Temple in the crowd

As NSC Bose Road winds down through Sowcarpet, it gets ever more narrow until you wonder how two vehicles can ever pass each other by. Suddenly, you sense space. The road opens out just a bit and there you see this wall, the red-and-white stripes identifying it as part of a temple. From the peacock placed on the wall, you would guess the temple has to do with Subramanya - and you would be correct.

It is not a large temple, but considering the bustle of the area around it, the space is more than ample. The main deity is seen with his consorts, Valli and Devasena, the former's idol showing four arms - a rather unique representation of this Goddess. 

This temple is probably between 200 and 300 years old, going by the local stories. However, there are also stories that tell of Agastyar - whose image is also somewhere on the temple walls - having prayed to Subramanya in this temple. Well, you can choose what to believe!

Who is this Adam?

This lovely, four-storeyed building on NSC Bose Road, just across from the Flower Bazaar police station, has been gracing the neighbourhood for almost 80 years, now. Yet, there is little information about who the building - the writing on it announces it is Adam's Building in 1923 - was named after and what it it is today.

Google maps indicates it is now a lodging house - if you do not trust that, the sign on the ground floor - Vijaya Lodge - will sway even the most sceptical. It seems a pity that there is little information, for the well maintained facade of this building seems to be inviting us to learn more about it.

Another day, another mystery - until the next time at NSC Bose Road, to ask the manager of Vijaya Lodge if heknows anything about the building's history.



Gotham!

Late in the evening, the folks of George Town have finished their supper and are taking a bit of rest. Can't really say this place goes to sleep, but around the big buildings of NSC Bose Road, activity cools off a bit and moves into the streets off the main road.

One such evening, a few months ago. The Bombay Mutual Building seems to be lit up in colours. Maybe it could do with more lights, but can't think of any other place in Chennai that can double up as Gotham!

Temple time

There is a story around how this temple was built by a Pakistani. How true is that story? I haven't heard it from any authentic source, if only because this temple predates the Pakistan nation by a couple of hundred years. Apparently there was someone from Lahore who was the man behind the construction of this temple, but the legend goes that the temple is about 200 years old.

The Bairagi Mutt is itself probably only slightly older. Although there are many shrines inside this complex, but the most prominent one is that of Lord Venkateswara and hence the name. As with quite a few other temples, while it is commonly called Bairagi Mutt, the full name of this temple is "Arulmigu Thiruvengadamudayan Venkatesa Perumal Thirukkoil". 

Bairagi Mutt will do, I guess!

Loane fountain

Well, don't judge the park by the fountain. That the centerpiece of Sriramulu Poonga on Prakasam Road is dry is no reflection on the status of the park itself. Confused? Well, old timers of Madras would probably understand better if I'd used the earlier names - Loane Square Garden on Broadway.

That garden was commissioned by Samuel Joshua Loane, probably as a bulwark against the space becoming messy and unsanitary once again. 'Once again', because sometime around the mid-nineteenth century, Loane had just finished cleaning up Popham's Market on Broadway. Stephen Popham had reportedly envisaged the market - for meat, vegetables and condiments - being spic and span. After his death, it seems to have degenerated considerably, to the extent of a garden being named after its rescuer.

Fast forward to the end of the 20st century; Loane Square Garden is in pretty much the same state that Popham's Market was, a hundred and fifty years earlier. Being used as a parking lot for trucks carting produce to and from Kotwal Chavadi, the Garden was "a public lavatory masquerading as a park and a startling testimonial to the failure of Stephen Popham's most basic idea - sanitation - to take root". Now, it has once again been transformed into an oasis of greenery in what's otherwise a rather grey and dusty district. I'm not very sure about the connection between Potti Sriramulu and this park, which is now named after him, but as with many other places in the city, it continues to be better known by its old name!

Gated parking

Seeing all those cars zip around George Town, one wonders where they go to rest for the night. For a long while, I was under the impression that the cars only brought the traders into the Town; when the day's work was done, they would go away from these congested enclaves, to their garden houses along the river Adayar to come back refreshed for the next day's work.

Obviously, that is not the case. Many of those conducting their business in George Town live fairly close by, if not in the Town itself. And the cars are normally parked inside the house itself - at least, with the shutters pulled down on the portico, there is nothing between the house and the road. Maybe these are additional cars, or more likely, these cars were housed in the building that used to occupy this space - and they keep coming back to their space out of sheer habit!

