India wins Superstar Challenge 2014

SINGAPORE — The international Tamil singing competition Superstar Challenge 2014 saw singers from such countries as Singapore, Malaysia, Sri Lanka and Canada taking part; but it was the duo from India who walked away with the big prize.

Singers Aravind and Abhilasha emerged as champions at the two-hour compeition on Saturday night, and they bagged not just a trophy but a cash prize of S$20,000 as well.

The singers competed in three challenging rounds. Though Singapore’s representatives, Vishnu and Pavithra, put up a strong showing, they had to make do with second place, winning S$5,000. Malaysia’s Ganesan and Iris came in third and walked away with S$3,000. The contestants from Sri Lanka (Kokularajh and Praveena) and Canada (Harish and Luksimi) took home S$2,000 each.

Superstar Challenge, which began last year, is a singing competition organised by MediaCorp’s Vasantham channel, in collaboration with Astro from Malaysia, Zee Tamizh from India, Independent Television Network from Sri Lanka and Tamil Entertainment Television from Canada.

Viewers were also entertained by Singaporean Kollywood music composer and singer Mohammed Raffee and his band, as well as popular Indian vocalist and actor Harish Raghavendra and Vasantham Star 2011 winner Suthasini. Christopher Toh