Category Archives: Historical Links, Pre-Independence

When the Queen of Song captured the West

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M.S. Subbulakshmi and her husband, T. Sadasivam (third from left), are greeted by the Duke of Edinburgh at the International Music Festival. / by Special Arrangement / The Hindu
M.S. Subbulakshmi and her husband, T. Sadasivam (third from left), are greeted by the Duke of Edinburgh at the International Music Festival. / by Special Arrangement / The Hindu

In 1963, M.S. Subbulakshmi enthralled audiences at the International Music Festival in Edinburgh

M.S. Subbulakshmi, the ‘queen of song’ would have turned 98 on September 16. While she continues to be celebrated as a legend of Indian classical music around the globe, not many are aware that up until 1963, the Western world knew little of her or her music.

It was only with the International Music Festival held in Edinburgh in September that year that things changed. The West finally discovered Carnatic music as it were, and the voice that rendered it best.

The Carnatic musician and her husband, T. Sadasivam, received Lord Harewood, the president of the festival, at their home in Madras. / by Special Arrangement / The Hindu
The Carnatic musician and her husband, T. Sadasivam, received Lord Harewood, the president of the festival, at their home in Madras. / by Special Arrangement / The Hindu

Lord Harewood, the president of the festival and a cousin of Queen Elizabeth, however, had the good fortune of hearing M.S. five years prior to his fellow countrymen. It was in October 1958, in Delhi, that Lord Harewood and his Countess found themselves enthralled by one of M.S.’ many national broadcasts.

T. Sadasivam, the icon’s husband, writes in M.S: The Queen of Song (1987): “Evidently they were taken up by her music and later gave us the pleasure of receiving them in our home in Madras. They invited us to Edinburgh in order that Subbulakshmi could participate in the International Music Festival.”

The show, conceived as an opportunity to initiate Western audiences to the riches of India’s performing arts, also featured sitar maestro Pandit Ravi Shankar, violinist Yehudi Menuhin and dancer Balasaraswati, among others.

For M.S., this was a first on many accounts. Not only was it her first overseas performance, but also her very first trip abroad.

On August 21, she left Madras by train to Bombay, from where she flew to London four days later. During her two-hour-long recitals on August 30 and September 2, she was accompanied by R.S. Gopalakrishnan on the violin, T.K. Murthy on the mridangam, and Alangudi Ramachandran on the ghatam.

Narayana Menon, secretary of the Sangeet Natak Academy, also educated the unfamiliar audience in the history, dynamics and nuances of the Carnatic music system, with special reference to the songs being performed.

M.S.’ concerts ran to packed houses in the Freemason Hall. A jubilant headline on the front page of The Hindu on September 4 read ‘M.S In Top Form at Edinburgh’.

The artist exhilarated crowds with her performance of compositions by Thyagaraja, Muthuswami Dikshitar, Swathi Thirunal, Papanasam Sivan, Panchanadeeswarar Aiyar and Tagore. It was Hari tuma haro, a favourite of Mahatma Gandhi, with which she chose to conclude.

Soon after, M.S. was invited to Europe and then America to perform.

This was the landmark which enabled Carnatic music to be unveiled to the West and find a truly international audience. For that, and much more, we have M.S. Subbulakshmi to thank.

source: http://www.thehindu.com / The Hindu / Home> News> Cities> Chennai / by Nitya Menon / Chennai – September 18th, 2014

Last chance to breathe life into 140-year-old trust

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Chennai :

Academics and jurists are waiting with bated breath, even as Madras high court is busy finalizing the list of trustees to run the 140 year old P T Lee Chengalvaraya Naicker Trust, which has institutions and properties valued at more than Rs 1,000 crore in Chennai and Kancheepuram districts. To this day, the HSBC Bank is sending dividend amount ranging from Rs 51 lakh to Rs 1.1 crore to the trust every year. Such was the vision of the man.

At the time of his death, philanthropist Chengalvaraya Naicker was barely 45 years old. But he had bequeathed all his wealth with an intention to establish educational institutions and orphanages. As on date, the trust runs at least a dozen institutions and has properties on Anna Salai, Vepery, Royapettah, Choolai and Kancheepuram district.

A division bench of Justice N Paul Vasanthakumar and Justice K Ravichandrabaabu is slated to pass orders in the matter in a day or two.