Writing instruments

A shop specializing in pens seems to be a bit of an anachronism, but Gem & Co. is merely one of the more visible such specialist shops in George Town. It has been around for over 80 years, having been established by M.C.Cunnan Chetty in the mid 1920s. In its heyday, Gem & Co. was one of the largest pen companies in south India. Name a brand, and Gem & Co. would have it in stock: Pelikan, Sheafer, Parker - all those brands were carried in pretty large quantities by Gem & Co., thanks to which they still have a large inventory of spare parts for all those pens. Also in that inventory, supposedly, is a significant lode of parts for vintage Mont Blanc pens.

Apart from all these well known brands, Gem & Co. had their in-house brand: the Gama Pen. I believe the brand still exists today, but has fallen in its cachet. Today's Gamas are plastic, steel-nibbed items, probably one very much like another and therefore lacking in individuality. But through the 1940s and '50s, when the brand was new, they had very specific sub-brands. And for its high end brands - the ones that were sold between Rs.50 and Rs.75 in those days - the nibs were made of 14-carat gold, coming with their own usage rating. A number stamped on the nib, e.g., '15', indicated the years of continuous use the nib could be put to.

As if establishing this shop were not claim enough to fame, M.C. Cunnan Chetty has another reason to be remembered by the citizens of Madras. It was he who made the original 'man missing' complaint in a 1952 case which went on to become the deliciously horrifying "Alavandar Murder Case"!

Small court

With the sprawling campus of the High Court of Judicature at Madras (to give it its proper title; some parts of Chennai are still Madras!) literally around the corner from this building, few people pay attention to the processes of justice carried out here. Even within the pecking order of the subordinate courts, the Metropolitan Magistrates come pretty low down - in fact they are 17th on the list of Subordinate Courts in Chennai, coming in after the Court of Small Causes. No great legal razzle-dazzle happens here, for the Magistrates Courts deal with the minutiae - affidavits, remand orders, minor warrants and suchlike things.

Moreover, the Metropolitan Magistrates Court at George Town is the smallest collection of these magistrates in the city, with only 5 of the city's 26 MMs operating from here. And yet, this building manages to hold its own, mainly by being quite different from its neighbours on Rajaji Salai. While the buildings of the General Post Office and the State Bank of India's Main Branch are rich with architectural flourishes, this one just sits there as a regular, 3-storied, boxy structure, with just that little kink in its facade.

It still has some vanity; what I had earlier mistaken for patches of white plaster, or bits of handbills stuck to the building, are actually mosaic tiles, forming beautiful patterns, and even going as far as to sport a 'photographic negative' effect along one line on the top floor!

Everyday antique?

It is said that the first 'irons' to press wrinkles out of cloth were used in China in the 1st century BCE. But when they began to appear in the western world of the 17th century CE, they had forsaken the Chinese technology and were instead being heated from the outside. After a while, it was accepted that the Chinese had got it right and charcoal irons, boxes with heavy plates at the bottom and a hinged lid that had a handle attached became the standard design.

A certain Mary Florence Potts of Iowa made some improvements to the earlier, externally heated 'sadirons'. She first had the baseplate pointed at both ends, which enabled the sadiron to be moved back and forth, rather than in just one direction. Further, she patented a 'detachable handle' design and sold her product as a set of 3 sadirons and one detachable handle - with that, one of the irons was always being heated up, one was cooling down and the third was being put to use all the time.

These days, of course, electric irons with thermostats and internal heating elements have replaced the charcoal iron almost everywhere. Yet, a sight that would not be out of place at Gochsheim Castle (reputed to have the largest collection of over 1300 historical irons) is played out in several areas of Chennai every morning, when the local iron-man sets up his practice for the day. The flames leaping out from the maw of the appliance remind us that for all our modernity, our clothes continue to depend upon a technology that's been around for over 2000 years!

