A Count in Sadness

As a member of the Maliyakal Family we have been 16 cousins. In the Kandathil family we have been 30 cousins. God has blessed us with long life. Over the last 75 years we have lost only 2 cousins on the Maliyakal side and 6 on the Kandathil side.

Today we remember one of the most brilliant cousin who left us - Ravi, son of Kochappachen (K. M. Mammen Mappillai) and Kunjukochamma, at the very height of his career, 15 years ago.

I was shaken by the news of the passing of Ravi, as he was like a younger brother to me. I remember him when he was studying at the Jamnanlal Bajaj Institute of Management Studies in Bombay. He used to come over to our Cooperage Road Meher Mansion house for a meal, looking dog-tired. (Ravi usually also came in time to watch a football match being played in the Cooperage football ground as our house overlooked the ground.) Ravi used to tell me how exhausted he was at the study schedule they had to follow in the Institute. But he always told me that despite the gruelling pace he was enjoying every minute of it, and the forays to our home gave him enough sustenance to carry on for just a few more days at a time. Ravi was one who built his base piece by piece, and that was his success in later but tragically short life.

Ravi was outstanding in many ways. But, it was his simplicity, honesty and forthrightness that helped MRF overcome its labour problems when they were really plagued by political interference, both in Goa and Madras. Ravi appealed directly to the workers and they trusted him. He delivered!!

It was Ravi's great interest in sport that resulted in the start of the MRF Pace Foundation. There are so many public tributes to Ravi on the internet for his contribution on this front. It is still remembered by many leading sportsmen today.

However, it was the way that MRF stepped in at a very late stage and took over the organisation and execution of running the 1987 Cricket World Cup that really made MRF a household name to be trusted by every Indian in every corner of the country. All politics was eliminated in organising and running the event. And the credit for that was the quality leadership provided by Ravi.

I remember that I was invited to participate at a Conference on Microelectronics in 1989 in Delhi. When I was registering with my colleague, my professor, I was asked by the lady at the counter for my local address. I was staying at the MRF Guest House in Sunder Nagar. When I mentioned MRF, the lady put down her pen asnd asked how someone from Finland was associated with MRF. I briefly explained my connection.

From that moment onward the whole atmosphere at the conference, for both my professor and me, was like electric. We were the VVIPs. She explained to me that if I belonged to the MRF family, it was a honour to know me!! They refused to take my registration fee, even though I pleaded with her that it was not me but our University in Oulu that was paying the amount. The Conference Organisers felt that MRF had done the nation proud in organising and running the World Cup and they could not ask me to pay for taking part in the International Conference!!! (I managed to pay it quietly to another lady as otherwise I would have been in trouble with my University Accounts Department!!!)

On the Kandathil side, many times in Kerala I have been told that because I belong to the K. C. Mammen Mappillai family is enough to ensure my high place in society - something I could not ever accept. A few in the next generation has given us the same standing in society, Doctors Bapukuttychayan (K. C. Mammen) and Mohanchayan (K. O. Mammen), Ravi, and now, none other than our Rajen, who will physically collect his Padma Shri from the President of India in a day or two.

So, on this 15th Memorial Day of Ravi, let us bow our heads for a moment and remember, not only this outstanding cousin of ours, but also the other members of his family who suffered the tragic loss and have stayed together as a symbol of unity in his name. Annikki and I especially remember his mother, Kunjukochamma and Ravi's wife, Meera, on this day.