Sunday Celebrity: Kalyanamalai Mohan breaks the mind blocks with smiles, touching talks

Kalyanam (marriage) is a ‘malai’ (mountain- up hill) for many when communities and relatives are disbursed far and wide in the expanding times. Here is one who makes malai (mountain) as maalai (garland) and his “Kalyanamalai” (marriage garland) brings the far and wide, near and near.

V. Venkatesan, the Founder-Chariman of Kalyanamalai, also fondly known as Kalyanamalai Mohan has his reach across the globe, high and wide, through the much sought-after effective media, Sun TV, which telecasts his popular matrimonial programme, “Kalayanamalai” every Sunday between 08.00 and 8.30 AM.

People are glued to the programme, for it combines a Talk Show, which is entertaining, food for thought, food for ears, food for eyes. This visual presentation of prospective brides and grooms blended with subjective debate is well received and viewed all over the world.

The Indian society places a high value on marriage and its life-long commitment. In a modern Indian marriage, set against the realities of a socio-cultural urban India, nerves and energies are tested endlessly. It used to be said in the days of our fore-fathers, one dozen pairs of chappals would worn out before a suitable alliance is settled. Now with the communication boom, running round is saved, but only time is wearing out. And so came media search by different ways—print media, online (internet) and electronic media (channels).

Kalyanamalai Mohan chose the latter to launch his services. That’s how was born Kalyanamalai or KM Matrimony. The effective functionality of the organization began during 1999 at Chennai and has grown to the extent of winning ISO certification with respect to the quality service. Now, it leads the others in match making and marching towards the target of binding millions in the beautiful bond of marriage.

Asian Tribune met Kalyanamalai Mohan at his office, fitted with modern gadgets in Chennai. He met us with his sister-in-law Mrs. Meera Nagarajan, who is the Managing Director of the corporate organization, and his right hand. He has 18 branches in Tamil Nadu, rest of India and outside India

Completed 10 years; one lakh marriages performed

Kalyanamalai has completed its ten years of service this year, and it was celebrated in a star-studded and glittering way in October at Kamarajar Arangam in Chennai. Mrs Mohan boasts that the organization has performed more than one lakh marriages past 10 years.

The smiling face, the cheering looks and the soothing speech of Mr. V. Venkatesan alias Kalyanamalai Mohan has stolen millions of hearts. The profiles displayed in Sun TV has achieved 100% success in these 10 years, first of it's kind.

The concept of this programme is to introduce the alliance on stage. 12 to 15 in an episode per week. Mohan is the anchor person, who will interact with the parents or the bride or grooms. The parents/guardians of the bride/groom accompany the profile introduction.

Their need, taste, status and other details will figure in the discussion, watched by innumerous viewers who are also in search of partners to their near and dear ones. The basic details and the expectation of the profile is displayed to the audience in order to facilitate his/her marriage at the earliest Or the picked information would be passed on by the viewers to those matching the interest. Thus the match is sealed when they contact the office.

This unique matrimonial program presenting prospective brides and grooms visually on Television was originally conceived by Mrs. Meera Nagarajan, and gone through several stages of change.

Today, KM Matrimony stands proud on the portal of development as one of the largest matrimonial business in India as a single domain in multi facet platforms-- Media, Magazine, portal and ground events among others, contributing to the significant progress in all fields of operation.

Initially when satellite channel boomed in 1996 Mohan and his brother Nagaraj, who was into exporting TV programmes and production of 13-episode serials, and sister-in-law Mrs Meera Nagarajan put their mind together to make video magazine for women in the channel. Then Meera hit up on the idea of entering matrimonial services on the channel, not thought of by anyone before. And the Kalyanamalai was launched in 1999 in a small way.

Around the year 2000, the matrimonial service on online made headway. Meera developed the alliance fixing service into a concept to introduce the prospective brides and grooms on Television and went on air through Sun TV in 2000, with Meera directing the programme and Mohan at anchor.

Finding people fighting shy to appear before the lights, and open to the world, they improved the concept to anchor with the parents of the bride and groom. Every week, a few cases were handled, and the response was overflowing.

Talk Show with matrimonial introduction

The next stage improvement of the concept was to include an entertainment part, which made the programme more successful. That was in 2002. “We better call it a Talk Show. As family issues with celebrity participation like Prof. Soloman Pappaiah, Prof. Gnanasundaram, Suki Sivam, Thenkartchi Swaminathan, and leading film stars and popular personalities added pep and pomp the show.” This would be followed by interaction with 12 to 15 families who were in search of alliance to their wards.

The entertainment part—Talk Show-- would be shot at different centres with the leading personalities on stage and with the public participation.
This would be shown in six to seven breaks, one per week, with every part tagging an interaction part with parents or brides/grooms.

Mohan has already shot the Talk Show at Chennai, Bangalore, Delhi, Hyderabad, Pondicherry, Andaman, Mumbai, Madurai and also at foreign lands like Dubai and Singapore. Best auditorium will be booked and local people and support of the local Tamil sangams would be drafted. “This is another reason for our success,” Mr. Mohan says.

Finding the expanding needs of the matrimonial market, Kalyanamalai started conducting localized matrimonial shows by their branches called “Thirumana Thiruvizha”, “Varan Pakalama Vango” and community and special group meetings.

All these still having its own limitation, “ we have ventured into print media where we publish all information of the brides and grooms. This sastisfies a targeted group.,” said Mr. Mohan. The “Kalyanamalai” fortnightly, is edited by Mohan and is printed and circulated by “Ananda Vikadan” group.

Kalyanamalai Mohan hails from Nannilam, Thanjavur. Even as a boy, marriages would be a festival for him. He enjoyed serving and running around. As he grew up, he would be in the forefront, organizing or participating in trouble shooting. Later he took to handling wedding contracts. He came to Chennai and was in the employ of Binny Ltd for three years. Then he switched over to production of short films along with his brother.

Kalayanamalai is a family-run organization: Mohan is the Chairman, Mrs. Meera Nagaraj, his sister-in-law (brother’s wife), is the MD, Mohan’s son Vijaya Bhaskar, a software engineer, handles technical part, K. Sridhar, his son-in-law, a chartered accountant, financial operation, Nithya, his daughter-in-law, general operations.

- Asian Tribune -