Why MR Radha shot MGR – A Quest for the Truth

On 12 January 1967 shortly after 16h00, actor MR Radha walked into MGR’s house and shot him at point blank range before turning the gun on himself in an attempted suicide. Miraculously, both survived, but the truth behind the curious incident has remained a mystery.

There are many versions of the incident, but the truth of the matter is only two people know the real reasons for the shooting – MGR and MR Radha.

Some articles maintain that MR Radha had gone to MGR’s house with the intention of talking about a forthcoming film together when an argument broke out. Radha then pulled out a gun and shot him in anger. Others maintain that the two of them had a long-standing dispute and this resulted in Radha wanting to kill MGR. Others believe that the incident was politically motivated. We will never the truth, but there are some points to ponder:

1. 1. Why was MR Radha in tears before pulling the trigger?

1. 1. Why would two people collaborating on a movie resort to such extreme violence?

1. 1. It was election season in Tamil Nadu at that time? Did this have any bearing on the events that ensued?

1. 1. Why would the victim, MGR, show such compassion to his attacker, arranging to take him to the hospital and insisting that the medical staff should attend to Radha first before seeing to him?

In the video below, I do not provide answers to these questions, but offer some facts about what happened. These have been gleaned from books written by MGR’s driver and the doctor who attended to both people at the emergency ward. Bearing in mind that all accounts are subjective, I offer this merely as a means to highlight the fact that no version can be regarded as the absolute truth and that much of what happened that night, the events preceding it and what transpired thereafter, will remain one of the unsolved mysteries of the Tamil film world.