She will voice rights of children, address major issues such as anaemia, early marriage and child abuse
Trisha Krishnan. | Photo Credit: PTI
Actor Trisha Krishnan is all set to don a new role, but in real life this time. She is the first actor from South India to be bestowed with the UNICEF celebrity advocate status.
She will voice the rights of young people, especially girls. The actor will support the efforts to address problems faced by children in Tamil Nadu and Kerala such as anaemia, early marriage, labour and child abuse.
Speaking at the event here on Monday, Ms. Trisha said that she was honoured to get the recognition.
“I commit myself to creating more awareness on health, education, nutrition and protection of children, especially the adolescents and young people in Tamil Nadu and Kerala. I would support the efforts of the government to make Tamil Nadu malnutrition-free and open defecation-free,” said the actor.
Interacting with over 50 children at the function, she said education for girls was a magic bullet that would eliminate social evils.
On child marriage
“If all girls attended school, we can eliminate child marriage and child labour. In the long run, [providing] education to girls will also contribute to the reduction of maternal and infant mortality and malnutrition,” she added. Making the announcement at a special function to mark the World Children’s Day, Job Zachariah, Chief of UNICEF office—Tamil Nadu and Kerala said Trisha was an icon for younger generation.
“She has the power to amplify the children’s issues and address violation of child rights in the family, community and in public spaces. She will also promote education and health of adolescents and the value of girl child in family and society.”
Ms. Trisha has acted in 64 films, including 38 in Tamil, 23 in Telugu and one each in Hindi, Kannada and Malayalam.
The programme was attended by M.P. Nirmala, Chairperson, Tamil Nadu State Commission for Protection of Child Rights, Sugata Roy, UNICEF communication specialist and representatives from child rights organisations and academic institutions.
source: http://www.thehindu.com / The Hindu / Home> News> Cities>Chennai / by Special Correspondent / Chennai – November 21st, 2017
Former Governor of West Bengal Gopalakrishna Gandhi paid rich tributes to the late neurologist Krishnamoorthy Srinivas at the Buddhi Immersion 2017, a workshop on the Brain, Mind and Integrative Medicine, held in the city on Friday. Mr. Gandhi said Dr. Srinivas had a microchip of a memory with a giga byte voltage containing everything in tight configuration and it could be unravelled at the slightest touch. Dr. Srinivas had the knack to describe an event, relate an episode or explain a phenomenon with sparkling clarity.
Mr. Gandhi said, “If you had to mention a name but were struggling, he (Dr. Srinivas) would complete the name, the background, ancestry, the signs of the zodiac, the traits of personality, the foils and foibles and it was only his highest professional rectitude which kept him from further going into the person’s medical history.”
Mr. Gandhi recalled a pertinent conversation with Dr. Srinivas about old age and the reasons for forgetfulness wherein he said the main reason for one to forget was not that they had forgotten but they did not choose to remember, which meant they did not register with due care what was being said to them.
Book released
“Dr. Srinivas said that if only they had registered it with due attention, they would not have experienced what seems to be the case of forgetfulness. So if you are interested in something, you are not likely to forget,” Mr. Gandhi recalled. He released the book ‘Autism: The Buddhi Book’ written by Ennapadam K. Krishnamoorthy and Subbulakshmy Natarajan on the occasion.
B.N. Gangadhar, director of NIMHANS, delivering the Dr. Krishnamoorthy Srinivas Lecture 2017, talked on the subject ‘Yoga for Integrative Mental Health: Neurobiological Evidence’.
source: http://www.thehindu.com / The Hindu / Home> News> Cities> Chennai / by Staff Reporter / Chennai – November 18th, 2017
M Nannan, who kindled an interest among people to learn Tamil through his famous ‘Tamil Karpom’ programme on Doordarshan in the 1980s and 1990s, died at his residence in Chennai on Tuesday due to aged-related illnesses. He was 94.
Nannan, who was a Tamil professor at Presidency College in Chennai, had written several Tamil textbooks. He was the recipient of Tamil Nadu government’s Periyar, Thiru Vika and Anna awards.
Born in 1924 in Cuddalore district, he started following Periyar and later joined the DMK. He participated in the anti-Hindi protests in 1965.
Political party leaders condoled the death of Nannan. “Nannan’s death is a great loss for the Dravidian movement. Apart from being a Tamil teacher, he was also involved in propagating Periyar’s teachings,” said DMK working president M K Stalin in a statement.
