Soundarya

Soundarya was a popular film actress in Kannada,Telugu, Tamil and Malayalam films. She had a successful career of about 12 years as heroine in films. Unfortunately, she died in a plane crash near Bangalore. All up, she acted in over 90 films. Soundarya, daughter of senior film writer and industrialist K. S. Satyanarayan was born and brought up in an Ashtagrama village near Bangalore, and was an Iyer. From an early age she showed an interest in acting, playing a role in her first film while she was in high school, in the film "Gandharva', a Kannada movie in 1992 by her father's friend, while she was studying in her first year of MBBS. After the film Ammoru became successful, she discontinued her studies . Thereafter, she acted in several successful Kannada and Telugu movies, mainly because of her acting skills and dialogue delivery.

Soundarya has also acted in Hindi film, Sooryavansham. She also produced and acted in a Kannada film Dweepa, with Girish Kasaravalli as director. The film won a host of National awards including Swarna Kamal (Golden Lotus) which is given for best film of the year. It also won Karnataka state awards for Best Actress, Best Film and Best Cinematography and was featured in five international film festivals.

She acted in four Malayalam movies: Chiranjeevi (1994), Yaathrakkaarude Sraddhaykku (2002), Kilichundan Maambazham (2003) and Apoorva (2008).

She married her maternal uncle and childhood friend, software engineer G. S. Raghu on 27 April 2003. She had great dreams of promoting public welfare during her lifetime. At the time of her death, she was about to produce and act in a film titled 'Kamli', directed by K. N. T Sastry. She has developed the entire village of Gangigunte (her native village), Mulabagal Taluk, in the Kolar district of Karnataka. Soundarya maintained an orphanage. Presently, it is being maintained by her relatives. In addition, the school, AMARA SOUNDARYA VIDYALAYA, is maintained by her trust and her own home is now being used as a school. Being very interested in Social welfare, she had many ideas and concepts about it. She had adopted some educational institutions and given funding for many more; and their family is continuing funding for educational institutions. Her wishes of funding welfare activities are currently being fulfilled by her husband and sister-in-law through the AMARA SOUNDARYA SOCIAL AND EDUCATIONAL TRUST (ASSET). Soundarya died on 17 April 2004 in an airplane crash near Bangalore when the four-seater plane Cessna 180 caught fire immediately after take-off. She was on her way to Andhra Pradesh to campaign for Bharatiya Janata Party for the elections. Her brother, Amarnath, a producer of Kannada films, also died in the accident.

Prepared by: Dr. Susie Pazhavarical