Madras curry powder — Photo: Apoorva Sripathi / The Hindu
Who would’ve imagined Madras curry powder would eventually turn out to be one of England’s best-loved spice mixes?
Comprising humble ingredients such as turmeric, cumin seeds, coriander seeds, fenugreek, black pepper, red chillies and others, the spice blend first travelled all the way to London from Fort St. George in Madras.
According to ‘Notes from Madras’ by Arthur Robert K. Wyvern, Madras curry powder (as well as mulligatawny paste) was first sold by Barrie’s in Leicester Square. By corollary, any dish that included the above-mentioned curry powder was duly named as ‘Madras’ something.
In the 1890s, P.V. Condiments’ brand of curry powder became famous in England thanks to a Mr. Sharwood. So famous that even the Buckingham Palace purchased it from them.
Believed to have originated from the Tamil word kari meaning sauce or relish, the frangrant Madars curry powder now has many variations.
The Metropolitan Transport Corporation honoured the best drivers and conductors as part of its Independence Day tradition.
The MTC identified 50 drivers who drove with the best mileage. E Puniyakodi of the Adyar depot topped the list by maintaining an average mileage of 6.38km per litre of diesel. M Thirumal, also from Adyar depot, came second with a mileage of 6.06km per litre.
The average mileage of 3,637 buses run by the corporation is 4.34km per litre. In financial year 2008-09, the mileage was 4.24km per litre. The corporation had 3,260 buses then. The average age of buses now is 4.29 years.
The corporation honoured 25 conductors with the highest average per day collection in the financial year. K Suresh from Chromepet had an average collection of Rs 7,077. On August 13, B Jayakumar, a conductor on route number 12B, created a record by collecting Rs 17,081.
The corporation gave away cash prizes to the children of its employees who fared well in board exams.
source: http://www.articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com / The Times of India / Home> City> Chennai> Mtc / by Karthikeyan Hemalatha, TNN / August 15th, 2013
From Thursday, the historic Senate House, the first building of University of Madras, will have a permanent exhibit of photographs that highlight the contributions of the university to education in south India.
At least 320 photographs in A3-size, including 16 folios with inscriptional details of the education system in the past, have been put up in the main hall of the building. Each picture has a story to tell, beginning with a paper folio of inscriptions from ghatikas (seats of higher learning during the Pallava period) and mutts (monasteries ) as educational centres in medieval Tamil Nadu.
The exhibition is also a pictorial recollection of the people and events that contributed to the university, which is one of the oldest in India along with University of Calcutta and University of Bombay.
The photographs have been arranged in 25 sub-divisions. Each division has at least 10 to 15 pictures with detailed captions. “We have exhibited photographs of dignitaries, Indians as well as foreign nationals, who were part of the institution and education in the city as a whole. We have also included the old buildings, particularly schools that were later converted into colleges. Presidency College, Government Arts College and Madura College are the best examples,” says P D Balaji, head of the department of ancient history and archeology, whose team took almost a year to collect the photographs from various sources.
Constructed between 1869 and 1873 by British architect Robert Fellowes Chisholm, the Senate House was where the first meeting of the Madras Legislative Assembly of the then Madras Presidency took place in 1937. With its colourful glass windows, stucco work and frescoes on the ceiling, it is a wonder of the Indo-Saracenic style with Byzantine and European architectural features.
source: http://www.articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com / The Times of India / Home> City> Chennai> Senate House / by M T Saju / February 23rd, 2012
EIR 21 over the Saidapet railway bridge across the Adyar river on Thursday. (Albin Mathew/EPS)
The 158-year old chugging beauty, EIR 21, was the pride of the Railways ever since it was restored at Perumbur Loco Works and put on tracks in 2010. But, on its 6th dream run, the world’s oldest working steam loco gave passengers and officials tense moments as it came to a halt near Chetpet station, shortly after it was flagged off from Egmore.