Stalin said DMK chief M Karunanidhi had entrusted him the responsibility of propagating the Tamil language and Periyar’s teachings in the party.
PMK chief S Ramadoss said, “Nannan was a famous Tamil professor and a good friend of mine. He started his career as a primary teacher and later he became the chief of Tamil department in college. He also created a separate type of teaching called Nannan Murai.”
AIADMK leader T T V Dhinakaran tweeted: “We have lost a Tamil expert in the death of Prof Nannan. His death cannot be replaced.”
source: http://www.timesofindia.indiatimes.com / The Times of India / Home> News> City News> Chennai News / by Abdullah Nurullah / TNN / November 07th, 2017
My Binny story last week had me recalling the life the early 19th Century sahibs led, as reflected in John Binny’s and Thomas Parry’s wills. Discussion of that lifestyle is sure to generate a plethora of views, but one view I don’t think can be denied, namely, that they had a conscience and a sense of obligation. But discussing the morality of the times is not my intent today, I merely present the gist of two fascinating documents.
John Binny, a bachelor, died in Madras in 1824. His last home leave began in August 1816. In his 1823 will he left a legacy to “a child now of the age 5 years and 5 months named John William Crouchley and boards with one under the charge of Mrs Wicklow…” Make of that what you will. Rather different is the record in India. The Company kept paying 8 pagodas (about ₹25) monthly in Binny’s name to each of two children. They each also received an annual clothing allowance of ₹105 and the elder, Charles, got ₹11 monthly from 1821 for education in the Madras Free School. In later years, the Binny records list a clerk, Charles Binny, who seemed of modest means. Was the second child his sister Belmina who received a marriage settlement of ₹3000, making you wonder whether that too had been left by John Binny? F De Souza, who wrote The House of Binny 50 years ago, leaves you wondering – particularly for answers.
Thomas Parry
Thomas Parry, in Madras from 1788, nine years before Binny, has a better recorded life, judging by his will, curiously also dated 1823. He too died in 1824. He left ₹110,000 in investments to Mary Pearce, whom he’d married in 1794. She went back for good to England in 1807 with their two children, both dying young there. Unfettered in India, Parry seemed to have enjoyed a home at every place he had business in on the way from Madras to Cuddalore, judging by his will. His legacies started with amounts to young George Parry Gibson (who travelled with him) and Emma Louisa Gibson, both left in the care of a Mrs Dowden. Compounding the mystery, he also left something for two Army captains called Gibson and Dowden!
A little clearer is his relationship with Mary Ann Carr, an Anglo Indian, by whom he had Thomas William Parry and Edward Moorat Parry in the early 1820s. Both probably died young, for only Mary Ann is remembered in the will. But then so are Elizabeth Chinnery, Charlotte Myers, Mrs Weehedie of Tranquebar and the son of Babkismah Candy. Parry certainly enjoyed the good life, even as he built a business empire that still flourishes.
To Parry and Binny India owes its industrial beginnings. While Binny’s is no longer a name in business circles, Parry’s is a respected one, the name remembered in a major junction and the firm’s headquarters building, instead of giving way to new highrise, remaining a landmark in Madras. But where the Parry’s name is endangered is in San Thomé. His home, Leith Castle, near his industrial unit, the first in the country, a tannery and a leather goods ‘factory,’ is a threatened heritage precinct.
* * * *
What’s happened to the prize?
Nobel Prize time reminded 90-year-old Ramachandran (Chandru) Arni of Hyderabad that long before CV Raman and S Chandrasekhar won Nobel Prizes for Physics, they’d won the Jagirdar of Arni’s Gold Medal for Physics/Chemistry at Presidency College, Madras. Why isn’t the College awarding the medal nowadays, he wonders. I look forward to hearing from Presidency, but meanwhile my correspondent’s surname struck a chord.
Arni Palace today
I first heard of the Jagirdar of Arni when writing a book on the West End Hotel, Bangalore, that, mysteriously, never got published. The West End was the second home of the then Jagirdar, Srinivasa Rao Sahib, the father of my correspondent who lists him as the 12th and last Jagirdar of the 211 sq miles zamin near Vellore. I’d written that the Jagirdar had stayed there occupying a three-room suite for over 36 years and that he was a regular at the Crazy Horse Bar at boisterous post-race parties. His son tells me horses and gambling were very much part of his life, but his “magnificent obsession” was cars. He bought his first car in 1923, when 19, and by 1948, when the Jagir was abolished by Government, had bought 182 cars! He kept the cars in immaculate condition, drove them himself and never lost on a sale of any of them.
