Chennai, Dec. 23: Veteran Tamil film director K. Balachander, who introduced Rajinikanth and Kamal Haasan, died on Tuesday of illness. He was 84.

A Dada Saheb Phalke award winner, KB, as he was fondly known, was seen as the Pitamaha of Tamil cinema for introducing and shaping the careers of many artistes.

A playwright who stepped into cinema, KB's films, mostly family dramas, competed against the big banners of MGR and Sivaji Ganesan in the 60s and 70s and held their own.

'Tamil cinema has lost an institution,' summed up KB's fellow traveller-journalist Cho Ramaswamy.