K. Pandiarajan (born 13 May 1959) popularly known as Ma Foi K. Pandiarajan is an Indian businessman and politician from

Tamil Nadu Tamil Nadu (; , TN) is a state in southern India. It is the tenth largest Indian state by area and the sixth largest by population. Its capital and largest city is Chennai. Tamil Nadu is the home of the Tamil people, whose Tamil language ...

. Ma Foi K. Pandiarajan is Minister of Avadi Constituency from 2016. He is the founder of Ma Foi Management Consultants Ltd, a human resource management company, and CIEL HR Services, another talent acquisition firm. He contested in the 2011 Tamil Nadu Legislative Assembly election as a

Desiya Murpokku Dravida Kazhagam The Desiya Murpokku Dravida Kazhagam (; DMDK) is an Indian regional political party in the state of Tamil Nadu. It is a Dravidian party founded by the former leader of the opposition in the Tamil Nadu Legislative Assembly Vijayakant (Ca ...

(DMDK) candidate and won from his Virdhunagar constituency. Again he contested in the 2016 Tamil Nadu Legislative Assembly election as an

All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam The All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (; AIADMK) is an Indian regional political party with great influence in the state of Tamil Nadu and the union territory of Puducherry. It is a Dravidian party founded by the former chief mi ...

(AIADMK) candidate and won from his Avadi constituency. Pandiarajan was appointed as Minister for School Education, Youth Welfare and Sports by former

Tamil Nadu Chief Minister The chief minister of Tamil Nadu is the chief executive of the Indian state of Tamil Nadu. In accordance with the Constitution of India, the governor is a state's '' de jure'' head, but '' de facto'' executive authority rests w ...

J. Jayalalithaa Jayaram Jayalalithaa (24 February 1948 – 5 December 2016) was an Indian politician and actress who served as Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu for more than fourteen years over six terms between 1991 and 2016. From 9 February 1989 to 5 December 2 ...

on 29 August 2016. He remained in her cabinet until her death on 5 December 2016. He was immediately sworn into the same office by the new Chief Minister,

O. Panneerselvam Ottakarathevar Panneerselvam, popularly known as OPS (born 14 January 1951) is an Indian politician who served as the .Coordinator of AIADMK 6th Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu from 6 December 2016 to 15 February 2017 and as the 2nd Deputy Chief ...

. He half-heartedly supported the appointment of V. K. Sasikala as General Secretary of AIADMK before deciding to support the Panneerselvam faction when Panneerselvam turned against Sasikala. He was relieved of his ministerial office when Edappadi K. Palaniswami became Chief Minister. Later, in August 2017, Panneerselvam's and Palaniswami's Factions joined and gained majority in the house. Pandiarajan was appointed as Minister for

Tamil language Tamil (; ' , ) is a Dravidian language natively spoken by the Tamil people of South Asia. Tamil is an official language of the Indian state of Tamil Nadu, the sovereign nations of Sri Lanka and Singapore, and the Indian territory o ...

, Tamil Culture and Archaeology.

Early life and education

K.Pandiarajan was born on 26 April 1959 in a village near

Sivakasi Sivakasi () is a city and Municipal Corporation in Virudhunagar District in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu. This city is known for its fireworks, firecracker, matchbox and printing industries. Sivakasi city alone meets about 90% fire cracke ...

Virudhunagar Virudhunagar is a city and the administrative headquarter of the Virudhunagar district in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu. It is located southwest of the state capital Chennai and south of Madurai. Virudhunagar emerged as an important trade ...

district. When Pandiarajan was three months old, he lost his father, a worker in a local

match A match is a tool for starting a fire. Typically, matches are made of small wooden sticks or stiff paper. One end is coated with a material that can be ignited by friction generated by striking the match against a suitable surface. Wooden mat ...

factory. He was brought up by his maternal grandparents. He finished his schooling from the Sivakasi Hindu Nadar Victoria School, Sivakasi and in 1976, joined

PSG College of Technology PSG College of Technology is an autonomous, government aided, private engineering college in Coimbatore, India. It is affiliated with Anna University. It is affiliated to PSG and Sons Charities Trust. Among engineering colleges in India, P ...

Coimbatore Coimbatore, also spelt as Koyamputhur (), sometimes shortened as Kovai (), is one of the major metropolitan cities in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu. It is located on the banks of the Noyyal River and surrounded by the Western Ghats. Coimbat ...

for an undergraduate course in Engineering. After earning his BE (Hons) degree, Pandia Rajan enrolled for an

MBA A Master of Business Administration (MBA; also Master's in Business Administration) is a postgraduate degree focused on business administration. The core courses in an MBA program cover various areas of business administration such as accounti ...

programme in

Industrial Relations Industrial relations or employment relations is the multidisciplinary academic field that studies the employment relationship; that is, the complex interrelations between employers and employees, labor/trade unions, employer organizations, ...

at Xavier Labour Relations Institute,

Jamshedpur Jamshedpur (, ) or Tatanagar is the largest and most populous city in Jharkhand and the first planned industrial city in India. It is a Notified Area Council and Municipal corporation, Municipal Corporation and also the headquarter of the East ...

