The Keela Theru commences with Srirangam House of T.V. Srinivasan, who worked as a Cashier in the Sri Ranganathaswamy Devasthanam, in Srirangam in the twenties.. The house was built in the thirties, and TVS family moved soon after.
The children of this family moved out of the village, though still keeping the house in their fold. Subramaniam the eldest, was at Meerut in the Military Accounts, the second son Nagarajan went over to Burma, to join the Police Supplies Department, Venkataraman the third after his graduation joined the Revenue Department of the local government. Radhakrishnan was employed the South Indian Railway Co., took a very active interest in the affairs of the village, was the Secretary of the Young Men’s Association, and the St. Johns Ambulance Brigade, Jiyapuram Division. Radhakrishnan was well known for his quick wit and punch line dialogues...
House next was that of Nagammal, whose sons Venkattu (a well versed Ganapatigal), Vaidyanathan (Postal Department) Bhoora Krishnamurthy, Sitaraman, and Jambunathan and their smart sister Kunjamma .. .. Bhoora and Seenu (grandson of Natesa Iyer and son of Radhakrishnan) were great in their ‘double-dutch’ language and used to thrill everyone with their conversation. If they said ‘lakai’ it is to be read as ‘kalai’ but one was amazed at the speed they talked to each other.
T.N.Subbarayan (son of Natesa Iyer) bought this house in the sixties. They did some reconstruction and made the premises more attractive – Kalyanam and his siblings lived in this house. A tragedy happened in that Sekhar younger brother of Kalyanam drowned in the river Cauvery at a very young age. A promising youngster plucked as a bud. And this was not the first tragedy either, as in the thirties, Subbarayan lost his wife who drowned in the river Cauvery. TNS married a second time and the bride was Sankari, daughter of V.G.Subbaier, and sister of Dr.S.Ganapathisundaram.
T.V. Muthukrishnan a nephew of Judge Seshagiri Iyer owns the house next; he must have been a resident of the village in his younger days but not in the thirties/forties. TVM and family used to visit the village, when the court at Madras closed for the vacation, and participated in the village functions to the extent he could. He was a leading advocate at Chennai, resident of Pammal House in Purasawalkam, an active Freemason, and was the Grand Master of the Masonic Movement in the South.. His sons are T.M.S. Mani (the first I.C.S. from the village) who last held the post of Chairman of the Neyveli Lignite Corporation, T.M.S. Giri (a civil engineer) and T.M.Seethapathy (a Colonel in the Army Medical Corps). Dr. M.K.Mani, grandson of TVM is a famous nephrologist, now attached to the Apollo Hospitals at Chennai. His articles in the Hindu on ‘organs donation’ has convinced many citizens to join the group of donors.
It is in this house R.Rajagopalan (Retired District and Sessions Judge) and family resided for a few years during the forties after his retirement.; Visu and his cousin Gopalan stayed here, and another tragedy occurred during this period, when young Visu’s precious life was taken by the River Cauvery when he drowned in it. Visu was exceptionally brilliant and was in his prime when this tragedy occurred. It was a shock to the whole village.
Next to TVM’s house were two tiny places, belonging to Ramanathan (affectionately called Eli) and Ayya Ayyar (different from the Munsif Ayya Ayyar of the 1924 floods). Ramanathan took very active part in the Bhajans conducted in the Perumal Koil – come Sita Kalyanam, and it is from this house, the ‘seer varisai’ for the kalyanam, will be taken out in a procession by the village ladies to the nearby Perumal Koil. During the Divyanama Sankeertanam Ramanathan used to perform a snake dance for the song ‘Adu Pambe” (Pambatti chithar) and for the snake he will use the ‘uddharani’ (spoon) of the pancha patra kept for the pooja. And he conducted the poojas to the Utsava portraits always. Ramanathan’s daughters also moved out of the village, after marriage.
