Tamil movie comedian and Padma Shri recipient Vivekh passed away on Saturday at a private hospital in Chennai. He was 59. He was admitted to SIMS Hospital on Friday morning after showing "acute coronary syndrome with cardiogenic shock". Vivekh was in a critical condition and was put on Extracorporeal Membrane Oxygenation (ECMO) support, the hospital said.

According to the doctors, Vivekh had complained to his family members about chest pain. Condoling his death, Telangana Governor and Lt. Governor of Puducherry Tamilisai Soundararajan said Vivekh through his comedy dialogues had spread good social messages and earned the sobriquet "Chinna Kalaivannara" or Little Kalaivannar (Late Tamil movie comedian N.S. Krishnan had the sobriquet Kalaivannar) and was also an environmentalist in planting lakhs of tree saplings.