Though more than five teams of trustees have had their full tenures in the past, the quality and volume of activities at the trust-run institutions have been steadily declining, say academics. “This year only a handful of students have joined our engineering college near Kancheepuram though we do not collect any capitation and we have good facilities,” he said, blaming the trustees’ misplaced priorities for the poor condition of the institutions. A former chairman suggested that the trust donate Rs 51 lakh to a city temple, while another wanted to sell a trust property at Mint street for a throwaway price, he rued. Another chairman appropriated all powers of all trustees, resulting in an internal revolt, while a chairman diverted all fixed deposit funds of the trust to a bank and branch of his personal choice.

“Malgovernance, rampant corruption and favouritism, besides discrimination of non-Vanniar staff members and employees at the trust and the trust-run institutions are causes of concern,” a jurist associated with the trust proceedings for a long time told The Times of India. Though the decree nowhere states that the retired HC judge who would head the team of trustees should be only from Vanniar community, for the past few terms only such candidates are being considered, resulting in the contraction of choices, he said.

Precious pieces of land such as the one in Royapettah are under illegal encroachment, and the trustees have not taken steps to get back Rs 2 crore from Pachaiyappa’s trust, a lawyer said, adding that the engineering college is deliberately being pushed into oblivion.

source: http://www.timesofindia.indiatimes.com / The Times of India / Home> City> Chennai / by A. Subramani,  TNN / September 18th, 2014

Chennai’s oldest telephone line is ringing loud at 100

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Chennai :

When Oriental Telephone Company Ltd of England started telephone services in a few Indian cities at the turn of the last century, only a few privileged citizens of Madras had a telephone. One of them continues to ring, at the Indian Commerce and Industries Co Pvt Ltd in Broadway.

The building where the company is located.
The building where the company is located.

The Beehive Foundry, established in 1907 as the flagship company of the Beehive Kowtha Group, received the connection in 1915.

Indian Commerce and Industries took over Beehive Foundry in 1924 and acquired the historic line with the purchase. Indian Commerce and Industries director Ramesh C Kumar, the fourth generation head of the company, retains the connection and intends to keep it in the family.

“Our first and currently working telephone line completed 99 years on July 11, 2014 and has entered the 100th year of service. It is a proud moment for us as a company and as a family,” said Ramesh, who BSNL felicitated on Wednesday as the owner of the oldest existing telephone line in Chennai.

The telephone number has changed so many times over the decades that it’s uncertain what it was to start out with, apart from the fact that it was a three digit number — and that the address of the connection remains Beehive Building, No 57 (Old No 29), Prakasam Road, Broadway, Chennai – 600 108.

“We first had a three-digit number, which changed to 2020 in 1952. It later changed to 21071,” Ramesh said. “With the introduction of Kalmandapam Telephone Exchange, our line shifted to the new exchange and it allotted us the number 555021. When the Harbour Telephone Exchange opened, the line shifted again and the number changed to 512221.”

When telephone subscribers had to adopt seven digit numbers, it changed to 5231477. Finally, when BSNL allotted eight digit numbers in metros in 2002, it became 25231477 and has remained the same till today.

Oriental Telephone — which was set up on January 25, 1881 under an agreement between Thomas Edison, Alexander Graham Bell, the Oriental Bell Telephone Company of New York and the Anglo-Indian Telephone Company Ltd — installed the telephone line on July 11, 1915.

“Our line was under Madras Telephones Company, which took over Oriental Telephone in 1923,” Ramesh said. “We had the billing address changed to include the name of our parent company only in the early 1990s.”

For Ramesh, the telephone line is a piece of history. “This is probably the oldest telephone line in the country,” he said. “It is an heirloom.”

source: http://www.timesofindia.indiatimes.com / The Times of India / Home> City> Chennai / by Daniel George, TNN / September 18th, 2014

VOC’s birth anniversary observed in Madurai

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Madurai :

The 143rd birth anniversary of freedom fighter V O Chidambaram Pillai, popularly known as VOC, was observed here on Friday.

