Virumandi "Virus" Santhanam is the main antagonist of the 2012 Kollywood coming-of-age comedy drama film Nanban, which is a remake of Bollywood's 3 Idiots.
He is the notoriously harsh principal of the Ideal Engineering College. The university has a reputation for being most successful on his watch but only from dealing immense stress and pressure to his students through harsh disciplinary action, pushing some of them to depression and self harm. He is also Panchavan "Pari" Parivendhan's arch-rival, and spends the entire movie trying to prove that his ideology is right to the latter. He was based on Viru Sahastrabuddhe.
He was portrayed by Sathyaraj.
Personality[]
Although appearing as a mere strict professor, Virus is ill-mannered and an undesirable person to get close with. He looks upon the students he teaches and even members of society as people he should upstage, stating that anybody who isn't fit for the benefit of humanity, including poor and uneducated people should be cast aside for smarter ones. He is naturally extremely competitive and easily angered, developing rivalries with his students for challenging him or thinking that they can convince him of acceptance. He also resorts to violent and illegal action to fail the students he dislikes. He is also revealed to have a son, whom just like Paneer, he pushed to suicide for following his passions and not receiving the top grades.
Biography[]
Virus is introduced by role through the main character Kosaksi Pasapughazh, one of his new year's students who was attending under a false identity. Although Virus is a smart man, even being able to write with his hands and feet, he is shown to have poor manners, bad temper, and extremely competitive and judgmental, demanding to see perfection out of everyone.
Virus introduces himself to the new students of the year holding a cuckoo bird nest, with the bird sculpture and real eggs. He explains to the students that cuckoos are cunning in how they survive, killing the babies of other birds in favor of their own. He states that the students are like the eggs and proceeds to dump paperwork and documents of hundreds of students who have failed his college. Virus states that life and the college is a race, and that they must do whatever it takes to get the top grades, and that if they don't the weaker students will be cast aside for failure. He also presents an anti-gravity pen that is used by astronauts to write, saying that it was given to him in youth for being the best student and that only the worthy will earn it. He also dismisses Kosaksi when he asks about why astronauts can't use pencils out of curiosity, considering it a stupid question. Kosaksi and another student named Srivatsan, who adopts Virus's darwinist ideals and takes advantage of himself being a smart student to push through is classes. He is also seen delivering erotic magazines to other dorms hoping to slow down his competitors, earning dislike in Kosaksi's eyes.
During the semester, an ambitious engineering student named Paneer Selvam develops a drone hoping it will be useful in monitoring and containing railway and vehicle traffic. He presents it to Virus who gets offended that he would dare submit a big project late. He also humiliates him by demanding that he calls his father, a poor farmer, and telling him that he will not be allowed to graduate because his idea was stupid and late. His father, having sacrificed heavily to get his son into college is in tears, and Paneer's begging goes on deaf ears. He throws the non functional drone away, but Kosaksi finds it and works on it in addition to his own project, making it function. When Kosaksi and his friends Venkat and Senthil try presenting it they see Paneer had hanged himself in his dorm through the drone camera. The students and Virus attend his funeral and Kosaksi tells virus that the immense pressure the school system puts on students is unacceptable and that Paneer's death is on their hands. Virus believes that Kosaksi accused him and scolds him in his office for it. Kosaksi states that a number of suicides and depression instances are caused by the immense pressure the education system puts on them, but Virus shows complete lack of concern for this, and demands Kosaksi to show him how engineering is taught when he suggests the school doesn't do it right.
Virus drags him to a lecture hall, interrupting a class with Venkat and Senthil in it. He demands Kosaksi to teach them engineering, hoping that he'll be humiliated. But Kosaksi proceeds to write two made up terms, word puns of his friends names, and challenges the students to define them in a minute. He uses this as an example where rushing to perfection isn't a good method of learning and tells Virus that maybe he will learn from them one day, before running out, leaving Virus angered and the students laughing. Offended, Virus writes hateful letters to Senthil and Venkat's families about how Kosaksi is a terrible student and poor influence on Venkat and Senthil, leading to Kosaksi seeing how poor his friend's families are. Senthil takes the criticism and distances himself from Kosaksi but Venkat stays with him. In the meantime, Kosaksi develops feelings for medical student Riya, who is actually Virus' daughter. The trio crash her sister's wedding for free food and Kosaksi advises Riya to break up with her gold digger fiance, to which she gets offended. Virus also catches them and lectures Senthil and Venkat, saying that Kosaksi is from a rich family and spoiled, and that for the sake of their own families they shouldn't be friends with him. In an effort to persuade Senthil not to stress himself out, Venkat and Kosaksi sabatoge Srivatsan's Teacher's Appreciation speech, replacing the Tamil word for "teach" in the speech with "rape" as a joke. The words sound very similar and since Srivatsan isn't fluent in Tamil he doesn't notice. Kosaksi does this to get back at Virus for targeting him and to Srivatsan, hoping to distance him from Senthil. He presents the speech publicly in front of Virus' father and hears the inappropriate speech, storming out. Virus beats up Srivatsan on stage, and when Srivatsan finds out what Kosaksi did he violently lashes at him, claiming that one day he'll outcompete them.
After the event, the trio get drunk on the college tower and break into Virus' house to get Kosaksi together with Riya. Riya and her sister take the joke but Virus busts them, and in retaliation tell Senthil to write an email to his parents confessing that he'll fail. Virus rightfully but harshly dismisses his pleading and Senthil jumps out the office window when Virus is getting shaved. Fortunately Senthil survives and Kosaksi manages to get his friends into job positions, convincing Venkat's parents to pursue a photography career and getting an application for Senthil despite his poor grades. Virus also loses the bet he makes with Kosaksi, and his barber shaves his moustache off since Kosaksi's friends get the jobs. Angered, Virus plots to submit a false document showing Senthil failing the semester, hoping that he'll never work. Riya disapproves of this and manages to get Kosaksi and Venkat to break into Virus' office to swap the fake document with the real one, but Virus catches them and threatens to call the police if they don't leave, and violently beats up Kosaksi before leaving. The trio do leave but are interrupted when they see Riya's sister Swetha in labor during a rainstorm. They take her to the college game room and with help from the other students, they restore the room's power and remove the baby. Virus is touched by this display and changes his mind about expelling Kosaksi, and even giving him the anti-gravity pen. After the incident Virus largely lightens up on his harsh demeanor but still proceeds to display a bad temper. He is last seen when Senthil and Venkat crash Riya's wedding and convince her to change her mind and be with Kosaksi. They run away and Virus is left behind, failing to pursue them. Eventually Senthil, Venkat, and Riya meet with Srivatsan and Kosaksi to settle their past conflicts and stay on good terms.