Veteran Malayalam lyricist and poet B Sivasankaran Nair, who was popularly known as Bichu Thirumala, passed away on Friday in Thiruvananthapuram. He was 80. Bichu Thirumala was admitted to the hospital on Wednesday after he suffered a heart attack. He had been on ventilator support. However, during the wee hours of Friday, he breathed his last while he was still under medical care. Mourning the demise of Bichu Thirumala, Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan said that the former through his lyrics brought film music closer to the people. Kerala education minister V Sivankutty has also offered his deepest condolences.
Bichu Thirumala entered the film industry as a lyricist with Bhaja Govindam, which came out in 1972. And he never looked back. He went on to pen more than 3000 songs for Malayalam movies. Between the 1970s and the 1990s, he collaborated with leading musicians, including M. S. Viswanathan, Ilaiyaraaja, G Devarajan, V Dakshinamurthy, MS Baburaj, K Raghavan, Ouseppachan and AR Rahman, among others. He also wrote numerous devotional songs. He won the prestigious Kerala State Awards twice in his career.