Ganesh Venkatraman

Ganesh Venkatraman
Ganesh Venkatraman at the 62nd Filmfare Awards South, 2015
Born	20 March 1980 Mumbai, Maharashtra, India
Occupation	Actor
Years active	2006-present
Spouse	Nisha Krishnan ​ (m. 2015)​
Children	2

Ganesh Venkatraman is an Indian actor who works predominantly in Tamil and Telugu films. He had acted in Radha Mohan's Abhiyum Naanum (2008), before working in Unnaipol Oruvan (2009) and Kandahar (2010).^[1]

Career

Ganesh began his acting career by appearing in television serials. It including Antariksh and Mayavi, which was the first known 3D serial in Tamil television. He made his film début with The Angrez (2006), an experimental crossover film shot in Hyderabadi Urdu but he could not garner any further film offers immediately. Subsequently, he made his début in Tamil cinema with Radha Mohan's family drama, Abhiyum Naanum (2008). He was cast in the role of Trisha's Punjabi fiancé, this role received critical acclaim.^[2] He appeared as a police officer, working alongside Mohanlal, Kamal Haasan and Venkatesh in the bilingual film Unnaipol Oruvan (2009), while he also portrayed an army general in Mohanlal Starrer Major Ravi's war film Kandahar. He also worked in a thriller film titled Muriyadi with Sathyaraj by Selva, but the film failed to have a theatrical release owing to Kavithalayaa Productions' financial troubles. During the period, Ganesh also opted out of another multi-starrer Mankatha (2011), and instead chose to work on another bilingual Tamil and Hindi film, Panithuli (2012), in a solo lead role. The film opened to negative reviews and performed poorly at the box office.Then he played antagonist in Nagarjuna Starrer Damarukam.^[3]

Ganesh worked on three projects in 2013, prioritising his work on Tamil cinema. He appeared in Sundar C's bilingual film, Theeya Velai Seiyyanum Kumaru in a supporting role of an office worker, while he was seen as a police officer in the action film, Ivan Veramathiri. He also portrayed the role of a prince in Roopa Iyer's Kannada and Tamil bilingual film, Chandra, and revealed that he signed on after hearing that Shriya Saran would be portraying the lead role.^[4] Ganesh subsequently worked on a few low budget films, the psychological thriller Achaaram (2015) and the drama Pallikoodam Pogamale (2015), both of which had limited theatrical releases. During the same year, he also portrayed a supporting role in Mohan Raja's Thani Oruvan (2015), which went on to become a success.^[5] His following his releases have fared less well with Thodari (2016) and Nayaki (2016), where he portrayed the antagonist, earning negative reviews and performing poorly at the box office.^[6][7] Likewise, neither of his subsequent investigative thriller films Inayathalam (2017) or 7 Naatkal (2017) were able to perform well commercially.^[8] For his role in Inayathalam, Ganesh spent time with the Chennai cyber-crime division to prepare for his character.^[9]

Other work

Prior to acting, Ganesh Venkatraman was a model and had been chosen Gladrags Mr. India 2003 and been a representative for India in Mr. World 2004.^[10] In September 2014, Ganesh made his debut as a television host by presenting the reality game show Vendhar Veetu Kalyanam on Vendhar TV.^[11] He later appeared in the reality show Achcham Thavir by Star Vijay. In 2017, he took part as a contestant in the Bigg Boss reality show, and finished as the show's third runner up.^[12]

Personal life

Ganesh Venkatraman was born to Tamil Brahmin Iyer parents. He and actress Nisha Krishnan got married in November 2015.^[13][14]

