Veteran Actor, Director And Producer Vijaya Nirmala Passes Away At 75

Veteran director, actor, and producer, Vijaya Nirmala passed away on Thursday. The news of her death was confirmed by her son Naresh. “I regret to inform you that my mother, senior artiste, a prominent producer, and director Dr A G Vijaya Nirmala passed away during early hours today, that is, 27.6.2019, at Continental Hospitals, Hyderabad, due to sickness. She was 75,” Naresh tweeted. “Her body will be kept at our residence from 11 a.m. Final rites will be held tomorrow (Friday),” he informed in another tweet.

She got her name registered in the Guinness Book of Records in 2002 as the female director with most number of movies, the number of movies directed by her being 44 in Telugu.

Vijaya Nirmala was born in Tamil Nadu and father had worked in film production. Though she entered the world of movies as an actor, she later on took on other roles as well like those of a producer and a director. She made her debut at the age of seven as a child artiste in the Tamil movie Machcha Rekhai (1950). In the Telugu industry, she made her debut in the film Rangula Ratnam . It was in 1964 when she acted opposite Prem Nazir in the Malayalam hit movie Bhargavi Nilayam. With this, she rose to stardom. She worked with Prem Nazir in yet another movie Udhogastha, which was directed by P. Venu.

Her body will be kept at our residence ( Nanakramguda) today from 11am Her final rites will be held tomorrow, that is, 28.6.2019.
Further information will be updated .
🙏🙏🙏🙏🙏 pic.twitter.com/MorRuNOXCM

— H.E Dr Naresh VK actor (@ItsActorNaresh) June 27, 2019

Interestingly, she got her name registered in the Guinness Book of Records in 2002 as the female director with most number of movies, the number of movies directed by her being 44 in Telugu. Her awards also include the Raghupati Venkaiah Award for her contributions to the Telugu Cinema. Also, she and another Telugu actor Savitri are the only female directors to have directed a movie which cast the legendary actor Shivaji Ganeshan.

Her debut in small screen was with Balaji Telefilm’s Pelli Kanuka. Also, under the banner she launched, by the name of Vijaya Krishna Movies, she produced 15 films.

Vijaya has a son from her first husband Krishna Murthy. After her divorce with her first husband, she married the actor Krishna. When it comes to her being a director, she made her debut with a Malayalam movie made with a budget of only three lakhs. She met her second husband on the sets of the movie Saakshi (1967). The couple worked together in 47 films. Also, it is said that it was Saakshi that fostered her interest in direction. Interestingly, she worked in 200 films in her career, 25 of which were in Tamil, 25 in Malayalam and the rest in Telugu.

The first Telugu film directed by her was Meena. Not only this, she has also ventured in Television. Her debut in small screen was with Balaji Telefilm’s Pelli Kanuka. Also, under the banner she launched, by the name of Vijaya Krishna Movies, she produced 15 films. Tributes started flowing soon after her son confirmed the news of her demise. Actor Sudheer Baby described her as "Mother like personality" and actor Nithin says that her demise is a huge loss to the film industry.

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