On the other side lived Ayya Ayyar (also called Ayya thatha) His children and grand children Karnam Vaidyanathan, Annamuthu and Ramaratnam lived here then.. Ramarathnam moved to Mandya in Karnataka to set up business .. Ambi from this house used to be active in the Ever Friends Association, the offshoot of Balar Sangam of the forties, and the Baktha Sabha.
Then comes the fairly big house of Rao Saheb Natesa Iyer of Military Accounts Service, and Lakshmi Ammal.---. Radhakrishnan, Subbarayan, Kamalam and Pichai were their children. Radhakrishnan married Madhuram, Subbarayan married Sankari (a second marriage, as the first spouse passed away), Kamalam married N.R.Sharma of Thogur, a senior Railway official of the North Eastern Railways at Moghulsarai, and Pichai married Umamaheswaran (Pichumani) of Karuppur a Congressite turned radical.. The house is now being occupied by Sharma’s second son, Venkataraman’s family. Venkataraman took a law degree, and became the Labour Officer of the Neyveli Lignite Corporation..
The house opposite is that of Radhakrishnan, and to the west was that of Headmaster D.V.Sharma.. Radhakrishnan’s sons and daughters also moved out of the village in the course of time, Seenu to pune, Sechu to Madras. Sechu was very active at Chennai and was working at the Cork Industries. Vaitha who joined the Regional Transport Authority spent some time in Madras, is back in the south now, but stays in Srirangam. The daughters Ambulu, Kalyani and Jayalakshmi also moved to their spouse’s locations after marriage.
The house on the east of Radhakrishnan’s belonged to Appanna Sastrigal, a vedic and Sanskrit scholar. His son Sundaram was in charge of the post office.. Santanagopalan the second son, a Sanskrit Scholar of repute, and recipient of awards from the Sankaracharya of Kanchi, moved out of the village to be with his children in Chennai ; Narayan the thired son joined the government services and now resides near Chingleput. Ammalam and Savithri the two daughters of this family, moved out of the village after their marriages.
Back to the north side now, to the house adjacent to that of Natesa Iyer – this must have also been one of the twin houses as I remember, for the marriage of Jayam, daughter of Sharma, the interconnecting wall was broken and a temporary link between the houses was made so the wedding could be in Natesa Iyer’s house, and other functions including lunch/dinner etc. were held in the latter. After some years, this house was purchased by Dr. Seshadri, and his family moved here from the ‘Periyaam’ Dr. Seshadri had married a second time, in the meantime, and moved here with new bride Sulochana, This family’s contribution to the growth and welfare of the village was admirable. Ranga after graduation joined the Geological Survey of India, and after placements in different towns and on retirement, is back in the South, staying at Tennur, Tiruchi.
Gopalan who graduated in medicine, started helping out father in the village, later established a clinic in nearby Pettaivathalai.. Gopalan’s wife Santha, son Mukundan and daughter are also doctors – after Gopalan’s demise, Santha and Mukundan are running the clinic.
Sundaram, son of Dr. Seshadri through second spouse Sulochana, also graduated in medicine, and after training under his father is now independently practicing at the village itself.. Sundaram married Jayashri of the well known Kizhanatham family of the Padmanabhans. (Sundaram will perhaps be the only Doctor who got a US visitor visa, without even appearing at the American Consulate in Madras, when he flew to the US along with wife Jayashri for his honeymoon.)
House next to that belonged to the Mudalipatti family, the place even then was in a dilapidated condition.. Ramaratnam, his wife and another family lived here. Ramaratnam was running a provision store near the railway station, and was an ardent participant in the bhajans – in addition he used to compose verses, and devotional poems on his own, and then sing them at the bhajan.
It is in this house, a Srividya Upasaka lady gave a music upanyasam and performed an all ladies bhajan – most of the village ladies participated in this musical event. Some of us young boys were also present on that occasion. It is around midnight Upasaka lady was possessed of divine spirit and informed the gathering that something sad was happening to one of the village girls and started praying for her. She would not disclose who it was and what the problem was. All that she could say was that the girl was in the clutches of death and all should pray for her life – and every one did tearfully. The group dispersed in the early hours of the next day, and later the village was learn that a lady of the village did indeed pass away that morning.