Leaders of political parties and organizations garlanded VOC’s statue at Simmakkal. Those who garlanded the statue include Tamil Nadu co-operative minister and the AIADMK’s Madurai district secretary K Sellur Raju, Madurai South MLA R Annadurai (CPM), Tamil Nadu Congress Committee president B S Gnanadesikan, DMK leader Jayaraman and representatives of VOC Peravai and Hindu Ilaignar Peravai.

Hindu Ilaignar Peravai activists raised slogans asking people to support indigenous products and avoid foreign goods.

VOC was born in Tuticorin district on September 5, 1872. A disciple of Bal Gangadhar Tilak, he launched the first indigenous Indian shipping service between Tuticorin and Colombo. He died on November 18, 1936.

source: http://www.timesofindia.indiatimes.com / The Times of India / Home> City> Madurai  /  byL. Srinivasan, TNN / September 05th, 2014

A Madurai street once famous for minting coins for Pandya kings

Business & Economy, Historical Links, Pre-Independence

Madurai :

Legend has it that Pandya kings had major ‘Akkasalai’ (coin minting units) in Tirunelveli, where many artisans and goldsmiths worked. When the units were wound up, they migrated to Madurai. The king then provided them land at a place in the city which is now called as Akkasalai Pillayar Koil Theru.

Akkasalai Pillayar (Lord Ganesh) is worshipped by these artisans and goldsmiths. Akkasalai Pillayar temples also exist in Korkai and Sivaganga, where goldsmiths live.

Most of the residents in Akkasalai Pillyar Koil Theru and the adjacent Ezhuthanikara Theru are goldsmiths. Chinnakadai Theru, another street next to Akkasalai Pillyar Koil Theru, once had numerous shops selling tools for goldsmiths. Retired archaeologist C Santhalingam said Akkasalai means coin minting units and goldsmiths were involved in minting coins for Tamil kings ? Chola, Chera and Pandiya – in those days. Archaeologists have unearthed a bronze statue in Nagapattinam known as Akkasalai Nayagar, he said.

Nonagenarian M V Mani Chinnakadai Theru, adjacent to Akkasalai Pillayar Koil Theru, also confirms that Akkasalai means coin minting unit.

Akkasalai Pillyar Koil Theru is a narrow lane, predominantly a residential area, sandwiched between Vaikolkara Theru and Ezhuthanikara Theru in South Gate area. Along with houses, there are also a number of gold ornaments making workshops and a Lord Ganesh temple, situated at the entrance of the street.

The temple was renovated some two decades ago, says Venkata Subramanian, 49, who resides nearby the temple. Before the renovation of the temple, there was an ancient temple built of stones, he said.

“Renowned film personality M K Thiagaraja Bagavathar worshipped in this temple and also sang bhajans at times,” he recalled. Subramanian says the street has not seen much change for many decades and remained intact. “Most of residents are from goldsmiths of Viswakarma community and demographics of the street did not change much like other places in the city,” he said.

source: http://www.timesofindia.indiatimes.com / The Times of India / Home> City> Madurai / by J. Arockiaraj, TNN / September 09th, 2014

MADRAS 375 – ‘Kappalottiya Tamilan’ sold rice in Madras for survival

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The life of 'Kappalottiya Tamilan', V.O. Chidambaram Pillai (VOC), took a drastic turn after his release from prison / by Special Arrangement / The Hindu
The life of ‘Kappalottiya Tamilan’, V.O. Chidambaram Pillai (VOC), took a drastic turn after his release from prison / by Special Arrangement / The Hindu

He was a famous lawyer, a noted Tamil scholar, and a redoubtable freedom fighter.

Cocking a snook at the mighty British Empire, he ran the Swadeshi Steam Navigation Company but eventually paid a heavy price for it.

Kappalottiya Tamilan, as V.O. Chidambaram Pillai (VOC) came to be known, was arrested and put in Coimbatore jail — where he had to pull the oil press — for his revolutionary activities.

Post prison, VOC’s life turned out to be more heart-rending. He had to eke out a living by running outlets that sold rice and ghee, in Mylapore, Chintadripet and Perambur.

“He wrote about his pathetic condition in a small poem,” said V. Arasu, editor of the collected works of VOC.

‘I used to rain rewards on Tamil scholars, but my condition is now so wretched that I have to literally beg for survival,’ VOC said in the poem.

After being imprisoned on charges of treason, VOC was released in 1912. He stayed in Coimbatore with C.K. Subramania Mudaliar, who published Periyapuranam.