Much to the dismay of travellers and officials, the train refused to budge for over half an hour. “There was a leak in a steam pipe joint that brought the train to a stop. Since it is a very old train, such issues are expected,“ said one of the senior staff. The water level in the boiler had reportedly gone down, preventing the production of steam, said a staff of the Perumbur Loco Works.
Finally, much to the relief of Railway officials, the train revived. “Senior officials announced an award of Rs 30,000 for the engineers and technicians who revived the train,” said the staff.
The Railway denied allegations that the train had been pulled by a diesel train after it broke down in Chetpet.“The diesel train is always kept as a stand-by in case of an emergency. But today, the train was revived immediately and the journey continued,” said a Railway spokesperson.
The train, built in 1855, was brought to India from Leeds, UK, where it was built. According to Railway archives, the train was used by the East India Company to transport troops from Howrah to Raniganj to quell the 1857 freedom struggle. After serving for over over 55 years; it was withdrawn from service in 1909. For over a hundred years, it lay at the Jamalpur workshops and Howrah station as an exhibit, where it was exposed to the elements. The damaged and corroded engine reached Perumbur Loco Works, where it was finally restored and put back on tracks.
source: http://www.newindianexpress.com / The New Indian Express / Home> Cities> Chennai / by Express News Service – Chennai / August 16th, 2013
Anuj Sharma, COO of Sarvajal, a firm that sells water, was in town to receive the Force Park Shared Value Award from the Park Group of Institutions on Wednesday. His firm purifies ground water and sells it through water ATMs.
“Pure water can easily be made available at a lower cost,” said Anuj. He had started the project 4 years ago in his home town of Alwar in Rajasthan. His water is now available in a few states as of now. The purified water is supplied through tanks from where people can collect it using their ATMs. “A litre of water will cost a maximum of 50 paise. The ATM which is similar to those used to withdraw money from banks can be recharged using cards. They will show the quality of water apart from the balance available.
“We target places where there are ground water sources, but lack quality water distribution. There should be a minimum of 1,000 households in the area,” he said. ‘Water ATM’ was a concept they developed to monitor the distribution of the water and check its quality.
“Around 50 percent of diseases are water borne diseases. At the same time, most water purifiers are either inefficient or costly. Thus, I came up with this idea,” he said. Responding to charges of commercialisation of water resources, he says they make sure their business model is affordable to all.
source: http://www.articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com / The Times of India / Home> City> Coimbatore> Water Resources / TNN / August 08th, 2013
I. Mayandi Bharathi. / Photo: Soma Basu / The Hindu
On this Independence Day, meet Madurai’s oldest living freedom fighter, I. Mayandi Bharathi, whose spirit remains intact at 97
On August 9 every year, the Gandhi Museum in Madurai holds a function to mark the anniversary of Quit India Movement. In the last five decades, guests and invitees to the function changed. Not I.Mayandi Bharathi.
This year his attendance was doubtful as he was admitted to the hospital for treatment of dysentery. But the 97-year-old was restless and got himself discharged in time for the function.
You cannot miss the fire in his eyes as he presses the flashback button. Listening to him is like going back to the black’n’white era and reliving the historic moments that our generation has only read about in books or seen in films.
Mayandi Bharathi is Madurai’s oldest living freedom fighter who unfailingly attends the City administration’s Independence-Day function every year. There are 150-odd freedom fighters in Madurai district who are seated in a special enclosure and Bharathi’s chair is never vacant.
Though it’s been 66 years, the voice of young revolutionaries, he says, still reverberate in his ears, “Down with British Imperialism…Long Live Revolution…Inquilab Zindabad.” He was part of many such rallies and protests and was jailed over a dozen times. His life changed when he was 14. His classroom window allowed him a peep into the street opposite to where Government Rajaji Hospital stands today. “There were no buildings then, only forests. Hidden inside the shrubs was a toddy shop run by the British,” he recalls.
As part of the Congress-led picketing of shops selling foreign cloth and liquor, the Seval Dal workers were lathi charged during a protest in 1932. Watching the action from his seat, Bharathi grew restless. He excused himself from the class, rid his school bag of the books and notebooks and filled it up with stones and pebbles instead. “I ran to the spot and supplied stones to the unarmed protestors to help them to hit back. I too got beaten up by the police,” he can’t hide his smile.
