Shipping line

It is highly unlikely that anyone reading this would get to travel in a train on this line. No, that's not meant as a challenge, for this is not a line meant to carry passenger traffic. It runs inside the Port of Chennai and is meant to carry freight. And that's rather unique, because there are very few railway lines that are operated outside the control of the Indian Railways, and this is one of them. 

Besides railway lines, but the Port of Chennai also has a Terminal Shunting Yard within it. The lines run for 41km within the harbour; there are designated sidings for specific kinds of cargo - apart from those for general dry bulk cargo and a dedicated sidings for container traffic. The tracks run for a few kilometres outside the harbour area as well - without that connect, how could goods ever get out of the port!

What's in a name?

You have to be a dubashi to figure out what's awkward with this street's name. Leading off from NSC Bose Road, across the road from the High Court complex, it is quite possible that it could lead to some kind of barracks. No awkwardness, for sure, if you know only English. If you know only Tamizh, you wouldn't be too worried about sign saying "Baker Theru". After all, there are quite a few streets in the city whose Tamizh names sound quite different from their English versions. The big question in this case, however, is about which version is correct. Is it Baker, or Barracks? Or was there a Baker in the Barracks?

Chennai's early history has a few candidates for the 'Baker' in this street; Henry Davidson Love's "Vestiges of Old Madras 1640-1800" lists eleven Bakers in its index. Of those, six are merely name entries, and two are related to one of the more storied Bakers. The first of the remaining three was also the first on another list - in 1652, Aaron Baker took over as the first President of Fort St George - an early attempt at creating a Madras Presidency. The second, Charles Baker, is listed as a 'Civil Servant', with some mention of "his pursuits". But it is the third one who is the likeliest candidate to be the eponym for this street.

That man was Captain George Baker, whose first visit to Madras seems to have been as the captain of the sloop Cuddalore, arriving in the city in 1756. For some reason, this Baker seems to have had a run of stop-gap appointments: his captaincy of the sloop seems to have been because of a heavy death toll at Negrais, Burma and the sloop sailed out of Madras with a new captain (John Howes). Baker seems to have been within a whisker's breadth of being appointed as the Ambassador to the King of Burma before his return from Negrais. The listing of Chennai's mayors lists a Captain George Baker for less than a year (1765-1765) and then again as an interim bearer of the office in 1773. But the reason for his being memorialized in the city is better explained by Sriram here!

Off cue?

Wikipedia tells us that games played on a cloth covered table, using a cue stick to strike smooth balls, have been around since the 15th century CE, under the generic term 'billiards'. They evolved from outdoor games like croquet and bowls, and have diversified into a wide range that includes billiards, snooker, pool and several variations of each of these. Given that timeline, cue sports gained popularity in Madras fairly late. The following it his is neither very vocal nor very visible - but with my limited experience, that could be true of cue sports in most places in India. 

Considering that Madras was the host to the first ever All India Amateur Billiards Tournament (in 1904), it is reasonable to expect the game to be a little more popular here than elsewhere in the country. However, for some reason, it is not so. I cannot recall any international - or national - billiards champion from Chennai. The same holds true for snooker; and that is even more galling, because that game is supposed to have originated in India. According to the Billiards and Snooker Federation of India, it was created in Ooty - and therefore in the Madras Presidency - in the year 1881. While that claim is contested, with the rival version having Jabalpur as the town and 1875 as the date, we shall in this case accept the version put out by BSFI. 

The Tamil Nadu Billiards & Snooker Association, makes no such claim, however. Having been formed in 1981, a century after the birth of snooker, the TNBSA is more concerned with "controlling and guiding the game in the state", than with weighing in on historical claims. I am not sure what level of control they exercised during the early 1990s: there was a mini-boom in the game in the city, with snooker parlours being set up across the city and, for a brief while, being the to-be-seen-in places. Whatever they did, or did not, one wishes they would soon find themselves a better office space than in this nondescript building on Avvai Shanmugham Salai! 

Nothing on the right is left

Moving from the white-on-blue lettering that seems to have been the favourite of signboard makers over a couple of centuries into this rather jazzy red-on-yellow scheme must have been the decision of a very brave man. Or someone so secure in the permanency of the business to not bother with such trivialities as signboard colours. Such a signboard, made around 50 years ago - that's a guess, and yours might be better than mine - still advertises the supplies provided by the Office Equipment Company, of Armenian Street, Madras.

Although I have not myself seen the offices of this company, I am fairly sure it continues to exist. It must be somewhere upstairs in one of those buildings on Armenian Street, trying to stay relevant for the office supplies and 'requisites' of the day. 

