Showing all artists born in 1940

Sukumari is an Indian film actress who has primarily acted in Malayalam and Tamil films. She has been acting since she was 10 years old and has acted in various roles. The total number of her films is presumed to be about two-thousand five hundred. In 2003, she was awarded the Padma Shri by the Government of India for her contributions towards the arts. And she recently won the National Film Award for Best Supporting Actress for her role in Namma Gramam (2010).

She was born in Nagercoil, Travancore in 1941. Sukumari is a first cousin of the Travancore Sisters, Lalitha, Padmini and Ragini (their mothers are sisters). She learned dance with the sisters and mastered dance forms like Keralanadanam, Kathakali and Bharathanatyam. She went for an all-India tour with the sisters. Sukumari was noticed by a director when she went to the sets of a film with Padmini, and she debuted in the lead role in the Tamil film Orarivu. She was married to director A. Bhimsingh until he died when she was barely 30. 

She has acted in various Malayalam films of the black and white age, like Chettathi, Kusruthikkuttan, Kunjali Marakkar, Thacholi Othenan, Yakshi and Karinizhal. She later became popular acting in various films of Priyadarshan like Poochakkoru Mookkuthi, Oodarathuammava Aalariyam, Boeing Boeing and Vandanam. She was also noticed in various films directed by Balachandra Menon like Manicheppu Thurannappol and Karyan Nissaram. In later years she played a major role in Nizhalkkuthu (2002) directed by Adoor Gopalakrishnan. She has played many notable mother roles. She has acted in films in Malayalam, Tamil, Kannada, Telugu and Hindi, and used her own voice in all languages without using dubbing artists. She is still actively involved in films, TV serials and stage dramas.

Murali Mohan Maganti (Telugu: మురళి మోహన్ మాగంటి) (born 24 June 1940) is an Indian film actor, producer, politician and business executive from Telugu cinema. In 1973, Murali Mohan debuted in Jagame Maya (1973), produced by Poornachandra Rao Atluri. He gained recognition with the 1974 film Tirupati, directed by Dasari Narayana Rao. He has acted in over 350 feature films. He has served in various positions in the National Film Development Corporation (NFDC) and the Andhra Pradesh Film Development Corporation. He was the Honorary President of the Telugu Movie Artists Association until the elections in 2015.

In 1980 he formed his own film production company, Jayabheri Arts, with his brother Kishore. His first film as producer was Varala Abbay, directed by Raja Chandra. This was Murali Mohan's 100th film. The company produced 25 films, which include the blockbuster film Athadu.

He is the Chairman of the construction company Jayabheri Group. He has also been active in politics for the Telugu Desam Party. He contested in the 15th Loksabha elections in 2009 as the TDP candidate from Rajahmundry parliamentary constituency of Andhra Pradesh, which eventually lost to the Indian National Congress candidate Vundavalli Aruna Kumar by just 2,147 votes. In 2014, he won the 16th Loksabha elections as a member of Parliament from Rajahmundry.

Murali Mohan Maganti (born Maganti Raja Babu) was born on 24 June 1940 in Chataparru to Maganti Madhava Rao, an Indian freedom fighter. He did his schooling in Eluru. He shifted gears in 1963 and started his own business dealing in electrical motors and oil engines. He then ventured into stage acting in Vijayawada.

Murali Mohan is married to Vijaya Lakshsmi, with whom he has a daughter, Madhu Bindhu, and a son, Ram Mohan.

The Murali Mohan Charitable Trust provides free education for people who secure 85% in both SSC and intermediate and below 10,000 rank in EAMCET or any other preferred entrance tests. The students will be taken into consideration only after full-fledged screening for their financial status. Since its inception the trust has adopted nearly 1,000 students of engineering and medicine.

Durai (born 25 February 1940) is a Tamil film director who was mostly active during the 1970s. As of 2014, he has directed 46 films in Tamil, Telugu, Kannada, Malayalam and Hindi. Though known for his work in commercial cinema, he made films women-centric like Avalum Penthaane and Pasi, which won two National Film Awards.

He served as a jury member of the 58th National Film Awards (India) in 2011. As of 2011, he was the vice president of the South Indian Film Writers' Association.