He even worked as a clerk in a bank for a while, but eventually came to Chennai in 1916 and remained here until 1932. He returned to Thootukudi to spend his final years.

“It seemed everything had turned against him. He was a follower of Bal Gangadhar Tilak, but by the time he was released from jail, the Gandhians had the Congress firmly under their control. As the British government had cancelled his advocate’s licence, he could not practise law,” said Prof. Arasu.

At one point, he wrote to the founder of Dravidar Kazhagam, E.V. Ramasamy Periyar, who was a Congress leader before his transformation, requesting him to help his son find a police job so his family could be sure of at least two square meals a day.

“But poverty never killed VOC’s spirit. While in Chennai, he worked with Tamil scholar and trade unionist Thiru.Vi.Ka., and organised textile workers and postal department employees. He was the first person to organise a union for postal employees,” said Prof. Arasu.

He also joined hands with Prof. Vaiyapuri Pillai and published Tholkappiyam with the notes of Ilampooranar in 1922. He also wrote commentary for the Arathupal part of Thirukkural.

Once, he wrote an angry letter to Va.Ra., the great reformer and freedom fighter, wondering how he could afford to live in peace in Thirupazhanam, while the country was in bad shape. He persuaded him to take up the editorship of Colombo-based Veerakesari.

VOC spent his final days in his home town, Thoothukudi. The British government had, at last, allowed him to practise law.

He continued to write and publish Tamil literary works, besides giving lectures on Sivagnana Bodham, a treatise on Saiva Siddantha.

source: http://www.thehindu.com / The Hindu / Home> News> Cities> Chennai / by B. Kolappan / Chennai – August 18th, 2014

Madras 375 – The man who chiselled the city’s skyline

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RobertCF06sept2014

Robert Fellowes Chisholm’s spirit lives on in the iconic buildings he designed

In the death centenary of architect Robert Fellowes Chisholm, it’s only fitting that we “remember the man who changed the skyline of Beach Road,” says writer and historian Sriram V. at his tribute talk on Chisholm, ‘The Indo-Saracenic Man’, as part of Madras Week celebrations. At a time when the predominant architecture was either Greek-inspired or in military-garrison method with minimal ornamentation, Chisholm is credited with blending indigenous building styles with classical British staples to popularise an architectural language that came to be called ‘Indo-Saracenic’. It defines colonial Madras to date.

Born to artist parents in 1840 in London, Chisholm came to India as a special engineer to the Government of Bengal in 1859, married the very next year and had six children in quick succession. In 1863, as part of the Puri division, Chisholm submitted drawings for an architectural competition the Government of Madras was conducting for its proposed university and senate house, which were to compete with the grandeur of Bombay’s Gothic architecture. Among 17 nationwide entries, Chisholm’s’ won. The new Governor of Madras, Lord Napier, got Chisholm immediately transferred as ‘consulting architect’ and the two became thick friends.

Presidency College Madras in the year 1890./ © Vintage Vignettes / The Hindu
Presidency College Madras in the year 1890./ © Vintage Vignettes / The Hindu

While the university (the present-day Presidency College) was completed by 1867, it was discovered years later that Chisholm had lifted this Italianate design from one reserved for a British hospital in Malta. “The arch of moulded bricks around the windows, an element Chisholm faithfully added to every building, marks the College as his,” says Sriram. Chisholm went on to build the Lawrence School, Lovedale, and the Nilgiris library, once again with similarly plagiarised designs, notes Sriram. Later, he built Madras’ PWD building, reminiscent of Scottish-baronial architecture, specially commissioned by Napier to hide the Chepauk Palace that Napier felt irritatingly reminded him of a time before British rule. A clue to Chisholm’s future direction in architecture though, lies in the tower he built to connect the Humayun and Khalsa Mahal wings of the Chepauk Palace. It seems inspired by the designs in Charminar, thus suggesting that Chisholm was finally acknowledging and adopting the beauty of native architecture.

