Popular faces and famous alumni of Anna University

Ranked as the 6th best university of the country, Anna University is certainly one of the most prominent names for education in the country. Established in 1978, Anna University is famous for producing some most famous and respected names of the country, in almost all fields.

Anna University came into existence in 1978 when it subsumed 4 big institutes – Madras Institute of Technology, College of Engineering (Guindy), Alagappa College of Technology and School of Architecture and planning – and took its current form as Anna University.

With several awards and recognitions, Anna University is a top higher education destination in the country. The list of accolades of Anna University is endless, however, the most choicest are: – recognition as ‘University with Potential for excellence’ by UGC for its R&D in the field of biomedical engineering, recognition of its Crystal Growth Centre as a National Facility, recognition as 7th best university in the country according to size of e-resources and 2nd in India on the basis of Research papers published.

Apart from this, Anna University has many significant research works to its name. One of these in ANUSAT, which is the first satellite designed, developed and operated by an Indian University. Anna University has filed 54 patents and has got 6 national patents in last 6 years, along with more than 5500 research papers been published in international journals.

Let’s take a look at some of the most famous and successful alumni of Anna University.

Akkineni Nagarjuna

With over 90 films to his name as an actor, Akkineni Nagarjuna is a famous face not just in South India, but all over the country. Films like Mass and Ragada still are the favorites of many, which prove the love and respect which people carry for this famous actor.

Born in 1959 in Chennai, Nagarjuna completed his schooling in Hyderabad. He also studied Industrial Engineering at College of Engineering, Guindy, which is a part of Anna University. But despite of this degree, Nagarjuna chose acting as a career as this was something he always loved and wanted to pursue.

The signs of acting actually started appearing in an early age, when Nagarjuna as a child artist in the film Sudigundalu in the year 1967, at a small age of just 8 years. He played his first lead role in 1986, in the film Vikram. After a success in his first ever film, Nagarjuna never looked back.

After this he worked in various films like Majnu, Sankeertana, Aakhari Poratam, Geetanjali, Killer, Criminal and many others. For his brilliant work in field, Nagarjuna has been honored with several awards. These include 2 National Film Awards, 9 Nandi Awards, 3 Filmfare (South) Awards, 1 IIFA (South) Award and 1 South Indian International Movie Award along with many other awards.

Verghese Kurien

An Engineer by education, Verghese Kurien is amongst the most respected and prominent personalities in the history of the country. He is called the Father of While Revolution in India, and his birth-date, 26th November is celebrated as National Milk Day.

Verghese Kurien was born in 1921 in Calicut. He attained school level education in Coimbatore and studied Physics in Loyola College, Madras. He completed his graduation in College of Engineering, Guindy in Mechanical Engineering in 1943. College of Engineering, Guindy, is now a part of Anna University.

His most famous work is The White Revolution, which was a huge turnaround in the area of milk production in the country. With his efforts, India, which was milk deficient country, became the largest producer of milk in the world. In 30 years of White Revolution, India’s milk production increased four times, and milk availability per capita became double.

For this huge contribution, Verghese Kuries has received many awards. Awards to his name include Padma Vibhushan, Ramon Magsaysay Award, Krishi Ratna, World Food Prize, Wateler Peace Prize and Order of Agricultural Merit.

Venu Srinivasan

Venu Srinivasan is an Indian Industrialist and chairman of Sundaram-Clayton Group. He is also a director in various companies and has served important positions in various associations and institutes in India.

Venu Srinivasan is an engineering graduate from College of Engineering, Guindy, which is now a part of Anna University. He also holds Masters and Doctorate level degrees in science and a Doctorate degree in Management as well, which he has attained from national and international universities.

Major work of Venu Srinivasan includes the turnaround which he made to TVS motor company. The grandson of the founder of TVS motor company was made its chairman in 1979. During his tenure, he solved the labor problem in the company, introduced some radical quality management measures, split the company from Suzuki motors and launched the first indigenously built four stroke motorcycle of India, TVS Victor. During his tenure, TVS motor has also become the third largest two-wheeler manufacturer in the country.

For his contribution to Indian Industry, he has been honored with Padma Shri. He has received multiple awards like Star of Asia, Jamsetji Tata Lifetime Achievement Award, J R D Tata Corporate Leadership Award, Honorary Commander of Korean Naval Vessel and many others.

Mylswami Annadurai

Mylswami Anndurai is a scientist working in Indian Space Research Organization. With an important role in many major projects of ISRO, Mylswami Annadurai is currently the director of ISRO Satellite Centre, Bangalore.

Mylswami Annadurai was born in 1958. He completed his schooling from native village of Kodhawady. He completed his bachelors in engineering in 1980 from Government College of Technology, Coimbatore and masters from PSG College of Technology, Coimbatore in 1982. He attained Doctorate level degree from Anna University of Technology, Coimbatore.