It was Jayalakshmi, daughter of N.R.Sharma and Kamalam, wife of D.Srinivasan residing at Tiruchi. It was known that she was bitten by a poisonous snake or similar reptile This is one of those irreconcilable facts … there were no phone communication facilities in the village then, why some houses were not even electrified -- Jayam was married to Srinivasan only in the previous year and this shook all residents of the village then.
Pulancheri Narayanan was residing in the next house, with his sons. Narayanan called Nanumama by the village boys was a very jovial type, and used to entertain the youngsters with a lot of stories, some true, some imaginary and some ribald!!.. he was a good singer too. Narayanan’s brother Radhakrishnan used to work for the Military in those days and an occasional visitor to the village – Narayanan’s sons Ramanathan and Kannappan took part in most activities of the village including the bhajans.
And in the next one resided K. Mahadevan of Karattampatti – whose sons Srinivasan, Ramachandran, and Muthukrishnan moved over to Calcutta for a livelihood as was the practice then – Venkataraman and Mani remained in the village along with their sisters Rajam and Jayam. Venkataraman married Brahajam of Tiruchi, and the family moved over to Madras in the fifties, as TMV secured a job with the Madras Advertising Company. His grandson, Sikkil Gurucharan is a very popular carnatic musician these days. TMV’s son Chandrasekaran a Medical Representative with May and Baker, a versatile sales person, and an actor, married into the Sikkil Sisters’ family and hence the tag-on for Gurucharan.. After nearly four decades or so I met Mani at the Sashtiabdapoorthy of K.V. Balasubramanian (younger brother of ’Kivaja’ and son-in-law of Venkatachalam Iyer neighbour of Madhumama) The Calcutta connections of the village still go on, and I learnt that Mani’s son is now working in Calcutta.
Rajam married Jayaraman a ward of Sir R.S. Sarma of Calcutta who later moved to Madras to be in charge of the Madras Advertising Company of the Simpsons group.
Venkatachalam was the owner of the house next but was resident at Arundel Street, in Madras as he was working there.. for a long time this house was occupied by Sivaraman Teacher of the Elementary School at Tiruchendurai, and after retirement Venkatachalam family moved over to the village. Venkatachalam’s wife Thenaal was a niece of popular tamil writer Ki.Va.Jagannathan and it is because of this connection, we were able to bring Kivaja to our village in the fifties for a day when he visited the Chandrasekaraswami Temple, and composed a verse about the Goddess Mrugadarambika (Manenduvalli) - Kothandaraman, Mani, Thangam and Rajeswari are the children of thjs family and are well settled in Madurai and Madras.
The vacant plot next belonged to Narayana Iyer, popularly known as Mavumill Narayanan – the plot was used to grow Greens of different types for a very long time. (to be continued in the third part)
The children of this family moved out of the village, though still keeping the house in their fold. Subramaniam the eldest, was at Meerut in the Military Accounts, the second son Nagarajan went over to Burma, to join the Police Supplies Department, Venkataraman the third after his graduation joined the Revenue Department of the local government. Radhakrishnan was employed the South Indian Railway Co., took a very active interest in the affairs of the village, was the Secretary of the Young Men’s Association, and the St. Johns Ambulance Brigade, Jiyapuram Division. Radhakrishnan was well known for his quick wit and punch line dialogues...
House next was that of Nagammal, whose sons Venkattu (a well versed Ganapatigal), Vaidyanathan (Postal Department) Bhoora Krishnamurthy, Sitaraman, and Jambunathan and their smart sister Kunjamma .. .. Bhoora and Seenu (grandson of Natesa Iyer and son of Radhakrishnan) were great in their ‘double-dutch’ language and used to thrill everyone with their conversation. If they said ‘lakai’ it is to be read as ‘kalai’ but one was amazed at the speed they talked to each other.
