Oneindia presents Soundarya's rare pictures on her 40th birthday

It was an incident that shocked the whole of South Indian film fraternity and audience. On April 17, 2004, a chapter of most sought after actress came to an end with the charter plane, in which she was travelling, crashed in Bangalore. Yes, we are talking about Soundarya, who was probably only the actress during her time to leave a lasting impression in all South Indian languages.

Soundarya was born to a Smartha Brahmin family in Ashtagrama village, Mulabagal taluk, Kolar district, Karnataka to producer Sathya Narayana and Manjula. The actress, who made her debut in Kannada films with Shashi Kumar starrer Gandharva in 1992, aspired to become a doctor but changed her plans after her Telugu movie Ammoru became a massive hit.

In the later years, Soundarya was showered with offers from Telugu film industry and became busy in the Tollywood before Ravichandran's Sipayi brought her back to Sandalwood and registering her first blockbuster in Kannada. It is also noted that she acted with many top actors like Rajinikanth, Amitabh Bachchan, Vishnuvardhan, Mammootty, etc.

Her biggest commercial hits of all time were Padayappa and Aapthamitra, which was her last film. Soundarya, who won many Filmfare and other awards, was honoured with National Award and State Award for her Kannada movie Dweepa. In her 12-year career, she acted in over 90 films in different languages.

However, the actress took the wedding vows with her childhood friend GS Raghu, a software engineer by profession, on 27 April 2003. Soundarya also entered politics by joining the BJP. But the tragedy came in the form of a most unfortunate plane crash near Jakkur aerodrome when she was going to Andhra Pradesh for an election campaign.

Though her physical presence may not be felt by many, her fans continue to believe that the actress is still alive in the form of her movies!