Uppalapati Venkata Krishnam Raju (born 20 January 1940) is a Telugu film actor. He was popularly known as 'Rebel Star' for his rebellious acting style. He was also the winner of the first ever Nandi Award for Best Actor.


Krishnam Raju starred in more than 183 Telugu films in his career and was a prominent actor of the 1970s and 1980s in Tollywood. He entered the films in 1966 with Chilaka Gorinka produced and directed by Kotayya Pratyagatma. He won 5 Filmfare Awards and 2 Nandi Awards.


Krishnam Raju acted in several blockbuster hit films like Jeevana Tarangalu (1973), Krishnaveni (1974), Bhakta Kannappa (1976), Amaradeepam (1977), Sati Savitri (1978), Katakataala Rudraiah (1978), Mana Voori Pandavulu (1978), Rangoon Rowdy (1979), Shri Vinayaka Vijayamu (1979), Sita Ramulu (1980), Taxi Driver (1981), Trishulam (1982), Dharmaatmudu (1983),Bobbili Brahmanna (1984), Tandra Paprayudu (1986), Marana Sasanam (1987), Vishwanatha Nayakudu (1987), Antima Theerpu (1988), Bava Bavamaridi (1993),Palnati Pourusham (1994).


After late 1990s, he became active in politics. He joined Bharatiya Janata Party and was elected to the 12th and 13th Lok Sabha from Kakinada and Narasapur constituencies. He served as a Minister of State for Ministry of External Affairs in the Third Vajpayee Ministry from 1999 to 2004. On 24 March 2009 he has joined Praja Rajyam Party founded by Chiranjeevi. In 2009 State Assembly elections he contested for M.P. seat from Rajahmundry and had Murali Mohan as a major opponent who contested on behalf of Telugu Desam Party. He has a nephew, Prabhas, who is also known as 'Young Rebel Star' and who is currently one of the most popular actors in Tollywood. Krishnam Raju has planned to launch his dream project "Okka Adugu" with Prabhas as the lead actor . He would be directing the movie.

Kattassery Joseph Yesudas (born 10 January 1940) is an Indian classical musician and playback singer.

Yesudas sings Indian classical, devotional, and popular music. He has recorded more than 50,000 songs in many languages including Malayalam, Tamil, Hindi, Kannada, Telugu, Bengali, Gujarati, Oriya, Marathi, Punjabi, Sanskrit, Tulu, Malay, Russian, Arabic, Latin and English during a career spanning five decades. He has performed in most Indian languages except Assamese, Konkani and Kashmiri.He also composed a number of Malayalam film songs in the 1970s and 1980s.Yesudas is fondly called Gana Gandharvan (The Celestial Singer).


Yesudas has won the National Award for the Best Male Playback Singer seven times (the most by any Indian singer) and the State Award for the Best Playback Singer 43 times, which consists of awards by the state governments of Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, and West Bengal. He was awarded Padma Shri in 1975 and Padma Bhushan in 2002 by the Government of India for his contributions to the arts. In 2011 Yesudas was honoured with the CNN-IBN outstanding achievement award having recorded over 50,000 songs in a five-decade career.



K. J. Yesudas was born at Fort Kochi, in the erstwhile Kingdom of Cochin, into a Roman Catholic Latin Rite family to late Augustine Joseph and late Alicekutty. His father, who was a well-known Malayalam classical musician and stage actor, was his first guru. Later he joined the R.L.V. Music Academy at Thrippunithura and underwent training. Later he studied at Sree Swati Thirunal music college, Thiruvananthapuram under the late Semmangudy Sreenivasa Iyer. But he could not complete his studies due to financial constraints. For a brief period, he was with Sri Vechur Harihara Subramania Iyer, after which he took advanced training from Chembai Vaidyanatha Bhagavatar. In 2011 he completed his 50 Years as a Play Back Singer.