T.N.Subbarayan (son of Natesa Iyer) bought this house in the sixties. They did some reconstruction and made the premises more attractive – Kalyanam and his siblings lived in this house. A tragedy happened in that Sekhar younger brother of Kalyanam drowned in the river Cauvery at a very young age. A promising youngster plucked as a bud. And this was not the first tragedy either, as in the thirties, Subbarayan lost his wife who drowned in the river Cauvery. TNS married a second time and the bride was Sankari, daughter of V.G.Subbaier, and sister of Dr.S.Ganapathisundaram.
T.V. Muthukrishnan a nephew of Judge Seshagiri Iyer owns the house next; he must have been a resident of the village in his younger days but not in the thirties/forties. TVM and family used to visit the village, when the court at Madras closed for the vacation, and participated in the village functions to the extent he could. He was a leading advocate at Chennai, resident of Pammal House in Purasawalkam, an active Freemason, and was the Grand Master of the Masonic Movement in the South.. His sons are T.M.S. Mani (the first I.C.S. from the village) who last held the post of Chairman of the Neyveli Lignite Corporation, T.M.S. Giri (a civil engineer) and T.M.Seethapathy (a Colonel in the Army Medical Corps). Dr. M.K.Mani, grandson of TVM is a famous nephrologist, now attached to the Apollo Hospitals at Chennai. His articles in the Hindu on ‘organs donation’ has convinced many citizens to join the group of donors.
It is in this house R.Rajagopalan (Retired District and Sessions Judge) and family resided for a few years during the forties after his retirement.; Visu and his cousin Gopalan stayed here, and another tragedy occurred during this period, when young Visu’s precious life was taken by the River Cauvery when he drowned in it. Visu was exceptionally brilliant and was in his prime when this tragedy occurred. It was a shock to the whole village.
Next to TVM’s house were two tiny places, belonging to Ramanathan (affectionately called Eli) and Ayya Ayyar (different from the Munsif Ayya Ayyar of the 1924 floods). Ramanathan took very active part in the Bhajans conducted in the Perumal Koil – come Sita Kalyanam, and it is from this house, the ‘seer varisai’ for the kalyanam, will be taken out in a procession by the village ladies to the nearby Perumal Koil. During the Divyanama Sankeertanam Ramanathan used to perform a snake dance for the song ‘Adu Pambe” (Pambatti chithar) and for the snake he will use the ‘uddharani’ (spoon) of the pancha patra kept for the pooja. And he conducted the poojas to the Utsava portraits always. Ramanathan’s daughters also moved out of the village, after marriage.
On the other side lived Ayya Ayyar (also called Ayya thatha) His children and grand children Karnam Vaidyanathan, Annamuthu and Ramaratnam lived here then.. Ramarathnam moved to Mandya in Karnataka to set up business .. Ambi from this house used to be active in the Ever Friends Association, the offshoot of Balar Sangam of the forties, and the Baktha Sabha.
Then comes the fairly big house of Rao Saheb Natesa Iyer of Military Accounts Service, and Lakshmi Ammal.---. Radhakrishnan, Subbarayan, Kamalam and Pichai were their children. Radhakrishnan married Madhuram, Subbarayan married Sankari (a second marriage, as the first spouse passed away), Kamalam married N.R.Sharma of Thogur, a senior Railway official of the North Eastern Railways at Moghulsarai, and Pichai married Umamaheswaran (Pichumani) of Karuppur a Congressite turned radical.. The house is now being occupied by Sharma’s second son, Venkataraman’s family. Venkataraman took a law degree, and became the Labour Officer of the Neyveli Lignite Corporation..
The house opposite is that of Radhakrishnan, and to the west was that of Headmaster D.V.Sharma.. Radhakrishnan’s sons and daughters also moved out of the village in the course of time, Seenu to pune, Sechu to Madras. Sechu was very active at Chennai and was working at the Cork Industries. Vaitha who joined the Regional Transport Authority spent some time in Madras, is back in the south now, but stays in Srirangam. The daughters Ambulu, Kalyani and Jayalakshmi also moved to their spouse’s locations after marriage.