A view of Senate House in Chennai. Photo: K.V. Srinivasan / The Hindu
A view of Senate House in Chennai. Photo: K.V. Srinivasan / The Hindu

In 1872, Napier sent Chisholm to visit the Thirumalai Nayak Mahal, an event that changed his life. “It was love at first sight,” says Sriram. Chisholm wrote extensively of the Mahal’s ornamentation, went on to restore it, returned to Madras, and reworked his designs for the Senate with numerous ‘Hindoo’ elements, winged gods and angels, columns typical of the Mahal, and in nine years, completed the building considered his best ever work. Next, Chisholm visited the Maharaja of Kerala to design a museum there in honour of Napier and fell in love all over again with the Kerala architectural style, its sloping Travancore roofs and Mangalore tiles. Madras’ General Post Office, was to incorporate much from Kerala, in its three-storeyed building whose central hall was only one storey that stretched upward to the iconic sloping roof. “The restoration of the building sadly retains little of Chisholm,” notes Sriram.

Chisholm went on to hone his brand of the Indo-Saracenic with Madras’ Victoria Public Hall, P. Orr and Sons office, a tower of the Central Station and eventually grew “above himself,” especially in matters of accounts corruption. In 1886, he resigned, and was snapped up by the Maharaja of Baroda, where he completed work on the Lakshmi Vilas Palace, the Baroda Museum, the Makarpura Palace, law courts and a library. “All along, he was building confidence to build the Sayajirao University of Baroda, with its 74-feet diameter dome, which was the biggest free-standing dome built by the British.”

For this, he was honoured by the Royal Institute of British Architects, where he was a Fellow and lectured often. Once Chisholm returned to England in 1901, he designed the First Church of Christ, Scientist in 1907 in Sloane London, which is today a concert hall, but bears a tower distinctly similar to Chisholm’s towers at the Senate House and Chepauk, observes Sriram.

Chisholm died in London on May 28, 1915, but Chennai’s skyline still remembers him well.

source: http://www.thehindu.com / The Hindu  / Home> News> Cities> Chennai> Madras 375 / by Esther Elias / Chennai – August 20th, 2014

British-era cemetery in Kotagiri left in ruins

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Udhagamandalam :

She’s spent the last few years tracking down her ancestors but when Australian social anthropologist Lesley Branagan reached the cemetery where the graves of her great-grand uncle and aunt are located in Kotagiri she was disappointed to find it in ruins and overrun with thorns and brambles.

The cemetery in Dimbatty village, about 1km from Kotagiri, is the first Christian burial ground of the Nilgiris and contains the graves of a number of British-era personalities who contributed to the entire state’s development. It was founded as an Angilican burial ground in 1822 on land gifted by modern Ooty’s founder John Sullivan.

Among the people buried here is Ralph T H Griffith of Corsley estate who was the first to translate the Vedas into English around 1900. According to Dharmalingam Venugopal, director of Nilgiri Documentation Centre, the entire Cockburn family is buried there. M D Cockburn of Hope Park, former Salem collector and regarded as the ‘father of Yercaud’, was the first to introduce coffee cultivation in Kotagiri. The popular tourist spot of Catherine Falls is named after his wife who loved to paint near them. The schools and churches the Cockburns helped build are still in use.

“The families in the British India Society Database’ contains the details of the graves along with their photographs taken 10 years ago,” said Venugopal. “Family members like Branagan who came hoping to see the graves are greatly disappointed. Even about five years ago the cemetery was well maintained.”

The cemetery is supposed to be undergoing restoration with the assistance of British Association for Cemeteries in South Asia. “The cemetery is part of Nilgiri history and heritage and needs to be cared for properly,” he said. Robert Stanes and his wife of the famous Stanes family of Coimbatore, E J Boesinger, one of the pioneering photographers of the Nilgiris, and noted archeologist A H Longhurst are other notable persons buried in the cemetery, apart from several planters and missionaries.

source: http://www.timesofindia.indiatimes.com / The Times of India / Home> City> Coimbatore / TNN / August 12th, 2014

Madras soldiers reason for both rise and fall of Raj, says book

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Chennai :

If ever there was a ‘piece of action’ that charted the course of history’, Captain D P Ramachandran believes it was the Battle of Adyar. Which is why the battle forms the opening chapter of his book, the “Empire’s First Soldiers”, detailing how the Madras Soldier was the reason for both the rise and fall of the British empire in India.

“Several years ago, I was asked to research the military history of Madras city for the Association of British Scholars and that ultimately led to the book,” says Captain Ramachandran, now 68.