When he reached home late that evening, he was admonished by his worried parents and asked to keep off such desh-bhakti activities. As he ate that night’s meal with 23 other family members (he was the 11th child for his parents, his mother bore 13 children and his father’s second wife had another five), Bharathi knew that his parents had already lost him to the patriotic fervour.
After that Bharathi became a regular at every rally that popularised swadeshi goods and khadi and boycotted collection of war funds. He went to prison numerous times between 1940 and 1946 and met several leaders of freedom movement including Pasumpon Muthuramalinga Thevar, K.P.Janaki Ammal, N.M.R.Subburaman, Sasivarna Thevar, Sitaramaiah, M.R.Venkatraman and A.Vaidyanatha Iyer who further inspired him.
Though he abided by Gandhian philosophy and principles, he was much in awe of Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose and was in the welcome committee when Netaji Bose visited Madurai in 1939. The mere recollection of the moment lit up his face. “I shook hands with him and remember he had a big hand. He told us the World War II had given us a golden opportunity to intensify the freedom struggle and win.”
An audacious freedom fighter characterised by altruistic values, Bharathi lives alone in a small cramped room on Kakathoppe Street in the heart of Madurai. At one end of the rectangular room is the kitchen and the other end has an old television perched on a small steel almirah. A charpoy in the centre seats him with support of pillows. His feet are swollen and he finds it difficult to walk without support. Every inch of space in the room, cot and the lone table is filled with papers, newspapers, booklets and books. He lives off the freedom fighters pension given by the Centre and is obviously too proud to admit that he has and continues to live in penury. He jokingly recalls how once his veshti was stolen by another patriot and he was left with only one for several months. “I never regretted the way I chose to live my life. I have no demands,” he says.
Bharathi has authored a dozen books – the first in 1939 and the latest this January – all on various aspects of the freedom struggle. He wrote for and edited the CPI journal Janashakti (1944-63) and the CPI-M’s Tamil daily Theekathir (1964-91). He laments though India attained “swaraj but sukhraj still eludes the people”. The lack of jobs and education, food and shelter, increasing crime and disrespect for women, the deepening caste-based and rich-poor divide – all dishearten him.
Remembered for giving fiery speeches, Bharathi wonders whether the billion-plus countrymen will ever be united to make India a super power and take on the challenges of modern society disabled by corruption and discrimination. Earlier, a leader’s call was enough to rouse the sentiments of the people and fight the British. But today, the so-called leaders ignore the welfare of the people, he rues.
Bharathi loves to narrate stories and meticulously maintains scrap books with photographs of leaders of the freedom movement along side notes scribbled by him. The day I called on him, he was working on his next book on the lives of different leaders. He saves his pension money to publish his books and distributes them among students, friends and laymen.
Driven by the dream of freedom, independence is Bharathi’s way of life.
(Making a difference is a fortnightly column about ordinary people and events that leave an extraordinary impact on us. E-mail soma.basu@thehindu.co.in to tell her about someone you know who is making a difference)
source: http://www.thehindu.com / The Hindu / Home> Features> Friday Review> History & Culture / by Soma Basu / Madurai – August 14th, 2013
The Tamil Nadu Veterinary and Animal Sciences University (TANUVAS) on Wednesday released a vaccine for classical swine fever, a contagious viral disease affecting pigs.
The vaccine was released by university officials at an international conference on the ‘Emerging and Transboundary Diseases of Global Importance.’ Dr V Purushothaman, director, Centre for Animal Health Studies at TANUVAS, said classical swine fever should not be confused with swine flu that affected humans.
The classical swine fever is prevalent in Tamil Nadu and northeast parts of the country. It causes death of pigs. “The spread of this disease results in a loss of Rs 10 crore annually in the country,” Dr Purushothaman said.
