The Mahabharatha contains the essence of Indian wisdom. It is an epic of gargantuan proportions. The string of stories and dialogues found in this magnum opus continue to offer unadulterated common sense to the people. There are four texts that can be considered as the pearls and they are - Yaksha Prasnam, Vidura Neethi, Bhagavad Gita and the advice of Bheeshma to the Pandavas. Vidura Neethi was published by the with the support of the Asoka Family in 1997. They had decided to welcome the Centenary of their Founder Asoka M.K.Krishna Chetty through this publication. The advice of Vidura to Emperor Dhritarashtra before the onset of the great war is very important. It talks about the value of common sense and aids in the resolution of conflict. A lovely foreword by Hema Kuppuraj of the Asoka Family shares a lot of details connected with the origins of the Asoka Family. The book is an excellent tribute to the ethical M.K.Krishna Chetty.
The Mahabharatha contains the essence of Indian wisdom. It is an epic of gargantuan proportions. The string of stories and dialogues found in this magnum opus continue to offer unadulterated common sense to the people. There are four texts that can be considered as the pearls and they are - Yaksha Prasnam, Vidura Neethi, Bhagavad Gita and the advice of Bheeshma to the Pandavas. Vidura Neethi was published by the scholar C. V. Radhakrishna Sastri with the support of the Asoka Family in 1997. They had decided to welcome the Centenary of their Founder Asoka M.K.Krishna Chetty through this publication. The advice of Vidura to Emperor Dhritarashtra before the onset of the great war is very important. It talks about the value of common sense and aids in the resolution of conflict. A lovely foreword by Hema Kuppuraj of the Asoka Family shares a lot of details connected with the origins of the Asoka Family. The book is an excellent tribute to the ethical M.K.Krishna Chetty.
It is rather difficult to find out the details connected with the peregrinations of the middle class during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Disease and rude governance were accompanied by famines. This scattered a number of families. The families of landlords stayed put in the company of a set of farmers and scholars in their respective regions. Therefore one has travel a bit in order to understand the connections between various segments of the society.
Thamboolam has been a wonderful tradition. Our elders used have scented betel nuts rolled in tender betel leaves. They added perfumed chunnambhu (lime) to it. It was once considered to be the in thing and it was ' Lakshmikaram ' to have this combination. The love and affection of couples used to be measured by the reddishness achieved on the tongue of the person consuming this combination. It was the paakku, vettrilai and chunnambhu combination. ' Vageesa Kalanidhi ' Ki.Va.Jagannathan of Kalaimagal has written an essay on this subject. The essay is titled ' Sunnanbil Irukkiradhu Sootchamam ' and it was published by Kalaimagal long ago. Recently it was republished by Siruvani Vasagar Maiyam in Coimbatore under the guidance of Saravanan, the scholar who is taking great steps in works connected with U.Ve.Swaminatha Iyer. The essay collection by Ki.Va.Jagannathan has been titled ' Ananda Vellam '. The essay under consideration talks about a temple benefactor Annamalai Reddiar serving the sculptor with paakku, vettrilai and chunnambhu of the best quality. The boy serving the sculptor disappears suddenly and the sculptor seeks the vettrilai. On seeing this Reddiar acts as the ' Adaipakkaran ' (the one who serves this combination of vettrilai and paakku). The sculptor tastes it and finds it to be excellent. Until then he had not noticed the boy disappearing for he is busy sculpting. He is taken aback and says that he will build the temple very well. May be do the job again. That was the influence of good taste those days. Now, this story will make us understand the importance of good quality betel nuts. Asoka Betalnut Company of Coimbatore was precisely into good quality.
The Asoka Betelnut family is known by the surname ' Munukur '. They had lived near Jolarpet and had to move over to Salem due to the administrative constraints created by the rulers. The Salem Kannika Parameswari Temple Chapparam was known as Ari Chettiar Chapparam and Munukkur Medai. Ari Chettiar happened to be the uncle of M.K.Krishna Chetty (Founder Asoka Betelnut Company).
Asoka M.K.Krishna Chetty (1899 - 1976) was born to Kasipathy Chettiar and Ananthalakshmi Ammal. Kasipathy Chettiar was a Sub Registrar around the year 1880 and Krishnamma Chettiar, the father in law was a Diwan in the Anegundi Samasthanam those days. The family moved to Rasipuram and another branch went over to Bellary in order to pursue commercial activities. They were known as the Golkonda family. Ananthalakshmi Kasipathy Chettiar passed away and the responsibility of bringing up her three kids fell on Seethalakshmi Ammal, the younger sister. M.K.Krishna Chetty's older brother Ananthapadmanabha Chettiar got educated and was working in Bank of Madras. He passed away and the responsibility of bringing up his kids devolved on the noble Seethalakshmi Ammal. One of the kids M.A.Govindarajulu was known for his meticulous record maintenance. He was known as the ' Keeper of Accounts '.
M.K.Krishna Chetty interned under his brother in law A.R.Pattabhirama Chettiar (ARP) from the age of 14. He was greatly supported by him and by 1930 (2nd October) he founded the Asoka Betenut Company. Support came in the form of Noorani Venkata Krishnaier, Gore Family of Mumbai and Venkataramana Iyer who had worked alongside. It is appropriate to recall Chandrakanthammal, the daughter of Seethalakshmi Ammal. She took a lot of care to look after the family and also supported poor kids with milk for decades. M.K.Krishna Chetty had contributed towards the construction of ' Seethalakshmi Maternity Home ' in the sacred memory of his benefactor and aunt.
