Kallipatti Ramasamy Palaniswamy

K. R. Palaniswamy has spent more than forty years treating digestive diseases, much of it among the poor of north Chennai. In 2026 he was named for the Padma Bhushan in the field of medicine, from Tamil Nadu ^[1].

From Kallipatti

Palaniswamy was born on 15 March 1949 into a farming family in Kallipatti, a village in Erode district ^[2]. He took his MBBS from Mysore University in 1972 and his MD (1977) and DM in gastroenterology (1981) from Madras Medical College ^[2].

Stanley and Apollo

In 1986 he founded the gastroenterology department at Stanley Medical College, Chennai, and led it until 2000, building an advanced unit for north Chennai’s poor patients ^[2]. He then headed gastroenterology at Apollo Hospitals, Chennai, where he set up a national board training programme ^[2].

He has been president of both the Society of Gastrointestinal Endoscopy of India and the Indian Society of Gastroenterology ^[2]. In 2008 he organised India’s first hands-on workshop in endoscopic ultrasound, and he has served on committees of the World Gastroenterology Organisation, which gave him its Masters award in 2022 ^[2].

Giving back

For more than thirty years he has volunteered at the Ramakrishna Mutt dispensary in Chennai ^[2]. He holds yearly health camps in Kallipatti and in 2025 ran awareness programmes on screening for colon cancer ^[2]. He has also helped bring a bridge over the Bhavani river, an electrical substation and a check dam to his home village ^[2].

He received the Padma Shri in 2007 ^[2].