Completed the Ganabooshanam course at R.L.V. Music Academy, Thripunithura, CochinGraduated from the Sree Swathithirunal Music Academy, TrivandrumTrained under K. R. Kumaraswamy (former principal of the Music College, Kochi), Thripunithura Shri K.C Kalyanasundaram Master, Kunjuvelan Aasan (a disciple of Nadaswara Vidwan Rajaratnam Pillai), Augustine Joseph (his father), V. Dakshinamoorthy, Ramankutti Bagavathar, Sivaraman Nayar, Semmangudi Srinivasa Iyer and Chembai Vaidyanatha Bhagavatar.Playback singing career Debut and Early career: In 1960'sYesudas with poet and lyricist O. N. V. KurupThe first song sung by Yesudas is Jaathi Bhedam Matha Dwesham (music: M B Sreenivasan) on 14 Nov 1961, which he usually sings on all the special occasions in front of the audience. Yesudas began his career in playback singing in the Malayalam movie Kaalpadukal and Tamil, Telugu and Kannada movies in the early 1960s.


He got the first break in his music career with the hit Malayalam film named Bharya ( music by G. Devarajan and lyrics by Vayalar Ramavarma). He sang in Tamil for Bommai first (music: S. Balachander), but the first released movie was Konjum Kumari (music: Veda).


The trio of Salil, Yesudas and Prem Nazir (the evergreen hero of Malayalam Cinema) took the Malayalam Cinema Industry of the 70's by storm. It was generally agreed that Yesudas's voice was the most suited one for Prem Nazir.
In 1970 he was nominated to head the Kerala Sangeetha Nataka Academy and was the youngest person ever to occupy the post.


On 9 Dec 1971, Yesudas missed a flight which later crashed on the way to Madurai. A Hawker Siddeley HS 748 near Chinnamanur was descending into Madurai in reduced visibility. It flew into high terrain about 50 mi (80 km) from the airport, killing the four crew members and 17 passengers.


1970s By the 1970s Yesudas entered Bollywood. The first Hindi song he sang was for the movie Jai Jawan Jai Kissan (1971), but the first released movie was Chhoti Si Baat. He has sung Hindi songs for many leading actors in Hindi cinema including Amitabh Bachchan, Amol Palekar and Jeetendra. He has sung many evergreen Hindi film songs for music directors including Ravindra Jain, Bappi Lahiri, Khayyam, Rajkamal and Salil Chowdhury.


Yesudas's most popular Hindi songs are in the 1976 movie Chitchor, with music given by Ravindra Jain. The greatest tribute to Yesudas was paid by Ravindra Jain, in an interview wherein the blind music director confessed that if ever he happened to regain vision, the first person he would like to see would be Yesudas.


Prominence over the world Yesudas has performed in many major cities around the world. In 1965, he was invited by the Soviet Union government to perform at music concerts in various cities in the USSR and also sang a Russian song over Radio Kazakhstan.Yesudas became one of the senate members in the International Parliament for Safety and Peace. On 14 November 1999, Yesudas was presented with an honorary award by UNESCO for "Outstanding Achievements in Music and Peace" at the "Music for Peace" event in Paris.a concert held to mark the dawn of the new millennium and whose attendees included artistes such as Lionel Richie, Ray Charles, Montserrat Caballé, and Zubin Mehta.


In 1971, during the Indo-Pakistani War, Yesudas travelled all around Kerala with his musical troupe to raise funds for the Indian prime minister's National Defense Fund.


In 2001 he sang for album Ahimsa in Sanskrit, Latin and English and in a mix of styles including New Age and Carnatic. In his music concerts in the Middle East he sings Arabic songs in the Carnatic style. He frequently serves as a cultural ambassador for India through his performances abroad, promoting Indian music.
In 2009 Yesudas began a cross-country musical campaign against terrorism in Thiruvananthapuram, with the motto 'Music For Peace'.Kavita Karkare, wife of Hemant Karkare, handed over the torch to Yesudas to mark the launch of the 'Shanthi Sangeetha Yatra'.


Yesudas is married to Prabha. They have three sons, Vinod, Vijay and Vishal. Their second son Vijay Yesudas is a musician who won the Kerala State Film Award for Best Male Playback Singer in 2007 and 2013. The family is currently settled in Chennai and Trivandrum. He also owns estates in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, USA and Flower Mound, TX, USA for personal and business reasons.


