Sowmya Sathyanarayan, better known by her stage name Soundarya, was an Indian actress who worked in Telugu, Kannada, Tamil, Hindi and Malayalam films.
19 Facts About Soundarya
2.
Soundarya was regarded as one of the greatest actresses in the history of Telugu Cinema and the most Successful actress after yesteryear's superstar Mahanati Savitri.
3.
Soundarya has received Three Nandi Awards, Two Karnataka State Film Awards for Best Actress and Six Filmfare Awards South for her performances in films such as Ammoru, Pavitra Bandham, Anthahpuram, Raja, Doni Saagali, Dweepa and Apthamitra.
4.
Soundarya was born and brought up in a Kannada Brahmin family in Bengaluru, Karnataka.
5.
Soundarya acted in more than 100 movies, predominantly in Telugu, in a span of 12 years.
6.
Soundarya began with lead roles in Kannada, her mother tongue, and went on to become the most popular actress in Telugu films.
7.
Soundarya played an award-winning role in Ammoru, directed by Kodi Ramakrishna, starring alongside Ramya Krishna and Suresh and played the role of Bhavani, a devotee of Goddess Ammoru.
8.
Soundarya starred alongside South Indian superstar Rajinikanth in Arunachalam, which became the highest-grossing film of 1997 in Tamil cinema.
9.
Soundarya starred alongside Kamal Haasan and Prabhudeva in Kaathala Kaathala in Tamil in the same year, dubbed in Telugu as Navvandi Lavvandi, directed by Singeetam Srinivas Rao.
10.
Soundarya was signed to play Draupadi but the film was shelved following her death.
11.
Soundarya has acted with several other heroes such as Vinod Kumar, Naresh, Suresh, Harish, Abbas, Vineeth, Vadde Naveen, Ramesh Babu, Avinash, Bhanu Chander and JD Chakravarthy.
12.
Soundarya has acted opposite Vikram, Anand, Rehman, Eeramana Rojave Shiva, and shared screen space with Shivaji Ganesan in Padayappa.
13.
Soundarya acted in the Hindi film Sooryavansham, opposite Amitabh Bachchan.
14.
Soundarya starred in several Tamil super-hits including Arunachalam and Padayappa with Rajinikanth and Kaadhala Kaadhala, with Kamal Haasan.
15.
Soundarya has acted in the Malayalam film Kilichundan Mampazham, with Mohanlal and Sreenivasan and Yathrakarude Sradhakku with Jayaram.
16.
Soundarya was about to make her Tv Debut with the successful Tamil Tv series Kolangal, Although she was interested, she was unable to join the crew due to her 2-month contract with the Bharatiya Janata Party to support them during election campaign.
17.
Soundarya had opened 3 schools for orphaned children in her native village Ganjigunte, in Mulbagal.
18.
Soundarya was known as the only actress in the 90s from South India who had shown keen interest in social service, and had done many voluntary activities to help the Underprivileged.
19.
On 17 April 2004, Soundarya died in an aircraft crash along with her brother Amarnath while travelling to Karimnagar from Bengaluru during an election campaign to support Bharatiya Janata Party, which she had joined that year.