My grandmother, Manorama Rao, Madras (now Chennai). 1939 Image and Text contributed by Rekha Rao, Hyderabad This is a photograph of my paternal grandmother Manorama Rao when she graduated and topped English Honours with the Grigg Memorial gold medal at the University level. My grandmother was born into a family in Madras (now Chennai) in 1917. She was the eldest of three daughters in a progressive family that encouraged education and goals. Her mother (my great grandmother) Kamala Devi Tombat was a progressive lady with immense willpower. My great grandfather, Kamala Devi’s husband, Anand Rao Tombat had hired a British tutor to teach her English after their marriage and encouraged her to learn music. After her husband’s passing in 1944, Kamala went on to do a Visharad in Hindi (equivalent to a Bachelor’s degree), became a Hindi (Brahmin Scholar) and then a Professor of Hindi and Sanskrit at, Madras, one of the first three colleges for women in the country. She wrote and composed devotional songs and even published a book with them, named Shri Gurugeet Bhajanmala priced at a mere Rs 1 in those days. She and her daughters regularly sang on too. Archives of Doordarshan & All India Radio are now available online. Apr 16, 2016 After what seemed like a never-ending wait, Prasar Bharati, the Indian national broadcaster has set up a website from which one can purchase selections. Conceived in 2000 as an experimental music outlet for Martin Kennedy, All India Radio has steadily evolved by combining genres such as ambient, lo-fi, world music. Not only does my grandmother Manorama bear an uncanny physical resemblance to her mother, but the musical, literary talent and zest for life have been passed on as well. After schooling at and, Madras, in 1937, my grandmother Manorama joined Queen Mary’s College where she topped the entire in English and was awarded the Gold Medal for proficiency in the English language. She then joined the BA Honours (English Language) and Literature course at while her sister Sushila opted for Botany. Both commuted each day by tram between home, and college, that had a beautiful and sprawling campus overlooking, and my grandmother tells me that she was very fond of looking out at the expansive waters of the Bay of Bengal from her classroom window. She also recounts that there were less than 10 students in English Honours, and that they had papers right from Old English (Beowulf) to Middle English (Chaucer), the Romantics to Shakespeare. She also narrates that many of her professors were educated at Oxford and Cambridge. In 1939, from (later Editor-in-Chief) was looking for superior English language and writing skills. My grandmother fit the bill perfectly. Eager to put her education to use and supplement the home income, my grandmother joined the newspaper. She gathered news items, wrote literary reviews and edited articles. That same year, she was introduced to a young England-returned barrister by name Udiavar Narayana Rao. Perhaps he was drawn to her for her good looks, her outgoing and sociable nature and above all, her intellectual capabilities and following a few months of courtship, the two married on 23 May, 1940. The wedding took place as per Hindu rites at Munagala House which eventually gave way to Hotel Ashoka in 1974. My grandfather, Udiavar Narayana Rao was born in 1910 into a well educated and accomplished family. During his years at college, he was also a member of the, a precursor to the modern-day NCC (). Subsequently, he became a Bar-at-Law from London’s Middle Temple, and returned to India in 1936, where he joined as an advocate at the High Court of Madras. To this day, my grandmother talks of my grandfather with awe and deep respect for his character and achievements. He was a man of few words, and respected for his upright character in both personal and professional circles. My grandfather died prematurely at age 54 in 1965, while still in service of the Karnataka Government. After my parents married in 1970, and my father got his first job in Hyderabad, the family moved to Hyderabad. In 1969, when my grandmother was around 52 years old, she traveled overseas for the first time to the US to see her daughter Geetha. But before landing on the shores of America, the adventurous middle-aged soul broke journey in Europe, where, for about 10 days, she visited places like Rome, Paris and London, taking in all the sights, sounds and scenes of life there. Coming from a country that is still dealing with the issue of educating the girl child, my grandmother was definitely way ahead of her time. This month on October 8, 2017, my grandmother, Manorama became a centenarian, celebrating her 100th birthday amidst family, friends and her many admirers. She is still one of the most organized persons I know and has meticulously maintained family pictures and documents. She labels them at the back and keeps them safely in her cupboard. She also saw the potential in me to be a writer and encouraged me to be one. Today, we’re four generations living under one roof, and are happy and proud to have her as the matriarch of the family. Krishna (my mother) with her friends, Mrs Puri and Mrs Roy. Uttar