Commemorating the founding of Madras on August 22, 1639, Madras Week is becoming a tradition that annually celebrates the city, its past and its present. As Abhishek, an enthusiast, puts it, “Madras Day is one of the few heritage revival and preservation initiatives that gives immense hope to those of us Good Madrasamaritans who fear the total erasure of our city’s history, heritage, identity and, lastly, the name Madras itself.”

Recognition at last? Madras Week this year saw advertisements, like the above, being released, and newspapers issuing supplements.

In the last four or five years, a couple of score schools and a few colleges across the city have not only been active participants in the celebrations but have also played hosts to several events. But many more need to join the bandwagon. As Sashi Nair, a journalist, writes, “The problem with many schools is that the students have so much work to do on the academic front that they find very little energy and time for Madras Week. Only when the management considers it worthwhile does it have a spiralling effect.”

One such contest for schoolchildren this year was to create a multimedia presentations on the heritage of Chennai. The objective was to encourage students to explore the city and focus on one aspect that interested them – buildings, monuments, religious places, housing colonies, cinema houses, schools, lakes, forested areas, etc. Sashi Nair, who judged the event, writes, “A couple of teams had some wonderful subjects – Bridge House, Guns in the Fort, Hamilton Bridge – and they gained points for considering such subjects and researching them.” Padma Seshadri, Nungam­­bakkam, won the first prize; the second and third prizes went to all-girl teams – Sri Sankara Vidya­shram, Tiruvan­miyur, and St Columban’s, George Town. Lady Andal and Kavi Bharathi Vidyalaya, Tiru­vottriyur, were ranked fourth and fifth.

Captured by Arvind Balaraman during the St. Thomas’ Mount Walk. From top to bottom, below: St. Patrick’s Church, in the foothills of the Mount; a bas relief on the walls of a school at the Mount; and a deserted bit of military heritage crying for restoration.

The many temples in Madras have fascinating inscriptions that provide vital clues to the life and times of the many 9th to 13th Century villages that constitute Madras today. Pradeep Chakravarthy’s Writing on the wall – Life in ancient Madras gleaned from inscriptions highlighted the politics of the villages, their economy, their layout, the now-forgotten cultural practices, the taxes the citizens paid and the occupations they were in. Together, they all painted a mental image of the daily life in the villages. Many issues we struggle with today were there in those days too. As Sridhar Joshi records, “The villages, spreading from Tiru­vottri­­yur to Mylapore of the modern day, of course, were examples of a republican form of government. It was a rather surprising revelation from Pradeep that the percentage of religious and mythological detail in the inscriptions on the walls of the villages – during the Chola era – was zero! The inscriptions, mainly in Tamil and Sanskrit, but with a bit of Telugu or Kannada thrown in, mainly detail the social life and governance in those days. Many of these inscriptions talk of gifts made to the kingdom, landmark judgments, landholdings, etc. These inscriptions were found in places as far apart as Manali and Tiruvottriyur, Myla­pore and Tiruvallikeni Significantly, they also speak of things that happened in, given the time, distant places. For example, you could find an inscription in Manali about some aspect of life in faraway Thiruvidanthai on the ECR of today!” Such a treasure is often lost during renovation and modernisation – irrevocably, most of the time. Pradeep pointed out the lack of awareness and foresight in preserving such inscriptions and appealed for their preservation. Sounding a similar note a few days later was Sathyabhama Badhreenath, Director, Archaeological Survey of India, Chennai Circle. When speaking of Bruce Foote’s 19th Century finds in the Pallavaram area, she regretted that numerous ancient burial sites around Madras had been flattened by development.

The photography exhibition by Ranjan De, titled Graffiti on the Walls of Madras that is Chennai, had taken him about six months to capture above 200 images. He, however, exhibited only a dozen at Studio Palazzo, but his creative effort in capturing for posterity the graffiti on the walls of Chennai really caught the viewer’s eye.

Noted film critic and writer Baradwaj Rangan spoke on Tanglish in Tamil Movies at The Park and explained why it was used.

An old house in Perambur. (Photo courtesy: P.V. Bharadwaj.)

Youth, depicting an ­educated background, and the generation gap were the most common reasons for the use of English in Tamil movies. As Sridhar Joshi notes, the use of English was also made to depict a bit of negativity, according to Baradwaj. He pointed out the prime example of M.R. Radha in Ratha-k-kanneer taking to English when he had a good life, and switching to Tamil when he needed help and sympathy. Baradwaj played clippings from movies such as Punnagai Mannan, Velaikkaran and Vettaiyadu Vilayadu, to name a few.

Mohan Raman, in his talk on Madras Bashai and the Man who Introduced it – J.P. Chandrababu, referred to the actor’s performance in Gul-e-bagavali, his ­yodeling – then a first in Indian cinema – and the irony of Babu playback singing for Sivaji in Kalyanam Panniyum Brahmma­chari and for Veenai Bala­chander in AVM’s Penn, but having Sirkazhi Govindarajan sing for him in Sabash Meena, and Babu successfully getting into the baila genre in Kungumapoove Konju­purave – a massive hit even ­today. Sridhar Joshi cites one of Mohan’s comical snippets: ­“Invited after a performance to rejuvenate the jawans post 1962 war with China, MSV, Babu and Sivaji were closeted with the then President Sarve­palli Radha­krishnan. The President asked for a performance, but the three were at their wits’ end as the ­orchestra was already on its way home! Undeterred, MSV
asked for a harmonium and Babu sang Pirakkum pothum azhuginran for the President. Halfway through the song, as the President sat absorbed by it, Babu jumped onto the President’s lap and continued singing – something that had the others aghast. But the President enjoyed it and gently ran his fingers through Babu’s hair!”