The 'Old Pagoda'

There is apprently a reference to this temple going back to 1652, but I have not been able to find that. However, James Talboys Wheeler, in his 'Madras in the Olden Time: 1702 - 1727' refers to a document "signed by President Baker, Agent Greenhill and Mr. Gurney dated in the year 1652", concerning the settlement of a dispute between the Right-Hand- and Left-Hand-Castes in the area north of Fort St George. That document names this temple as "Malley Carjun's old Pagoda", the use of the adjective supporting the claim that the temple is more than 500 years old.

Legends of the temple founding date it to between 800 and 1000 years ago: the discovery of a Siva lingam in the midst of a jasmine (malli) garden - apparently this area was thick with them - led to the construction of this temple. Today, the area is thick with various business establishments; many with tiny, one room offices, keeping the wheels of commerce moving through from the port to the city and beyond. In the midst of all that hubbub, the Mallikeswarar temple on Linghi Chetty Street is an oasis of serenity. In the past few years, the rajagopuram, built by a devotee in 1923 has been renovated and the teakwood temple car has also been restored; in 2008, the car went out on its festival run, after a gap of 58 years.

But if it is the 'Mallikeswarar' temple, how did it get corrupted as "Mally Carjun's Pagoda"? That's a riddle which will have to wait for another day!

Where are they?

The first ever World House Sparrow Day celebrated today seeks to put the spotlight on the plight of these little chappies, mainly because it is assumed they are in no danger of dying out. They were all over Chennai, once upon a time. Today, they are to be seen only in a few localities, places where urban development, in a sense, has remained where it was about a generation ago - like Linghi Chetty Street, where today's picture was taken.

The fall of the house sparrow (Passer domesticus) has been attributed to several factors, from modern buildings not having the eaves preferred as nesting sites by the sparrows, to microwave radiation from cell-phone towers. Some of them seem reasonable but some border the consipiracy-theory category. This is not just a Chennai-only phenomenon, but really a global concern; as yet, the IUCN does not regard the P. domesticus as being a 'vulnerable' species, though they acknowledge that the population trend is declining. Researchers too are hard pressed to come up with an explanation that covers all the facts, especially when many still believe that the house sparrows continue to be as common as it was during their childhood - even if they can't remember having seen them near their apartment.

One reason, from a Chennai newspaper a few years ago: "With diminishing tolerance among the younger generation, sparrows are denied entry into houses to nest and breed. People even enlist expert opinion on how best to get rid of nesting sparrows." Well, they did create a lot of noise and a bit of mess in our house during my childhood, but I'd rather take that than have these little birds go extinct!

No more shows

Raghupathy Venkiah was one of the first in Madras to foresee the potential of cinema. Though his first cinema theatre, 'Gaiety', was the third in Madras after Mrs. Klug's 'Bioscope' and Warwick Major's 'Electric Theatre', he lasted much longer in the business. Soon after setting up Gaiety just off Mount Road in 1914, he went to heart of the city and set up 'Crown' next to the Mint, in 1916. These were followed by 'Globe' (later renamed 'Roxy') at Purasawakkam in 1918.

The last of the three had the shortest life; it was shut down sometime in the mid 1990s. That building was used as an exhibition hall for a while, but was pulled down a few years ago. Gaiety has also given way, the empty lot being used for the filming of 'Kanthaswamy' recently. Nothing remains of those two theatres, but the Crown is slightly different. It has also shut down, but it is the only one of the three that still has a part of its facade standing, just fronting the empty lot behind. It will not last many weeks, however.

Wonder if the 'Imperial', the fourth of Raghupathy Venkiah's theatres, is still standing. It is in Madurai, however, so I'll have to wait for someone from that city to let me know!

Music Street

Madras of the 19th century was an attractive destination not only for traders and business-people, but also for many others. Among them were the musicians, several of who relocated to Madras. They were then influential in bringing in some of the musical greats, if not to stay in the city, to at least make their visits regular occurances, typically coinciding with one of the many festivals.

One such musician/composer was 'Veena' Kuppier. Although he moved only a short distance to reach George Town from Tiruvottiyur, his hometown, it must have been a significant decision in the early nineteenth century. His patron was Kovur Sundaresa Mudaliar, who made Kuppier the samasthana vidwan of Kovur, a village that Kuppier had probably never even visited earlier. Kuppier was not only an expert vainika (veena player), but also a violinist and singer - accomplishments which led him to be called gana chakravarti (emperor of music). It was Kuppier who, on behalf of Kovur Sundaresa Mudaliar, persuaded Thyagaraja to visit Madras in 1839. Though the great composer stayed at Sundaresa Mudaliar's town-house on Bunder Street, he did visit Kuppier's house and also sang in praise of the family deity.

