Ambika

Ambika is an Indian film and television actress known for her works predominantly in Tamil, Malayalam, Kannada films and teleserials. She also did a few Telugu and English films. She was one of the top south Indian heroines for more than a decade from 1978 to 1989. Her younger sister Radha was also an actress. They acted together in a number of south Indian films during the peak of their careers.

Ambika was born in 1962 to Kunjan Nair and Sarasamma at Kallara village,(Kallara, Thiruvananthapuram) located in Thiruvananthapuram district.[1] Her mother Kallara Sarasamma was Mahila Congress leader during 2014.[2] She has two younger sisters, Radha and Mallika, and two younger brothers, Arjun and Suresh.

Ambika married a NRI, named Premkumar Menon in the year 1988. The couple have two sons and are settled at United States of America. However, they have got divorced in 1996. Later, she was remarried with actor Ravikanth in 2000, which have also ended divorce in 2002. She is currently settled in Chennai along with her sons.[3]

Ambika started her career as a child artist and later starred as heroine acting in more than 200 South Indian films. Her career as a heroine started with the Malayalam movie Seetha, which only released very late in her career. But with films such as Neelathaamara (which was made again in 2009) and Lejjavathi, she became a busy actress within a few years not only in Malayalam,[4] but also in Tamil and Kannada.[5]

K. Bhagyaraj introduced Ambika in his movie Andha 7 Naatkal (1981). Ambika did many films with the leading actors of her time such as Kamal Hassan, Rajinikanth, Vijayakanth, Mammootty, Mohanlal, Dileep, Shankar, N. T. Rama Rao, Krishna, Chiranjeevi, Dr Rajkumar and Ambareesh.

She had a very successful career in Tamil, Kannada and Malayalam movies throughout the 1980s. In 1986, she acted in the superhit Malayalam movie Rajavinte Makan, which starred Mohanlal. She also acted with him the following year in another massive hit movie Irupatham Noottandu.

In Tamil, Ambika shot to fame with Kaakki Sattai (1985). At the zenith of her career she costarred with her sister Radha in Kadhal Parisu (1987), where both actresses demonstrated their acting prowess in the roles of two sisters, both with strong but conflicting personalities.

After getting divorced, she returned to India from U.S.A. Later in the year 1997, she started acting again in films Periya Manushan, opposite Sathyaraj in Maa Naanaki Pelli Telugu and opposite Krishnam Raju in Simhada mari Kannada. She acted in Vikraman’s project Mariyadhai (2009), in which Vijayakanth played a double role of father and son.[6]