Filmography

Year	Film	Role	Language	Notes
2006	The Angrez	Rochak Suddala	English/Hyderabadi Urdu
2008	Abhiyum Naanum	Joginder Singh	Tamil
2009	Unnaipol Oruvan	Inspector Arif Khan	Tamil	Edison Award for Best Supporting Actor
	Eenadu		Telugu
2010	Kandahar	Captain Sooryanath Sharma	Malayalam
2011	Ko	Himself	Tamil	Special appearance
2012	Panithuli	Shiva	Tamil
	Damarukam	Rahul	Telugu
2013	Theeya Velai Seiyyanum Kumaru	George	Tamil
	Chandra	Arya	Kannada
	Ivan Veramathiri	DCP Aravindan	Tamil
2014	Chandra	Arya	Tamil
	Tum Ho Yaara	Shiva	Hindi	Hindi version of Panithuli
2015	Achaaram	SI Suriya	Tamil
	Thani Oruvan	Shakthi IPS	Tamil
	Pallikoodam Pogamale	DCP Ganesh Venkatram	Tamil
2016	Nayagi	Yogendher	Tamil
	Nayaki		Telugu
	Thodari	DIG Sultan	Tamil
2017	Inayathalam	Ganesh IPS	Tamil
	7 Naatkal	Sai Prasad IPS	Tamil
2018	My Story	David Eapen	Malayalam	Santhosham Award for Best Villain
2019	Raagala 24 Gantallo	Ganesh IAS	Telugu
2020	Guns of Banaras	Vikram Singh	Hindi
2023	Varisu	Mukesh	Tamil
	Red Sandalwood	Ramaiya	Tamil
2024	Rathnam	Rathnam's father	Tamil
2024	Anthima Theerpu	DCP Bose	Telugu
2024	Sabari	Aravind	Telugu

Television

Year	Show	Role	Language	Notes
2006	Antariksh - Ek Amar Katha	Amar	Hindi
2006-2007	Mayavi	Vikram	Tamil
2014	Vendhar Veetu Kalyanam	Anchor
2016	Achcham Thavir	Contestant		1st Runner Up
2017	Bigg Boss Tamil 1	Contestant		3rd Runner-up
2020	Thirumagal	Himself		Special appearance
2021	Vanakkam Tamizha	Guest		Along with Nisha
2021	Rowdy Baby	Contestant
2021	Kannana Kanne	Assistant Commissioner Dinesh		Special appearance
2022	Namma Veettu Kalyanam	Guest		Along with Nisha
2022	Thallatu	Aravind		Special appearance
2023	Sweet Kaaram Coffee	The Major
2024-Present	Ninaithen Vandhai	Dr. Ezhil		Lead Role

References

1. Nadadhur, Srivathsan (20 September 2015). "Ganesh Venkatraman is in an ideal space". The Hindu. Archived from the original on 5 December 2017. Retrieved 31 December 2017.
2. "Inspired sensitivity". The New Indian Express. 26 December 2008. Archived from the original on 2 February 2022. Retrieved 2 February 2022.
3. Manigandan, K. R. (11 August 2012). "Panithuli - Plot with many loopholes". The Hindu. Retrieved 31 December 2017.
4. "2013 is Ganesh Venkatraman's year". Newindianexpress.com. Archived from the original on 4 March 2016. Retrieved 31 December 2017.
5. "'Thani Oruvan' is 'biggest hit' in Jayam Ravi's career". Indianexpress.com. 8 September 2015. Archived from the original on 9 January 2018. Retrieved 31 December 2017.
6. Nadadhur, Srivathsan (15 July 2016). "Nayaki: A futile effort". The Hindu. Archived from the original on 26 November 2016. Retrieved 31 December 2017.
7. jalapathy (22 September 2016). "Rail - Movie Review". Telugucinema.com. Archived from the original on 12 September 2017. Retrieved 31 December 2017.
8. "Review : Inayathalam review: An amateurish attempt that is worth a (2017)". Sify. Archived from the original on 13 January 2018. Retrieved 31 December 2017.
9. "Ganesh Venkatraman spent time with Chennai cyber-crime division to prepare for Inayathalam". Bollywoodlife.com. 19 May 2017. Archived from the original on 27 December 2017. Retrieved 31 December 2017.
10. "Actor Ganesh Venkatraman - Tamil Movie Actors Interview - Unnaipol Oruvan Abiyum Naanum Angrez - Behindwoods.com". behindwoods.com. Archived from the original on 16 January 2016. Retrieved 31 December 2017.
11. "Ganesh Venkatraman makes his TV debut". Times of India. Archived from the original on 15 August 2017. Retrieved 31 December 2017.
12. "I am in a happy phase: Ganesh Venkatraman". Deccanchronicle.com. 13 November 2017. Archived from the original on 23 November 2017. Retrieved 31 December 2017.
13. "Ganesh Venkatraman's wedding date is fixed for the 22nd November". Behindwoods.com. 4 November 2015. Archived from the original on 7 November 2015. Retrieved 31 December 2017.
14. "- Tamil Movie News". IndiaGlitz.com. Archived from the original on 28 April 2017. Retrieved 31 December 2017.

External links

Ganesh Venkatraman at IMDb