Vani Jairam, Veteran playback singer, Padma awardee found dead at 78

Vani Jairam is dead.

Vani Jairam, a legendary playback singer who performed in more than a half-dozen languages, including Tamil, Kannada, and Hindi, for five decades, passed away. She was 78.

Jairam, a singer who debuted in 1971, was discovered dead on Saturday afternoon at her home in affluent Nungambakkam. As of the time of writing, the cause of her death was unknown because police claimed they didn't want to make any assumptions.

In her five-decade career, the legendary vocalist has performed over 10,000 songs and collaborated with renowned music producers such as Ilaiyaraja, M S Viswanathan, K V Mahadevan, Madhan Mohan, and O P Nayyar.

The Union Government just selected her for the Padma Vibhushan award.

“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.

The police had to force open the door to go inside her home, he said, because it was locked from the inside. Police have a suspicion that Vani Jairam may have slipped on the floor, but they aren't ready to draw any conclusions until they obtain the results of the postmortem.