, which he completed in 1984.

Career

After graduating from XLRI in 1984, he joined the Indian operations of an

industrial gas Industrial gases are the gaseous materials that are manufactured for use in industry. The principal gases provided are nitrogen, oxygen, carbon dioxide, argon, hydrogen, helium and acetylene, although many other gases and mixtures are also av ...

multi-national BOC Group and later Deutsche Babcock. In 1992, he co-founded Ma Foi Management Consultants along with his wife, to tap into opportunities arising out of the 1991 economic liberalisation policy in India. The initial focus of Ma Foi was placing middle-level and managerial people overseas, especially in the West Asia. In 2002, Ma Foi partnered with Editor, a Dutch head-hunter firm looking to expand their operations in West Asia and South-East Asia. He sold majority of his stake in Ma Foi to Vedior in 2004. In 2007, Dutch HR services firm

Randstad The Randstad (; "Rim" or "Edge" City) is a roughly crescent-shaped conurbation in the central-western Netherlands, consisting primarily of the four largest Dutch cities (Amsterdam, Rotterdam, The Hague, and Utrecht); their suburbs, and many tow ...

acquired the operations of Ma Foi through its US$5.14 billion acquisition of Vedior. Pandiarajan became the Chairman of

Randstad India Randstad India is a division of Dutch-based Randstad Holding NV, a Dutch multinational human resource consulting firm A consulting firm or simply consultancy is a professional service firm that provides expertise and specialised labour for ...

. On 5 April 2012, he announced the launch of a new venture focusing on

management consulting Management consulting is the practice of providing consulting services to organizations to improve their performance or in any way to assist in achieving organizational objectives. Organizations may draw upon the services of management consultan ...

and education space – Ma Foi Strategic Consultants Pvt. Ltd, with investments of over ₹ 250 million in the first three years. The new company had got into an agreement with Randstad for using the brand Ma Foi for three years. Pandirajan, along with a few Ma Foi veterans, made his latest foray into the HR Services industry with the launch of CIEL HR Services in August 2015. CIEL HR focuses on talent acquisition for companies and flex staffing using modern analytical tools.

Political career: 2000 – till date

Pandiarajan joined the DMDK party founded by actor turned politician

Vijaykanth Narayanan Vijayaraj Alagarswami (born 25 August 1952), better known by his stage name Vijayakanth, is an Indian politician and former actor who has worked predominantly in Tamil cinema. He was the Leader of the Opposition in the Tamil Nadu Leg ...

. He contested in the

2011 Tamil Nadu Legislative Assembly election The Fourteenth Legislative Assembly Election was held on 13 April 2011 to elect members from 234 constituencies in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu. Results were released on 13 May 2011. Two major parties Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) and All ...

and won from his Virdhunagar constituency with a margin of 21,286. He switched loyalties to AIADMK in 2013. On 26 February 2016, He along with 9 DMDK MLAs joined ADMK. He won as a MLA from Avadi Constituency in

2016 Tamil Nadu Legislative Assembly election The Fifteenth Legislative Assembly Election was held on 16 May 2016 for the 232 seats (except Thanjavur and Aravakurichi for which held on 26 October 2016) of the Legislative Assembly in the state of Tamil Nadu in India. AIADMK under J. Jayal ...

as an AIADMK candidate. In February 2017, following the appointment of Edappadi K. Palaniswami as Chief Minister in place of O. Paneerselvam, K. A. Sengottaiyan replaced Pandiarajan as Minister for School Education. Pandiarajan was the only cabinet minister to have supported Paneerselvam during a party dispute in which V. K. Sasikala was being touted as a possible Chief Minister. The appointment of Sengottaiyan was the only change made to the cabinet by Palaniswami at that time. On 21 August 2017, with the merger of

AIADMK The All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (; AIADMK) is an Indian regional political party with great influence in the state of Tamil Nadu and the union territory of Puducherry. It is a Dravidian party founded by the former chief m ...

factions headed by Edappadi K. Palaniswami and

, Pandiarajan was again sworn in as a cabinet minister with portfolios of archaeology, Tamil language and Culture.http://www.ptinews.com/news/9000809_OPS-sworn-in-as-TN-deputy-CM--to-hold-finance-portfolio

Personal life

Pandiarajan lives in Avadi with his wife, Hemalatha. He has two children.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Pandiarajan, K. 1959 births Living people Indian chief executives Businesspeople from Chennai Tamil businesspeople Tamil Nadu MLAs 2011–2016 Desiya Murpokku Dravida Kazhagam politicians Bharatiya Janata Party politicians from Tamil Nadu All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam politicians Tamil Nadu MLAs 2016–2021 XLRI – Xavier School of Management alumni