Arni House Front view
The Arni Jagir dates to 1640, when this Maharashtrian Brahmin family received it from Shahjee (the father of Shivaji) for services rendered in the Carnatic. It was the 10th Jagirdar, also Srinivasa Rao Sahib – a name the eldest generally took – who created the endowment for the prize at Presidency in 1877.
A footnote Chandru Arni adds is that his mother was the great great grand-daughter of Purniah, Dewan to Hyder Ali, Tipu Sultan and the Mysore Royal Family. An old Presidencian himself, he says he is the country’s first games developer and the first, in 1953, to a win an official meet in a self-built sports car.
The chronicler of Madras that is Chennai tells stories of people, places, and events from the years gone by, and sometimes from today.
source: http://www.thehindu.com / The Hindu / Home> News> Cities> Chennai / Madras Miscellany – by S. Muthiah / October 30th, 2017
Film throws light on unknown facets of Vipulananda Adigalar’s life
Tracing the unknown aspects of a prominent personality in the world of Tamil literature is quite a challenging task and Mu. Elangovan, a faculty in the Kanchi Mamunivar Centre for Post Graduate Studies, Puducherry, has travelled across the sea to do exactly that.
After a year of research, documentation and interviews, Mr. Elangovan has brought out a 50-minute documentary to depict the life of Vipulananda Adigalar, who wrote the famous Yazh Nool (a book of stringed musical instruments), a principal research treatise on Isai Tamil.
“I wanted to know more about his life. While I began collecting his books, manuscripts, photographs and letters, many unknown facts about him attracted my attention. I felt that a documentary film would be the proper medium to bring these facts before the public. SivamVeluppillai, who works in a private firm in Canada and Kasupathi Nataraja, an elderly person in Sri Lanka helped me complete this work,” said Mr.Elangovan.
Taught in T.N.
The famed Tamil scholar and educationist, who was born in Karaitivu near Batticaloa, Sri Lanka, in 1892, edited several magazines, translated works and played an instrumental role in establishing several academic institutions in Sri Lanka. On the invitation of Rajah Sir Annamalai Chettiar, the founder of the Annamalai University, Vipulananda Adigalar even served there from 1931 to 1933 as Tamil Professor.
While teaching in Annamalai University, he translated Vivekanandar’s Gnana deepam, Karma Yogam, Raja yogam, Pantanjali’s Yoga Sutram. He was a pioneer in teaching and propagating Bharathiar’s Poems in the academic circle during the British rule. “He was the first scholar to recognise and appreciate Bharathiar’s poetic genius. He protested the visit of the English Governor to Annamalai University by hoisting black flag at his residence,” he added.
Vipulananda had his early education at his native place Karaitivu, Kalmunai, Batticaloa, and later he studied Technical Education at Colombo, got his B.Sc Degree by passing the Cambridge University Examinations, and also ‘Pandithar’ title of the Madurai Tamil Sangam at the age of 24; served as a teacher at Colombo, Batticaloa, Trincomalee, Jaffna, received Mahatma Gandhi when he visited Jaffna and also hosted Maraimalai Adigal at Jaffna.
Mr. Elangovan travelled to Sri Lanka and Thanjavur, Pudukkottai, Chidambaram, Kumbakonam, Chennai, Cuddalore in Tamil Nadu, West Bengal and Mayavathi (the Himalayan foot) for making the documentary.
“This documentary will remind the future generations about the excellence of Vipulananda Adigalar. It has interviews of those who have been his co-workers, friends and relatives, and addition to his writings, photographs. This film will be released first in Sri Lanka.”
In Sri Lanka, he visited Colombo Tamil Sangam, Sri Lanka Ramakrishna Mutt Branches, Swami Vipulananda Institute of Aesthetic Studies at Eastern University as well as his relatives and many other places including Karaithivu, Batticaloa, Trincomalee, Jaffna, Mandur, Thetratthivu, Colombo, Rosalla, Kandy, where evidences of his life and works are available.