Madras Week’s Chennai Heritage Lecture Series opened with Tamil writer Sivasankari speaking on My Madras at the Taj Connemara. She reminisced about going to the Sun Theatre, which was considered infra dig in comparison with the Rajakumari – apparently the only movie theatre to be named after an actress – which screened English movies. She also used to sneak into the Minerva wearing clothes that made her look like an adult to watch ‘A’ rated movies. What must take the cake, or the ice cream, was watching films at the New Elphinstone where Jaffar had the ice cream sent to your seat in the Dress Circle if you paid for it in advance and gave your seat number at the time of ordering. “The Satyams and the PVRs – we have done that before you!” blogs Sridhar Joshi. “Another surprise for me,” he adds, “was Sivasankari narrating that Modern Café, that wonderful restaurant of yesteryears, actually sold food from a van parked on the Marina; but its main attraction for her was the iced water it served!” She also reminisced about her birthplace on Boag Road – now a wedding hall – and a pet deer she had when she lived in a huge house on Tirumalai Pillai Road. She also recalled celebrating her birthday when travelling aboard an Air Force plane with Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi – on his orders.

At Beatrix D’Souza’s talk on the Anglo Indians in Madras, Vincent D’Souza couldn’t help but notice one man who stood out in the crowd. Nigel Foote from Melbourne had set up his small digicam at his seat and shot Betty’s talk start to end. Nigel said he could trace his roots to an Englishman who first sailed to Australia and then came to serve in Fort St George, Madras. Nigel wasn’t exactly tracing his ancestors here; he was on a recce of the pilgrimages made by people to the Vailankanni Church in Nagapattinam, for a full-length docu-film for Australians on pilgrims walking for days on end for a purpose.

Photographs of the Anglo- Indian community of Madras, exhibited by Harry MacLure, editor of Anglos in the Wind, at Studio Palazzo, had Sashi Nair recall his early working days in Calcutta and the secretaries he met there! “Up to the early 1980s at least, when I started working, most vice-presidents and CEOs had pretty Anglo-Indian secretaries. And they did a fantastic job as secretaries, answering calls on the phone politely, with voices that were charming and pleasant to the ear. Where are the Anglo- Indian secretaries today?” he wondered.

Numismatist and philatelist D.H. Rao once again organised his Heritage Lovers’ exhibition this year at Bhavan’s Rajaji Vidyashram in Kilpauk. His own special display this year was a series of pictures on the Red Buildings of the city: the GPO, the State Bank of India’s main branch, the High Court, the Magistrates’ Courts, the Museum and several on Pantheon Road, among others. Moses was a newcomer to this exhibition this year and his collection was small but unique: buttons of men in the Band and the Artillery
which he had picked up at the Pallavaram shandy a decade ago. He also had cute lampstands and pens and a rice measure with ‘Madras’ markings etched on it. “It is through such events that Madras Week creates the space for people to showcase objects, records and all things of the past that we would never have got to see,” points out Vincent D’Souza.

Apart from the usual photowalks organised by the Chennai Photowalk team, there were two photowalks for children this year, organised by YOCee, a website for Chennai children. Revathi R, editor and publisher of the website, organised the walks as a preevent to Madras Week celebrations. She writes, “Though the children are used to referring to the city as Chennai, they looked for interesting history about the places they spotted on the walks down the roads of Madras. The children captured the spirit of the city through their simple aim-and-shoot cameras.” The walk on August 1st started at the famed Ratna Cafe in Triplicane and the children walked shooting all along Pycroft’s Road. On the next weekend, they walked along Poonamallee High Road and it was a different experience for a group of students from Maharshi Vidya Mandir, Chetpet, who participated in it. The photographs taken by the children during these walks were exhibited at the Maharshi Vidya Mandir, Lady Willingdon School, Anna University (School of Architecture), and the Alliance Francaise, Madras.

As Chandrachoodan Gopalakrishnan, organiser of the Chennai Photowalks, was abroad, Srivatsan Murali took charge and led two walks, one to St.Thomas’ Mount, the other in Perambur. The walks had photography enthusiasts capture images of the Railway buildings in Perambur, the churches in St.Thomas’ Mount, the scenic hilltop, and images of the local coffee shop at the Convent. “The view of Chennai is breathtaking from the Mount. Taking pictures of the stairs down from the Mount to the main road was awesome and some of the houses you see are quaint and lovely,” said Vaishnavi Prasad, a participant.

Vincent D’Souza’s walk in Fort St. George had M. Ramanathan noting that “King’s Barracks, one of the largest in Asia, was being used for storing provisions (carton after carton after carton) to meet the local army and navy requirements.” Such a magnificent building deserved better, he felt. Restoration of such historic buildings was a constant plea throughout Madras Week that Madras Day has grown into.