In Memoriam: Fondly remembered
Industry pays tribute to five printers from South India who passed away during this pandemic.
21 May 2021 | By TKS Lakshmi Priya
S Siva Arumugam, Nandhi Achchagam, Coimbatore
S Siva Arumugam of Nandhi Achchagam in Barathi Park Road, Coimbatore passed away on 3 September 2020. He was 87.
In 1965, Arumugam started Gandhi Dhasan Achchagam for his elder brother, when they were all in a joint family. Later, in 1982, Nandhi Achchagam was inaugurated for producing commercial jobs, book works, and registers and forms for schools and colleges.
Arumugam’s close friends say that he was deeply rooted in spiritualism and was also the head of the committee caretaking the Vinayaka Temple situated near the press.
KC Ramachandran, Pravin Printers, Coimbatore
On 6 April 2021, a time when the resurgence of the second wave of Covid-19 was being witnessed across the country, print veteran KC Ramachandran of Pravin Printers, Ramnagar, Coimbatore passed away. He was 71.
In 1986, he opened Pravin Printers. Since then, he had been catering to the books stationery market in and around Coimbatore. He was a former GB member of AIFMP and ex-treasurer of Coimbatore Master Printers Association.
CR Krishna Kumar, Impress The Print Shop, Coimbatore
CR Krishna Kumar of Impress The Print Shop, situated in RS Puram, Coimbatore, passed away on 8 February 2021. He was 55.
Kumar started the Impress around 15 years ago. The print shop used to produce books on a four-colour machine.
Sundar Raj, PK Printers, Coimbatore
Sundar Raj aka Suri of PK Printers, Ganapathy, Coimbatore passed away on 26 September 2020. He was 48.
Suri started the press in 1990. The press used to produce stationery products for customers in and around Coimbatore.
K Thiyagarajan, Amaravathi Printers, Karur
K Thiyagarajan of Karur-based Amaravathi Printers died on 22 April 2021. He was more than 70 years old according to his close associates.
Amaravathi Printers, which began operation more than 50 years ago, used to produce jobs pertaining to commercial books and other business verticals. He was also one of the former treasurers of the Karur District Offset Printers Association.
Naveena, Suriya Digital, Cumbam
My student (and friend) K Naveena of Cumbam-based Suriya Digital is probably one of the youngest from the print industry to have died during the pandemic. She was 24 when she died on 21 February 2021.
Naveena was an alumnus of the Coimbatore-based Avinashilingam Institute. She studied BE Printing Technology, and was one of students in the 2015-2019 batch.
Soon after graduation, she started working in Suriya Digital, Cumbam, Tamil Nadu. Her close friends say that Naveena was a very enthusiastic person with impressive entrepreneurial skills.
This is evident from her fourth-year project that she worked on during her stint in Avinashilingam. The project was a comparison between Inkscape and Coreldraw (freeware versus licensed software).
TKS Lakshmi Priya is a professor and head of printing technology, School of Engineering at Avinashilingam University
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