The documentary also depicts Vipulananda’s association with Ramakrishna Math and his visit to Chennai where he had his ascetic training from 1922 to 1924. His Brahmachariya name was Prabodha Saithanyer and got his spiritual initiation from Swamy Sivananda in 1924 and later he was called Vipulananda Adigalar. Vipulanandar established and superintended various schools in Sri Lanka from 1925 to 1931. He founded Sivananda Vidyalayam in memory of his Guru who initiated him in the spiritual order and thereby paved way for several thousand poor pupils to receive education.
source: http://www.thehindu.com / The Hindu / Home> News> Cities> Puducherry / by S. Senthalir / Puducherry – October 30th, 2017
FIRST FAMILY OF TENNIS: T.K. Ramanathan with his son Ramanathan Krishnan, daughter-in-law Lalitha Krishnan and grandchidren Ramesh Krishnan and Gowri Krishnan. Photo: Special Arrangement
Tenkasi Krishnaiyer Ramanathan. This name casts a spell of reverence, awe, admiration and astounding nostalgia among the tennisfraternity.
TKR, whose birth centenary falls on Wednesday, was not a mere coach who shaped three Davis Cup stars — Ramanathan Krishnan, Ramesh Krishnan and Shankar Krishnan — from his family. He was an institution that etched a new dimension to the art of playing tennis in a classical mould.
The life and times of TKR is a saga of sacrifice; a mirror to an era when austerity and discipline ruled every aspect of existence. Not many in the present generation are aware that TKR had the first feel of a racquet at the age of 23; he bought this for Rs. 34 after selling a piece of his wife’s jewellery.
Overcoming odds
Self taught and steeled to conquer the odds, cashing in on indomitable will, discipline and dedication, which he later made a signature for his wards, TKR climbed the ladder to figure in the final of the all-India hardcourt championship in 1939. If not for World War II, he would have played at Wimbledon.
TKR’s genius lay in purveying the essence of tennis to his wards. A perfectionist, he was a master of the fundamentals. Everyone who passed his rigorous training benefited from the hours of toil on the court. He was never dogmatic. He displayed the instinct to discover the flair in each player and make it flourish.
“He was a motivator and a strategist, who emphasised on groundstrokes, made the trainee to develop a feel of the ball with perfect footwork,” observes a former National level player, V.K. Parthasarathy.
“My grandfather wanted whoever he was coaching to achieve their potential. There were no half measures, it was all, or nothing,” writes his US based grandson, Shankar Krishnan. “His coaching did not stop with tennis… whether Economics, Sanskrit, or driving a car, he was there to help us. His coaching gave us life lessons.”
Biggest influence
Ramesh Krishnan, another grandson, considers TKR “the biggest influence” in his formative years. “He gave me a very good foundation, stressed on consistency, early preparation and concentration. As a child I loved to play with other children, cricket and other activities.
“But grandfather would have none of it. Many times I have been dragged from cricket games right in the middle. Amidst all this, he was able to nurture my love for tennis. He was very passionate about tennis. I have not seen that kind of intensity in too many people,” recalls Ramesh.
For N. Srinivasan, BCCI Secretary, one of his students, TKR was a gentle coaching colossus. “Spartan by nature, gifted with enormous patience and imbued with genuine love for his trainees, he was a rare and endearing personality. His coaching skills and unerring ability to spot talent are part of Madras’s tennis lore,” says Srinivasan.
The tallest of them all, R. Krishnan, reckons TKR “the best coach ever. He was self taught, read a lot and had extraordinary foresight. He predicted years ago how top spin will rule competitive tennis and how professionalism will take over.”
“It is not easy to coach a son, and more so, grandsons,” Krishnan adds. “Many think I coached Ramesh, but it was my father who did that as I was constantly on tour.”
TKR’s dream was to see Krishnan at the pinnacle in Wimbledon. It went unrealised. But the adulation Krishnan earned across the globe filled him with pride. He endured the hardships for giving Krishnan the best environment to pursue a career of excellence.
“It is only the wearer who knows where the shoe pinches,” he once told this writer sitting in the verandah of his modest house in Tiruvengadam Street in Mandaveli.
Tennis is the priority
“Have you heard of a father telling his son to play tennis first and then to study. I had tuition for Kannan — that’s how he called Krishnan — in all the subjects while he was in college. I only wanted him to win at Wimbledon.”
Money was never a factor. Else, he would have persuaded Krishnan to turn professional when Jack Kramer made a fabulous offer.
