Balu, 3 other AP artists conferred with Padma Vibhushan

Anantapur/Nellore: AP-born singer S.P. Balasubrahmanyam was posthumously conferred the Padma Vibhushan on Monday, marking Republic Day. The nation's second highest civilian honour was also conferred on former PM of Japan Shinzo Abe.

Three artists from Andhra Pradesh were conferred the Padma Shri: Classical violinist Ramaswamy Annavarapu, who is 95 years old, Dalit author and poet Prakash Rao Asavadi and Nidumolu Sumathi, one of the first female mrudungam players,

Ramaswamy’s students wanted more for their teacher. M. Sudhakar, student of the Ramaswamy, observed: “We expected more recognition for our guru who is about to turn 96 and was close to Balamurali Krishna and accompanied him in n many concerts.”

It is said that that the veteran violinist can still play for two hours on stage in a concert.

Dr Prakash Rao is known in the literary world as a versatile intellectual, critic, observer and poet from Anantapur district.

Dr Prakash Rao was born on August 2, 1944, at Korivipalli Village Singanamala mandal in Anantapur district. A poet and scholar, he retired as principal at Penukonda and received the AP Sahitya Akademi award. He was member of the working committee of Sri Krishnadevaraya University.

Nidumolu Sumathi from Eluru was a leading mrudangist in the state. She is the daughter of Nidumolu Raghavayya, who was an expert at playing the mridangam/

For the much-decorated Balasubrahmanyam, who bagged six national awards as best playback singer in Telugu, Tamil, Kannada and Hindi, and 25 Nandi awards from the AP government, apart from scores of awards from Tamil Nadu and Karnataka governments, the Padma Vibhushan, conferred posthumously, is easily the biggest honour.

He had been conferred the Padma Bhushan in 2011 and Padma Shri in 2001. The singer died in September last year in Chennai due to complications caused by Covid-19.

Incidentally Balasubhramanyam, while releasing a special postal cover with his picture at the collectorate in Nellore in November 2018, had said the people of Tamil Nadu assume that he is a Tamilian, those in Kerala think that he is a Keralite, he is Kannadiga for Karnataka and a Hindi speaker for North Indians.

Though Andhra Pradesh Assembly had passed a resolution urging the Centre to bestow the award after his sudden demise, his name was mentioned from Tamil Nadu in the award list.

Balu and SPB to his fans, Balasubrahmanyam made his debut as a playback singer on December 15, 1966 with Sri Sri Sri Maryada Ramanna, a Telugu film produced by the famous comedian Padmanabham.

In the subsequent five decades, he recorded more than 40,000 songs in several languages and bagged the Guinness World Record for recording the highest number of songs. He was also an actor, film producer, television anchor and dubbing artist. He holds the mark for recording 19 songs in Tamil and 16 songs in Hindi in a day.