As we know, Rajinikanth met his fans this morning at Raghavendra Kalyana Mandapam. A special invitee to the event was former film producer and writer, Kalaignanam. Notably, Kalaignanam is the person who insisted and introduced Rajinikanth as a solo hero in the film Bairavi. At the event, Rajini narrated the intriguing story of how he got the role of the hero from Kalaignanam in the year 1978.

"I didn't enter the industry to become a hero. I was doing many Tamil, Telugu and Kannada films in other roles. I was always travelling and was busy with many films as the villain. That was the time Kalaignanam sir came to me and said he wanted to do a movie. I thought it was a villain role and informed him that my schedule was tight. But he said he wanted to produce a film with me as the hero. I was shocked. I didn't know too much about him, and I rejected the offer.

Again, within the next few days when he approached me, I wanted to avoid him. At that time, I was taking a salary of Rs 25-30,000. I told him to give me Rs 50,000, thinking he would never come back after hearing my salary. But within a few days, he came back and gave me Rs 30,000 as cash and said that it is the advance. Moreover, he said that Sreekanth would be the villain. At that time, Sreekanth was a big artiste. Also, he said Sripriya would be the heroine. I was awestruck, and I just agreed to do the film"