The legendary singer, S.P. Balasubrahmanyam (74), who was hospitalised in August after testing positive for COVID-19, died on September 25 at a private hospital in Chennai.
He reportedly did well initially, but his condition took a turn for the worse, and was put on a ventilator and ECMO support. On September 4, he tested negative for COVID-19 but continued to be on the ventilator and ECMO even as he participated in passive physiotherapy.
In a further setback on Sept. 25 morning, despite maximal life support measures and the best efforts of the clinical team, his condition deteriorated further and he suffered a cardio-respiratory arrest. He passed away at 13:04 hours.
Popularly known as SPB, Balasubrahmanyam made his singing debut in 1966 with Telugu movie Sri Sri Sri Maryada Ramanna. He has sung over 40,000 songs in as many as 16 languages including Telugu, Tamil, Malayalam, Kannada and Hindi.
Balasubrahmanyam was also a voice-over artist. He was the voice-over artist for actor Kamal Hassan, whenever the latter’s Tamil movies were dubbed in Telugu. Balasubrahmanyam also acted in a few movies.
He is survived by wife, son and daughter — both are playback singers.
B.R. Prajapati, President & G. Prabhakaran, Secretary General, New Delhi, September 25, 2019.