Considering that no one below the age of 40 has conceivably never seen a cyclostyle machine, it would be fair to say that as a business, nothing on the right of this sign is left, these days!

Famous merchant

The whole concept of Madras, as you may know, came into being due to the supposed availability of fabrics in the hinterland, which a 'factory' in Madras could exploit. Having started off on this flawed premise, it was necessary to ensure that the city did supply cloth of various kinds. Therefore, it does not seem surprising at all that a Gujarati comes to Madras to set up a business styled as "Benares, Kollegal, Madura Cloth & Musk Merchants". Mani Sunker Davay set up this business in 18... and brought his son into it later. Today, it is run by his descendants, possibly in the same location that the founder conducted his business. For that reason alone, it deserves to be famous.

The kind of cloth that they trade in includes garments designed for ceremonial occasions - veshtis, angavastrams and the like. Benares is of course famous for its silks; Kollegal is well known for its gold-laced cloth, besides its silk weaving. The Gazetteer of South India, sometime in the 1880s, notes that "...some of the silk cloths made here cost as much as Rs.300 each, or even more, according to the gold and silver embroidery...". Madura - with its famous art of making lacework in gold and silver, for the borders of turbans and other cloths. That Mani Sunker traded in such cloth shows off the nature of his clientele. Even today, he is the preferred supplier to famous singers - Sanjay Subrahmanyan being one who swears by Mani Sunker Davay for all his concert wardrobes.

But the most intriguing feature of this board, for me, is its break with 'tradition'. There are many who still refer to this city as 'Madras', refusing to acknowledge its 1996 renaming to Chennai. They all forget the fact that even before 1996, it was very common, if not the standard practice, to use 'Madras' in English versions and 'Chennai' in Tamizh. However, this signboard not only shows the word "Madras" in Tamizh, but has spelt it using a script that was replaced sometime in the 1970s!

Uprooted

If you happened to drive across Chennai yesterday, you would have been surprised at the density of greenery lining the roads. No matter what part of the city you were in, the green roadsides would have been the default sight. It is not as if the city grew green thumbs overnight; all of the green would have been the effect of Cyclone Vardah, the most severe storm to hit Chennai in a generation. That's what they say, but I will go further to say that C. Vardah is the most severe of the past 50 years at least.

The official statistics of the numbers of fallen trees is in 3 digits, but most certainly many more than that have fallen. One estimate says 12,000 trees. There are all kinds of debates about which trees were able to weather the storm better than the others. In general, it seems that the "local" species stood up to the winds, shedding a lot of their leaves, and some branches, while the "exotic" species were more easily brought down in their entirety. 

The jury is still out on that; but being a domestic species was obviously no guarantee that Vardah would be gentle on you. This peepul (Ficus religiosa) tree - I'm told it was over 70 years old - just toppled over, bringing down with it an industrial shed, an electricity post and the power cables running along it. The whole locality has been without power for the past two days. Maybe one of the other trees in the background - the neem (Azadirachta indica) or the coconut palm (Cocos nucifera) - would not have caused this extent of damages!

Mountain fort

With Madras becoming the favoured spot of the British in the mid-17th century, towns that were important in an earlier era faded away to being footnotes. One such is Senjee (செஞ்சி, also as Gingee), about 150km from Chennai. Actually, it wasn't much of a town at any time, but a complex fortification built on three hillocks. It is situated close to the intersection of today's NH4 and SH77; that leads me to assume it would have been in a similar position vis-a-vis yesteryears' trade routes. And anyone occupying this would have strategic control of those routes, for sure.

The hillock in the picture is Rajagiri, atop which sits the largest of the Senjee fortifications. There is also a fort at the base of this hillock; one needs to get past that to be able to go up the Rajagiri. Inside the lower fortification are several buildings - a couple of temples, a mosque, a large granary, living quarters for the soldiers and the king (and a huge tank for the elephants to bathe in), a magazine and the "Kalyana Mahal" - no, not necessarily a wedding hall, but that's what you see in the foreground, just inside the fort wall. Kalyana Mahal is a "pleasure pavilion", with a central tank, fountains at all the seven levels, with the open verandahs allowing the breeze to blow in from any side, to be cooled by the fountains.

Though the British apparently called it "Troy of the East", Senjee is still not a significant tourist magnet. That is a shame, really. Maybe the steep trek up the Rajagiri dissuades many from experiencing the fortifications fully. The ASI tries to do its little bits and pieces. But woefully short on budgets, there is only so much they can help with. It is time the citizens contribute - at the very least, by visiting and buying the entrance tickets!

