Gauthami: Overcoming Multiple Obstacles

Gauthami was born in Andhra Pradesh on 02 July 1968. She made her debut to the Tamil screen in the 1988 Rajinikanth-Prabhu starrer, Guru Sishyan.

She soon found herself with lots of offers and shared the screen with Kamalhaasan, Rajinikanth, Prabhu, Karthik, Vijayakanth, Murali, Sathyaraj, Rahman and co-starred the most with Ramarajan.

She won the Tamil Nadu state award for best actress for her role in M. Manivasagam’s Namma Ooru Poovatha where she played the female lead opposite Murali.

In 1991 she won the Filmfare Award for Best Actress for her role in Vasanth’s Nee Paathi Naan Paathi produced by K. Balachander.

She shared the screen with Sivaji Ganesan and Kamalhaasan in the iconic 1992 film, Thevar Magan. Although she had a relatively small role in the film, she regards this film as one of her favourites.

Three years later she played a small but important role in Mani Ratnam’s Iruvar – a film based on the lives of M.G. Ramachandran, Jayalalitha and M. Karunanidhi.

Gauthami married businessman, Sandeep Bhatia in 1998 but they were divorced a year later.

In 2003, Gauthami was diagnosed with breast cancer – a hurdle she successfully crossed. This led to her forming the Life Again Foundation to help patients of cancer.

From 2005 to 2016, Gauthami had a close relationship with Kamalhaasan and was the costume designer in many of his movies. They parted ways in 2016 and Gauthami turned her attention to active politics.