Although the book was released several years ago, Ramachandran is still called on for Madras Week celebrations to speak about the Madras troops.

“I have visited every battle-field mentioned in the book so I could visualize the possible strategies and blueprint how the battle might have taken place,” says Ramachandran. “In terms of the Battle of Adyar, if you stand overlooking the mouth of the river, even today, it is not difficult to visualize the two armies facing off. I believe that battle, led to the creation of the Indian army,” he says.

The Madras soldiers returned to the spotlight when the British began recruiting them for fighting overseas wars. “Troops from North India would refuse to cross the blackwater (sea) but the Madras soldiers were willing to travel,” says Ramachandran.

“The Madras Army was the first the British created in India. This was followed by the Bengal army and then the Bombay army. It was after the First War of Independence in 1857 that the military operation went northwards,” says Ramachandran.

After this year, he adds, British interest in soldiers from the south waned. “The south Indians too lost interest in the British army. The British later began recruiting them as sappers or engineers in the army.” To date, the Madras Sappers, which include men from all the four southern states, have distinguished themselves both in the armed forces as well as in the area of Indian sport.

source: http://www.timesofindia.indiatimes.com / The Times of India / Home> City> Chennai /  TNN / September 05th, 2014

Battlefield to silver screen

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Chennai :

Quibble Island’s been creating quite a scene for centuries now. In October 1746, it set the stage for the Battle of Adyar, which several historians believe is one of the most important in modern Indian history. In the battle, a small French force managed to defeat the 10,000-strong army of the Nawab of Arcot, proving not just the superiority of the French, but also how far military training can take an army.

Today, while Quibble Island cemetery hasn’t really been scripted into history books, it is certainly helping Tamil movie directors plot their scenes — a shootout spread across the 10,000 graves, a little body dumping perhaps behind the massive silk cotton tree or the ominous neem tree, a hero staring teary-eyed at the cross on his father’s tomb, or a hooded cobra popping out of a head-stone. According to caretaker Paul Raj, the last movie to be shot there was director Mysskin’s “Onaayum Aatukuttiyum”, which released in 2013. “There is another unit coming here sometime soon,” he says.

The Padmanabhan committee report, which documents historical buildings in Chennai, has categorized the cemetery as a grade 1 structure (meaning it is an important landmark of the city). It forms one of the three groups of cemeteries that grew on the outskirts of the city, all in the early 1900s. The first group had those attached to churches, the second were those that came up near Vepery and Purasawalkam, and third comprise Quibble, and the cemeteries at Kilpauk and Kasimode.

The cemetery, Raj explains, is split down the middle — since 2007, the left comes under the purview of the CSI Thomas English Church and the right is under control of the Santhome Basilica of the Roman Catholic Order.

“There is no more space in the cemetery and so the churches do not accept any ‘new’ burial applications. These are all family graves,” says Raj.

Apart from its rather romantic past as a battlefield, there is nothing very significant about the architecture here other than the typical exposed brick entrance gate with a pointed archway and rooms on either side. Definitely the most striking spot here — the centerpiece if you can call it that — is the tomb of the three children of William and Amelia Donahue, dating to between 1882 and 1885. The children who died a couple of years apart from each other, all of them between the ages of one and three. “I think there must have been a disease or a plague in those years, otherwise how would they all die,” explains Raj(he may be right too, considering small pox was rampant in India).

“Most cemeteries don’t come under the subject of archaeology because they are not that old. Also, a number of them are under private care,” says S Suresh, TN state convener, Indian National Trust for Art and Cultural Heritage (Intach). “But while in terms of architecture there may not be much to conserve, there is certainly a lot in terms of history,” says Suresh, adding that a national scheme to document tomb stones never kicked off.

“For instance, for decades historians searched for the grave of Robert Brucefoote in Chennai. It was finally recently discovered in Yercaud. It was just assumed that Brucefoote, a geologist who is considered the father of pre-historic archaeology in Chennai and whose discoveries are in the Egmore Museum, died here,” says Suresh. “Cemeteries are a link to history and can be marketed in terms of tourism. That in itself will ensure conservation.”

source: http://www.timesofindia.indiatimes.com / The Times of India / Home> City> Chennai / by Kamini Mathai, TNN / September 05th, 2014