Concern and welfare of the trainees were TKR’s top priority. Lakshmi Mahadevan, former Asian champion, notes, “When I won the Asian, he was the first to phone me…. He came in person to offer his felicitations when the India rankings were announced. These and so many more lovely moments are evergreen in my memory.” Lakshmi and Krishnan won the Asian titles in the same year, a feat that no other coach has ever achieved.
N. Sankar, who formed a formidable collegiate doubles pair with N. Srinivasan, says, “ Saar, as we referred to him, was forthright in his views. As a coach, he was very strict, and quite voluble in criticism. That most of his trainees were from some of the leading families of Madras made no difference to him. We cared for him that much more because of it.”
When life ebbed out of TKR on Monday, October 8, 1990, tennis lost an ardent devotee. But memories linger and will stay forever.
source: http://www.thehindu.com / The Hindu / Home> Sport> Tennis / by S. Thiagarjan / Chennai – November 03rd, 2010
In his centenary year, a perceptive biography presents MGR with all his achievements and faltering, his personality and politics
M.G. Ramachandran never ceases to fascinate. In the 30 years since his death, there are signs to show that his popularity in Tamil Nadu has not declined. If a digitised version of one of his movies from the 1960s is released, it still runs to packed houses. It is his centenary year, and the same veneration that he commanded among his followers seems to prevail even among a generation that could not have seen him in his heyday.
R. Kannan’s informative biography brings out the major reasons for the MGR phenomenon: an everlasting reputation for charity, the trust he inspired in the masses that he stood for their welfare, and his carefully cultivated image as a do-gooder. What makes this a perceptive account is that it rarely descends to hagiography, and touches, albeit in a nuanced way, the man’s undoubted shortcomings.
Early episodes in MGR’s life accounts are revealing. Much of this part is perhaps drawn from MGR’s own memoirs and from contemporary accounts, but what Kannan offers is the first cogent narrative of MGR’s early years, the debilitating poverty in which he grew up, the role of his mother and brother in shaping his outlook in life. The portrayal of Ramachandran’s poverty-stricken life as a child theatre artiste makes for a moving read. Too poor to go to school, he and his brother lived through ordeals and torments in a theatre company as they had no other means of livelihood. MGR had early exposure to both the survival throes and the petty jealousies of an incipient theatre and cinema career. These experiences informed his welfare-centric policies several decades later as chief minister.
Tinsel world stories
Many pages are devoted to MGR’s experiences in the tinsel world, understandably so, as this was the medium that was used to project his image. Initially used by the Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam to draw crowds, he was somehow catapulted into the political limelight due to various factors. His mentors in theatre and politics were not his only influences. Even those who saw him as a threat and still others who underestimated his rise in the party, were also indirect motivators for his aspirations.
Almost all of MGR’s film songs were written with an eye on his emerging political career. Even though this is well known, the author’s engaging account — as well as free-wheeling translations — of the various songs that made him a hero, a revolutionary, a friend of the masses, a philanthropist, a teetotaller and the scourge of evil, helps in understanding the direction in which he was heading in politics.
There is a lot about his career in cinema, but somehow, there seem to be too many details about how he signed up particular films and how he landed a certain role. There is not enough about many other aspects of his film career, including his directorial ventures and his insight into various trades in the industry. Given the build-up in the biography about his career trajectory, the account of his three successive stints as chief minister can be seen as sketchy. As this part is narrated mainly through public events and major political developments, the reader does not get a full insight into the functioning of MGR as an administrator. At the same time, the author does convey the essentials. One gets a sense of how MGR did not believe in the core Dravidian principle of rationalism and opposition to religion, of how he lived in perpetual fear of the Centre and how tax investigations influenced his political decisions.
Chief minister’s diary
As chief minister for 10 years, he relied on intuition and the unique connect he had with the masses in making major announcements. Of course, there were blunders and long phases of inactivity, economic and administrative stagnation and political uncertainty because of his bouts of illnesses. The transition from a person who managed to run a relatively clean government to one who allowed corruption to acquire huge proportions has been captured. The extent to which the liquor trade and the privatisation of engineering and medical education contributed to it is amply clear in the account.
Nearly a century ago, E.M. Forster contrasted the western or English character with that of the easterners. “The Oriental has behind him a tradition of kingly munificence and splendour,” he wrote, contrasting these qualities with the “middle class prudence” of an Englishman. Forster would have been delighted had he met someone with MGR’s reputation for munificence.