A path ends

The grounds of the Theosophical Society - Adyar, spread over 250 acres, have very few named roads. Actually there are very few proper roads inside the grounds, for that matter; they are named after the founders or early presidents of the TS-A. So that takes care of the nomenclature for six of the paths, the ones that show up on Google Maps. Getting around the TS-A involves many other paths, the ones that are not paved, the ones that do not show up on the maps.

Here is one such path, running west-east, parallel to the Adyar river, along its southern bank. I am guessing it was called the "River Path" much earlier, and that the addition of "Radha Burnier" was as a tribute to her memory, after she passed away in 2013. She was the seventh President of the Theosophical Society, holding that office for 33 years. Doing so, she edged out the Society's first president, Henry Steel Olcott, who was in office for 32 years between 1875 and 1907. 

In the 141 years it has been around, the TS has had only 8 presidents - the current one, Tim Boyd, began his term in 2014. He is just 53 now, and has a good chance of beating Radha Burnier's record. At this rate, it will be few centuries before all the paths and byways of the TS get their names!

Weather report?

Cyclone Vardah is expected to make landfall this evening. It has been looming as a menacing presence in the Bay of Bengal since Thursday last, building up its fury and even practicing its menace over Thailand and the Andaman and Nicobar Islands. It is expected to be the most severe storm in over a generation to hit northern Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh, the region where it is expected to move over from sea to land. There have been so many instances in the past where such cyclones have veered northwards, sometimes over 90º, to threaten Odisha or even Bangladesh. 

But Cyclone Vardah seems to be charting a straight path. And it is threatening wind speeds of 95kmph+; Chennai is the biggest city in its way, and we are all bracing for impact this afternoon. 

Last evening was the proverbial calm before the storm. The sea at the Marina Beach was a little rougher than usual. The mounted police cantered up and down the beach, ensuring that folks were staying up, away from the water. In the midst of it all was this gentleman, probably trying to re-assure members of his family that Cyclone Vardah is not all that fearsome at is being made out - but then, we shall know the truth of that in a few hours from now!

Another gate, another beyond

In case you missed it, the British were not the first European power to establish its presence in India. They were rather slow off the mark, with the Portuguese and the Dutch definitely getting in ahead of them and the French and Danes running them close in the early stages. The Dutch, for a while, were the masters of the west coast, and had a significant presence in Sri Lanka as well, before shifting their focus to the Dutch East Indies, later to become Indonesia.

Not that the Dutch did not know the Coromandel Coast. Their earliest settlement was at Masulipatnam, in 1605. Within a few years, they had expanded further along the coast to the south. By then, the Portuguese were already well established at Mylapore (San Thome) and also at another ancient seaport further north. That was Pulicat, or Pazhaverkadu, which had been trading with the Arab and the Mediterranean kingdoms for several centuries. In 1610, the Dutch dispossessed the Portuguese and established Fort Geldria in 1613. It was the only fortification of the Dutch in India, protecting not just the trade in cloth, but also the transportation of indentured labour to other colonies of the Dutch.

The Dutch established their cemetery, according to the inscription above its gate, in 1656. The gravestones show dates for at least about a century after that. It was in 1825 that the town was ceded to the British. Not only did the British not invest much in the town, they let the earlier buildings decline. The cemetery was also forgotten, overgrown with vegetation and hidden from passers-by. It was sometime in the 2000s that it was re-discovered, and has since then been rather well cared for!

A different world

Even a rudimentary knowledge of Indian iconography will be enough to know this is representation of Mahavishnu in his form as Padmanabhaswamy - the one with a lotus growing out of his navel - resting on Anantasesha, the divine serpent. Also in the picture are Hanuman, Lakshmi, Siva, Brahma and Narada. This entire tableau is placed above an entrance on Wall Tax Road. 

With so many deities, you might believe that the entrance is to a place of religious significance. In some senses, that might be true, given our penchant for elevating our heroes to god-like levels; but the reality is that once you go past this, you would be entering the fantasy world of the movies. At least, that is how it was until a few years ago. Last year, the posters announced the advent of a multi-storey residential complex, confirming that the Padmanabha has indeed played out its last show, about 5 years ago.

Padmanabha Theatre began life as the Regal; does this tableau go back to those days, when it was placed to bring good luck, or did it come up after (possibly) a change of ownership and name, with the new owner trying to ensure that the re-branding sticks, with this visual representation? If the latter, it couldn't have been too successful - even today, the MTC bus routes indicate this stage as 'Regal'!

