Chennai: Veteran Tamil publisher S Ramakrishnan, who published the widely consulted Tamil-English dictionary, died here late on Monday night after he tested positive for Covid-19.
He was 75. His wife predeceased him a few years back.
Ramakrishnan was admitted to the Government Multi Super Speciality hospital at the Omandurar Government Estate last
week. He later tested positive for Covid-19.
His condition deteriorated a couple of days back and he died last night.
As his condition deteriorated, his third edition of a work with which he had associated nearly for 30 years–‘Cre-A:Dictionary of Contemporary Tamil (TamilāTamilāEnglish)’–was
released at the hospital.
A post-graduate in social work, Ramakrishnan, had a brief stint in advertising, before he took to publishing at the age of about 30.
He founded Cre-A, a Tamil publishing firm, in 1974 with the objective of bringing out serious literature in Tamil.
He had published titles on environment, healthcare, agriculture, modern Western philosophy and technology.
Cre-A had also brought out Tamil translations of literary works in Hindi, Bengali and Kannada, apart from publishing the works
of leading Tamil writers and thinkers like Mowni, Ashokamitran, Sa Kandasamy, Sundara Ramaswamy, Na Muthuswamy and S V Rajadurai.
DMK president M K Stalin and AMMK chief TTV Dhinakaran condoled the death of Ramakrishnan and offered their condolences to the bereaved family members.