Child Artist Shamili From Mani Ratnams Anjali Then and Now

Baby Shamili won a National Film Award for Best Child Artist for her performance as the mentally challenged child Anjali in the 1990 film Anjali.

All of us who grew up in the 90's do remember watching Mani Ratnam's movie 'Anjali. It was primarily aimed at Kids but also had a strong message. Released in 1990, Anjali was a Tamil-Language movie directed by Mani Ratnam and featured Raghuvaran, Revathi, Master Tarun, Baby Shruti Vijaykumar and Baby Shamili (playing mentally challenged girl Anjali) in the lead roles. The music of Anjali was composed by Ilayaraja and it also happened to be his 500th film.

The movie Anjali revolved around a dying mentally disabled child 'Anjali', played by Baby Shamili. It also showed the emotional trauma experienced by her family. It won three National Film Awards and was also India's official entry to the Academy Awards in 1991, though it didn't get nominated in the Top 5 foreign films category.

Anjali was Baby Shamili's (also spelt as Shamlee) third film as a child artist. Shamili started acting at the age of two. In 1990, she acted in Bharathan's Malootty, a film based on Jessica McClure and her performance won her the Kerala State Film Award for Best Child Artist.

Her breakthrough in Tamil Cinema came with Mani Ratnam's Anjali, where she played a mentally challenged child. Baby Shamili won the National Film Award for Best Child Artist for her performance in 'Anjali'.

Shamlee made her debut as a lead actress in 2009 in the Telugu movie 'Oye!'. Her performance fetched her the CineMAA Award for Best Female Debut. Though the film's mixed response at the box office prompted her to embark on yet another sabbatical. Between 2010 and 2015, Shamili studied and worked in Singapore and turned down numerous opportunities to return to acting. She later returned to Chennai and was last seen as a heroine in Tamil movie Veera Sivaji. Call it a co-incidence, her chracter's name in Veera Sivaji was also 'Anjali'.