He would be up and about in the dawn , a man of regular
habits ,one could time a watch with his moves
living in England and the English had made
him imbibe many of their customs ,their punctuality and value for time .
VG Nair was known as a brown sahib in the
small village of Parappanangadi .
A brown sahib in indian dress
The one railway platform Parappanangadi was
always ignored by the mail and express trains as they thundered past it with
disdain in fact they did this with a
distinct sneer as they increased their speed once they crossed the bridge over
the river just before the station .
Ravunni the red turbaned porter with a limp
had always had a suspicion about this ,he was a permanent fixture in the lazy station
,like a picture hung on its wall ,he
lived there day and night ,it was his job in the nights to wake up and stand
with his hand outstretched holding the key
This tricky job of stretching out the key
specially in dark rainy nights with a kerosene lamp or a bon fire was given generally to old
porters
this image of a man standing with a key in
a dark night to a roaring steam engine is embedded in my mind even today
Ravunni would then return to his deep slumberand the brew inside him assured him of that
Come day time he would have a quick bath in the
waiting room combing his beard with his fingers and tying his turban around his
unruly hair ,the tea and steamed rice in
the nearby shop would invigorate him to go about his work which would include
carrying loads of luggage to far houses of the rare passengers who would get
down from the slow trains that deemed to stop in this place ,his thin slippers
would step gingerly over the sharp stones as he trundled balancing the bags talking as he
walked .
He always looked forwards to the browns
sahibs visit either on his way to Kozhikode ( Calicut ) or back which he took
at least once in a month ,this was a man Ravunni respected ,one could see in his face that he was a learned
man from a cultured family and even though he had English habits he wore a
spotless white dhoti and bush shirt which hung on his tall frame if it was
rainy or early in the morning he had a brown coat over this he also had an ornamental walking stick which added to his
dignified presence .
Sankaran nair his man butler cum secretary walked close
to him carrying his huge umbrella with a curved handle and some books in his
hand
VG
sir was a doctorate in chemistry and was known to have held a high position for
years in the Bombay Morarjee mills leaving them for retiring to his native
place after winning a court case against them on a matter of principle
he
was known to the village as one scientist who made waves in England even to the
extent of getting some patents in textile chemistry his chosen field ,he had left all that and today was like any
rich landowner looking after an extended family of nephews and nieces ,he had
never married ,and to him his family was the more than sixty inmates of his
huge house
Those days such big houses were common in
kerala and were called Tharavadus ,following matrilineal system the uncle had a
honored place in such tharavads where the nieces lived with their children
,husbands making periodical visits .
Generally the household matters like
servant handling cooking matters temple pujas were dealt by the nieces in
accordance to their seniority and the senior most nieces were like ministers in
a royal durbar holding great power with
direct access to the grand uncle himself ,some even went to the extent of
ticking the big man for perceived misdemeanors
.
For the children it was one big playground
,generally left alone to tend themselves with their mothers busy in their own
errands or temple going or servant dealing or cooking the children were like
flocks of sheep with a rare shepherd to guide them ,they knew their limits and
were careful not to be seen much in the presence of the grand uncle or other
sterner seniors ,school days involved walking at least for 4 to 5 km at times
in poring rains with dark umbrellas and getting into the red roofed yellow
walled building near the railway station where many of the droning voices of their teachers
were drowned by a rumbling train or shattering thunder and rain,
during karkadakam or the dark monsoon days
the school was mostly flooded as the whole place turned into a green water
world ,children safely stayed at home ,this was the time they stole into
kitchens to steal jiggery or mango pickles and get into dark attics to play their
games ,generally the children kept to their world and the adults to theirs but
both were mutually aware of the other
summer would see their teeth tingle with sourness as they bit
into unripe green mangoes sprinkled with stolen red chilly powder or climb
cashew trees and suck out the acidic juice while pocketing the cashew nuts to
be roasted later over fire
jack fruits were plenty and many tummies
had to be quitened with a mixture form the local compounder after a gluttonous orgy of jack fruit eating
frenzy
,children played well ate well and were generally
free of any stress those days .