Pradesh. Image and Text contributed by Kavita Krishna, USA. My Amma’s (Mrs. Krishna) life has been what can easily be phrased as that of constant transformation, from a simple south Indian orthodox girl into a cosmopolitan fauji (military officer’s) wife. Her life saw so many moves and travels that it made her into an extremely adaptable and a flexible person. Everyone who knows her agrees that she is the epitome of, what was once a compliment, a secular Indian. My mother was born in in the then Madras State in1946 (now in Andhra Pradesh) into an orthodox household. Where orthodoxy meant continuing the family’s brahmin traditions but also possessing liberality of thought that helped her later in her fauji married life. Adjustments began with her family moving to and then to, in 1955; right in the middle of the of 1954-56. She was just a school kid at Narayanguda Girls High School but remembers being teased as ‘ Gongura Gongura‘ by boys following in bicycles. Boys those days simply stalked you singing the latest songs but didn’t do anything, she tells me. (Gongura, a sour green leaf Sorrel, is the staple diet in an Andhra household and belongs to the same family as Marijuana) For someone who dressed and spoke very conservatively in Hyderabad, Amma blossomed into a more cosmopolitan person enjoying the very popular shows on like and, she like millions of others also became into a huge fan of, AIR’s most famous talk show host ever. She would hog the radio and would not let even her younger sisters listen to it. My maternal grandfather, taatayya, was a lawyer at the High Court and had indulged his own share of adjustments, to study law for instance, he had gone off to the very (Madras Presidency) and had cut off his ‘ (Sikha)’, a supposed unholy act, resulting in his mother ostracising him for a year or more. Amma says very proudly that she had seen taatayya refuse many a cases despite the stacks of bribe cash people would offer because he could not lie. “He was in the wrong profession, he wanted to study language.” she adds ruefully. Of course my grandfather spent all his free time translating Sanskrit works into Telugu, playing chess, discussing philosophy and politics, editing Telugu magazinesSo when my mother and her friends would go to watch movies, her affluent and generous Telangana Reddy friends paid for rather unaffordable film tickets, she says “We didn’t really bother about such things among friends those days. I did not have much money but nobody seemed to care who paid or who didn’t” she adds wistfully. A few Hyderabadi Muslim friends taught her Urdu/Hindi and she rather enjoyed speaking it. On religion, my mother remembers that Muslims and Hindus of their economic and similar conservative class rarely visited each others’ houses, but when they did it was for festivals and they did not enter her mother’s kitchen. It was never stated explicitly but was understood. Amma says even she and her sisters were not allowed to enter or touch anything when her mother was doing her cooking or prayers and if she did accidentally touch something, her poor mother would have to go off and take a cold water bath. Sitting separately during the menstruation was the norm, hanging one’s ‘outside’ clothes outside and not bringing those inside the house, offering naivedyam (prayer) to the altar before eating and so on but that never came in the way of friendships. People knew of each other’s customs and respected them. Soon my mother, began indulging in her love of art and writing. Once she won the first prize for short story writing, a competition conducted by the. She received many congratulatory letters of appreciation. But since she could not afford to buy postcards to reply to all of them she chose two among the 40-odd replies and sent them a Thank you postcard in return. Co-incidentally or one may call it fate; one of the recipients was her future husband. Amma was not the marrying kind. She wanted to write, work,earn her own living, and was fiery and a feminist before her realisation. But when the proposal came from my father directly to the family – that he was from the same caste, that he was an Air Force Officer plus handsome to boot, was enough to have my grandmother literally bulldoze my mother into marrying my father. Their first ‘posting’ together was to in 1967. Amma absolutely loves that place, she says that India was a wonderful place to be young in those days. In their 20s, she and my father set up their first household in Mohaddipur, it was a three storied building called the ATC and it housed five other air force families. There Amma befriended the North Indian Puri aunty and the East Indian Roy aunty. When the men were away on temporary duty, these three women would take a rickshaw to Gol Ghar and indulge in whatever shopping their meagre salaries allowed them. These three friends, one from each geographical corner of the country, also decided to seal their friendship with this photograph for eternity, for a handsome sum of Rs.15. Those days my father, a expert, earned Rs 475 in hand after all the tax cuts, the pilots earned a little more. My parents had a lot of financial responsibilities – my father being