Atlas Ramachandran

M.M. Ramachandran
Born	(1941-07-31) 31 July 1941 Thrissur, Kerala, India
Nationality	Indian
Occupation	Chairman, Atlas Group
Spouse(s)	Indira Ramachandran
Children	Sreekanth Ramachandran, Manju Ramachandran
Parent(s)	V. Kamalakara Menon, M.M. Rugmani Amma
Website	www.atlasera.com

M.M. Ramachandran (popularly known as Atlas Ramachandran)^[1] is an Indian businessman, film producer, and actor. He is the chairman of the jewelry chain Atlas group. He is well known for the tagline of his jewelry, "Janakodikalude Vishwasthasthapanam" (Meaning: The trusted enterprise of the masses), which later became a hackneyed phrase in Malayalam.^[2]

Business career

M. M. Ramachandran established the Atlas Group in the 1970s with the first gold jewellery showroom in Kuwait City.. He later founded more than 50 establishments around the world. Atlas pioneered transparency in the gold business by advertising the Atlas daily gold rates through mass media and fixing the price separately for 22 and 24 Karat gold jewelry. In the late 80s he took the Atlas Group into movie production. At the beginning of the millennium, he further expanded into industries such as health care (Atlas Health Care),^[3] real estate (Atlas Gold Townships)^[4] and studios for advertising and photography.^[5]

Setback

In 2015 the I-T department held simultaneous raids^[6] at 23 premises owned by the jewellers including Thrissur, Coimbatore, Kochi, Thiruvananthapuram, Bengaluru, Mumbai and New Delhi. Raids were also held at the three houses of the group owner and the houses of five key employees in Thrissur and Ernakulam. I-T department suspects Rs 30 crore tax evasion by jeweller group^[7] Ramachandran and his daughter was arrested by the Dubai police following defaults of over Rs 1,000 crores with multiple banks^[8]

There are also reports that the Kerala Chief Minister has been requested to broker a deal to rescue Atlas Ramachandran.^[9]

Hence Ramachandran struggled to settle the overdues with the banks within the framed time, The court gave 3 years jail term^[10] Currently he is in Dubai prison.

Film

In 2011, he made his directorial debut, with Holidays’.^[11] This film got a very negative review, and failed miserably at the box office.^[12] Sify reviewed the film saying, "With a ridiculous plot that has been presented as a thriller, Dr.M M Ramachandran’s Holidays is an amateurish attempt, to say the least. The script, visuals, music and the performances doesn’t help in making things better either."^[13]

Personal life

Ramachandran as born as the son of renowned poet and aksharaslokam exponent late V. Kamalakara Menon and Mathukkara Moothedath Rugmani Amma on 31 July 1941 in Thrissur. His siblings are Radha, Raveendran, Rathnam, Rajendran, Rajalakshmi, Ramadevi and Ramaprasad. He is married to Indira Ramachandran and has two children - a son named Sreekanth and a daughter named Manju. His daughter, originally a doctor by profession, was arrested for another case, and she is also serving in prison.

Filmography

Producer

• Vaisali (film) (1988)
• Vasthuhara (1991)
• Dhanam (1991)
• Sukrutham (1994)

Actor

• Youth Festival (2004)
• Anandabhairavi (2007)
• Arabikkatha (2007)
• Subhadram (2007)
• Malabar Wedding (2008)
• 2 Harihar Nagar (2009)
• Thathwamasi (2010)
• Bombay Mittayi (2013)
• Balyakala Sakhi (2014)

Director

• Holidays (2010 film) (2010)

References

Later