P. Pullayya and Shantakumari made Ardhangi on their own banner Ragini in 1955 based on a novel “Swayamsiddha” written by Sharath babu in Bengali. The film starred ANR, Savitri, Jaggayya, Gummadi and Shanta Kumari in the lead roles and was highly successful. Savitri acted phenomenally as Zamindar (Gummadi)’s elder daughter in law and as wife of Zamindar’s elder son (ANR) , who transforms her mentally challenged husband to a normal person. As per the storyline, Savitri had to wear lot of jewellery as the affluent daughter in law of a zamindar. Instead of imitation jewellery, Shantakumari adorned Savitri with her own gold jewellery and told her “ You look exactly like Goddess Lakshmi with them, my dear!” and felt delighted.
Savitri, who acted with the real gold jewellery in that film also felt happy and asked Shantakumari, “ Ma’am, will I ever buy such costly jewellery in my real life at any point of time?”. Then Shantakumari blessed Savitri saying, “My dear, you have got a great future. You will get more jewellery better than these!”. Shantakumari’s blessings turned to reality when Savitri became a top actress, who used to buy any new model jewellery which used to come in market those days! Being a lady with an almirah full of gold jewellery in her career heights, it is sad to see her affluence fade away during her last days of life..
