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THIS TEENAGER’S EFFORTS HELPS HUNDREDS OF FAMILIES IN ALWARPETBy Bama Ranganathan

Megha Sivakumar has just completed her Class 12 from Chettinad Hari Shree Vidyalayam in R. A. Puram. The pandemic has upset her college-plans but this teenager has taken this hiccup in her stride and done something positive these past months.

Watching on TV the stories of people affected by the lockdown, she began to toss an idea - on ways to launch a project that would help people in her neighbourhood who had lost their jobs.

‘The journey started in June with me realizing the amount of privilege I have and how with that privilege I can help those who are in need,” says this resident of Seethammal Colony Extension, off TTK Road.

She raised Rs. 10,000 and used

the money to buy dry rations for about 20 families.

How did she raise the money?By spreading the word among

her friends and setting up G-Pay and PayTM accounts for easy pay-ments. She also posted her idea on her social media pages. The dona-tions began to trickle in.

As the donations flowed, Megha expanded her appeal to a wider segment of people and tapped her family’s contacts. Her parents and her brother created some buzz.

Says the teen, “Friends and relatives who lived over-seas thought this would be a trustworthy cause and sent me donations.”

The collection went up to Rs. 1,50,000.

“It was a pleasant shock for me and I was determined to do a good job since so many people had put their faith in me.

Since it was my project, I decided to do the bulk of the jobs myself, taking some help from my parents when I needed. I had to manage the accounts and created a What-sApp group for all those who wanted periodic updates about what was happen-

ing,” she says.The next challenge was to

identify what people needed, how to procure these goods and distribute them.

Megha says she sought help from her parents. They iden-tified a city NGO with prior experience in this field and de-cided on a package of essential dry food items - rice, toor dhal, cooking oil, salt and spices.

These bags were to be donated to 350 families in

Baruva Nagar, a colony located off K. B. Dasan Road, not far from her place.

This process had its hiccups too - as her team was packing the foodstuff, work had to be put on hold due to second, long lock down imposed in Chennai.

Her team then got into the act in August. The NGO procured the provisions and packed them into bags. The family members and some volunteers chipped in.

The Mylapore MLA’s office offered to help Megha plan the distrbution in an orderly manner. This was done on August 21.

Megha says the MLA was impressed by her resolve to help others and praised her at the gathering and on his social media page.

Megha says she has grown a lot from this experience. “Being a part of each step of the process helped me understand the amount of work that goes into a project like this.

I also learnt that such work is possible only through team work and collective effort. We cannot keep talking of change but need to act and make a difference”, she says.

By Dheepthi O. J.

For the past few weeks, a small group of Covid workers (who visit homes to check on fever and oxygen levels of resi-dents) at Srinivasapuram have been reaching out to residents of this neighbourhood.

They go beyond their daily duty because some families are helpless and suffer in silence.

Srinivasapuram is a dense colony located off Loop Road of the Marina at its south end. Over 1200 families of daily-wage earn-ers, maids, fishermen, carpenters and painters reside here.

Says Deepa Satish, a Covid worker of this area, “Several families here have lost their livelihood due to the pandemic. Many are living in bad condi-tions now. So, we are personally reaching out to them in small ways we can.” Recently, through the course of Covid work, Deepa and her group came across a young physically challenged woman, who had a 10-month old baby. Her husband, a daily-wage earner had lost his job following the lockdown. The family didn’t even have the money to buy milk to feed the baby.

Says Deepa,”So our group of four/five of us (Covid workers) pooled in 100 rupees each to pro-vide milk for the baby for a week. Then through a volunteer, who works for Banyan, a NGO, we got provisions distributed to them. Now, the family is doing better.”

In another instance, Deepa says a pregnant woman desper-ately needed rations. “She had no one around to help. We supplied groceries to her through an NGO, that regularly supports people of this area.” Deepa says she and her group can only help that much. But they do when they come across helpless people here.

This group of Covid workers reaches out to helpless residents

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August 29, 20202

V I N C E N T D ’ S O U Z A

One of the areas in our neighbourhood which we at Mylapore Times regularly report and write on are the kuppams of San Thome and Pattinapakkam zones.

Located as they are on the seaside and off the high road that runs parallel to the sea, the areas and its people tend to stay off our radar. In a way, you may say we often do not turn our sights there.

Most of our contacts in these areas are community leaders, women’s group heads and social workers. Kavitha, a social worker who has been working here for many years, associated with different groups, is always ready to share stories with us. And ask for help to be put out in Mylapore Times.

