Hyderabad: Veteran actor and character artiste Potti Veeraiah passed away following a brief illness at his residence in the city on Sunday.
Hailing from the small village of Phanigiri in Nalgonda district, Potti Veeraiah went on to act in more than 400 movies in filmy career stretching five long decades. The actor who is originally named Gattu Veeraiah, had been suffering from health-related problems for quite some time now. Knowing his plight, Megastar Chiranjeevi had extended monetary help of Rs 2 lakh sometime ago.
Potti Veeraiah started off his acting debut with B Vittalacharya directorial ‘Aggi Veerudu’ starring NT Rama Rao and Rajasree. Later, he chanced upon offers from film production companies as he played comic and dwarf characters in films like ‘Radhamma Pelli’, ‘Tata Manavadu’, ‘Tarjan Sundari’, ‘Jaganmohini’, ‘Pedarasi Peddamma Katha’ etc,.
The veteran actor had the privilege of sharing screen space with senior and veteran film stars like MG Ramachandran, Sivaji Ganesan, Kantha Rao, Rajinikanth and Krishna. Several actors from Telugu and south Indian film industries expressed shock over his demise.