Nambiar vattam zindabad howled the gang of
children when they saw the folded dhoti clad Nambiar the chief cook ,he was a prized possession
of VG uncle and though others tried to lure him with offers of lucre he stuck loyally
to Thekkepat Kovilakkam and for this he
was bestowed with vast viceragal powers .
no nieces dared to cross sword with him and
the senior most velliya muthamma or big mother conspired with him on matters of
menu and came to an understanding ,it
was left to Nambiar to oversee the menu but to do the job he had two hands
one was svelte Ammini whose seductive hips tantalized
many nephews to eternal visits to the kitchen to inspect what was brewing and
what not ,Nambiar was well aware of such tempting possibilities and virile
beings that roamed the house and his
stern roving eyes would discourage any such frivolities
he himself was too old for such carnal temptations and
only lost himself to the cuisine itself
,it was his job to make Ammini do the work and for her assistance was Unal………who
was an antithesis to Ammini……and her charms ,Unal ……was the hardworking loyal
dog who did the odd jobs as an assistant ,there once was a story of a
slithering snake biting Ammini…….which I had recounted in an earlier post
many a heart missed a beat that day only to
be resurrected with her saucy comeback !
It was only Nambiar who was allowed to cook
for the big uncle for he knew how fluffy
the omelette needed to be or in which place the fork should behe knew how warm
and soft his toasts would be he knew how
his English loving master liked his porridge his cup of ovaltine or his fineimported
biscuits to be
Uncle generally had his breakfast or dinner
alone in the north hall where he sat like a king in the huge dining table Nambiar
would serve his food quietly and stand with folded hand while Sankaran nair
would walk busily up and down
at
times an elder niece would break in with a question as administrative matters
were discussed over uncles mouthfuls
He would then stretch out in the wooden
easy reclining chair with two huge foot rests spreading out his dhotied legs
modestly as the workers lined up to receive their wages
every single paise would be noted meticulously
in his neat handwriting into his ledgers all so methodical and precise the
scientist in him was always in the background ,
monthly once he would go for a tour to his
lands around the house and it would last for two to three days as they were
plenty and vast
During harvest season he would be very busy
as loads of grain would be carried by dark sweaty men and women from different
fields and the western compound would thunder with their feet trampling out the
hay which would be gathered into small molehills the granaries would fill
before the rains came crashing down to continue for more than three months
,many of the poor would then stay in makeshift huts in the ground as thiers
would get flooded and were looked after and tended by their master whom they
loved as much as he cared for them
this
was true socialism one born out of love not of fear as it is today .
Uncle would go to Kozhikode or Calicut at
least once a month where he would have a huge list of to do things so much so he would invariably stay there in
some relatives house or in Mankavu kovilakkam from where one of the nieces
husband hailed form ( my grandfather )
he would meet Dr Balakrishnan during his
visits to check on his ailments
Dr Balakrishnan was occasionally brought to
Parappanangadi by first class in the passenger train from Calicut
it
was a big event as the doctor came to kovilakkam with a retinue of servants who
had go to the station to receive him and carry his bag
,Ravunni too joined such processions ,grand
uncle would ask all nieces to bring their children if they had any problem to
see the doctor and slowly a small clinic would be formed there
The good doctor would go back by the evening train after a
sumptous nambiar special lunch and he would be laden with fruits and nuts and chips and his fees
Grand uncle was a passionate reader he
would order his books from Britain and his shelf was heavy with encyclopedias
and short stories classics in leather bound luxury adorned his bookshelves he
would sit majestically in the big red tiled hall behind a mammoth table to do
his writing in his fine hand with exquisite pens
As I had described in an earlier blogpost
his hoe and coe diaries were written meticulously for more than four decades
every singe day without fail
The freedom fighters of the village never used to like grand uncle
he
too had no love lost to them being the anglophile he was ,to him Indians should
start talking of freedom once they acquired the good habits of the British like hard work and punctuality which he felt
they possessed in abundance ,he would
never part with his money to them as donations and considered them as riffraff
,
all this are from small bits of information
I had gathered from my mother before she passed away
how I wish I had met this uncle of mine
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