the eldest in his family, sent support to them, and this did not leave much for shopping. Amma recollects that plastic goods, beaded jewellery and steel vessels that came from Nepal were most sought after by these newly wed wives. The women would quickly finish their rounds and hurry back to Mohaddipur before their husbands returned from work or before it was too late in the evening because that area was also infested with dacoits and political goons. In Gorakhpur, even the five rupees for the rickshaw was something she had to struggle to save. Drinking and Smoking were the favourite indulgences among officers and everyone splurged on hosting parties, there was never any money left by the 15th of the month, she adds laughingly. Bachelors would ‘drop-in’ for Home made food bored of eating mess food daily and suddenly post dinner or lunch, plans would be made to drive on their motorbikes to Kusinagar or Benaras or to Ayodhya. She found all this very odd initially, this intermingling, this easy casual banter among genders, the adventurous spirit, eating anything by the roadside but she grew to love everything about the life that Air Force had brought to her. Amma says she had never eaten or before 1967. She didn’t know what they were. All of it was discovered in Gorakhpur. “It wasn’t like it is now, when you can eat anything anywhere anytime” she remarks reproachfully. “For the terrible of Gol Ghar we saved money the whole month, and they tasted so bad, but we were somehow satisfied”, and now she she makes the best Chhole Bhature I have ever eaten. She also speaks on the prejudices she faced, being short and dark, not having studied in a convent, not being able to speak ‘good English’, not being from a big city (Hyderabad was not considered a big city then) she constantly felt ridiculed and put-down. Considering that she did not belong to a rich or powerful family or have money, she had to really work hard at being taken seriously by others, especially the women, who were quite unkind to her. She learnt to wear make-up and perfume. She grew her nails and painted them, bought nylon saris and matching artificial jewellery, all this was was so unlike she had been brought up. Cutting her long hair off was another bold step. Having a ‘‘ was deemed to be more modern, and thus she succumbed to it in the early 80s. In the year 1982 my father was posted to, Coimbatore in Tamil Nadu. We ran into the Puris who were also posted there and Amma met Puri aunty serendipitously after fifteen years. They were so happy to be together for the next two years, giggling like school girls, gossiping away whenever they got a chance. It was as though they had never married or had had two kids each. I am amazed whenever I think of my mother’s journey. When we visited her old haunts of Machilipatnam and Vijayawada in 2002, I saw in a flash how tough each transition for Amma might have been, in attitude, in ideology, in social mores, yet she took it in her stride and managed to raise me and my sister with a very gentle message: that there is beauty in everyone, wherever they come from, whoever they are. Today, Puri aunty is settled in Chandigarh, Roy aunty in Kolkata. Amma known as Chivukula Annapurna or Mrs Krishna or Radha lives with my father (who also fought two wars and took voluntary retirement) in Secunderabad. I am her older daughter Kavita, I teach language, culture, yoga & vedanta. My younger sister is Pujita and she teaches and performs and. We have both chosen professions where there is not much money, but a lot of spirit & passion. My mother and I with Mrs. Kelkar & her daughter Shalini. Byculla, Bombay. Circa 1950 Image and Text contributed by Joe Joseph Zachariah, Mumbai This is a picture taken in the late 50s by my dad Mr. O S Joseph and each time I look at it, it evokes several fond memories of my childhood. The four-storied building seen behind is in Byculla, a colony in Bombay. Every year on first monsoon rains my dad would make me stand by the white pail. “having bath in the first rain cures you of all illnesses” he would say. In retrospect, I now see why that spot was good because all the water from the tiles converged at that spot. I have no memory of this picture being photographed but I will also never forget the Kelkar family. Our next door neighbours. Kelkar is with her daughter Shalini. I used to call her Aai (mother in ) Aai was more conversant in Marathi than with Hindi and my Marathi wasn’t very good, but we used to get along well. She used to pamper me a lot. I remember the Kelkars had a huge radio in their drawing room (living room) with high ceilings built by the British. But what fascinated me more was the extension speaker, which was in the kitchen. I used to sit on the small stool in the kitchen observing her as she went about happily doing her daily chores of cutting vegetables, cooking, heating the water for husband’s bath and all the while singing a very famous marathi song “ ” along with the the radio on India’s only radio network at the time,. I remember deciding then, that when I grow up and have my own house I will listen to the radio and have an extension speaker in every room. The best time to be in