Srinivasaraghavan Lifetime Achievement Award

Unflinching Commitment to Society, a Record Breaking Mikeless Kutcheri and Phenomenal growth in business earns TT Srinivasaraghavan, MD, Sundaram Finance the Lifetime Achievement award at the Trinity Arts Festival

Dedicates the Award to 'Team Sundaram'

While commending his contribution to the business - Sundaram Finance under Srinivasaraghavan’s dynamic leadership saw phenomenal growth and earned the distinction as one of India’s most trusted NBFCs with best in class ratings in Fixed Deposits, Long Term and Short Term borrowings - the award Citation pointed to his commitment to the Society.                                  

It was a revolutionary never before heard concept on the Indian Music Scene. An open air kutcheri at a public park without mikes and speakers in an informal atmosphere with the audience seated around the artiste  - 'Mikeless Kutcheri in the Park' as it has now come to be called. Will artistes be interested to perform in such a Kutcheri sans mikes?

The Launch in February 2006

Just over 12 years ago, on the first Sunday of February 2006, Srinivasaraghavan launched the Sunday Kutcheri in the Park for children making it a monthly feature "We chose to focus on young children - ‘catch them young’ - and restricted it to children below 15 years as we believed it would help them shed their inhibitions and give them the confidence to move up to the next level. To us, the first Sunday of every month is their ‘Day’. The young children are the ‘stars’ of the show. For most children, this is their first Kutcheri." 

                                                 

A committee from Sundaram Finance conducts an audition to select the students. Certificate and memento are presented to the artistes.

While there were voices that pushed for mikes and speakers, Srinivasaraghavan stuck to his stated position "We did not want to disturb the peace of the morning walkers with loud music and hence consciously stayed away from mikes and speakers. We have to be conscious and mindful of the fact that we operate in a public place. It would be presumptuous on our part to assume that all of them are lovers of carnatic music. Therefore the first thing we decided was ‘No mikes No speakers’. We decided to do it in a confined space, whereby those who are interested can come seeking this but we will not impose this on someone who doesn’t necessarily want to be bothered by carnatic music. Also, being an open-air kutcheri, amidst falling leaves and curious birds chirping around the park, we believed that we would be able to bring out the best in the children if they performed without the help of mikes and speakers."

In the initial phase of the launch, "we wondered if the participants would really like this concept and if we would have enough interest in this ‘never before tried out mikeless open air format’."

But very soon and frankly quite unexpectedly, the Sunday Kutcheri in the Park encountered a happy problem. Applications poured in and there was a serious backlog that the children who had cleared the audition.In fact the demand from prospective artistes increased so dramatically that Sundaram Finance expanded the Kutcheri concept to include a three day Navarathri special every year.
       
Nostalgic memories                                 
10 years after she performed with her friend Sagarika in February 2008, Anjana Venkataramanan
(Photograph above) still cherishes the memento that she received from TT Srinivasaraghavan that morning at the Nageswara Rao Park.

Says her mother, Geetha Venkataramanan ( the Editor of The Hindu, Friday Review), "It has faded, almost tearing at the edges but Anjana would not remove it from her cupboard door. It has been stuck there for 10 years - the review with that photo and the memento. Nostalgic memories of the Kutcheri!!!" 

                                            

Murali Raghavan, Convener of the Trinity Arts Festival said that it was this persuasive long term commitment of Srinivasaraghavan to provide opportunities to budding musical talent and making this a launch pad for children aged below 15 that led to over 1200 children getting opportunities to sing at the Nageswara Rao Park in Mylapore. Many of whom have gone on to scale higher peaks in the musical arena."

A decade after the launch of the Sunday Kutcheri in the Park, the Limca Book of Records, after an exhaustive study and analysis, included the Mikeless Kutcheri in the Records Books for being the longest running open air Mikeless Kutcheri in India.

                                  

In his award acceptance speech, Srinivasaraghavan said, “All evening I have been sitting here wondering why I am here. You have a whole bunch of extraordinarily talented people who have achieved so much individually in their chosen field. All of them received awards because they are outstanding individuals. The award that I have received has very little to do with me the individual. I am very humbled by this recognition. However, this award belongs to all my colleagues who constitute Team Sundaram. I receive it as the captain of the team."

                                        

T. T. Srinivasaraghavan, Managing Director, Sundaram Finance Ltd., was presented the Life Time Achievement award by N Ravi, Chairman, Press Trust of India at a function held at the RR Sabha in Mylapore, Madras on Friday evening at the inauguration function of the Trinity Arts Festival.