Sripriya Kumar

Sripriya was born on September 26, 1973, at an old-fashioned but pleasing clinic in Gopalapuram, bang opposite the home of former Chief Minister M Karunanidhi. Parents Kumar and Bharathi were overjoyed at the arrival of a girl. In Srinivasan, they already had a son.

The Kumar’s allowed their daughter to decide her life independently, and neither imposed their wishes on her.

“Parents often cast both their successes and failed dreams on their children. I had no such pressures and was left to myself to decide what I wanted to do, as long as I would not be a Vet.” Sripriya’s obsession with cats and dogs was the source of worry. But the one thing that mother Bharathi, a devout Hindu, was particular about was the importance of plurality. “I am fairly religious and firmly believe that the Hand of God is integral to one’s success and standing,” says Sripriya echoing that very sentiment.

“My fondest memories of childhood are of my grandparents’ residence and particularly an old steel cradle into which I could curl up and read. Grandpa had stacked the house with copies of Reader’s Digest magazines collected over two decades.” By the time the book-hungry Sripriya was 15 years old, she had read them all.

This helped her to expand her spectrum of knowing, and today she counts R K Narayan, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, James Herriot, the Mahabharata, and The Iliad by Homer as her favourites.

Sripriya lists her mother and grandmother as the strongest women she has known, and the three of them ensured no gender stereotyping. The only sensitization was the need to be home before dark, which she religiously follows even today. A doting grandmother ensured that the granddaughter had low culinary skills, and the household, present and future, learned to live with. Making things worse was an obsessive-compulsive disorder for cleanliness and orderliness.

Sripriya and her elder brother Srinivasan are poles apart. An alumnus of IIT, now settled in the United States as a successful software professional, Srinivasan was the Mr. Brains at home, the one his sister looked up for inspiration. For a significant part of her early life, madam was known to the world only as “Srini’s sister!”

The lady who would later make her mark in the Regional and the Central councils of the ICAI studied at the National English School and later at the DAV Senior Secondary School. As was the norm of those times, she joined classical music and dance classes with danseuse Sudharani Raghupathy. She wasn’t bowled over by it and so didn’t pursue it more fully but finds it incredibly calming and inspiring to listen to M S Subbulakshmi.

Until Class X, Sripriya was academically, not given to breaking into a podium finish. After class X, she opted for the Commerce stream. It was Hobson’s choice, as she hated the Sciences. It was a certain teacher, Malini Sampath, who unveiled Sripriya’s potential and encouraged her to study well. Her motivation pushed Sripriya to get the 1st rank, the first-ever incident of academic excellence, in the half-yearly exams at Class XII.

And from then on, the once academically quiet Sripriya was transformed into a competitively hungry student. The legendary Principal of DAV, A S Ram Kalia, who gave her the rolling medal at the General Assembly, tapped on her head and said, “I have not seen you before. Where were you all these days?” Touché. The lass blushed with pride, her cheeks turning pink.

Sripriya was the Junior and Senior category champion in athletics in school. While juggling sports and studies, she topped the Class XII examinations with an all-India first rank in Economics. And no prizes for guessing who handled that subject; of course, Malini Sampath!