The entrepreneur got married to Nachiarammal and the couple were blessed with - M.K.Kuppuraj, M.K.Chandrakanth, M.K.Ananthakumar, Shantha, Vimala, Somalatha, Prema, Nirmala and Usha. The family deity was Ankala Parameswari in Salem. "Grandfather was in a textile outlet on R.G.Street and there was a marriage in the family of the boss. He went to buy betel nuts for the wedding and understood that if he crushed the nuts, the cost would come down while also making consumption easier. The idea began there and took form later. It evolved into good form ' paakku ' because of grandfather's acumen towards high standard and quality. One can say that it was an outcome of his attitude. He began with the nuts from Mettupalayam. Eventually the search for the best pushed him to the ' Malnad Arecanut ' which is the best in the world. Malnad is the rain forest region of Karnataka. While Seethalakshmi Ammal helped him in the early stages of production, his formula was unique and he was quick to migrate to the best ingredients. Global Management Guru C.K.Prahlad spoke about revolution in marketing by explaining that a big fortune lay in the bottom of the pyramid. Grandfather practiced this from the year 1930 at Asoka. It was here that good quality mouth freshness was made available at the lowest price possible. The colour of Asoka was blue and it came to be known as ' Asoka Blue '. He used to place advertisements with just the blue colour and this was followed by the Asoka logo the very next day. Grandfather had used techniques much before they found a place in textbooks, " stated M.A.Krishna - Director : Asoka Betelnut Company.
M.K.Krishna Chetty purchased a number of properties and he put his ' Asoka ' advertisements on the façade of the properties. The properties served as hoardings and also as investments. He paid high taxes all his life and his sons were among the top tax payers in the country. Once he had travelled to Pondicherry and he had purchased a shawl during the course of his visit. It had been a French colony those days and he wanted to pay the customs duty on his way back. However he could not find the officer and therefore he paid it on his return home.
His accounts were pucca and he had been inspired by Mahatma Gandhi. Paying the taxes was the most important thing for him to do. He did a lot of activities all his career. He printed the Asoka calendar. A number of books like Thus Spake Mahatma, Thiruppavai, Abirami Andhadhi etc., were published by him. He was known for his vigorous advertisement campaign. Once Lever wanted his back wrapper space and S.S.Vasan of Ananda Vikatan visited him personally in order to effect the same. His campaign ' Enna Shaar ' with a picture of writer Mali was very famous.
"Sadasivam (Kalki), the husband of M.S.Subbulakshmi was father's advertisement strategist. Walchand Hirachand of Premier Automobiles was among his close set of friends. Asoka was early to get registered as a trademark. Father had a good knowledge about the importance of a trademark. He employed a lot of people to pack the nuts and hundreds from Pudukottai, Chennai and Coimbatore got gainfully employed. The approach to employment was totally Gandhian. Goods were sent to the market shortly after packing. Those days Angu Vilas, Nanjangud Palpodi and Asoka had the same agents. Shop keepers used to visit the agent and take delivery of the goods as per the schedule. He bought a Pilot Radio for about Rs.1000 and a Morris Minor car for Rs.800. Father used to advertise in all the three corner locations all over the south. We moved over to Ramnagar in 1937 and our telephone number was 106. Materials were dispatched by train. Father was interested in art and heritage. Particularly the heritage of temples. He sent an artist to copy the picture of Samrat Asoka in the Ajanta caves. Artist Mani was commissioned by him to do a portrait of Adi Sankara. We had a vendoring system till 1960. Father was active till 1959 and he led a renounced life later. A tablet manufacturer had once approached him with an offer but he did not want to offer hand packed tablets and market them. Ethics were important for him," shared M.K.Ananthakumar, Managing Director of Asoka Betelnut Company.
M.K.Krishna Chetty led the life of a renunciate for many years. He used to write ' Sri Rama Jayam ' everyday. He was known for creating records and documents. The visitors book of Asoka is an important record. It begins from the year 1938. The book has comments, remarks and appreciation from a number of people. One will be amazed to see the notes written by a diverse group of eminent people like Sir Mutha Venkatasubba Rao, Lady Andal, Vasudeva Raja of Kollengode, Health Minister of Assam, J.Shivashanmugham MLA, Vijayaraghavachariar, Diwan Bahadur C.V.Venkataramana Iyengar, S.S.Vasan, Justice K.Sundaram Chettiar among many others.
Asoka M.K.Kuppuraj joined his father nearly seventy years ago. He took over the operations and began to work at a frenetic pace. M.K.Kuppuraj was known for his business acumen. He was known for studying the demography of a place by going through the gazette of those times. "Uncle joined grandfather and the business grew under his tutelage. Asoka grew phenomenally and became a top brand. It became spoken about in all the circles nationally. A new peak was attained. Uncle has retired now and his work took the company to greater heights. He was an active Rotarian and was the President - Rotary Club of Coimbatore," recalled M.A.Krishna while sharing details about the availability of Asoka on the e marketing platform. M.K.Kuppuraj had contributed a lot towards the development of Erode Vasavi College.
Asoka M.K.Krishna Chetty was also a good friend of another entrepreneur from Chennai. He was none other than D.V.Seshiah Guptha, the Founder of Vijaya Chemicals, manufacturers of ' Asoka ' Talcum Powder.
Asoka was part of a ' perfect setting ' and it encouraged discussions after a meal. M.K.Krishna Chetty started ' Amala Envelopes ' and he had his own Heidelberg Machine for printing. He enjoyed a good relationship with everyone associated with Asoka. The families supplying areca nuts had developed a personal relationship with him and it has continued over time.
Asoka M.K.Krishna Chetty was an embodiment of entrepreneurship accompanied by virtues and he was a true patriot. These qualities are the need of the hour.