Father's Day special: South stars share special moments with their fathers

To a child, their father is their first hero. The first and only person in the world, to whom a child can look up to as they grow, is a father. In every step of their children's lives, a father makes sure he is always there to prevent their child from falling and to teach how to be strong.

On the occasion of Father's Day, here are some popular actors who share their favorite childhood moments with their father, their first gift to him, what they have learned the most and a lot more.

Rashmika Mandanna

My dad never told me I shouldn't or should do anything. He's been a strong backbone and agreed to anything the ladies in the house wanted or said. He's just been a good father to his daughters. I don't hear him say much about my work because he knows that he can't advise me on something he doesn't personally knows.

He's been an audience till now and even now he doesn't say something which he's unsure of but as a business partner he'll take me through the things I need to know. He loves seeing me on screen and do my thing. I guess he's proud of me but I love to see the glow and the smile on his face when he watches me on screen. He's my dad and I will always be his proud little girl.

Varalaxmi Sarathkumar

One of the favourite moments from my childhood, with my father Sarathkumar is when he used to drop and pick me up from school. That is something I always loved. Discipline and punctuality are a must for him and he taught me to follow the same in my career as well. I remember taking him on lunch with my first hard earned remuneration. I and my sister Pooja always keep fighting when it comes to deciding who his favourite is in between us. I even used to bully her by saying she is an adopted child.

Rahul Ravindran

One of the many things my father taught me and I follow without fail is that never owe money to anyone. He told me not to borrow money at all and in case I do, to return them the money as early as possible. Besides this, he told me that self-respect is very important. He' always been a strong pillar of support to me and I am thankful to him.

Lavanya Tripathi

My dad talks very less and we all at home understand a lot from his expressions and smiles itself. Every time he looks at me and smiles, I know that he is proud of me. He taught me to be cool always, not take things too seriously and help those in need. He always let me and siblings do what we want to and let us learn from our experiences.

Nivetha Thomas

Simply put in 3 words, I learnt from my dad that perseverance, patience and punctuality and virtues to live by. He has religiously followed them in his life and I've seen the benefits of applying them in my field of work. It is not so easy working in a different county far away from home and your loved ones is never easy, and for my dad to be doing that for 15 years now shows a great deal of his conviction to keep working through all the difficulties to keep his family in a better place.

At work, I, at a very young age learnt to say 'No' and ask 'Why?' These things have helped me set a strong foothold on what I'm here to do in the movie industry. Dad supported me then, he supports me now, and he sure wants to see his daughter do well in whatever she chooses. This definitely pushes me to do better! And I am abundantly blessed to have both my parents with me on my journey.

Swapna Dutt

Whatever I am today, or my siblings (Priyanka Dutt and Sravanthi Dutt) are, we owe to him. I believe that empowerment starts at home and my father made sure that all his daughters are empowered enough. He asked us to go the US, study, explore the world, learn new things, and was completely against getting us married just because we were in our late 20s. He asked us to work with him, made us learn things, and now, Vyjayanthi Movies and dad, are our responsibility.

In fact he never regretted that he didn't have a son. He always stood with us like a rock and encouraged us in everything we wanted to learn and explore. And now, it feels nice to see him spending time with our kids and I am thankful for having him in my life.

Anupama Parameswaran

My father used to work as a salesman at a jewellery shop and we belong to a middle class family. But still, he used to send me to music classes, dance classes, prepare me for competitions at school and make sure that I am no less than any other friends of mine. He used to write speeches and essays for me. When I and my brother used to ask for something, and if it was affordable, he used to get them for us.

Few years ago, we had to sell away our ancestral property because we were in need of money. So once I started earning, I bought back all that house, and land and gifted it to my father. That's the first gift I ever gave him. He had a lot of sentiments and emotions attached to that house. I was happy seeing him happy.