Celebrated playback singer and Padma awardee S.P. Balasubrahmanyam, or famously SPB or Balu in the film world and who has recorded more than 40,000 songs in 16 languages over a period of five decades died lost his fight against Covid-19 and passed away early Friday, his child S.P.Charan said.

Talking quickly to the media outside the MGM Healthcare, Charan said Balasubrahmanyam died at 1.04 p.m. also, expressed gratitude toward the hospital authorities for the treatment and service.

He said further subtleties will be shared later.

Since Thursday the signs about Balasubrahmanyam were bad.

On Thursday the MGM Healthcare said the singer stays on ECMO and other life support systems.

“His condition in the last 24-hours has deteriorated further warranting maximal life support and he is extremely critical. The team of experts at MGM Healthcare are closely monitoring his health condition,” the hospital had said.

Since Friday morning countless police personnel were deployed outside the hospital.

The singer’s relatives were all present at the hospital.

Popular Director Bharathiraja subsequent to visiting Balasubrahmanyam at the hospital told the media during this time of misery he couldn’t talk anything.

“Even now there is some ray of hope. There is one power above us all,” an emotional Bharathiraja said.

It was film Director Venkat Prabha who originally tweeted about the singer’s death.

Prabhu tweeted “#RIPSPB 1:04pm” declaring the sad news.

On August 5, in a Facebook post, the 74-year old SPB said that he was experiencing an exceptionally mellow assault of Covid and had got himself hospitalized to take rest.

He had said that however the specialists had exhorted him to remain at home and take rest, he chose to be in a clinic, as at home his relatives would get concerned.

He wanted to get released from the clinic in two days. However, it was not to be.