Know about contractor Lasar Elayappan before you #Pray_for_Nesamani

On Thursday morning, Twitter woke up to a bizarre trend - #Pray_for_Nesamani. The uninitiated were curious to know who is Nesamani and what happened to him.

It all began after a user’s comment on a Facebook post went viral.

The post had a photo of a hammer with the A question: What is the name of this tool in your country?

A Facebook user commented: ...Painting contractor Nesamani’s head was broken in Jamin palace with this one by his niece. Paavam (sic)”

Responding to his comment, many uninitiated Facebook users, who were seemingly concerned about Nesamani’s health, inquired about his well being. This started #Pray_for_Nesamani hashtag.

The user was referring to the fictional character from a scene in the 2001 Tamil movie Friends, in which Ramesh Kanna as Krishnamoorthi drops a hammer that lands on Nesamani's (Vadivelu) head.

Well, let's come to the point. Before Nesamani was born, there was Lasar Elayappan, who was hit first by the hammer. For the unknown, it was the Malayalam film Friends, the 1999 comedy drama film written and directed by Siddique, which was remade into Tamil with the same name (2001) and into Telugu as Snehamante Idera (2001) and Odia as Dosti.

Produced by Lal, the film starred Jayaram, Mukesh, Sreenivasan and Meena in the lead.

Jagathi Sreekumar donned the role of Chackachamparambil Lasar, aka contractor Laser Elayappan, which was later reprised by Vadivelu.

So, if you are planning to pray for Nesamani, think about Laser Elayappan first!