. Sreeja Chandran and Mirchi Senthil of Saravanan Meenatchi fame, bagged the Favourite Actor awards, female and male, respectively. The Favourite Show (Fiction) award went to Saravanan Meenatchi and Deivam Thandha Veedu . “Anchoring is a thankless, tiresome job that is often unrewarded. I can’t find enough words to thank the people who took the time to vote for me. I always believe my source of strength is love and this award has restored my faith in it. A huge thank you to my all time co-anchor, Deepak!,” said DD who bagged the Favourite Anchor (Female) award.
Apart from these award categories, there were special awards too. Actress Radha, currently a judge on Jodi No1 , was awarded Vijay’s Elegant Lady, while actor Siva Karthikeyan of Maan Karate fame, was awarded Pride of Vijay TV. The other awards were Special Award and Special Jury Award for Anand Vaidhyanadhan (Super Singer) and Kuyili – Rajasekar (Saravanan Meenatchi) respectively. The Special Honorary Award was given to Yugi Sethu. Actress Simran and Sangeetha, director P. Vasu and Vetrimaran, Powerstar and several other celebrities graced the evening.
Sponsored by Sunfeast Farmlite and powered by Karbonn Smart A5s’, Vijay Television Awards will be telecast in the second week of June.