Sree Narayana Guru’s great message, One religion and One God for all humanity", influenced young Yesudas in his dealings with his fellow men. He had his own heroes among the musicians too. Mohammed Rafi, Chembai Vaidyanatha Bhagavatar and Balamurali Krishna are the ones he admires the most.


For the past 30 years Yesudas has been visiting Kollur Mookambika temple, Kollur, Karnataka on his birthday to sing keerthans of Saraswati devi, the Goddess of knowledge, music and the arts. The music festival started on his 60th birthday. The nine-day music festival begins every January at Kollur Mookambika Temple. On Sunday, 10 January 2010, he celebrated his 70th birthday (Sapthathi) at Kollur Sri Mookambika Temple with 'Sangeetharchana' (classical devotional songs), along with 70 singers before goddess Mookambika. The Sangeetharchana included "Pancharatna Gayana" of Thyagaraja's poems. He also took part in the Vidyarambha function. All India Radio broadcast the special Sangeetharchana all over Kerala.


In 1980 Yesudas established the Tharangani Studio at Trivandrum. In 1992 the office and studio were moved to Chennai, Tamil Nadu and the company was incorporated in the US in 1998. Tharangni Studio and Tharangni Records became a recording center in Kerala which, for the first time, brought out audio cassettes of Malayalam film songs in stereo. The record company also had a voice mixing studio in Studio27, Chennai. The studio continues to produce and present events of Yesudas both for film and Indian classical music concerts throughout the world.

Ravichandran (died 25 July 2011) was a Malaysian Indian actor who played lead hero roles in Tamil films from 1964–1979. He has also acted in supporting roles from 1986, and directed a few films. He was given the title of Kalaingnar Thilagham in many of the on-screen credits of films starring him in the lead role. He was, also, called "Puratchi Kalaignar" (Refer: Anandha Bairavi Tamil Movie Title Scene). Before entering cine-field, during his studies in Trichy, he has acted in two dramas, namely, "AanaiyidungalAnna" and "Udhaya Suriyan". After entering cine-field, he has acted in two dramas, namely, "Mapplley Yen Magalaik Kadhali" and "That Man from Poonthamallee". 

In the drama "That man from Poonthamallee", he performed in double role and Thirumuruga Kirupanandha Variyar, who presided over the drama in Vellore, has appreciated and awarded a title "Nadaga Sigamani". He has, also, acted in a TV Serial namely., GEE boom ba in 1986. During his tenure of acting, his fans, journalists, movie-directors/producers have given many titles, viz., Kalai Ulaga Ilavarasar, Kalai Nilavu, Romantic Hero, Velli Vizha kathanayagan, Vannap Pada Nayagan, Evergreen Hero, Chennai MGR, Kalaignar Thilagam, Style King, Stunt Man an, Bhagdath Perazhagan, Kalai chelvan, Pudhumai Thilagam etc. He was much affectionate with his fans.

Ravichandran was born B.S. Raman in Kuala Lumpur, capital of the Federated Malay States. He moved to Tiruchirappalli, India in 1951, and studied at the St. Joseph's College. He was married twice; his first marriage was to Vimala, with whom he has a daughter, Lavanya, and two sons, Balaji and Hamsavardhan. There after, he married Malayalam actress Sheela, and had a son George. His sons Hamsavardhan and George also took up acting as a career, with Hamsavardhan starring in the film Manthiran, directed by Ravichandran himself. Lavanya is married and has 2 daughters.

LIC Narasimhan was a Tamil film character artiste who appeared in Tamil-language films. He has appeared in over 300 films and was also seen on the small screen and in ads. He was working for LIC as an officer, quit his job to take up a career in Kollywood, hence was called as LIC Narasimhan. He had acted in many films in the role of doctor, police officer and Judge.

He was seen as Superstar Rajnikanth’s brother in the hit film Aarilirunthu Arubathu Varai. His comical pronunciation of ‘Ninnu Kori Varnam’ and ‘Paal Irukke Palam Irukkee’ to ace comedian Goundamani in the film Themmangu Paattukaaran was very popular among the audience.

He died on 27 October 2011, of cancer. The actor had been fighting the disease for two years now and died while he was still asleep. He is survived by a son and a daughter. His cremation took place at his residence in Valasaravakkam, Chennai.