Legendary Tollywood actor Padma Vibhushan Dr Akkineni Nageswara Rao is no more. The actor, who was suffering from cancer for quite some time, took his last breath early this morning at 2.02 AM on Wednesday, January 22, 2014. His body was shifted to Annapurna Studios for fans and celebrities to pay homage. It will be created tomorrow at Erragadda Burrial Grounds. The 90 year old actor is survived by two sons (Venkat Akkineni and Nagarjuna Akkineni) and three daughters (Satyavathi, Naga Susheela and Saroja). His grandsons Sumanth, Sushanth and Naga Chaitanya are also serving the Telugu Film Industry as actors.
Chief Minister N Kiran Kumar Reddy, Governor ESl Narsimhan, K Roshaiah, N Chandra Babu Naidu, DK Aruna, Chiranjeevi, Hari Krishna, Jayaprakash Narayana, D Ramanaidu, K Raghavendra Rao, Dasari Narayana Rao, Mohan Babu, Rajendra Prasad, D Suresh Babu, Venkatesh, Jasasudha, Srikanth, Nithin and several others from the film fraternity and political field expressed their condolences to his family members.
Born on September 20, 1923 to Akkineni Venkataratnam and Akkineni Punnamma at Ramapuram in Krishna District, ANR entered the film industry in 1941 with ‘Dharmapatni’. His last film was ‘Manam’ costarring his son Nagarjuna and grandsons Naga Chaitanya and Akhil Akkineni. In his career span of 70 years, ANR acted in more than 300 films in Telugu, Tamil and Hindi languages. The veteran actor played number of variety roles ranging from charming prince in ‘Maya Bazaar’, ‘Chenchu Lakshmi’, ‘Sri Krishnarjuna Yuddam’, to the frustrated alcoholic lover in ‘Devadas’ and ‘Prem Nagar’. ANR did numerous romantic entertainers and family entertainers like ‘Laila Majnu’, ‘Anarkali’, ‘Premabhishekam’, ‘Meghasandesham’, ‘Missamma’, ‘Gundamma Katha’, ‘Chakrapani’, ‘Bharya Bhartalu’, ‘Aaradhana’, ‘Donga Ramudu’, ‘Dr Chakravarthi’, ‘Ardhaangi’, ‘Mangalya Balam’, ‘Illarikam’, ‘Shantinivasam’, ‘Velugu Needalu’, ‘Preminchi Choodu’, ‘Dasara Bullodu’, ‘Batasari’, ‘Samsaram’, ‘Sitaramayyagari Manavaralu’ and won a special place in the hearts of Telugu people. Some of his notable devotional films are ‘Mahakavi Kalidas’, ‘Panduranga Mahatyam’, ‘Bhakta Tukaram’, ‘Amarasilpi Jakkanna’, ‘Sree Ramadasu’, etc.
Films like ‘Sudigundalu’, ‘Marapurani Manishi’, ‘Seetharamaiah Gari Manavaralu’ and ‘Bangaru Kutumbam’ earned him Filmfare awards while ‘Meghasandesam’ and ‘Bangaru Kutumbam’ earned him two prestigious Nandi Awards. He was also honoured with Tamil Nadu State Award for the film ‘Kalaimamini’ and Madhya Pradesh State award for ‘Kalidasu’.
The legendary actor was awarded with several other prestigious awards that includes the second highest civilian award Padma Vibhushan, Dada Saheb Phalke Award, Raghupathi Venkaiah Award and NTR National Award. Nageswara Rao established the studio named Annapurna Studios and also produced few films.
Ragalahari prays for the Honourable Telugu Actor Dr Akkineni Nageswara Rao’s soul to Rest in Peace.
