Kodumudi Story Series-1

Krishnaveni

Krishnaveni is the eldest of the three children brought up by her widow mother at Kodumudi. The younger brother and sister were well looked after by her who did cooking and baby sitting at home. Their mother, the only bread winner of the family was too busy to look after them. Her full day ended up in the chores as servant maid to earn a few hundreds.

Thankfully the regime of the then chief minister Kamaraj that introduced noon meal scheme nurtured them and all students responded to the importance of education. Full attendance was reported in all the elementary schools in the Periyar district of Tamilnadu.

Krishnaveni with a pony tail and kempt hair was clad in green petticoat and the material she wore was terribly coarse. It produced the noise of a wet bed sheet when fluttered or walked in a hurry. Walking bare foot was a natural healthy was of living for the weakest economy. She often enjoyed the roadside scenery everyday while covering two miles to her school. With left over rice gruel for the next day’s breakfast, she was prompt and punctual enough to school. Back home she helped her mother in the dinner preparation and in cleaning vessels. Earthen ware was adjudged the best for the leftover cooked rice to be soaked in water overnight. Accompanying her brother and sister, she enjoyed going to school.

The London Mission School was the perfect place of wisdom where Pitchu vadhiyar was its headmaster. It was a time when Australian milk powder was introduced for supply to schools.

Pitchu was not only a man who was bound up in his work but also a good cook. All have seen him serving tasty food with affection at the noon meal scheme center. Through him the elementary school children had the warmth of home at school.

The District Education officer who made few appearances at school was the satisfied soul under the management of Pitchu. The village though looked somber otherwise, woke up to the alarm of rooster and the ringing of bell at the Makudeswarar temple for the usha-kaala puja.

Elders and ladies made it a compulsory daily dip at the Cauvery ghat. The early morning rays displayed the perfect laws of spectroscopy and optic connoisseur. The warmth of sunny rays splashing on one side and the cool wind from the agriculture lands laden with the strong smell of kernel drenched the other half of the body that gave a mesmerizing effect.

Krishnaveni added meager support to her mother by way of pruning and weeding jobs in the cultivated lands of the Pannaiyar or landlord. She waited restlessly for her education to get over so that she could vigorously jump into action with her mother.

The school was the epitome of knowledge, culture and values as Pitchu made it compulsory for all to qualify above elementary level. He personally visited the habitual absentee students and enquired their parents. Whenever she fell ill due to weakness and malnutrition, Dr. Arumugam treated her free of cost and also gave money. An expert doctor, he was celebrated as a living god by the needy. The affectionate bus driver Ramankutty Nair occasionally gave her free ticket on the Kodumudi-Kangeyam route. The total village was moved and tried to ease the plight of this poor girl.

Days rolled on and Krishnaveni struggled hard to reach SSLC. All the years her mind was inclined towards taking up a job and ultimately thought that an average pass out is sufficient. The electives never frightened her as science and history did. Her ears automatically shut her brains from concentrating at the spell of Panipat and Kalinga battles. Her chemistry of scientific reasoning hardly worked out to her expectations.

The D-day came with fan fare for the jubilant ones. Krishnaveni passed out successfully with a third class. She was thankful to her teacher-mentor Pitchu who took care to uplift her status. Falling at the feet of the noble teacher her mother wept in joy and praised him.

Though her mother wanted her to take up Teacher’s training, Krishnaveni was bent upon the fact that she cannot do justice as a competent teacher. Hence her choice was the postal service which was very dear to her. She had seen postman Duraisami carrying mail bundles across the village without tension.

She wondered how a postcard dropped inside a red box came out with a stamped face to reach the addressee. She had seen him reading out letters near the temple on the banks of the cauvery and down the paddy fields. It was those days when non-departmental candidates berthed a place in postal service backed up by the village headman. Since the mail traffic was low for that village, Duraisami covered the beat up to the limits of Unjalur. The district head post office at Erode dispatched very few articles, registration and Money order to Kodumudi.

Krishnaveni joined the postal department as sorting clerk. She liked the ways seal was affixed on letter with a bang. It reminded her of the way wheat flour was mixed, kneaded and beaten for Roti. The mails received from Burma and Ceylon came to a standstill and overseas mail was a rare scene. When Danushkodi was washed out in 1964, the inland mails from Rameswaram and Mannar completely stopped. The only option that came to rescue was the Morse code service for them.

Years rolled and Krishnaveni had the responsibility to marry off her younger sister. Her brother a studious young man enjoyed the college life at Kandar’s college, Vellore.

As a spinster Krishnaveni shouldered the family responsibility and balanced her life with focal approach. Having completed long innings in the career, Krishnaveni opted for a VRS and wanted to settle down in Kodumudi which transformed her and gave a meaning to her life. The award she received for distinguished service was a milestone in her life.

