Roots in music, roots in the land.
Revathi Kamath was born on 14 April 1958 in Mysore, Karnataka, into a brahmin family steeped in music and culture. Her father, Vainika Vidwan Shri N. Krishnamurthy, was a disciple of Mysore Court Scholar Veena Venkatagiriappa. Her mother was Smt. Shyamala Krishnamurthy.
Growing up in a home where the veena was as natural as breathing, she became a child prodigy. She performed on stages before she had words for what she was doing. Music was not learned. It was inherited.
She pursued her M.Sc. and a Graduation in Landscaping Architecture with distinction, laying the technical foundation for a career that would eventually shape the landscape of Karnataka itself.
A journey no blueprint could have planned.
She began as a florist. Then became a landscapist. Then an entrepreneur. Then a conservationist. Each step was not a pivot but an expansion, a deepening of the same core belief: that the world around us deserves to be tended to, not just used.
As a legendary landscapist of India, she worked across scales from intimate gardens to civic green spaces. But it was her work with water bodies that defined her legacy. She looked at Mysuru's dying lakes and saw not loss but a call to act. She answered that call, again and again, for decades.
She is the first woman to be addressed with the title "the earthist" and "the lake woman" of India. These are not honorary titles. They are descriptions of what she has done on the ground, with her hands, with her community, with her trust.
A mission that holds five causes as one.
Revathi Kamath does not see lakes, education, health and plantation as separate concerns. She sees them as one conversation: what does a community owe the place it lives in, and the people it lives with?
Lake Matters restores water bodies. Education Matters and Akshara Patra ensure children are not left behind. Health Matters reaches communities that the healthcare system has not. Plantation and Climate work plants not just trees but the idea that we are responsible for the air we breathe.
And through Sri Shyamala Krishna Sangeetha Sabha, she ensures that classical music, the art she was born into, continues to reach those who could never afford it.
The Revathi Raghuram Kamath Charitable Foundation.
All of this work is anchored in the Revathi Raghuram Kamath Charitable Foundation, a registered philanthropic organisation under whose umbrella every initiative operates with full transparency and legal accountability.
The trust is 80G certified, meaning every donation made to it is eligible for income tax deduction under Section 80G of the Income Tax Act. Automated receipts are issued for every donation.
Her unimaginable philanthropic work and her inspiration have been the guiding light which has shaped many lives. One will certainly feel the divinity in her humility, despite her knowledge, her success, and the aura centred by her persona.