But MGR had other qualities that monarchs are famed for. He rewarded loyalty and punished disloyalty. He rarely brooked dissent, although political heavyweights within his party did take him on occasionally. Farmers and government employees, political rivals and the media, all bore the brunt of his authoritarian style, although he sometimes tried to balance the strong-arm tactics with occasional sops. He was whimsical to a fault, once attempting to undermine caste-based reservations by introducing economic criteria and then rolling back the decision and raising backward classes quota from 31% to 50%. This biography does not miss any of this.
When writing about a larger than life figure, one tends to place more emphasis on the aura and mythology around the person and less on the man himself. R. Kannan manages to tease out a balanced picture of the man, with all his idiosyncrasies and foibles, his achievements and faltering, his personality and politics.
MGR: A Life; R. Kannan, Penguin Random House, ₹499.
source: http://www.thehindu.com / The Hindu / Home> Books> Reviews / by K. Venkataraman / September 16th, 2017
The Consulate General of Japan awarded the Foreign Minister’s Commendations to Narayanan Kumar, president of the Indo-Japan Chamber of Commerce and Industry (IJCCI), on Tuesday.
Seiji Baba, Consul General of Japan, who presented the certificates of commendation, said Mr. Kumar has contributed significantly to the development of Japan-India relations, especially in business cooperation, as well as the dissemination of knowledge, culture and information about Japan.
“He has done this through a number of programmes of the IJCCI, including publishing Gateway Newsletter and establishing the Centre for Japanese Studies. He visited Japan as the head of an IJCCI delegation and met Kiyoshi Odawara, the Parliamentary Vice-Minister for Foreign Affairs,” he added.
Mr. Baba also noted the contributions made by IJCCI to promote business relations between the two countries.
Mr. Kumar said,“I really hope business cooperation between the two countries will reach great heights,” he added.
source: http://www.thehindu.com / The Hindu / Home> News> Cities> Chennai / by Staff Reporter / Chennai – August 30th, 2017
What do you know about Campbellabad, I was asked the other day. Thinking I still knew the Political Geography I had once specialised in, “It’s a town in Pakistan,” I casually answered. Only to be told it’s a 300-year-old village in Tuticorin District. When my caller wanted to know whether what the locals had told him, that it was named after a Madras Governor, was correct, I was a little more careful. “I think Governor Campbell was some time later but let me check,” I hesitantly answered.
So achecking I went. And found Sir Archibald Campbell was Governor from 1786 to 1789, not quite 300 years ago. But I also found that there was another Archibald Campbell, a Madras Civilian from 1896 to 1937. He has been involved with the raising of the Mettur Dam (1925-934), retired as Chief Secretary and had served on the Boards of Revenue and Irrigation. He was more likely to have had something to do with land settlement for which the Muslim settlers could have named their new village after him. But that was just 100 years ago.
Later that day, who should I bump into but Civilian Campbell — or at least a bust of him in the 1901 banqueting hall of the Freemasons of Madras. He had been an ardent Freemason and started the Sir Arthur Campbell Lodge in Madras in 1930. This was the first Lodge where both Europeans and Indians could be members, on condition each spent at least six months a year in the others’ country (Miscellany, March 11, 2013).
While the bust and I looked each other in the eye, the voices swirling around us talked of the August celebration of 300 years of English Freemasonry with the consecration of the first Grand Lodge of the English Order in London. There was that number again, but this time the records showed the date was indeed 1717. Thirty-five years later, the Grand Lodge of Madras was consecrated. From then on, till the British left India, virtually every British official who was anyone in Madras was a Freemason, it would seem.
Two winners of honours
Two residents of Madras many decades ago whom I met recently were on quick visits to the city. To me the link between them were the honours they’d won, rather more distinguished and national in the case of one, rather more local in the case of the other. But both were greeted with the same warmth and enthusiasm by their former colleagues on the occasion of the 150th year celebrations of their respective affiliations.
It was while visiting his old school, Lawrence of
Lovedale, as a distinguished guest that Paul Sabapathy from Birmingham heard that he had been honoured for the third time by the Queen of England. An OBE in 1995 for urban regeneration, a CBE in 2004 for his contribution to business and higher education was being followed by a CVO (Companion of the Royal Victorian Order) for his services as Lord Lieutenant of the West Midlands.
