Veteran playback singer, Padma awardee Vani Jairam found dead; police probe under way

The singer was conferred with Padma Bhushan on Republic Day

Legendary playback singer Vani Jairam, whose magical voice mesmerized millions of audience for five decades in over half-a-dozen languages including Tamil, Kannada, and Hindi, died here on Saturday. She was 78.

Jairam, who began her singing career in 1971, was found dead at her residence in upscale Nungambakkam on Saturday afternoon. The reason for her death was not clear at the time of writing as police said they didn’t want to speculate.

The legendary singer, who had worked with famed music directors like Ilaiyaraja, M S Viswanathan, K V Mahadevan, Madhan Mohan, and O P Nayyar, has sung over 10,000 songs in her five-decade career. She was recently chosen for Padma Vibhushan award by the Union Government.

A senior police officer told DH that Vani Jairam, who was living alone, did not open the door to the calls of her maid on Saturday morning following which she informed the singer’s relatives.

“The relatives informed us and when we broke open the door, we found her dead. She had a deep cut on her forehead. We have done the autopsy and we will wait for its report before saying anything on her death,” the officer said.

He added that the door was locked from inside and that was the reason the cops broke open the door to enter her residence. Police suspect that Vani Jairam might have slipped on the floor but didn’t want to conclude anything before they get the findings of the postmortem report.

Vani Jairam began her career in Bollywood in 1971 after which she began singing in several languages and was known for singing compositions that are deemed difficult. She thrived in the film industry at a time legends like P Sushila, and S Janaki were ruling the playback singing field in almost all languages that made cinema in India.

A veteran in the field, Vani Jairam bagged the coveted National Award thrice and was honoured with several film awards by various state governments and other recognitions like FilmFare awards.

Vani Jairam was born as Kalaivani into a family of trained classical musicians in Vellore.

Vani was born as Kalaivani in Vellore in Tamil Nadu and developed the habit of listening to Hindi songs on the Radio Ceylon channel since her early days and performed for the first time at the age of 8. After she became an accomplished singer too, Vani Jairam performed across the globe.