Senior director Eedara Veera Venkata Satyanarayana, popular as EVV, died of throat cancer at Apollo Hospitals in Hyderabad late on Friday night.

He was admitted to hospital on January 19 and died while undergoing treatment. He is 53, and is survived by his wife Saraswati Devi and two sons, Aryan Rajesh and Allari Naresh.

EVV had directed 51 films in his career and most among them were comedy films. He hailed from Korumamidi village in West Godavari district in a farmers’ family. His parents are Venkata Rao and Venkata Ratnamma. He pursued his studies in Nidadavole till Intermediate.

However, he had a passion about film making. He used to watch films very regularly by bunking classes and he could not complete his Intermediate due to shortage in attendance. EVV’s father has 70 acres land in Dommera. Though EVV took to agriculture, he could not continue in it and suffered huge losses. So, he sold out the agricultural land and decided to leave his native village and settle somewhere else.

He got a recommendation letter from Subbaraju, a relative of popular producer Navata Krishnamraju, and reached Chennai (then Madras). However, Navata Krishnamraju did not give him a chance despite the recommendation letter and instead suggested him to return to his native place.

But EVV continued to look for opportunities by staying in Pondy Bazar and other areas. Realising the zeal and commitment in him, Navata Krishnamraju gave him an opportunity to work as an assistant director for a film ‘O Inti Bhagotam’ directed by Devadas Kanakala.

Later EVV joined as an assistant to Jandhyala following Krishnamraju’s advice and worked for several films. He made his debut as director with “Chevilo Puvvu”. However, he got a break with ‘Prema Khaidi’ produced by Dr D Ramanaidu. From then onwards had had no looking back.

He made 10 consecutive hits during his career. He was associated with several top heroes and made films with Balakrishna, Venkatesh, Nagarjuna and Rajendra Prasad besides several other new generation heroes.

Not only in Telugu, he had also directed a couple of Hindi films including one with Big B Amitabh Bachchan titled ‘’Surya Vamsh”. He launched his own banner called ‘EVV Cinema’ and produced several films.

Not only entertainers, EVV brought out several experimental films like ‘Aame’, ‘Thaali’ and ‘Ammo Okato Tareeku’. His last film as director is ‘Katti Kanta Rao’ wherein he had directed his younger son Allari Naresh.

Several film personalities rushed to the Apollo Hospital to pay their last respects soon after the receipt of news.

Check out Gallery of Tollywood Condolenses To EVV