Chennai, September 25: The Natya Peroli (radiant light of dance) of the Tamil film industry is no more. Actress Padmini, who made a mark on celluloid as a dancer and among the first heroines of the industry, died last night at a city hospital following a heart attack. She was 74.

Padmini earned the sobriquet ‘Natya Peroli’ for her impressive skills as a Bharatnatyam dancer and captivated audiences in India and abroad with her films many of which featured her dances with a classical core. Her son, Prem Ramachandran, lives in New Jersey in the US, with whom she had stayed for several years, running a classical dance school, before returning to Chennai in August 2006 for good.

Only the evening before her death, the actress had attended an extravagant public function in the city despite her ill-health and got up to felicitate Chief Minister M Karunanidhi, himself a well-known script writer, for his contribution to the film industry.

Introduced to the film world by the legendary Uday Shanker, who saw her performance when she was 14, the doe-eyed, pretty actress first acted in a Hindi film Kalpana (1949) when she was barely 17. Her first Tamil film Manamagal (Bride) came a year later. She went on to act in more than 250 films in Tamil, Malayalam, Hindi, Telugu and Kannada, in a versatile film career that lasted more than two decades.

Padmini, along with her sisters Lalitha and Ragini, also Bharatanatyam dancers, came to be known as the famous ‘Travancore sisters’ hailing as they did from Poojapura in Thiruvananthapuram in Kerala. But it was Padmini among the trio who achieved greater fame as an actress. Born to landlord Thankappan Pillai and Saraswati Amma, Padmini learnt dance along with her sisters when she was four under teachers Guru Gopinath and T M Mahalingam Pillai.

Thillana Mohanambal in which she acted as a Bharatanatyam dancer by the same name and cast opposite the late thespian Sivaji Ganesan was a big hit for its dances and songs. Padmini, especially, won critical acclaim for gracefully and fluidly adapting to the film songs while maintaining classical movements.

Several of her films opposite MG Ramachandran, Sivaji Ganesan, Prem Nazir (popular Malayalam actor of yesteryears) and a few with Raj Kumar, Raj Kapoor and Dev Anand, including Jis Desh Mein Ganga Behti Hai and Mera Naam Joker were very successful.

She quit acting after her marriage with Dr KT Ramachandran but remained devoted to dancing. After her husband’s death in 1981, she acted in a Tamil film, Poovey Poochoodava (Tamil), another big hit, and later a Hindi film with Sunil Dutt. She started the Padmini School of Fine Arts in New Jersey, which is today rated as the oldest and most popular school for Indian classical dances in the US. Her two sisters died a few years ago. Recently, her niece, actress Shobana won the National Award for Best Actress for Mitr.

“Her death is an irreparable loss not only to the film world but also to the entire field of fine arts,” former CM J Jayalalithaa said.