As Lord Lieutenant, he was the Queen’s personal representative in the area from 2007 to 2015. It could well have been a knighthood if an email of his had not been leaked. In it, after a visit to the Pakistan consulate in the city, he was critical of the Pakistani community of Birmingham. Apologising, then stepping down was not enough.
Sabapathy, who went to Birmingham 53 years ago, soon after graduating from Madras Christian College, had a rather remarkable record in Britain. He was the first non-white to be a Lord Lieutenant (a 550-year-old institution), chairman of a British University (Birmingham City U), and a President of the Walsall Chamber of Commerce.
Unlike Sabapathy, Demitrius Sarandis was no public figure except in the small world of rowing in India. And in the even smaller world of the Madras Boat Club (MBC) he was welcomed for all he had achieved when he was a member (1958-1962).
Sarandis, from Greece, came out as a 22-year-old to Madras in 1957 to monitor the machinery that his company in the UK had supplied to the South India Flour Mills. While first living in that legendary chummery Chesney Hall, and then closer to the Club, he established an enviable record becoming the MBC’s Captain of Boats within three years. He’d never rowed in his life till a fellow resident at the chummery made him a member of the Boat Club. There, some thought him too small, others, seeing his scanty hair and luxuriant moustache, thought him more aged than he was and too old (35) to row successfully. But taught by the boat boys, he rowed competitively for the first time in 1959. Beating KR Ramachandran, reckoned till then the best Club sculler, Sarandis went on to team with him and win the Pairs too. In three years, his trophy cupboard was full. But then, faced with visa problems, he had to go back — and greater honours were not to be his.
The chronicler of Madras that is Chennai tells stories of people, places and events from the years gone by and, sometimes, from today
source: http://www.thehindu.com / The Hindu / Home> Madras Miscellany> Society / by S. Muthiah / July 31st, 2017
He cracked the Rajiv assassination case; helped identify bomber Dhanu
Renowned forensic expert, Pakkiriswamy Chandra Sekharan, who helped investigators crack the Rajiv Gandhi assassination case and played a seminal role in getting back the stolen 1,500-year-old Pathur Nataraja idol from the U.K., died here on Tuesday.
He was 83 and is survived by his wife and daughter.
A former director of the Tamil Nadu Forensic Sciences department, Prof. Chandra Sekharan was awarded the Padma Bhushan.
An acknowledged expert as well as a pioneer in some forensic techniques, Prof. Chandra Sekharan deconstructed the suicide bomb attack on Rajiv Gandhi in May 1991.
He made the sensational disclosure a day after the assassination that the killer was a woman who acted as a human bomb.
He pieced together tattered pieces of denim fabric to conclude that the assassin was wearing a vest or jacket in which a bomb could have been packed.
He proceeded to reconstruct the belt bomb as well as its two-switch circuitry, one to switch on the mechanism and the other to detonate the RDX bomb.
K. Ragothaman, the chief investigating officer, recalled Prof. Chandra Sekharan’s great help. The forensic expert obtained the roll of film from a camera used by Hari Babu, a photographer who was killed in the explosion, to get pictures of the fateful public meeting.
“But for those 10 crucial photographs, we would not have been able to detect the case. While video footage taken minutes before the explosion was suppressed by none other than the then Intelligence Bureau Director, Prof. Chandra Sekharan preserved the valuable evidence and gave it to us,” Mr. Ragothaman said.
D.R. Kaarthikeyan, former CBI Director and Chief of the Special Investigation Team that investigated the Rajiv Gandhi assassination, said Prof. Chandra Sekharan had enormous knowledge in forensic science and his service was of immense help in the case.
Tracking Nataraja
He used both forensic science and traditional knowledge in establishing India’s claim over the Nataraja idol at the Royal Court of Justice in the U.K.
After the idols were stolen from the Viswanatha Swamy temple, they were hidden for some time in a haystack. Termites devoured the haystack and in the process left their ‘galleries’ on the idols. The idols were later unearthed, but the Nataraja idol alone was sold and it found its way to London. “Though the idol was cleaned a couple of times, the lower part was left untouched and I spotted the termite nest. I used that to win the case,” he once told The Hindu.
He was a much sought-after expert witness, appearing in courts across India, as well as in the United Kingdom, Singapore and Sri Lanka for both prosecution and defence.
source: http://www.thehindu.com / The Hindu / Home> News> National / by Special Correspondent / Chennai – July 11th, 2017
