Meet the wife of the great actor Ravu Gopala Rao

Everybody knows about the great Telugu actor Ravu Gopala Rao But not many know about his wife Kamala Kumari Here is a  small attempt to introduce her

Mrs. Ravu Kamaka Kumari is a noted ‘Harikatha’ artist and wife of actor Ravu Gopala Rao. She has enacted more than 5000 ‘Harikathas’ in Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Odisha, West Bengal, Madhya Pradesh and other states.

Born

Kamala Kumari was born on April 21^st 1944 to Manda Surya Narayana and Rajeswari in Vijayanagaram. The native place of her father was Bhag Rathipuram in Srikakulam District. Her grandfather Kalavarayuni Lakshmi Narayana Sastry was the court musician in Vijayanagaram.

Fine Arts

Her father Surya Narayana Sastry was a diploma holder in Carnatic Music from Vijayanagaram Music College and Hindustani Music in Pune. Kamala Kumari learnt Veena, singing, bharatanatyam and harikatha. At the age of eight, she performed when her father enacted ‘harikathas’.

She studied ‘swarajati, varnam, tillana, svaram, samdham, sahityam’. She performed her songs along with folkdances. She performed ‘Harikatha’ in pilgrimage places like Tirupathi, Srisailam, Bhadrachalam, Annavaram and Yadagirigutta.

Marriage – Children

Theirs was a love marriage. Kamla Kumari married Ravu Gopala Rao on January 16^th 1966. Ravu Gopala Rao hated epic stories and traditional arts. He went to Kakinada to create a fuss in the harikatha show of Kamala Kumari. But he was mesmerised by her and listened to the harikatha for six continuous hours. In the end, he fell in love with her. They have two sons and one daughter. Eldest son Rao Ramesh is also a noted film actor, second son Kranthi Kumar is an engineer in America and their daughter is Sitadevi.

(Writer from ‘Ancient Vizag Patnam’)