An actor and producer, Maniyanpillai Raju's original name was Sudheer Kumar. He took this name from his own movie 'Maniyanpillai Athava Maniyanpillai'. His debut movie was 'Mohiniyattam' directed by Sreekumaran Thampi. He later appeared in lead roles, charactor roles, comedy roles etc. Both his sons Niranjen and Sachin made their debut performance in the movie 'Black Butterfly'.