Director Kamal and Mammootty share a good rapport. They have come together four times before and the last three occasions of it have turned out to be successful ventures.

Now they are back for the fourth time with Karutha Pakshikal. The movie is about Tamil workers earning livelihood doing menial jobs in Kerala.

Says Kamal, 'Tamil workers making a fairly good living by doing casual jobs in Kerala have become a common scene in the State. All of us need them for sundry works even though many of us always treat them as alien.

In this backdrop, I was contemplating a theme on those poor laborers in Kerala, looking into its social values and economic implications. When I discussed the story with Mammootty, he evinced interest in the topic and we began working on it, says Kamal.

This is Kamal's 37th film and the fourth with Mammootty.