the Kelkar’s house was during the “festival of lights”, or rather the month before Diwali because of the lovely aroma of the sweets being made in the kitchen. I had free access to all the sweet boxes and it was one of the reasons why my dad forbade me several time to go there during Diwali. Sharad, Aai’s eldest son was another influential figure during my childhood. The way he would construct the (paper lantern) was nothing short of perfection. He was very forthright & responsible and even though I could not understand much Marathi at the time, I could make out that he was someone who had some principles and was fair in all dealings. Today, I don’t have an extension speaker but a radio sits in my bed-room and is almost always on for 24 hours. There is nothing better than listening to the good old songs. Donor challenge: A generous supporter will match your donation 3-to-1 right now. Your $5 becomes $20! Dear Internet Archive Supporter: Time is Running Out! I ask only once a year: please help the Internet Archive today. We’re an independent, non-profit website that the entire world depends on. Our work is powered by donations averaging about $41. If everyone chips in $5, we can keep this going for free. For the cost of a used paperback, we can share a book online forever. When I started this, people called me crazy. Collect web pages? Who’d want to read a book on a screen? For 21 years, we’ve backed up the Web, so if government data or entire newspapers disappear, we can say: We Got This. The key is to keep improving—and to keep it free. We have only 150 staff but run one of the world’s top websites. We’re dedicated to reader privacy. We never accept ads. But we still need to pay for servers and staff. The Internet Archive is a bargain, but we need your help. If you find our site useful, please chip in. —Brewster Kahle, Founder, Internet Archive. Donor challenge: A generous supporter will match your donation 3-to-1 right now. Your $5 becomes $20! Dear Internet Archive Supporter: Time is Running Out! I ask only once a year: please help the Internet Archive today. We’re an independent, non-profit website that the entire world depends on. Our work is powered by donations averaging about $41. If everyone chips in $5, we can keep this going for free. For the cost of a used paperback, we can share a book online forever. When I started this, people called me crazy. Collect web pages? Who’d want to read a book on a screen? For 21 years, we’ve backed up the Web, so if government data or entire newspapers disappear, we can say: We Got This. We’re dedicated to reader privacy. We never accept ads. But we still need to pay for servers and staff. If you find our site useful, please chip in. —Brewster Kahle, Founder, Internet Archive. Donor challenge: A generous supporter will match your donation 3-to-1 right now. Your $5 becomes $20! Dear Internet Archive Supporter: Time is Running Out! I ask only once a year: please help the Internet Archive today. We’re an independent, non-profit website that the entire world depends on. Our work is powered by donations averaging about $41. If everyone chips in $5, we can keep this going for free. For the cost of a used paperback, we can share a book online forever. When I started this, people called me crazy. Collect web pages? Who’d want to read a book on a screen? For 21 years, we’ve backed up the Web, so if government data or entire newspapers disappear, we can say: We Got This. We’re dedicated to reader privacy. We never accept ads. But we still need to pay for servers and staff. If you find our site useful, please chip in. —Brewster Kahle, Founder, Internet Archive. Donor challenge: A generous supporter will match your donation 3-to-1 right now. Your $5 becomes $20! Dear Internet Archive Supporter: Time is Running Out! I ask only once a year: please help the Internet Archive today. We’re an independent, non-profit website that the entire world depends on. Our work is powered by donations averaging about $41. If everyone chips in $5, we can keep this going for free. For the cost of a used paperback, we can share a book online forever. When I started this, people called me crazy. Collect web pages? Who’d want to read a book on a screen? For 21 years, we’ve backed up the Web, so if government data or entire newspapers disappear, we can say: We Got This. We’re dedicated to reader privacy. We never accept ads. But we still need to pay for servers and staff. If you find our site useful, please chip in. —Brewster Kahle, Founder, Internet Archive. Telugu Radio Playlet, broadcast by All India Radio, Vijayawada India during 1960s. Its a funny playlet where a Grandmother goes to purchase a Radio with Grandson. How they purchase the radio, the negotiation and ultimate purchase. After bringing the radio to the house, one day when Grand Mother tunes it, some rowdy song comes. In anger she pours water on it. In those days Radio was required to have licence and annual fee to be paid. To save money Grandmother does not take licence. When the Wireless Inspector comes, you should hear the conversation. Smt Seetaratnamma acted wonderfully as Grand Mother.
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