All About Maitreyi Ramakrishnan's Parents, Ram Selvarajah and Kiruthiha Kulendiren

Maitreyi Ramakrishnan has been a rising star since she landed a leading role in Hollywood at age 19, and she is grateful for her parent’s support through it all.

The Tamil-Canadian actress was raised in a tight-knit family just outside of Toronto by her father, Ram Selvarajah, a system analyst for the Ontario Government, and her mother, Kiruthiha Kulendiren.

From the moment Ramakrishnan learned she had landed the lead role of Devi in Netflix’s Never Have I Ever, her first acting job in Hollywood, her parents have been unwavering in their support. Since then, she has voiced characters in Turning Red and My Little Pony. In June 2024, it was announced that she would be joining the cast of Freaky Friday 2.

“... A big reason why people tell me in interviews, ‘You’re so wise beyond your years,’ or ‘You’re so grounded,’ or ‘You’ve got a great head on your shoulders,’ a big part of that is my family,” Ramakrishnan told Teen Vogue in August 2021. “I could not do this as well as I am without my fam.”

From escaping the civil war in Sri Lanka to supporting their daughter’s career, here’s everything to know about Maitreyi Ramakrishnan’s parents, Ram Selvarajah and Kiruthiha Kulendiren.

They share two kids

Before their daughter was born in December 2001, Selvarajah and Kulendiren had welcomed a son, Vishwaa Ramakrishnan. They raised their children just outside of Toronto, in Mississauga, Ontario.

Vishwaa attended McGill University and, according to his Instagram, later received a master of science in empires, colonialism and globalization from the London School of Economics and Political Science in 2023.

In August 2022, on Jimmy Fallon’s The Tonight Show, the actress joked that as a younger sibling, she used to “make all of my brother’s birthday parties about me.”

They immigrated to Canada from Sri Lanka

Selvarajah and Kulendiren escaped the civil war in Sri Lanka (which was fought from 1983 to 2009) and relocated to Canada as refugees in the late 1980s.

“We’re displaced not by choice but by circumstances,” Kulendiren told Now Toronto in August 2019.

Ramakrishnan is grateful for learning her family’s history.

“It’s just that appreciation for my family and for who they are as individuals coming here to Canada,” she told the Georgetown Institute for Women, Peace and Security. “And it, of course, makes me even more grateful for the soil that I walk on to live the life and be able to do what I do again, you know.”

Selvarajah and Kulendiren brought their children to a protest on the Gardiner Expressway when they were young kids, which took place to raise awareness about the war crimes happening back home.

“We consciously raised them so that our stories wouldn’t define them,” Kulendiren told Now Toronto.

Going to protests with her mom as a kid gave her an understanding of social justice and instilled in her a need to speak out against injustices, she told the Georgetown Institute for Women, Peace and Security.

“By the time I was in, like middle school and high school, like that was no stranger to me,” she said. “Doing a walkout – that wasn’t anything new that felt out of the ordinary. It just felt like the right thing to do.”

They raised Ramakrishnan in a multigenerational home

Like her Never Have I Ever character, Ramakrishnan grew up in a multi-generational home that included her mom, dad, brother, grandmother, grandfather and great-grandmother.

“Family discussions in my house are like ping pong matches,” Ramakrishnan told The New York Times in June 2023. She continued to explain that she got her “overdramatic self” from her grandmother.

In August 2022, she revealed on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon that she used to steal her mother’s clothes as a kid.

She also told SELF in October 2020 that “my mom and my grandma really drive into both me and my brother that we take care of our body and take care of our skin.”

“Whenever I don’t, [my mom] always looms it over me, like, ‘I’ve taken care of your skin for so long when you were a child. Your skin was perfect, and now you’re just going to throw it away!’ And I’m like, Ah, okay! Alright! I’ll fix it! My bad! Definitely owe it to my mom to make sure that I stay on top of my health,” she told SELF.

In September 2021, Ramakrishnan told PEOPLE that she felt lucky to have a family full of cooks — including a mom who makes "really good stir-frys," a culinarily inclined brother and a grandma who "cooks a lot of rice and curry.”

