Kalyanam Raghuramaiah

Kalyanam Raghuramaiah or better known as Eelapata Raghuramaiah is a Telugu singer, stage and film actor. He was born as Kalyanam Venkata Subbaiah on Feb 5, 1901, in the village of Suddapalli, Guntur district in Andhra Pradesh. His parents are Kalyanam Narasimhan and Venkata Subbama. He was popular during his childhood after portraying the role of Raghurama and hence, he was named as Raghuramaiah by the late journalist and politician, Kasinathuni Nageswara Rao.

Kalyanam was only 8-years old when Dantu Kishtaiah, owner of a drama company, noticed him. He sensed that he has the potentials, and so he asked permission from Kalyanam’s father to take him and polished him to become an actor. In the span of 60 years, Kalyanam has acted as Krishna, Bhavanisankar, Dushyantha, Narada and more. Initially, he underwent music training from Yadavalli Suryanarayana Bio coming soon... >> Read More... . Later on, he got involved in raga alapana and he rendered padyams and songs through his unique way of whistling. He had done over 45,000 stage performances and has acted in several dramas. The Bengali polymath, Rabindranath Tagore, called him the “Nightingale of the Stage.” His extraordinary talent in music had made him Famous. Even Jawaharlal Nehru and Indira Gandhi appreciated him.

In the year 1933, he was debuted in the Telugu film, 'Prudhvi Putra'; the fifth film in the Telugu film industry and the first Telugu film that was produced by a Telugu person. Kalyanam had portrayed Krishna in many of his films including 'Chintamani' and in the popular drama, 'Sri Krishna Rayabaram'. He had acted in many films such as 'Bhakta Kuchela', 'Apavadu', 'Maya Rambha', 'Mayapilla', 'Sati Sakkubai', 'Shri Krishna Tulabharam', ' Nagarjuna Bio coming soon... >> Read More... ', 'Dakshayagnam', 'Mohini Bhasmasura' and much more. Kalyanam became a playback singer in the 1967 Telugu film, 'Sri Sri Sri Maryada Ramanna'; as a request of his comedian friend, Basavaraju Venkata Padmanabha Rao, who also produced the film.

In 1973, he was awarded with Sangeet Natak Akademi Award and with the prestigious Padmashri Award that was presented by the Government of India in the year 1975. In 1938, he got married to Savitri, the daughter of Sitamma and Venkata Subbaiah. They have one daughter named Thota Satyavathi.

Kalyanam has toured Singapore, Malaysia, Hong Kong and Japan, along with his drama troupe during the 1970s.

On February 24, 1975, he died due to a heart attack. He was 75 years old when he died.