B Saroja Devi (1938-2025), Icon of South Indian Screen Modernity, Dies at 87

B Saroja Devi, who died at her residence in Bengaluru on 14 July at the age of 87, was one of the earliest pan-South stars, fluent across Tamil, Kannada, Telugu and Hindi, and fluent, too, in the language of screen presence. Over three decades and more than 200 films, she moved without effort between queens, widows, wives and heiresses. She did not belong to just one industry—although she is acknowledged as the first female Kannada superstar—or to one idiom of beauty. She belonged to the frame.

She arrived at a moment when Indian cinema was shifting. The old mythologies were thinning and the era of melodrama was here to stay. Films were beginning to flirt with colour, with cities, with sarcasm. In the middle of all this, here was Saroja Devi, unshakeably poised, her glamour derived from a certain poise (she famously refused to wear sleeveless blouses) that can be attributed to her training in classical dance.

Born in Bangalore in 1938 to a police inspector and a homemaker, she was cast in Mahakavi Kalidasa (1955) at 17. By her 20s, she was starring opposite MGR, Sivaji Ganesan, NTR, and Rajkumar, not merely as romantic interest but also as tonal ballast. She brought emotional intelligence to spectacles. In Nadodi Mannan (1958), her Ratna grounded MGR’s double role. In Kalyana Parisu (1959), she embodied the sacrificial sister with such restraint that the film became a blueprint for every love triangle that followed.

She did 26 films with MGR, including Anbe Vaa (1966), in which she plays a rich, sharp-tongued woman who goes toe-to-toe with his dandy industrialist. It is a romantic comedy with deft comic timing, and in the now-iconic skating scene where the two twist and tumble on a hilltop rink you see her genius in miniature—a lightness without frivolity.

Across genres—courtroom drama, historical epic, political fable, classic romance, domestic tragedy—she worked like a stylist’s comma, essential to sentence and script. President Panchaksharam (1959), a Gogol-inspired satire, had her gliding through farce without tipping into parody. In Sri Krishnadevaraya (1970), she matched Dr Rajkumar’s oratory with quiet regality. In Puthiya Paravai, opposite Sivaji Ganesan, her reserve gave the noir-ish plot its rhythm.

At the peak of her fame, she had 161 consecutive releases as lead heroine. She acted in four languages, handled her own finances, kept her contracts tight, and reportedly never arrived unprepared. In 1967, she married Sri Harsha, an electronics engineer at Bharat Electronics. He encouraged her to keep working, unusual for the time.

Her success wasn’t accidental. It was engineered through discipline and effort. Awarded the Padma Shri in 1969 and the Padma Bhushan in 1992, she also received the Kalaimamani, the Karnataka State Award, and enough lifetime honours to fill a house. But the most enduring tribute came from her fans, who called her “Abhinaya Saraswathi” and “Kannadathu Paingili”. Her only brush with controversy came in the 2000s, when a politician’s memoir implied a closeness with then-Governor S M Krishna. The book was halted.

Saroja Devi also made a brief but notable impression in Hindi cinema. She debuted in Paigham (1959), a film about labour rights and class struggle, alongside Dilip Kumar and Raaj Kumar. Her restrained performance stood out, leading to roles in Sasural (1961) with Rajendra Kumar and Pyar Kiya To Darna Kya (1963) opposite Shammi Kapoor. Unlike other southern actresses who adapted to Bombay’s flashier idiom, Saroja Devi retained her classical bearing, graceful and unhurried. Her Hindi filmography was brief, largely because of her commitments in Tamil, Kannada, and Telugu, but it extended her cultural footprint.

Her final appearance was a cameo in the Puneeth Rajkumar-starrer Natasaarvabhowma (2019). Saroja Devi is survived by her children, and by a style of performance that now feels vanishingly rare: graceful without being passive, precise but not cold. Long after the lights have gone out, the echo of her presence will remain.

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