Sarojamma

Sarojamma, a Kannada actress, is the golden name in the list of great women of India. She died on 25th June 2016 at the age of 60 in a heart attack. Her full name was K.S Sarojamma. She is more popularly known as “the Hooch Queen Marimuthu” in Kannada cine world after the big success of the film “Upendra” and nicknamed as “marimuthu sarojamma.” She has acted in the character of “marimuthu,” a gritty and powerful underworld lady don. Upendra was her debut film and gave her success in the role of a lady-villain. In most of her films, she has acted as donned antagonist roles and became famous as a lady don. Kannada films got a new meaning of negative roles through her acting. She has acted more than 15 movies among which the films like Upendra, Karigalu sar Karigalu, Kitty, Kothigalu Sar Kothigalu, Suntaragali are got popularised.

Along with an actress, she was a government employee, a former counselor, and the president of the union of domestic workers. She was a contestant of JD(S) from Sagayapuram ward in the BBMP election. She was also an accuser for the loss of 229 people in Karnataka Hooch Tragedy happened on 18th May 2008. Sarojamma was living at her house at Kamalanagara in Bengaluru, Karnataka. Her husband was a fearless, brave journalist working in Mysore, Karnataka. He has written a sensitive and blasting report about the theft of natural resources in the forest of Bandipur. Due to his report, some forest officials got exposed. Even the culprits accused him that he has involved in this scandal by the politicians. He brutally killed by the unknown victims who have chopped his body parts in pieces.

It is another sad thing that nobody has convicted yet for his murder. But this incidence didn’t revert Sarojamma from her missions. She worked with more aggression and with a strong will power to reach her goal. Sarojamma was the lady don in real life also. She comes in the category of those women who made the difference. She was the woman who rescued over 3000 children from the silk weaving factories in Karnataka. As a researcher, she came through the havoc situation of the children, when she visited the silk factories of Maragadi in the early 1990s. They were so young that even the children of 6 years were among them. Thousands of children were working under the dim light and inhumane atmosphere of the factory for long hours. After witnessing the poor condition of those children workers, she published her research in this issue and filed a lawsuit against the silk unit. More than 1200 children rescued in the first phase.

She raided the silk industries again and again within 1999-2005 to save the child laborers. In 2001, about 8.2 lakh children in Karnataka were working as laborers which reduced to 2.49 lakh by 2011. Sarojamma has a great role in this success of the state. Sarojamma was a combination of bravery and kindness gave shelter to the homeless young girls freed by her. She realized the helpless situation of the girls and founded a home for them known as “Chiguru Balvikas Sanstha.” Even she trained and educated those girls to stand on their own feet without depending upon anybody. She counseled with the parents of other children not to send them to work illegally. Her words influenced the parents and the rate of child labor reduced in Karnataka.