Whenever pal of gloom invaded her mind, she took solace under the comfort words of her fragile teacher, Pitchu. The octogenarian teacher who was in penury was so magnanimous in words and kindness. She had done the best she could for her family and enjoys a retired life with her brother and his family in Chennai. The cycle of responsibility has turned its wheel and she happily baby sits for his kids. With no other choice she had to do irrelevant jobs in the past when she was young and today it has become her passing time. What an irony!

For Krishnaveni, the village school teacher, river Cauvery, Makudeswara temple, post office and the Daak Seva award remains nostalgia for ever. Beyond postal beat, Morse code and pincode, into a world she travels loaded with memories of Kodumudi.

                                                                                    ----- Selvaraj Chandrasekar © 2007

Pitchu Master, selfless and secular to the core

The Hindu, Open page

 

We grew up in a traditional south Indian family that nurtured the values of education, ethics, unity, culture and charity. Right through the years of the last century, my grandfather's big family with his wife, five daughters and a son, had a tough time surviving. It was in the pre and post-independence era that the family realised the acute need for education for girls. In the quiet village of Kodumudi on the banks of the Cauvery in Tamil Nadu, I grew up with the flavour of education, agriculture, sports and moral values.

Pitchu Someswaran, the schoolmaster, was an embodiment of knowledge, selfless paropakara service and secular faith. His father Vembu Iyer, a true karmayogi, donated a part of his land to the London Mission School in 1930s and his mother Poochima was a noble lady. The talk of the town was the statement of the European Durai Reverend Father Populi of the Missionary, who wholeheartedly appreciated the act of the only Brahmin who donated to the Christian Mission. Only two schools existed then, Sri Sankara Vidyasala (SSV) High School and the London Mission School.

This year (2010-11) SSV is celebrating its diamond jubilee, while the London Mission School is fast crossing milestones. It was a time when the schoolmaster visited the homes of absenting students to inquire why. His neat handwritten notes of lessons often circulated among us and remained a specimen to all teachers on training. Pitchu master himself cooked tasty food for students and prepared milk when the Australian milk powder was widely distributed to schools during the Kamaraj regime. The visiting District Education Officer from Bhavani was the most satisfied soul who had seen the culmination of knowledge, service and love.

When Gandhiji addressed a gathering on our school grounds sitting on top of a lorry, his smile had real charisma. Singer-actor K.B. Sundarambal was a happy person to host parties to leaders and freedom fighters. My master never allowed us to indulge in freedom or political affairs and his strict command was a blinker on our career path. A mere pass in standard X was all that was needed to land government jobs.

Prior to independence, in 1945 though my fifth form (class X) had enough strength, only two girls enrolled. Of the two, one dropped out and the other Kunjamma passed in third class. Education for women was taboo. It was an uphill task to break the age old barrier, which he did successfully. Vidwan Sandanam Pillai, Deivasigamani Gownder, Dharmaraja Iyer, Sundaraja Iyer were noted teachers of Kodumudi who perfectly shaped the generations. To have a Bachelor of Oriental Language degree was a craze among linguists and language fanatics. Radio Periasamy, hotelier Thayirvadai Kuppanna, noble doctor Arumugam, bus driver Ramankutty Nair, midwife Raji and postman Duraisami were some indispensable characters of Kodumudi.  

I recall with pleasure the moments of my boyhood days, schooling and the knowledge that I gained. Tuitions were never heard of unless required. I remember Pitchu master walking to the next village to teach my classmate for a rupee a month. Can we imagine this today when advance tuition fee is collected in five digits? The partially visible tuft, angavastram and an aged umbrella branded my master from a distance. In 1985, accolades and felicitations came upon the octogenarian when the then Archbishop of Canterbury visited the school. Like his father, Pitchu practised secularism and helped students of poor Muslims. Despite hailing from a lower middle class family, he helped others financially what was possible within his means and with whole heart.

Coincidentally, the reminiscence of my master has been around the corner when we are celebrating the Teacher's Day to honour our educators and acknowledge their crucial role in shaping every student into a promising citizen. It need not be construed that those teachers who were not honoured with colours by the government are not heroes. There will be a guiding teacher or a philosopher in everybody's life who had shown special interest to elevate the wisdom at every point of life.

Though Pitchu master has gone into history, his memories are sure to rejuvenate the nostalgia of old students like me who are past 70 and 80. I salute with respect the unsung heroes of the teaching community.

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*The Hindu, Openpage, Sep 11, 2011 (National edition) [Wrote in the name of my father K.P.Selvaraj]