Remembering Ravi

Losing Son Too Early, Father Puts

Pension Into Fostering Memories

By LIBBY CUDMORE • Hometown Oneonta & The Freeman’s Journal

ONEONTA – Dad Ram Singh is trying to follow son Ravi’s philosophy.

“His philosophy was the share a loaf of bread with many rather than just give it to one,” said the father. “So I try to do the best I can.”

Following his 25-year-old son’s sudden death in September 2016, Singh struggled to find an outlet for his grief. “I was sick to my stomach,” he said. “No one should ever have to go through that.”

But Ravi’s philosophy stuck in his mind, and he figured out how to honor his son’s short life and keep his memory alive in the community he was raised in. “I decided to do a charity,” he said. “He was very outgoing. I was shocked at how many people liked him.”

His first thought was that he would donate Ravi’s house on East Main Street to one of the local non-profits.

“I offered it to Catholic Charities and (Catskill Area) Hospice – they could have it as long as they kept his name on it,” he said. “But they both said it wasn’t suitable for their needs.”

He decided that he would start a charity to give money to local organizations. “This is what his feeling would have been for the community,” he said.

Singh put $50,000 from his retirement from Pizza Hut, where he served as a district manager, into a CD at the Bank of Cooperstown. “I talked with the president, Scott White, and told him that I was starting a charity,” he said. “He gave me an extra half a percentage point.”

While the CD matured, he used his own funds to begin the Ravi Singh Memorial Charity, writing checks to local organizations, including Family Planning, the Susquehanna SPCA, The Oneonta Community Health Center, the Girl Scouts and Boy Scouts, school groups, the Salvation Army, fire departments and others.

He also bought $5 gift cards to local fast foods restaurants. “I would give them to different charities and tell them to give them to a child who was hungry so they could get a meal,” he said.

In 2017, he donated $600 of his own money. “We didn’t have any interest, so I just wrote the checks,” he said.

And when the CD matured in 2018, he had $999 in interest, and donated $1,193 to charities, in amounts ranging from $25 to $130. “I thought about the organizations he would like to have helped,” he said.

In addition to his father, Ravi was survived by his brothers, Raj and Gulab, and his mother, Madhu.

On the properties Ravi managed – one in Oneonta, the other in Portlandville – he has hung signs that read “Loving Ravi Singh Home.”

“I put his name on his buildings in his memory,” he said.

Son Gulab helped him build a website, www.ravisinghcharity.com, and though he accepts donations to the charity, he has not solicited any.

And in the back room of Singh’s home, he has saved many of Ravi’s things. “I have all his belongings,” he said. “His boots, his clothes, his popcorn maker. I come in here and talk to him.”

A picture of his son is hung above his bed. “He’s the first thing I see in the morning and the last thing I see at night,” the said.