The house on the east of Radhakrishnan’s belonged to Appanna Sastrigal, a vedic and Sanskrit scholar. His son Sundaram was in charge of the post office.. Santanagopalan the second son, a Sanskrit Scholar of repute, and recipient of awards from the Sankaracharya of Kanchi, moved out of the village to be with his children in Chennai ; Narayan the thired son joined the government services and now resides near Chingleput. Ammalam and Savithri the two daughters of this family, moved out of the village after their marriages.
Back to the north side now, to the house adjacent to that of Natesa Iyer – this must have also been one of the twin houses as I remember, for the marriage of Jayam, daughter of Sharma, the interconnecting wall was broken and a temporary link between the houses was made so the wedding could be in Natesa Iyer’s house, and other functions including lunch/dinner etc. were held in the latter. After some years, this house was purchased by Dr. Seshadri, and his family moved here from the ‘Periyaam’ Dr. Seshadri had married a second time, in the meantime, and moved here with new bride Sulochana, This family’s contribution to the growth and welfare of the village was admirable. Ranga after graduation joined the Geological Survey of India, and after placements in different towns and on retirement, is back in the South, staying at Tennur, Tiruchi.
Gopalan who graduated in medicine, started helping out father in the village, later established a clinic in nearby Pettaivathalai.. Gopalan’s wife Santha, son Mukundan and daughter are also doctors – after Gopalan’s demise, Santha and Mukundan are running the clinic.
Sundaram, son of Dr. Seshadri through second spouse Sulochana, also graduated in medicine, and after training under his father is now independently practicing at the village itself.. Sundaram married Jayashri of the well known Kizhanatham family of the Padmanabhans. (Sundaram will perhaps be the only Doctor who got a US visitor visa, without even appearing at the American Consulate in Madras, when he flew to the US along with wife Jayashri for his honeymoon.)
House next to that belonged to the Mudalipatti family, the place even then was in a dilapidated condition.. Ramaratnam, his wife and another family lived here. Ramaratnam was running a provision store near the railway station, and was an ardent participant in the bhajans – in addition he used to compose verses, and devotional poems on his own, and then sing them at the bhajan.
It is in this house, a Srividya Upasaka lady gave a music upanyasam and performed an all ladies bhajan – most of the village ladies participated in this musical event. Some of us young boys were also present on that occasion. It is around midnight Upasaka lady was possessed of divine spirit and informed the gathering that something sad was happening to one of the village girls and started praying for her. She would not disclose who it was and what the problem was. All that she could say was that the girl was in the clutches of death and all should pray for her life – and every one did tearfully. The group dispersed in the early hours of the next day, and later the village was learn that a lady of the village did indeed pass away that morning.
It was Jayalakshmi, daughter of N.R.Sharma and Kamalam, wife of D.Srinivasan residing at Tiruchi. It was known that she was bitten by a poisonous snake or similar reptile This is one of those irreconcilable facts … there were no phone communication facilities in the village then, why some houses were not even electrified -- Jayam was married to Srinivasan only in the previous year and this shook all residents of the village then.
Pulancheri Narayanan was residing in the next house, with his sons. Narayanan called Nanumama by the village boys was a very jovial type, and used to entertain the youngsters with a lot of stories, some true, some imaginary and some ribald!!.. he was a good singer too. Narayanan’s brother Radhakrishnan used to work for the Military in those days and an occasional visitor to the village – Narayanan’s sons Ramanathan and Kannappan took part in most activities of the village including the bhajans.