Mylswami Annadurai started his career at ISRO in 1982. He has acted as mission director in important missions such as INSAT 2C, 2D, 2E, 3B, 3E and GSAT 1. He has acted as Project Director is some highly important projects such as Chandrayaan 1 and 2 as well.

For his contributions, he has recently been awarded Padma Shri. He was listed in top 100 global thinkers in 2014 and stood at first place amongst innovators. He has an endless list of national and international awards which show the impact his work and life has made.

Kutraleeswaran

Kutral Ramesh, popularly known as Kutraleeswaran, is a famous Indian Swimmer and holds several swimming records.

Kutral was born in 1981 in Erode, Tamil Nadu. He completed his schooling in Chennai and attained Bachelors degree in Engineering from College of Engineering, Guindy. He also holds MBA from MIT Sloan School of Management. Kutral has worked in international corporations like Intel and CitiBank.

Kutral’s career in swimming started at the age of 7, when he participated in district level contest. He performed fairly well in this and continued participating in various such competitions.

His major work includes breaking the long held record of Mihir Sen, for swimming 5 channels in a calendar year. He decided to break this record in 1994 and successfully achieved the feat of swimming through 6 channels in a calendar year. He got his name in Guinness Book of World Records for this achievement.

After this he participated in several competitions around the globe and won several medals for the country. He was awarded with Arjun Award for his work.

Crazy Mohan

Mohan Rangachari, famous as Crazy Mohan, is a famous actor, comedian, screen writer. The artist has several plays, short stories and films to his name.

Mohan is a graduate in mechanical engineering from College of Engineering, Guindy. He actually started writing in College, but after completing his degree, he started working in Sundaram-Clayton Limited. But as his interest was in writing and comedy, he quit his job and became a full time writer.

Mohan received great appreciation right from his first piece of writing. He wrote ‘Great Bank Robbery’, a college skit for the very first time and for this he received an award from Kamal Hasan. This filled him up with confidence and he wrote several plays and dialogues for many films as well.

Currently, he has many successful plays, stories, film dialogues and TV shows to his name. He has also acted in various South Indian films.

Madhan Karky

Madhan Karky, a Doctorate in Information Technology, is a song lyricist, film dialogue writer and a software engineer. He has given lyrics to various songs in South Indian Film Industry and has provided dialogues in many films as well.

Born in 1980, Madhan Karky holds a bachelor degree in Computer Science from College of Engineering, Guindy. He further studied in University of Queensland, Australia, where he attained Master’s Degree and PhD.

He started his career as lyricist in 2010 with the song ‘Irumbile Oru Irudhaiyam’ in the movie Enthrian. Although he has worked in many movies, his most famous work is his association with movie Bahubali. He wrote dialogues for this film as well as created a new language Kiliki for Kalakeya tribes in the movie.

Sujatha Rangrajan

Sujatha Rangrajan is a famous Tamil writer. He has published several novel, short stories, books and stage plays.

Sujatha was born in 1935 in Madras. He completed his schooling in Srirangam and attended St Joseph College, where Abdul Kalam was his batchmate. Sujatha studied Electronics Engineering from Madras Institute of Technology, which currently falls under Anna University.

Sujatha started his writing career in by writing a series of short stories. His first short story was published in Kumudam Magazine in 1962.

Apart from writing, he is also famous for playing an important role in design and production of Electronic Voting Machines at Bharat Electronics Limited.

For his work on EVMs, he received VASWIK award. He has also received awards like Best Writer Award for Tamil cinema and Tamil Nadu state film award for best film for his writings.

Raj Reddy

Dabbala Rajagopal Reddy, commonly known as Raj Reddy is an Indo-American computer scientist and a pioneer in the field of Artificial Intelligence. For his work in the field of AI, Raj Reddy has been awarded the Turing award, which is the highest prize in Computer Science. He is also the first person from Asian origin to receive this award.

He was born in 1937 in Chittoor district. He attained his bachelor’s degree in College of Engineering, Guindy, in the field of civil engineering. Later, he completed his masters in University of New South Wales, in the field of technology and Doctorate in computer science from Stanford University.

He started his career as an assistant professor in Stanford Universities. He also worked with IBM and acted as faculty in many other universities as well. In all his workplaces, he initiated research and works on robotics and computer technology. He played a keen role in establishing Rajiv Gandhi University of Knowledge Technologies in the country and is currently the chairman of IIIT Hyderabad.

Raj Reddy has several international awards to his name. He has also been awarded with Padma Bhushan, for his contributions in the field of technology.

 

Although a university rich in Academics, Anna University has produced maestros in almost every field. This truly reflects that Anna University is a campus for overall learning that nurtures your personality. Undoubtedly, Anna University is a place where everyone wants to be. The university definitely holds a solid place amongst the best universities of the country.

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