Mr.R.Panneerselvam, the founder of Mahatma group of schools in the city is known for his love for books. At home he has a personal collection of 5,000 plus books mostly on philosophy, spirituality and almost every best known biography in the world.
But it is his latest purchase that he can’t get over – a signature edition of The Bhagavad Gita. It arrived a fortnight ago and he is now busy making a special table with wheels and a glass box to encase the prized edition with a price tag of Rs.37,000.
“I spend my money on books, newspapers and magazines,” smiles Panneerselvam, who strictly dislikes free or discount offers on books. A reader lives a thousand lives before he dies, he quotes and shares that not even his friend from Srinivasa Publishers in Sivakasi could convince him to accept the premium edition of The Bhagavad Gita as a gift. “The moment I saw it,” he says, “I knew the finely ornamented special edition will make a grand gift for my students.”
Now Panneerselvam is keen to buy a copy each for all the four branches of Mahatma School. So what makes this edition of The Bhagavad Gita a mega masterpiece?
The book has been crafted with extreme care with precious and eco-friendly materials imported from all over the world, says Rajesh of the House of Nightingale. It took them two years to print the first copy that was presented to Prime Minister Narendra Modi last month. The second copy was gifted to Kokilaben Ambani who, impressed by the publication, has now ordered more copies for her family members.
If the high quality paper is from Europe and ink from Japan, the special material for the cover is from Netherland, the spine of the book embossed with fine art is from Germany, the swarovski crystals and stones embedded on the cover are from Austria, the metal gilded case for the book is from U.K and the reading stand from Switzerland.
The special edition with exclusive binding features and ornamentation has used all ultra-premium and environment-friendly material that, says the publisher, can be preserved for generations. The text of 700 verses with translation is based on various schools of thoughts including the Advaita, Visishtadvaita and Dvaita.
Mr.Panneerselvam’s excitement is on a new high. He can’t wait to share the thrill of re-reading the Bhagavad Gita in all its splendour with his teachers, students and their parents, other staff and any visitor.
“Each day, we will turn a new page”, he says, “and I know whoever visits the foyer will pause to read the page.” It will work because, he adds, in all the Mahatma Schools the practice of daily reading is already ingrained.
In each school’s reception, a story is displayed every morning in English and Tamil. And it seems Mr.Panneerselvam’s reading habit has rubbed off on to several others as well. “You will always find somebody reading it,” he says.
As far as he is concerned, daily from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. when he shuffles between the four branches of the school, he not only reads four English and five Tamil dailies but also meticulously clips the interesting items for his voluminous scrap book that dates back to 1964.
He has volumes of these scrap books with newspaper clippings that have been segregated and neatly pasted under various categories like science and the universe, higher education, medical advancement, development skills, lead political or any controversial news, obituaries from the Time Magazine, editorials from The Hindu , and everything related to the school that he established with his wife, Premalatha, in 1983.
Mr.Panneerselvam says he has always lived with books. His father too had a collection of 1,000 plus books and many of them were classics and printed in the early 20th Century. His father established the E.Rm. Erulappa Konar Memorial Library in 1954 on North Masi Street in memory of his grandfather. Those days the library was visited by top leaders and VIPs from Periyar, MGR, Karunanidhi, Bharathidasan, Kannadasan to Members of Parliament and Ministers from the Centre. He still has the priceless leather-covered visitor’s diary containing pages of handwritten notes from each of the visitors. The library was donated to Yadava College in 1980.
That he breathes books is evident from Mr.Panneerselvam’s penchant for constantly finding out new things to read. And he has already placed an order for the Guru Granth Sahib and The Bible for his students and is now searching for the Holy Quran.
( Making a difference is a fortnightly column about ordinary people and events that leave an extraordinary impact on us. E-mail soma.basu@thehindu.co.in to tell her about someone you know who is making a difference)