Veterinarians in India had been administering the crystal violet vaccine to curb the disease in pigs earlier. But the vaccine was discontinued a few years ago because of some side effects. “The new vaccine has been proved safe and potent without side effects,” Dr Purushothaman said.
source: http://www.articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com / The Times of India / Home> City> Chennai> Side Effects / by M Ramya / July 17th, 2013
Seven hundred and thirty years after he built the 56.5 mile long Kalingarayancanal to connect River Bhavani with River Noyyal, hoping to enhance irrigation facilities in the Erode region, a fitting memorial for the Kongu chieftain Kalingarayan inKalingarayanpalayam, where the irrigation canal originated, is in the pipeline. PWD Minister K V Ramalingam has confirmed that the memorial would come up inside a children’s park where there will be a special column and statue of Kalingarayan.
A memorial for the chieftain has been a long pending demand from the Kongu Vellalar community. Long forgotten by authorities, there is no memorial of Kalingarayan anywhere in Western Tamil Nadu. When the minister visited Kalingarayanpalayam recently, to release water through the canal, the locals urged him to initiate the long pending project.
The canal supports one of the largest ayacuts in the state. It irrigates vast stretches of turmeric, sugarcane and paddy fields. So, its creator must get a fitting tribute,” said Ramalingam. The canal had deteriorated in recent years and a massive renovation is in progress. Efforts to ensure smooth flow of water till the tail end of the canal and prevent the flow of sewage and industrial waste into it are going on. The canal is the worst affected waterway in the district due to indiscriminate dumping of untreated effluents by the textile processing and tannery industries.
Kalingarayan has contributed significantly to the region’s development. Born Lingaya Gounder around 1240, he rose to become Veera Pandian’s (1265-1280) chieftain,” says Periyaswami Prahladan, a farmer on its banks. The PWD is planning to build the memorial at an estimated cost of Rs1crore. In the beginning, the canal irrigated only about 3,500 acres, as historian and traveller Francis Buchanan noted in his diary, later published as ‘A Journey From Madras Through the Countries of Mysore, Canara, and Malabar”.
Buchanan visited the entire region as per the orders of then British Governor General Marquis Wellesley to check the state of agriculture from April 23, 1800 to January 15, 1801. In his book he writes that Kalingarayan’s family never seemed to have received any reward in the form of land on account of the grand canal that he built.
source: http://www.articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com / The Times of India / Home> City> Coimbatore> Industrial Waste / by K A Shaji, TNN / August 14th, 2013
A R Rahman is a spiritual man. That’s probably why he rushed his staff to get their brand new premises of the KM College of Music up and running on Eid. The landscaping may not be perfect, going by the patches of grass on the lawn, the interiors may need a little more touching up and the location (on a rather bumpy gulley off 100 feet road) isn’t exactly posh, but the ‘Mozart of Madras’ is upbeat as he arrives at his new college. “Inshallah, it will all go off well,” he tells his wife Saira as he awaits the arrival of India’s industrial power couple Nita and Mukesh Ambani — the ‘under-wraps’ guests of honour for Rahman’s college opening. With a host of Hollywood and local films to score music for, Rahman took time to reflect on the journey that his ‘pet project’ has taken from a single room KM Music Conservatory, opposite his house, to this magnificent campus. Notes from the maestro’s mind:
How did this project come to be?
I’ve always been interested in music education, because there is this distance between what people in the music industry need and what is being taught. That was the vision behind KM Conservatory. Some time ago, the students staged a full-fledged musical and they managed a spectacular show with such a small rehearsal space on the old campus. I began to think that we could do a lot more with a larger space and that is how this unfolded. We can comfortably teach about 300 students here.
So, It’s a dream come true?
(Laughs) Everything is. This morning when I came here to see how things were going, I was astonished to hear western classical being practised in one room, while sufi music was coming from the floor above…there were so many musical confluences from all around, it finally made sense. There is room for experimentation and growth here, for every talented musician.
Is it financially viable to run such a top-of-the-line school of music?
