Ravi J. Matthai

Ravi John Matthai (1927–1984) was an educationist and a professor and the first full-time Director of the Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad. He is also the co-founder, along with Dr. K. Varghese, of Institute of Rural Management, Anand.

Early life, education Ravi was born to a Syrian Anglican family in Kerala as the son of John Mathai, who served as India's first Railway Minister and subsequently as India's Finance Minister. The 'Father of the White Revolution' Verghese Kurien is his cousin.

He was educated at The Doon School, Dehradun and later graduated from University of Oxford with Bachelor of Arts (Hons.) in Economics. He began his career at MacNeill & Baryy Limited, a Calcutta based firm with interests in coal, tea, shipping, jute, and cotton. Later, he moved to the Indian Institute of Management Calcutta in 1963 as Professor of Marketing. He also worked for a year as a Visiting Professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

A number of reasons are attributed to Matthai's enduring influence on IIMA: The area was then regarded by the government authorities as devoid of any scope for development. Believing that people were the greatest resource for development, Matthai began to work with village communities on issues of livelihood and empowerment in an environment that was (and still remains) among India's most degraded and oppressive. Volunteers from IIMA and the National Institute of Design (NID) joined with local citizens in the search for livelihood options that could be sustained in the face of social, environmental and political challenges. Among them was Raaj Sah, subsequently Professor at the University of Chicago, who worked on the project during and after his MBA studies at IIMA. Among his contributions were that Ravi Matthai and he together were the first on the ground and, starting from nothing, they began structuring and implementing the work of poverty alleviation. Ravi Matthai (on the chair) and Raaj Sah (with beard and long hair) with villagers in Jawaja, 1975.

Languishing skills in weaving and leather work were selected in an effort to develop new opportunities for earning that could be outside the control of local vested interests while remaining rooted in familiar and tested capacities. The Jawaja Experiment thus began with Prof. Ravi Matthai leading a small group of volunteers to a barren patch of land with little resources. Today, the Jawaja Leather Association and the Jawaja Weaver's Association, linked as AAJ, continue their struggle for self-reliance and dignity. The leather workers and weavers have won a degree of economic independence. Their products are reputed in India and in many parts of the world.

This experiential learning of running a gross root development project, led to the setting up of the Institute of Rural Management, Anand. Ravi Mathai, and two of his former IIMA colleagues, Kamala Chowdhary and Michael Halse are credited with conceptualising the need for an independent Institute of Rural Management. The institute was established in Anand, at the express invitation of Verghese Kurien, his cousin, then Chairman of the National Dairy Development Board. Ravi Mathai was associated in the initial years in various capacities - being a member on the Board, directly in teaching students, apart from informally mentoring the faculty.

Honors

The National Institute of Design (NID) at Paldi, Ahmedabad, has a Ravi J Matthai Design Research Chair for 'design innovation for enriching school education, craft sectors and design research'. It focuses on developing a range of design research related projects and activities in this area.

The institute library at the Institute of Rural Management, Anand and the Centre for Educational Innovation at IIM Ahmedabad are named after him.

In 1986, IIMA established the Ravi J. Matthai Centre for Educational Innovation (RJMCEI), to conduct research and undertake training activities to influence the management of education systems in India.