SP Balasubrahmanyam to be honoured with Centenary award at IFFI 2016

New Delhi: Veteran singer SP Balasubrahmanyam will be honoured with the Centenary Award for Indian Film Personality of the year at the 47th International Film Festival of India (IFFI) in Goa.

Minister of Information & Broadcasting, M Venkaiah Naidu made the announcement here on Tuesday at a press conference.

"Balasubrahmanyam is being honoured for his talent. It's an award not a reward. He has been working in the film industry since the past five decades. He has rendered more than 40,000 songs till now. He is a big name in Telugu, Tamil, Kannada, Malayalam and also in Hindi. He has a melodious voice and hard working nature," Naidu said.

Born as Sripathi Panditaradhyula Balasubrahmanyam in a Telugu Brahman family, the singer has received the National Film Award for best male playback singer six times and also holds a Guinness World Record for recording maximum number of songs.

Balasubrahmanyam, 70, is also a recipient of civilian honours - Padmashri and Padma Bhushan - from the government of India.

Besides a successful career in the southern film industry, he was also considered to be the voice of superstar Salman Khan during the '90s and was behind hit songs like 'Mere Rang Main', 'Hum Aapke Hain Koun', and 'Pehla Pehla Pyaar Hai'.

Apart from singing, Balasubrahmanyam, has also acted in several films.