In the loving memory of Shyamettan

Its a long time I have written something here. Everytime I think of it, I will get involved in something else and forget about it. This time, I can’t resist it.

Our friend, Shyam Karanattu passed away two days before. The saddest part is that it was a suicide. All people who know him are shocked to hear the news and has not yet recovered from it. Shyam was an active free software advocate and activist. Here is what Anivar has to tell about him.

For me, he was more than a friend. He was my senior at THSS Vattamkulam and also at MESCE, though he was in EC branch. He was one of the persons who has influenced me much. Even though I am attracted to FOSS a long time before, it was he who introduced me(and many others) to the FOSS Community and Swathantra Malayalam Computing group. Later, we became colleagues, organized many events at MESCE and participated in many events together. He was the major driving force for the formation of MES-FSUG group and GNULabs at MESCE.

He was so attracted to FOSS and whenever we talked, we end up with something related to it. After his B-Tech also, we kept in touch and the last time I contacted him was during the time of SMC Localization Camp at MESCE. He said he had some family functions and couldn’t attend and will try to be there for the next event. Now he left us without waiting for thee next event.

Here are few snaps of him from my collection.

He has also interviewed RMS during the FSFS.in conference.

Shyam Karanattu Interviewing Richard Stallman for Amrita TV

There are much more to say about him, but….
We all love you Shyam. You shouldn’t have done that, whatever the reason was.