RJ Balaji

Balaji Patturaj (born 20 June 1985), popularly known as RJ Balaji, is an Indian radio jockey, actor, television presenter, comedian and film director in Chennai, Tamil Nadu. He is best known as the host of the 92.7 Big FM shows The Night Show with RJ Balaji, Take it Easy and it's now defunct segment Cross Talk, where he made prank calls to unsuspecting victims. Originally a radio jockey, Balaji is also active in other fields; he is known for his association with the television shows Ungalil Yaar Adutha Prabhu Dheva and Why This Kolaveri, and for his performance in the films Theeya Velai Seiyyanum Kumaru (2013), Vadacurry (2014) Naanum Rowdy Dhaan (2015), Pugazh (2016) and LKG (2019) (as an actor), Mookuthi Amman (2020) and Veetla Vishesham (2022) (as an actor and a co-director). He has also been a presenter at many inter-school cultural events in Chennai, a cricket commentator, and has contributed to many social causes, such as providing relief support to the victims of the 2015 South India floods along with other actors. Early life Balaji was born on 20 June, and was raised in Chennai, Tamil Nadu. He has four siblings, one younger brother and three younger sisters. He said that his father abandoned his family at an unspecified point. Balaji told Sudhish Kamath in 2013 that he changed 27 houses and 11 schools while growing up in Chennai because his "mother just cannot stay in one place. She would move from Perambur to Thiruvanmiyur to Mylapore... no place close to each other." When he was in college, Balaji realised that his strength was in interaction and that the attention and acclaim he received in his college cultural gave him confidence and he realised that he had to be in the media. After completing his BSc computer science from the Kumararani Meena Muthiah College of Arts in 2006, Balaji joined the Amrita School of Communication in Coimbatore for a Postgraduate Diploma in Journalism, because he wanted to become like his cousin who worked at NDTV, but when he was asked to write a report on his hostel's canteen, the 56-word report contained 47 grammatical errors, and he soon realised that English journalism was not what he was interested in. At that time he saw a newspaper advertisement of a radio station (Radio Mirchi Coimbatore) that auditioned for radio jockeys and he applied for it, though he "never knew what an RJ was back then". He said that he almost did not get selected then when he sang a gaana but was finally selected in November 2006.