Political Leader / Businessman of TTK group
Birth
T.T. Krishnamachari (Tiruvallore Thattai Krishnamachari) was born in 1899 to Rengachari in a Tamil Iyengar Brahmin family in Madras of British India (Chennai). His father was a judge in the High Court.
Education
Krishnamachari had completed his schooling in the Dharma Murthi Rao Bahadur Calavala Cunnan Chetty’s Hindu Higher Secondary School. He got the graduation from the Madras Christian College (MCC).
Personal Life
Krishnamachari was married. He had four children TT Rangasamy, TT Vasu, TT Narasimhan and TT Raghavan.
Career
He became the visiting Professor in the department of Economics at MCC. In 1928, he established the TTK group. This TTK group was the business aggregate known for the Prestige Brand. In 1928, he began his career as an entrepreneur and made the foundation for the successful company TT Krishnamachari & Co. in Chennai, which is now known as the TTK Group.
He took the decision to enter the Politics in 1937, once his company got familiar. After this, he got elected to the local legislative assembly. In 1942, he had been elected to the Central Legislative Assembly. As a member of the Constituent Assembly, he gave the assistance to draft the Indian constitution. For a period of 1952 to 1967, he was an elected member of the Parliament and had been a Cabinet Minister. Then in 1962, he gave his service in the Steel Ministry for some time. Again, he became the Minister in 1962. He became the Finance Minister, before which he was working as a Commerce Minister. Krishnamachari had been the instrumental in beginning the three major steel plants and financial Institutions like ICICI, IDBI and UTI in the country. In 1965, he left the Minister post when his term as Member of the Parliament was over and was continuing his other works till he got the illness.
Krishnamachari Political works
Krishnamachari had brought in the path-breaking tax amendments, when he was the Finance Minister. He was responsible to plan the schemes like the Dandakaranya, Rajasthan Canal Schemes and the Damodar Valley Project.
Records of Krishnamachari
In 1964, by bringing the Family Pension Scheme, Krishnamachari had been the extension of the Pension scheme to benefit the family of the older Government employees. He had been the founding member of the Governing Body of NCAER (National council of Applied Economic Research) in New Delhi. He was the member of the drafting Committee, the Congress leader and the Entrepreneur. He was one of the founders of the Modern India. Krishnamachari had a key role in developing the industrial and economic infrastructure of the Indian Subcontinent.
He was the Finance Minister of India for two times, that is from a period of 1956 to1958 and from 1964 to 1966.
Honor of Krishnamachari
After his death, the Mowbray’s Road in Chennai was renamed as TTK Road in honor of him. In 1956, first Independence economic Policy Institute of India was started .
Controversies faced by Krishnamachari
Then the Freight Equalization Policy brought by him, made the availability of coal and other natural resources from the Eastern part of India to the other places in India. This Policy has made the Southern and Western states to flourish, but the Eastern states have seen the discrimination In the Parliament, Feroze Gandhi questioned about the Life Insurance Corporation giving 1.24 crores in businessman Haridas Mundhra’s sinking quoted inquiry commission, for which Justice M.C.Chagla was the head. Then many witnesses were investigated under the oath which includes then Principal Finance Secretary H.K.Patel and the Finance Minister T.T.Krishnamachari. A comprehensive report was released by the Government on 13th, February 1958.
Reason for resignation of his post
Mundhra Scandal case in 1957 was the thing, which made the TT Krishnamachari to resign his Minister post. The business methods of Mundhra were suspicious, for which the allegation was put against him. An enquiry was made with all the witnesses including TT Krishnamachari. Before some months, the life Insurance Corporation of India had bought the shares of Mundhra for Rs.1,26,86,100 in Kanpur. This was the largest investment made by the LIC, after the Nationalization of the LIC. After the parliamentary question by Feroze Gandhi (son-in-law of Nehru), all the papers relating this case were submitted to the Commission. Even though the Finance Ministry’s written answer to this issue was technically correct, but practically not acceptable. According to Motilal Chimanlal Setalvad(the Indian Jurist and former Attorney General of India) in his autobiography, the Mundhra scandal case was sensitive from December 1957 to February 1958 which shook the Government of Nehru and led to the resignation of the T.T.Krishnamachari.
Death
Krishnamachari died in 1974, due to age and illness.