Hidden Value Insert Problem

[eluser]Zed[/eluser]
hi,
i want to insert current date into my db and the value comes from a hidden field in a form. i declared the date variable in my view file, all i got was 00:00:00 in the db, then i altered it and declared it in my controller file, but still didn't work
this is what i did:

view

Code:

$date = $date = date('Y-m-d H:i:s', now());
<?php echo form_hidden('date', '$date'); ?>

controller

Code:

$form_data = array(
'title' => set_value('title'),
'surname' => set_value('surname'),
'firstname' => set_value('firstname'),
'email' => set_value('email'),
'state' => set_value('state'),
'tel' => set_value('tel'),
'topic' => set_value('topic'),
'msg' => set_value('msg'),
'date' => set_value('date')
);