Pits!

Any theatre would have a designated location for the control booth - the space for technicians controlling the stage lights and sounds to sit and do their work while the performance is in progress. The ideal location for this is, in some ways, the place where the best seats in the house should be; far enough away from the stage to have a full view of what is happening on it, but close enough to not miss out any of the details.

Chennai's theatres have different approaches to placing the control booth. Many of them - at least among the ones I have seen - have them right up front, just at the edge of the stage. The Museum Theatre has it jammed in the centre aisle, crushing into the seats nearby. Obviously, given the age of that building, it is a much later addition and it gives a definite appearance of having been jerry-rigged, as if it has been placed there just for this performance and no more.

The control booth at the Mutha Venkata Subba Rao Hall is much better organized. I don't recall seeing this space when I have been on the ground floor - and so I guess it blends well with the seating. But when looking down on the balcony, it looks like a fairly comfortable area to sit and work - and the best spot to watch the performance from!

Half mast

It has been over 48 hours since the ailing Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu breathed her last at a Chennai hospital, but many parts of the city seem to be in mourning still. Even the airport seemed to be deserted last evening; the usual jockeying of vehicles, to be ahead of the rest in the queue, seemed to be desultory at best.

All that was because of J. Jayalalithaa, whose impact on the country's psyche seemed disproportionate to her political presence at the national level. It is difficult for an outsider to comprehend the hold she had on the person-on-the-Tamil Nadu-street; the editorial in yesterday's The Hindu gives you glimpses of why. But it is well nigh impossible to describe an image crafted over 4 decades and more to be encapsulated into a few sheets of newsprint.

The national flag at Chennai airport is flying at half mast. That is because the state has announced a 7-day official mourning for its former Chief Minister. "Former", only because she is not around any longer. But for millions of Tamil Nadu, she will always be their "Nirandhara Mudalvar" (perennial Chief Minister)!

Old type

Has this building been around for as long as the year on that small brown board over the door? It is quite likely, given that this was a locality where a lot of publications got their start. What's that? You are not able to make out the board? Well, you can click on the picture to get it to open - you will then still have to enlarge it. For all those pains, you will get to know that the board proclaims "Sastra Sanjeevini Press" and then, in even more faded letters, "ESTD 1900". 

So what did the Sastra Sanjeevini Press do? As best as I have been able to find out, it published largely in two genres: Religion and Linguistics. It will take much more effort before I can hope to have more information about the history of this institution. But thanks to the Digital Library of India at the IISc, it is possible to access at least a dozen titles published by this House. The oldest of them goes back to 1901 - and that, somehow validates the founding date. The most recent is dated 1934, so that begs the question - did Sastra Sanjeevini Press continue to turn out those tomes? 

Chances are that it diversified and went into some other genres - maybe ones that the Digital Library project chose to not archive. But the interesting part is that the oldest title in that list - "Bhagavan Siddhantha Saravali", by Subrahmanya Sastri can be printed on demand, and made available in the hard-bound form (US $8.93) or as a paperback (US$6.89). Wonder if any of those greenbacks get back to this building in Chennai!

All the Gods

Tucked away off a side street on Radhakrishnan Salai is a rather unique institution. The Sufi Dar is run by a Trust that was founded in 1971 as a dedication to a Sindhi saint, Puj Shahenshah Baba Nebhraj Sahib. Originally, it functioned from Walltax Road, but moved to Radhakrishnan Salai to cater to the growing band of the Puj Baba's devotees. There is no reason to believe that the Puj Baba had ever come to this part of the world. The founder of the Sufi Dar Trust, Ratanchand Sahib, was himself an accidental visitor to Madras. When he was in Madras, he met Dr. Hariram, another visitor to the city, but one who believed that his presence here was pre-destined so that he could initiate Ratanchand. 

Ratanchand Sahib attained samadhi in 2013. The Sufi Dar Trust continues to carry forward his ideals. They believe that the Puj Baba can be accessed by anyone, not just a follower. But to make any supplicant of the Baba more comfortable, the Sufi Dar accommodates many deities: pictures of Sufi saints, Hindu Gods, the Sikh gurus, Sai Baba, Jesus and Mary, and leaders of various sects, as well as several statues depicting all of these Gods, are all present in the Sufi Dar. 

Haven't been inside yet. When there is so much divinity around, one must be there in a proper frame of mind, so as to not be overwhelmed by their presence! 