All this information was gathered much later. This photo was taken more because the street sign is of a style that was used maybe 50 years or so ago; the name 'Kuppier' sounded odd; familiar, yet foreign. I guess I couldn't have been more mistaken about that!

Town temple - the twin

Although the twin town temples - of Chenna Kesavaperumal and Chenna Malleswarar - cover roughly the same area, it does not appear to be so from their entrances. The entrance to the former is pretty much on the road; being gopuram-less, it is not easy to spot unless you know what you're looking for. The entrance to the latter is tucked into a corner - what you have to do is to go further north on Devaraja Mudali Street, past the entrance to the Chenna Kesavaperumal temple and turn left into NSC Bose Road. Do you see it now?

Ah, you probably missed it amidst all the shops and their signboards and you've probably walked much further down NSC Bose Road than you intended to - so now, turn around and walk east: there! The high wall behind the shops, you see it now, don't you? Where the wall ends is the doorway and now you can go in for your darshan of Chenna Malleswarar.

There is probably an easier way to get in - as both temples share a common tank, I guess one can skirt around the tank and get to one from the other. I have not tried that so far, though!

Small road

This was the first - and still the only - road on which I could name all the buildings. Not a difficult task, for there are only five of them. The youngest of them is the Kuralagam, about forty years old, housing countless offices of the state government. Coming up north on Muthuswamy Road and turning into the Esplanade Road (which's what this one is called), all the five buildings will be on your left. In order, they are the Raja Annamalai Mandram, the United India Building, the Chennai House (originally the Burmah Shell building), South Indian Chamber of Commerce and finally the Kuralagam.

What of the other side of the road? You will no doubt remember that the British had cleared the area around Fort St George in the middle of the 18th century. This road was at the north-western corner of the Esplanade that was created. Much later, part of the Esplanade was used to house the buildings of the Madras High Court. The walls of the court run almost the full length of the this road, except where there is a bus terminus at the southern end. The court buildings - including the two towers of the Dr. Ambedkar Law College on the right - are accessed through NSC Bose Road.

Now, don't you think remembering all the buildings on this small road is child's play?

Extreme cycling

As on many other streets of George Town, walking up Mint Street is an art; put in a couple of conditions - one, that you will not pause in your steps and two, you will not come into bodily contact with anyone - and the walk can easily be turned into an urban challenge that cannot be easily overcome. Though it widens at certain points, Mint Street is predominantly narrow, the kind of narrowness caused by lack of pavements, vendors sitting on the sides and haphazard parking. People on two wheels - or on feet - will probably travel one-and-a-half times the distance they intend to travel, having to constantly veer off to avoid the traffic and fellow pedestrians.

But here was a set of travellers intent on taking the shortest path to their destination; the little fellow must have been just 6 or 7 years old and he was putting all his might into pedalling, trying to stay ahead of the truck. The truck, in turn was looking for an opening to get ahead of the tricycles and did not seem to be paying attention to the kids - thankfully, one of them jumped off the cycle, bringing the whole set to a halt before anything more damaging could happen!

Town temple

Beri Thimappa, who, as the dubash of Day and Cogan, was instrumental in negotiating the grant of land that would grow into Madras, appears to have been a far-sighted man. He recognized that if the 'natives' had to be persuaded into moving close to the new 'factory' at Medraspatnam, they had to have facilities for their spiritual needs; acting on this, he appears to have had a temple built in fairly quick order. While the exact date of its building is unknown, it appears that both Nagabattan (who was gunpowder-maker to Francis Day) and Thimappa made contributions generous enough to be recorded, the former in 1646 and the latter in 1648. It is possible that what started out as a small shrine to Chennakeshwara Perumal was expanded, thanks to these (and other, smaller,) contributions, to cover an area of over 8000 square yards, enclosing sanctums for both Perumal and Mahadeva, thereby catering to both the Vaishnavas and the Shaivites who were doing business with the British East India Company by then.

