Straight From the Heart

M. Anjaneya Rao

Ravi Publications

Making People successful in a changing World

Ravi Publishers is one of south India’s leading publishers of children’s school books ranging from kindergarten to standard 10, spanning a remarkably wide variety of subjects in six different languages. The company was founded in 1988 by M.A Rao, whose first project ‘The ABC Book’ aimed at kindergarten kids was a phenomenal success. Since the publication of the first book twenty years ago, the Ravi Publishers Group has established an exceptional quality-oriented brand image and till today stands as one of the most trusted publishing houses in South India. The company strives hard to publish books that inspire and motivate the young minds; and has taken a holistic approach in the development of value-based education that nurtures and hones the creative thinking skills of our children. The willingness of the brand to innovate has led to the publishing of several successful books like the ‘Hindi English Premier’, ‘The ABC Book ‘, and the ‘Hindi Telugu Premier’, for grades kindergarten to five; these books have made learning different language very easy for our kids. It currently publishes many titles per year servicing numerous schools across Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Kerala and Karnataka. Ravi Publishers believes that books create a difference and make an impact on the lives of the readers. Hence, it aims to satisfy its customers with exceptional products and will continue to publish books that enhance and enrich the educational of our children at all levels.

Q. Tell us something about your family?

A.I has been brought-up in a very discipline atmosphere where values and principles have always been given priority. It gives me great pleasure to give introduction of my family. I was married to Dhana Lakahmi. In spit-of being a very family lady, she has been a great source of motivation in my life. I am blessed with two sons. My eldest son Ravi Kanth is a doctor by profession and the younger one is Sasi Kanth. He is a software engineer settled in the U.S.

Q. Why did you decide to create a publishing company?

A. Initially, I never had a thought of starting a Publication house. I am a teacher by profession. My passion towards teaching made me to start Ravi Converts. I found the need of good educational institutions even in the nook and corner of Andhra Pradesh. That spurred an idea of starting number of schools across A.P I was successful in starting nearly 1,000 convents across Andhra Pradesh. During this time, I was not at all satisfied with the content in text books. I thought that the text books were lacking innovative concepts of learning. That motivated me to take up self-publishing of text books. That’s how Ravi Publishers had come into being.

Q. When did you start the Publishing Company?

A. It all happened in the year 1988.

Q. What inspired to start these publications of educational books?

A.As I told, I was not satisfied with the text books available in the market. That’s way I decided to start myself publishing. In a way, I was able to fulfill the needs of my convents.

Q. What were the books you published for the first time when you started this publishing house?

A. ABC English book and 12 other titles.

Q. What was the response for your first venture?

A. It was a huge success. Teachers accepted our books as they were very unique in approach.

Q. How long have you been working on the company?

A.I has been working for the past 25 years.

Q. When you start to accept work from other authors what will you look for?

A.I doesn’t look for any special qualities as such. But the author should understand the expectations of the publisher and give the content accordingly.

Q. Ravi Publishers are a role model for many publishers for bringing out books with great quality and I am told that you take an extra bit of caution in proof reading. Why is this so?

A. publisher should very careful as far as mistakes are concerned. The content should be free from any mistakes. For this, we introduced, a unique contest, by name ‘pick a mistake, and win cash prize’. We have been implementing this contest quite successfully.

Q. In your opinion, what is the role of a publisher?

A. educational books publishers plays an important role in disseminating right kind of content to the learning community. The key trait the publisher should possess is that he should understand the learning needs of the student community.

Q. Do you think the present competition prevailing among the educational publishers is a healthy one?

A . No. The ethical and moral values are on the decline. In the name of competition, some publishers are restoring to unhealthy practices.

Q 12. What are your future goals?

A. We are launching e-learning series. We are also planning to expand our wings of business to the other parts of India.

Q. What are your message/success tips to our young readers?

A. Regardless of how old you are, where you live, or what your career goals are, everybody’s ultimate goal in life is to be happy and successful. To attain success in our efforts, we should have-sincerity, hardworking nature, and we should know what we are doing and we should plan accordingly.