Honestly, (clears his throat) it’s like I’ve got a knife to my neck when I think about the amount of work and money that we have pumped in. Like everything else, we’ll just have to wait and see. We have a superb studio here that will be rented commercially at night, so that ought to help!
Do you have partners or a franchisee model in mind. Reliance could be interested in this as a brand…
Not at the moment, no. I can say that things are comfortable at the moment and I am able to finance this institute without worry. When I figure out how much it takes to run things here, then I will think about whether we need partnership or any other support. I’ll know in a month’s time.
Do you see KM being in the league of a Berkeley or Julliard School of Music?
I’ve always felt that KM as a concept is in a different direction. Where Julliard and Berkeley have specified directions for where they see their students, we have always had a mix of musical styles – essentially we are Indian at the heart of it, but there is room and space for any kind of world music to play its part. We’re also trying to teach people how to adapt to the needs of any music industry and not just a theoretical one. We have the option of students doing an internship anywhere and even doing commercial work while they’re studying.
Has the attitude towards music education changed since you started KM in 2008?
Not much, but I’d like to think that we have made a difference somewhere. In India, there is this strange attitude that people have where even musician’s have towards their children taking up IT jobs – abroad, people are proud to say that their kids play for the Boston Chamber Orchestra or study at Julliard, but that’s not the case here. I wanted to change that. These days, music is limited only to cinema, cinema and cinema. I wanted to create an interest among people who wanted to make music and help them get to where they wanted to be – successful musicians, whether for music sake, for personal satisfaction or even to play in the industry.
So it’s about recognition of talent for you?
Right now it’s (industry) all about popularity. Things have changed to a small extent where small bands put stuff up on Youtube and if it’s good, it becomes a sensation. If it doesn’t, it just fades. But there is a lot of good stuff and talent out there that needs to be nurtured and we hope to bridge that gap.
Making music without knowing the industry must be tough
It’s a strange thing, but I’ve found that sometimes people with the best talent have dropped off by the industry very early, like the initial rounds of a reality show. Some musicians and singers may be really talented and technically good, but they get knocked out by the commercial aspects and others who aren’t quite talented make it. This needs to change.
You’ve been away from Tamil films for awhile and now you’re returning. Was it a planned hiatus?
Here’s the thing – Hollywood projects come calling only once and you really have to grab on to those opportunities. The good thing about most of those projects is that they take time and allow me a certain space to work. Setting up this kind of an institute could not have been possible without that kind of space or ‘resources’.
source: http://www.newindianexpress.com / The New Indian Express / Home> Entertainment> Interview / by Daniel Thimmayya / ENS – Chennai / August 10th, 2013
Renowned surgical gastroenterologist, Prof N. Rangabashyam, 79, passed away in his sleep on Sunday morning.
His last rites were performed the same evening at Besant Nagar crematorium. Prof Rangabashyam is survived by his wife, son and daughter.
Former head of the department of surgical gastroenterology and proctology and clinical professor of surgery, Madras Medical College, and GGH, Prof Rangabashyam was the first to start a separate department for surgical gastroenterology and again the first to start a specialisation in surgical gastroenterology, M.Ch. degree course in India.
Recalling his association with Prof Rangabahsyam from 1985-1991 at GH, the present head of department of surgical gastroenterology, Dr S.M. Chandramohan, said Rangabashyam was a visionary and a doctor with commitment.
“I’m sitting in the department that he started. He wanted healthcare of our country on a par with other countries and worked towards it. Rangabashyam was the one to start M.Ch degree and the course has produced many eminent doctors,” he said.
A student of Rangabashyam and at present the transplant coordinator of state cadaver transplant programme, Dr J. Amalopavanathan, said he was a go-getter. Prof Rangabashyam was awarded the Padma Bhushan in 2002, and won the prestigious Dr B C Roy national award twice.
A.C Muthaiah, former president of FICCI and BCCI, condoled the death of Dr Rangabashyam saying that India has lost an eminent surgical gastroenterologist.
source: http://www.deccanchronicle.com / Deccan Chronicle / Home> News> Current Affairs / by DC / July 15th, 2013
