Kalpana Rai

Kalpana Rai was an Indian artist who performed in Telugu movies. She was born on 9 May, 1950 in Kakinada, Andhra Pradesh. Kalpana volunteered in many plays and skits which got her noticed by many film-makers. Eventually, she got her first break in the film O Seeta Katha which released in 1974. Under the direction of K Vishwanath, this drama won over the audience with the film being remade both in Tamil and Malayalam languages. O Seeta Katha won various awards such as Nandi Award for Best Feature Film and Best Film Award (Filmfare, Telugu).

From then onwards, she was casted for comical roles. People began to love her skill of comic-timing in comedy scenes. She starred in around 400 movies. In 1986, she starred in Captain Nagarjun with superstar Akkineni Nagarjuna Akkineni Nagarjuna is a veteran Indian actor, TV p >> Read More... as the lead actor. Directed by VB Rajendra Prasad, this romantic movie could not perform well at the Box-Office. Later, she was seen in a 1988 Telugu movie Aakhari Poratam Click to look into! >> Read More... , again collaborating with Nagarjuna for the project. As a matter of fact, it marked late Amrish Puri’s Tollywood debut. Aakhari Poratam became popular with movie buffs and was declared as “Superhit” by many people. In 1997, she joined the cast of Hitler. With Chiranjeevi playing the titular role, it was a remake of Mammootty’s flick of the same name.

In Hitler, Kalpana enacted the role of Gangamma. After the release of this family drama, it ran over 100 days in different theatres and the movie is still considered as one of the admired movies made ever in the history of Telugu cinema. In the same year, she portrayed the role of Damayanthi in Venkatesh starrer Preminchukundam Raa, which turned out to be a hit among the mass. In 2001, she played a supporting role in Puri Jagannadh’s Itlu Sravani Subramanyam. In 2002, she worked in Allari, featuring Swetha Agarwal and Allari Naresh Allari Naresh is a popular Telugu actor, who has a >> Read More... . The movie received mixed and positive feedbacks.

In 2005, she was approached for Ravi Babu’s Soggadu. People appreciated Soggadu for its refreshing take on the subject of true love and sacrifice in terms of light-hearted manner. Soggadu was later remade in other regional languages with Rajkumar Santoshi’s Ajab Prem Ki Ghazab Kahani being a notable remake of the 2005 flick. Soggadu turned out to be Kalpana’s last well-known project as she died on 6th February, 2008. It is said that she was not in a financially stable condition, which led her to live a miserable life in her last days. After coming to know about this, Movie Artistes’ Association stepped up to donate 10,000 rupees for her funeral rites.