Temple benefactors

Going along Mint Street, one will come across several temples; it would be very difficult to see any that is grander than the Chennai Arulmigu Ekambareswarar Temple. As with several of the old temples of the city, this one is also claimed to be more than 500 years old; an intermediate period, which is difficult to confirm or deny. What is possible to confirm is that this temple was in existence in the early 18th century, being important enough to feature in the earliest map of the city, dating circa 1710. 

The more believable version of this temple's origin dates it to the 1680s, when Alangatha Pillai (more about him here), one of the dubashes employed by the East India Company makes a generous contribution to build a temple to his favourite deity, Ekambareswarar. The temple was built close to Fort St George, Alangatha Pillai's workplace. In those days, that part of the world was inhabited by washers and so, it was on Washers Street that Alangatha Pillai's temple came up.

In an earlier post about Alangatha Pillai, I had assumed it was his likeness that was sculpted on the pillar just inside the entrance. Turns out that is of a different gentleman, though, like Alangatha Pillai, he too was a benefactor of the temple. And where is it rather difficult to find any reference to Alangatha Pillai in the temple itself, this person's name is written in large letters on the stone canopy in front of the gopuram - Va Mu Appukutty Chettiar!

If the sea don't get you, we will

The beaches of Chennai are inviting. Very. Long stretches of sand, and the waves seem to be coming in quite calmly, almost boringly. It is very tempting to go out and ride the waves back in, which is what many people seem to do. (Going against the advice of the Outdoor Swimming Society, and other experts, who say that one should never swim with one's back to the sea). 

But the city's beaches are quite dangerous. There have been quite a number of fatalities, and an equal, if not greater, number of rescues. The most famous (or best memorialised) tragi-heroic act was off Elliot's Beach at Besant Nagar, but there are probably many more which happen off the Marina, considering the greater volume of people who throng there. 

The city police frown on any attempt to "take bath" in the sea. Well you can try and argue that you weren't bathing, but you were trying to swim. But they will still prosecute you anyway!

Metro to mofussil

That's a picture of the entrance to the CMBT, taken when passing by on an overhead train track. The "M" in the abbreviation is "Mofussil". A word that I haven't heard used in English very often, but one that gained currency under the British East India Company. A word that I have encountered so often in Madras and Chennai that it could have been Tamizh - and yet, one that unsurprisingly has its origins in Urdu. 

Mofussil originally stood for those areas beyond the administrative ken of the Company, outside the realms of their headquarters in Madras, Bombay and Calcutta. Somewhere along the way, it gathered connotations of a hayseed provinciality, not compatible with the sophistication of the city. And yet, here is this facility, in the middle of the city, calling itself the "Mofussil" Bus Terminus. 

No, it is not as if the city expanded to swallow up a bus terminus that was once outside its boundaries. The simpler explanation is that this is the destination for anyone coming into the city by bus from its mofussil areas. It doesn't mater that the origin of bus could be another metro city - Benagaluru, for example - but that doesn't matter; anything outside the city is mofussil. And so here we are, looking down to the transport to the wide world outside, from a very in-city mode of transport - the metro!

Waiting to open

In a couple of weeks from today, the gates of the MA Chidambaram Stadium will open for the fifth test of the India-England series. In that time, India could have either won the series already, or it could be that England is looking to square the series, having won the fourth test at Mumbai. 

Either way, there will be a lot of excitement around the test. Chennai has not hosted an international test match in a long time. The last one such played here was almost four years ago, when India played Australia in February 2013; it is about time the next one takes place. 

So, are you going to be watching this match live?

All together, now!

In 1958, the Tamil Nadu government got into the business of supplying milk to the citizens of the state, and in 1965 it took control of all the milk producers' co-operatives across the state.  It was much later that it took on a more 'corporate' form, with the Tamil Nadu Co-operative Milk Producers' Federation Limited being formally registered in August 1981. Since then, the TNCMPFL has been marketing its products under the Aavin brand. While it started off with processed milk, today, the brand covers a range of milk products, many of which have been sold through small outlets across the city (and state). 

Aavin has been on a spree of modernisation over the past few months. Old parlours are being refurbished and jazzed up. Play-areas, air-conditioning and brightly lit parlours seem to be the new normal, as Aavin tries to catch up market share in categories like ice-cream, flavoured milk and sweets. In the process, it is also changing a few of the bunks which were the main points of sale for these products. Happened to catch one such bunk in transition - which, by the way, is the 'Theme of the Day' for the city photobloggers today*.

No idea why this Aavin booth had to be moved from wherever it was, but looks like it just needs a few people to transfer it to wherever it has to go to!

*If you would like to see how this theme is interpreted around the world, go here