K. G. Appusamy was born on May 16, 1923, in a small village called Velur, in the southernmost state in India, called Tamil Nadu. He was raised there by his father, Gopalsamy Naidu and by his mother, Ammani Ammal. He was named for Lord Ganesha.
He was the 4th of 9 children, some of whom did not make it beyond infancy. He was raised with 3 brothers and a sister, and the 5 siblings and their families have grown over the years. Their father, and his father before that, was a tailor.
When they was growing up, there were not many schools. There was only one government elementary school. The school was very small and there were no desks and chairs for students. The students were to sit on a plank on the floor.
The education standard then was very good, except they learned in their native language, Tamil. The books were not supplied by the government. Each person was to buy his own books, which were specified by the government.
Appusamy was born in 1923 but his father reported that he was born in 1922 to get him into school a year earlier–his older brother was 3 years apart but now considered 2 years apart for school, entering kindergarten together. They studied the same syllabus as there was only 1 teacher for that age group. They shared the same set of books. They walked to school together.
Once he finished kindergarten, the next step was the elementary school, that was located in the neighboring larger village. At that time there were no means of transportation, except walking, so he and a few other village boys walked there in the morning and walked back in the afternoon. He got such good grades in the third grade that they moved him into fifth. In addition, his entrance exam scores for higher elementary school were so good that they moved him to seventh grade instead of sixth. The brothers were given a bicycle to share to ride to school.
After higher elementary school he moved on to high school for grades 8-12, and then he graduated. At 15 (real age of 14), he finished high school, he went to an engineering college in the district headquarters, Coimbatore, called P.S.G Engineering college.
Appusamy selected electrical engineering because when he was commuting from his village to the higher elementary school, he used to see people laying electrical posts that carried wire on the top connecting the posts, and wondered what they were doing. The people said that it carried electricity which was used for lighting and other purposes. Mr. Appusamy was very fascinated.