And in the next one resided K. Mahadevan of Karattampatti – whose sons Srinivasan, Ramachandran, and Muthukrishnan moved over to Calcutta for a livelihood as was the practice then – Venkataraman and Mani remained in the village along with their sisters Rajam and Jayam. Venkataraman married Brahajam of Tiruchi, and the family moved over to Madras in the fifties, as TMV secured a job with the Madras Advertising Company. His grandson, Sikkil Gurucharan is a very popular carnatic musician these days. TMV’s son Chandrasekaran a Medical Representative with May and Baker, a versatile sales person, and an actor, married into the Sikkil Sisters’ family and hence the tag-on for Gurucharan.. After nearly four decades or so I met Mani at the Sashtiabdapoorthy of K.V. Balasubramanian (younger brother of ’Kivaja’ and son-in-law of Venkatachalam Iyer neighbour of Madhumama) The Calcutta connections of the village still go on, and I learnt that Mani’s son is now working in Calcutta.
Rajam married Jayaraman a ward of Sir R.S. Sarma of Calcutta who later moved to Madras to be in charge of the Madras Advertising Company of the Simpsons group.
Venkatachalam was the owner of the house next but was resident at Arundel Street, in Madras as he was working there.. for a long time this house was occupied by Sivaraman Teacher of the Elementary School at Tiruchendurai, and after retirement Venkatachalam family moved over to the village. Venkatachalam’s wife Thenaal was a niece of popular tamil writer Ki.Va.Jagannathan and it is because of this connection, we were able to bring Kivaja to our village in the fifties for a day when he visited the Chandrasekaraswami Temple, and composed a verse about the Goddess Mrugadarambika (Manenduvalli) - Kothandaraman, Mani, Thangam and Rajeswari are the children of thjs family and are well settled in Madurai and Madras.
The vacant plot next belonged to Narayana Iyer, popularly known as Mavumill Narayanan – the plot was used to grow Greens of different types for a very long time. (to be continued in the third part)
8 comments:
Jai Sri Ram-
An amazing account of my dad (Kalyaman)'s house and roots.
Thanks to Sethuraman sir.
Ven
Very interesting and illuminating to read. However, my only regret is, how you forgot to mention my mother, Rajam, the daughter of Dr. Seshadri, in the article here. Is it because she is not a "doctor" or an "engineer", but a mere home maker/housewife. I am her son, Hari,posting this from the US. I have lived here for 20 years. I actually was very happy to see my grand father being mentioned. I have spent every summer, quarterly, half yearly holidays in Jeeyapuram, and I still cherish fond memories of my childhood.
Dear Hari:
I am glad you took time to read the article in detail and made a comment on it.
If you had observed keenly, the period covered was the thirties and forties and only those who were in the village at that time and contributed to its growth and welfare were mentioned.
Sethuraman
As my brother Hari, mentioned it is very interesting to read about this article and my grandparents.
My mother Rajam was raised in Jeeyapuram in the 40s and when mentioning the family I think her name ought to be mentioned. omission of her name(while all others were mentioned) almost implies that she is not part of the family. I hope you would kindly rectify this. Also, my uncle Ranganthan worked in the Central governement of India and was never in Jeeyapuram.Wonder, how he contributed towards the welfare and growth of Jeeyapuram
Thanks for post about my grandparents
Sharanya
imbedded http://cciworldwide.org/members/Annuity-Calculator.aspx http://cciworldwide.org/members/Bariatric-Surgery.aspx http://cciworldwide.org/members/Electric-Blankets.aspx http://www.netknowledgenow.com/members/Furnace-Filters.aspx http://www.netknowledgenow.com/members/Vending-Machines.aspx
Nice brief and this fill someone in on helped me alot in my college assignement. Thanks you seeking your information.
Hi, very interesting post, greetings from Greece!
hi, am vaidyanathan son of ramarathnam who moved to mandya for business ,who was grandson of ayyavu aiyyer... very happy to note all those changes... am a practising anaesthesiologist and intensivist in mysore... me and my brothers cherish our days in jeeyapuram where we used to be there during every summer holidays and radha and seetha kalyanams,,,....
Post a Comment