Ayushmann Khurana, Neena Gupta mourn the death of 'Badhai Ho' co-star Surekha Sikri

Veteran Indian actor and National Award Winner, Surekha Sikri, has passed away.

The star, who also played a well-acclaimed role in Badhaai Ho (2018) died in the early hours of Friday, as per her manager.

“Three-time national award winning actress, Surekha Sikri has passed away following a cardiac arrest earlier this morning at the age of 75. She had been suffering from complications arising from a second brain stroke. She was surrounded by family and her caregivers. The family asks for privacy at this time. Om Sai Ram.”

The actor's Badhai Ho co-stars, Neena Gupta and Ayushmann Khurana also paid homage to the late actor in emotional Instagram posts. 

"It's said grief is lessened if shared," said Neena Gupt who played the actor's daughter-in-law on screen.

"Today morning I received a sad news, of the death of Surekha Sikriji. I thought of sharing my pain with you. When we were students in (National) School of Drama she was in the repertory company and they used to play parts. Without her knowledge, we would sneak in to have a peek at her acting and I would think 'I want to become an actress like this', which is many many years ago. Then we worked together in Badhaai Ho and before that in Saloni. Irrespective of that, I used to look up to her when she did her scenes. I learnt a lot from her and there was still so much more to learn from her."

Ayushmann also posted a special tribute to Surekha Sikri, calling her 'head of the family.'

"In every film we have a family and we end up spending more time with the film family than our own families. One such beautiful family was in Badhaai Ho. Out of all my films, it was the perfect family with a perfect cast. Surekha Sikri was the head of our family, who was more progressive than the entire family tree. You know what, that was her in real life too. A complete boho. A chiller. Young at heart," he wrote.

Surekha began her career with 1978 political drama film Kissa Kursi Ka . She received the National Film Award for Best Supporting Actress thrice, including Tamas (1988), Mammo (1995) and Badhaai Ho (2018).