Ramakrishnan's father accompanied her to her first audition

Ramakrishnan’s friends and family "flipped out" with excitement when she got a callback email for Never Have I Ever that read: “Can you come to L.A.?”

However, according to Now Toronto, her father was initially concerned about the legitimacy of the casting email because it came from a generic address rather than a studio account.

After confirming its authenticity, they had to find an agent and coordinate travel plans, figuring out which parent could take time off on short notice to accompany their daughter to L.A. It wound up being her father, who joined his daughter on what would be both of their first trips to Hollywood.

When Mindy Kaling and Lang Fisher called Ramakrishnan in May 2019 to congratulate her on the leading role, she remembers her parents screaming in the background.

“It was a whole event,” she told Now Toronto in August 2019.

They work full-time jobs while supporting Ramakrishnan's career

In June 2023, Ramakrishnan told PEOPLE that she is the “daughter of a workaholic.”

According to his LinkedIn, Selvarajah has worked for the Government of Ontario for over 16 years and is currently a system analyst. Meanwhile, according to her LinkedIn, Kulendiren is a staff representative at the Canadian Office and Professional Employees Union in Ontario.

During filming, Ramakrishnan's mom's boss allowed her to work from home in L.A. Halfway through filming, she switched out with her husband.

“It definitely made me feel a little bit of pressure, but also not really because I knew without a doubt my parents were gonna do that for me. That wasn’t even a question,” she told the Los Angeles Times in June 2023. “It was pressure in the sense of, ‘OK, you’re doing everything for me. I have no reason to not be on my ‘A’ game.’ ”

In June 2023, she shared during a panel at The 92nd Street Y that she felt fortunate to have a mother and father who drove her to set every day, and who often stayed there with her while working full-time jobs.

“They were always supportive, never complained,” she shared.

Ramakrishnan was living at home when the show was released during the pandemic, and her family traveled with her to New York to do promo for season 2.

“Over these four years, I have learned how absolutely privileged I am to have the parents that I do,” Ramakrishnan said at the panel.

They empower Ramakrishnan to speak up

In February 2024, Ramakrishnan told The 92nd Street Y that her mother and father’s biggest concern while watching “sexy dream sequences with Paxton” being filmed is always her comfort.

“Their priority is, ‘Do you like what you’re wearing? Do you feel comfortable doing what you’re doing in this scene? And are you okay with what you’re saying?” Yes? Great.’ And then if I'm not comfortable, my parents always empower me to speak up,” Ramakrishnan said, adding, “I have to just shout out my parents for that.”

When the crowd started clapping, she encouraged them to “give it up for my parents,” adding that they are “quite cool.”

In addition to her acting roles, this lesson carries over into her passion for fighting food insecurity. In September 2021, while speaking about her partnership with MadeGood for the company’s Un-Wreck the Future campaign, Ramakrishnan told PEOPLE that she was raised to “speak up for what I believe in.”

"When it comes to food insecurity, ever since I was a kid my mom would always tell me, 'Make sure you eat everything because there's kids out there that don't get food,” she said. "It is true and it is something that has translated into who I am now because I'm all about making sure there's no food waste and getting people food."

Ramakrishnan thought of them while filming one of Never Have I Ever’s final scenes

In one of the final scenes of Never Have I Ever, Ramakrishnan’s character, Devi, is seen at the altar praying and expressing gratitude for her life.

“Thank you, I feel really grateful. I have this awesome life full of dope people who care about me and who love me,” her character says.

Ramakrishnan told the Los Angeles Times in 2023 that she was thinking of her family while filming this scene.

“In that scene, when I was acting that out, it was very easy because I was just thinking about the gratitude that I have for the show, the opportunity, for the crew members that have worked on the show and have taught me so many things, for Mindy, for the fans, for my family,” she told the Los Angeles Times.

“My mom and my dad drove me to work every single day [for] Season 1, 2 and 3. And never once did they complain to me. Never once. So, it was so easy to act out that scene. It was important to me to hit it exactly right to show overwhelming gratitude — that was the emotion I wanted to portray,” she added.