The Maanga

The Madras Book Club met yesterday for the re-launch of a well received book in the name of this glorious city.

The original book, written in Tamil, has been re-written in English by its author K.R.A.Narasiah. The meeting, true to Madras style middle class meetings, was more about Rava Upma. And sadly, the rather mediocre Upma quite easily won the contest — those who came to speak were either uninterested or uninteresting.

The author himself is an affable and slightly ageing man, who drops in trivia about the City’s history in the unlikeliest of conversations. He gives the impression of having researched his book very well and probably, the book is a very good read. The book, one is lead to believe, traces the history of Madras from the time Francis Day got a land grant from through the services of his dubash Beri Thimmappa from the local Nayak — “a strip of no man’s sand three miles long, one mile wide at its broadest[1]” — to set up a trading post for the East India Company in 1639. That land, as we know, was fortified soon into the magnificient Fort St. George.

Oft repeated history was repeated,

“It was in Madras that the first rules of governance and justice, and the red tape and record keeping that went with both, were introduced by Langhorne and Master, Yale and `Pirate’ Pitt. It was here that the oldest civic corporation was established outside Europe,” recounts the author, listing the many firsts.

St. Mary’s church was consecrated on October 28, 1680, and the marriage register records as the first entry the wedding of Elihu Yale, after who is named the Yale University in the U.S. “It was in Fort St. George that Robert Clive worked as a Writer in 1744 on a salary of £5 a year.” Clive was bored with his work; and was `on the verge of suicide on occasion’. He found his true vocation “on the battlefields around Fort St. David in Cuddalore.”

While these bits of random trivia is something every quiz loving adolescent in the city will know, Narasaiah has also taken pains to dig into various historical records — including the only written diary available from those times. The author cites a simple murder of a prostitute as the origin of the traders’ progression to being rulers. That he says, was a landmark event in terms of the local chieftains handing over judicial responsibilities to the British. This, much to the chagrin of the author, was the beginning of an empire won by default.

The subject of the book, no doubt, is something that all of us hold very dear. We don’t need to be sold on it — but what the event failed to do was, sell seriousness and purpose. S Muthiah, in his very own style, quips thus on a different occasion,

Perhaps, then, it was just the glamour of a successful author who is a big name in the Indian book world, a handsome face, a bit of stylish dressing and a St. Stephen’s eloquence. Pity the Madras Book Club can’t get that combination all the time. If it did, it might even regularly get such crowds, even a part of which would do its meagre coffers a world of good.

Sashi Tharoor and his ilk may deserve our contempt — however, that hardly absolves the rest for not even trying. The publisher of this book, a longtime blogger, gave the most insipid of speeches. The author rambled a bit and failed to tell us why he wrote this book. The journalist who was asked speak rambled some more.

Selling bad and badly selling hardly offer choice.

[1] — As read out from land records of the time with Muthiah’s inputs.

At the mouth of Doraisamy Subway, there was a mild collision between two cars — a Santro hit an Ambassador from behind. Both were at fault and that is hardly the point. The men in the Ambassador, predictably, were not from South Madras; at least, they did not look like they were. The Santro had a family of three, predictably, from Mambalam; at least they did look like they were. The usual flare up lead to a reasonably rare but not entirely uncommon fist fight between the husband driver and the driver driver.

The woman in the Santro looked typical. Slightly plump, fair skinned and probably had a name like Visalakshi or Kamakshi. She had a child on her lap and looked to be in her early thirties. Was clad in a polyester salwar kameez that indicated she was millitary medium middle class. That is, if one needed more indicators after the Santro.

At that moment, she yelled — ‘thevidya payya, ootha….kottaya naariduven‘

I am not sure what class I belong to. Whatever the case, I did not quite gather the courage to take a photograph of the scene. I had to move all the way to the other side of the subway to laugh out loud.

Today, I saw the Times of India’s Chennai edition. There was an impressive front page write-up. The bottom section of that page was written by our own V Anand. It really was well done — I thought. Until I read it. I also reminded myself, The Hindu had a supplement over the weekend that had pictures of couples at the Marina. On its front page.

Madras becoming Chennai is when the North Indians call it that. Or, when we decide this is all we can.

Moral of the story: Eventually, one gets what one wants.

Patriotism is an error in judgment — of the boundary of your city.

PS: Apropos to this. I know, this sounds lame. But sounded quite profound in my head. And in my defense, I don’t have much to cover it.

Since Madras is the best Indian city, Hedge Fund type boys who are too old to go elsewhere should come here.

Thol Thirumavalavan and his Dalit Panthers must be spending the most money for political advertising per voter gained. While the Dalit Panthers’ vote base is estimated at one percent, their presence in terms of posters and other paraphernalia across street corners rivals that of the DMK and the AIADMK. The content of those banners though, seem to miss the point. One such, put up in KK Nagar, next to similar posters from the Dravidian parties, for example, says something about Thirumavalavan paying homage to Pasumpon Muthuramalinga Thevar! No, I am not making that up — once I manage to figure the camera function on the phone, I will even be a loyal subject.

That brings one to the question –who makes these posters? Is the same person contracted to to do the job for all political parties? And was this an occasion when he simply batch processed without thinking? Or, are the local members of a political party so eager to make their presence felt that they don’t mind their leader paying homage to the person who was once considered by some of them as their biggest oppressor? Ignorance is possibly the simple and uninteresting answer , which will remain that as long as the poster stays in Madras and does not travel further south.