As the years rolled by, the area occupied by the temple contracted and in 1757, it was just under 24,000 square feet. The British, with their plans for an esplanade, found the temple to be a hindrance (it was in the place where the Madras High Court stands today) and therefore pulled it down. There must have been some outcry when the 'Town Temple' (also called 'Patnam Perumal' Temple) was demolished, for the East India Company very soon offered to help reconstruct the temple and gave a piece of land equal to the area occupied by the Town Temple, a little further away (at what is today Devaraja Mudali Street). The reconstruction took the shape of not one, but two distinct temples - the Chenna Kesavaperumal and the Chenna Malleswarar. The money provided by the Company - 1173 pagodas (about Rs.4,400) - was hardly enough for such grand plans, so Manali Muthukrishna Mudaliar, then dubash to Governor Pigot, opened a subscription list, to which he contributed 5202 pagodas. The total subscription of 15,562 pagodas was gathered and the temples were consecrated in 1766.

Both temples continue to be in active use and the entrance to the Chenna Kesavaperumal temple is shown in the photo. Without the gopurams that are a feature of almost every temple here, it is possible to overlook this as being just a gathering hall of some sort. If you do so, however, you will miss the 'first temple of Madras' - one that also contributes in some way to the city's name today!

By George! Again!!

Rather than the statue itself, it is the plaque on its pedestal that has come up. Up on this pedestal is King Goerge V, standing tall, sceptre in hand and facing east, looking towards the Madras High Court and beyond to the Port. In 1913, when the public of Madras wanted to put up this statue, the entire cost was picked up by one man - Govindoss Chathoorbhoojadoss, who was appointed Sheriff of Madras in 1914, the same year this statue was unveiled.

The Hub

Any Chennaiite wondering about the relevance of George Town in these modern times must spend an hour or so at the Broadway bus terminus. That it is a crowded, bustling bus depot goes without saying. That you can hear some fifteen different languages being spoken should also not come as a surprise. But the sheer number of Metropolitan Transport Corporation (MTC) buses coming through is overwhelming. In the 15 minutes or so that I spent there on a Sunday afternoon, I counted 18 buses going out; considering that it was a non-business day and non-peak hour, it is not far-fetched to estimate that at least 1,500 buses would pass through this terminus every day.

That makes Broadway the largest of MTC's hubs; and remember, this is after the wholesale vegetable market having been shifted away from the George Town area and after the inter-state bus terminus also having been moved away to the other corner of the city. Despite those moves, George Town continues to be a hub for commercial activity; also, its proximity to the Madras High Court, the District Collectorate, the Port of Chennai and several other government and private institutions ensures that every resident of Chennai will have to pass through it one day or the other.

If only those changes hadn't been made, Broadway would have been absolutely unmanageable today. So, if you think you're in the most happening place in the city, come here, stay a while and think again!

Lasting faith

Amidst the hustle and bustle of the 'Town', this building seems to be slightly out of place. The last remaining structure of what was once a large complex of buildings, it celebrated its sesquicentennial a couple of months ago. The origin of the insititution it houses (used to house, rather) can be traced back to 1836, when Rev. George James Laurie and Rev Matthew Bowie, the Chaplains of the Church of Scotland in Madras, requested headquarters for a missionary to run the St Andrews School which they had started a year or so earlier. And thus it was that the Rev. John Anderson came to Madras; in 1837, he opened the General Assembly's School in Armenian Street, with the core group of 59 pupils moving from the St Andrews School. It was to be the first of many schools founded by this Scotsman, whose love for education seems to have been greater than his love for the gospel.

The school grew; in 1877 it was re-christened as "Madras Christian College". College House, College Chapel, College Hall - buildings joined the College itself and, difficult as it is to imagine now, George Town became an important centre for higher education. It was only in 1919 that the Senatus Committee recommended the College's move, upon which it relocated right across the city, to Tambaram, where it continues to function today. Sometime in between (Mr. Muthiah puts it as being after 1895), the College Chapel and College Hall were switched; the latter, which was called Anderson Hall in memory of the college's founder, became Anderson Church.

That holy association has probably saved this building from the fate that befell its companions; though it is listed as a heritage building by INTACH, there is no guarantee that such listing will save it from demolition. A better protection, however, is provided by an active congregation, which travels from various parts of the city to this building!