Musings on Chinnaswamy Subramania Bharathi Narasimhan Vijayaraghavan 38

Musings on Chinnaswamy Subramania Bharathi
Narasimhan Vijayaraghavan
38

Bharathi’s Chellamma had Kizhavi Ammakannu. Va.Ve.Su. Iyer had his Bakkialakshmi. His wife. She was a bold and imaginative housewife. Rarely ruffled. She stood like a rock. When the going got tougher, she got stronger. She stood like a rock behind Iyer. Particularly, when Iyer was faced with the most difficult times in his life. That was Chellamma’s character certificate to Bakkialakshmi, who was also in Pondicherry, following the example set by Bharathi and Aurobindo Ghosh to seek exile. Chellamma wondered whether it was nature’s way of balancing the equations by giving Iyer his Bakkia Lakshmi (lucky one) despite compelling Iyer to face one stumbling block after another.

Let Chellammal take over here-It was election time in Pondicherry. I distinctly recall it was a day before Amavasya. Night was dark. Visibility was poor. Subadra, the adorable daughter of Iyer and B Lakshmi had been born for just 25 days. Lakshmi had an elderly helper lady. In the dead of night, she heard loud rattle of the doors of her house. The little one was rudely woken up by the noise. Believe it not, there was a crowd of over 100 who had assembled on the outside. They all seemed to be punch drunk as the smell of alcohol was overpowering. A self annointed leader of this loud mouthed pack was banging the door furiously.

B Lakshmi, from the inside, shouted back, “ Who is it? What do you want at this unearthly hour?”. They responded with gusto.”Where the hell is Iyer? Open the door and now. Lest we are forced to bang it open”. Lakshmi was not put down. “ Iyer is not there. If you are looking for him, pick some other earthly hour to come visiting”.

The crowd in unison, “ Even if he is not there as you suggest, open the door right away. We would like to be convinced. We are not budging an inch”. Imagine this. Iyer was very much inside. And he was hearing all these exchanges. He was terribly perturbed knowing not how they can handle the situation and the night will pass. It would be terrible to put ourselves in the shoes of the inmates facing such an emergency.

Iyer and Lakshmi had to do something and swiftly at that. Twenty five day old Subadra was there to care about. The only congenial neighbour they could move to was Arumugham Chettiar’s household.And that house was three blocks away and it was not possible to get out and move in there. And it was well known in the locality that this Chettiar’s house was securely guarded with multiple doors and locks. So, moving out from the front, in the face of an unruly mob was ruled out totally. Iyers had to look for another way out of trouble, as the doors may give way anytime. If that happened, god alone knew what the mob may indulge in and what may come of the infant in the cradle. Iyers had to think fast and B Lakshmi was better and best at it,Chellamma felt.

B Lakshmi was unwilling to face the mob. She was not taking any chances, as mobs can act crazy and devilishly . So she told Iyer that they had no choice but to get to the roof of the building to cross over two households and reach the safety of Arumugham Chettiar home. That was easier said than done. There were no stairs to reach the top floor. The only access without being seen by the mob was to claim the Pomegranate tree, with thorns, which gave a perfect cover in the dark for this climb. There were no stools, chairs or ladder to climb.

And, mind you,it had to be to done with the infant in hand or the hip. An Olympian task of gargantuan proportions with baying and drunken lumpen elements on the road. B Lakshmi was ready to go. She enthusiastically backed herself saying that her mother’s instincts would suffice. Iyer had to fall in line. Iyer scaled the roof. He took part custody of the infant Subadra. B Lakshmi came behind by clinging to the thorny tree. Iyer had to balance the child in one hand. With another he clung to the thorny Pomegranate tree. Thorns stung the child. Iyer’s dhoti was torn. But B Lakshmi asked him to keep his focus as she held on to Iyer and child with prayers on her lips. In one swoop, unimaginable for a lady who had but 25 days earlier, was in serious and agonising labour, B Lakshmi made the top floor. It was some feat. And Chellamma said that their hearts must have been pounding above the mob noise.

And all this had to accomplished in the dead of night. With poor visibility. And B Lakshmi clung to her little one for dear life. Iyer had to escort them to the top floor of Arumugham Chettiar. He safely did it. B Lakshmi did it with the infant in hand. They together heaved a sigh of relief. The child and mother seemed safe for now. Iyer returned to his roof top. By then, miraculously Bharathi had a sense of discomfort that his bosom pal Iyer was under a strain. A telepathic transfer of information, it seemed.

Bharathis were then residing in Krishna Gana Sabha. But only during daytime. They cooked and ate their meals there. But when nighttime fell , as jointly decided, they moved to the residence of Ponnu Murugesam Pillai to stay together. This they did as a daily routine. By 18.00 hrs it was dinner time to close shop and move on for joint residence. Bharathis did not live in any independent house. This, to avoid Bharathi’s personal effects being stolen or seized.

Murugesam Pillai’s house was twenty houses beyond Iyer’s. Bharathi was on the rooftop furiously ‘walking hither and thither in a disturbed state of mind’. Instinctively, Bharathi felt that something had gone wrong, and he had to take cognisance of. Even as he was walking up and down on the rooftop, he had heard a mob enter the road. He heard loud voices. And found them converging outside Va.Ve.Su’s house. They appear to have stopped and not gone beyond Iyer’s house.

Bharathi’s gut feel said that Iyer may be the target of whatever their ire was against . He immediately rushed out calling his immediate friends in the earshot as Govindan, Venugopal, Devasigamani and a few others who came to not more than 10 to 15 in all, at that hour.Bharathi was his brisk self, as if leading a contingent of forces to take the mob head on. The mob had sticks and lathis. The Bharathi led ‘forces’ had ‘words’ as their weapons and to a man they were thin, wiry and puny, surely incapable of taking a drunken lot.

And Bharathi was his fearless self and yelled, “ Dey, Yaar Ange. Ada Payalgala. Enne Inge- Who is that. What are you urchins here for? It was a command and a demand. The manner in which ‘Bharathi commanded his forces seemed that they were in the lead with a huge army behind as well. And the noise they made literally our voiced the unbalanced mob”. Just one shout that they were cornered and nowhere to go was enough to send panic among them. The ‘brave mob’ fled at once as if they were being chased by an armed lot. The ‘cause’ they were enthused by was immoral and unethical and they had no legs to stand but only to run at the first turn of exposure.

And Chellamma turned funny. She said , “Just as the police forces make their appearance in our movies after the hero had quelled the rebellion , the CIDs who were fast asleep across the roads, rushed in, on hearing the dissipating commotion. Bharathi’s army stood taller and stronger. The drunken louts ran away even faster. What a fiasco the mob turned the show into. And B Lakshmi literally stood between the mob and her family by a brave and direct defiance , gaining valuable time. Her stock grew among us as one who could be counted upon in such difficult circumstances”.

On enquiries, it was found that the mob comprised of mercenaries put together from a neighbouring village, Keeraipalayam, to confront the Swadeshis. As they were let loose, for a fee not a cause, they could not stand the noble cause of Bharathis and Iyers even if they had outnumbered the Swadeshis. And Bharathi’s voice was heard above theirs and that had a ‘moral force that overwhelmed them’ wrote a commentator.

Chellammal noted that Bharathi died at all of 39 years in 1921 and Va.Ve.Su Iyer died at all of 44 years in 1925. While Bharathi died allegedly due to the blow he received from the Parthasarathi Kovil temple elephant , Va.Ve.Su’s death was not in any alleged genre. It was as tragic as they get and it had everything to do with the 25 day old Subadra. We need to know . Do we?

( Author is practising advocate in the Madras High Court)