A fortnight ago, she asked me if we could be of help to two sisters who had lost their father and the family was in dire straits.

The family lives on the fringe of Mandavelipakkam; the girls’ mom and her mother-in-law were, till the pandemic broke out in late March working as maids in neighbourhood houses. They must have brought home some Rs.5000 every month.

Both girls studied in a prominent school close to home but now did not have the means to pay even part of the fees that school had asked students to pay.

Yes, they would pick up the text-books, the bag and the footwear that the state provided every academic year to aided schools.

But they were finding it difficult to rustle up some 8000 rupees for starters. The family had borrowed money in the recent past and so, turning to the familiar resources was out of question.

We put out a SOS request for help and it came on time. Part of the fees were paid. The rest will have to be paid over the year.

But there was another problem. Taking part in online classes offered by the school teachers. The family possessed an old phone and borrowing a better and suitable one from an uncle who lived close-by was not practical. The girls now listen to some audio tutorials and make best use of messages sent to them. They are resigned to the situation. For, a simple smartphone costs over 5000 rupees.

This then is the story in many a Mylapore home where members have been greatly affected by the pandemic. Loss or cut in jobs has meant thin or zero earnings. And this does not provide much to support the schooling of girls and boys.

Homemade breakfast and lunch door delivered by this Mandaveli duoBy Dheepthi O. J.

More and more Mylaporeans are venturing into new food businesses.

Most recently, Mandaveli based brother-sister duo – Swaminathan Ramachandran and Sarada Ramachandran have started one.

They are now door deliver-ing home-cooked vegetarian breakfast and lunch to Mylapore, Mandaveli and R.A.Puram.

For two years, the duo has been selling homemade podis (sambhar podi, rasam podi and idly podi) and thokku (tomato, manga) to people.

Says Swaminathan, a working professional, “Those products have been moving well. So we had the idea of starting a food business.

This lockdown, when we realised there is demand for home-cooked food, we pitched in to try our luck.”

Called ‘Mangalam Foods’, their new venture provides idli, vada, pongal and sevai for breakfast.

The lunch menu includes rice,

sambhar, rasam, kootu, poriyal. The duo is also

offering an option of buying meals without rice. “This is aimed at people who prefer buying only the side dishes and cook rice at home.”

The food, Swa-minathan says, is

prepared at his friend’s house and then delivered.

To ensure a personal touch with customers, he and his homemaker sister deliver personally. “We wear a mask and gloves when we are out.”

Their business seems to be slowly picking up now. “A small group of people have started buying from us regularly. In fact, people also want us to deliver on weekends especially on Sundays. However, we are unable to go out for delivery due to complete lockdown on Sundays.”

In time, when the demand increases, the duo plan to deliver dinner too.

A plate of two idlis cost Rs. 40. Meals – Rs 135. The menu without rice is priced at Rs 110. To order call 8148910220

Some Mylaporeans resume using services of domestic helpers

Months after the March lockdown, residents at some parts of Mylapore have resumed using services of domestic helpers.

Until recently, the residents had stopped their helper’s services as a precautionary measure to prevent the spread of the virus.

Says Ganga Sridhar, a resident of Dwaraka Apartments at Raja Street, Mandaveli, “In the initial period of lockdown, we could manage house-hold chores without a maid, as children also lent a hand.”

But soon after online classes started for her children life became dif-ficult for Ganga.

“I had to guide my children in assignments, besides cooking, cleaning, and doing personal work, all by myself.

So, once virus patients at my maid’s area recovered, I called her back.”

“To avoid virus spread, now my maid wears a mask and

maintains social distancing from family members while at work,” Ganga says.

She adds that most fami-lies in her apartment have also called back the helpers.

At an apartment com-plex in Alwarpet too, some families have resumed services of domestic helpers.

Says Vidya Bal-akrishnan, a resident here, “We have over 150 families in our complex. Now, 30 % of them have started using their maid’s services.”

She says this happened after the residents had to go out for work, following lockdown relaxations, in early August. “However, as a precaution, we check tem-peratures of maids using

thermal scanners. We also make sure they sanitize their hands and legs before entering the houses, ” she says.

Students from two Mylapore schools have been awarded funding to pursue their studies in these trying times.

This has been made possible by Mylapore Times Charita-ble Trust ( MTCT). This project is an annual one of the MTCT at this time of the year, and this year, due to the impact of the pandemic on many families, the requests are growing.

This past week, 3 students of Sivaswami Kalalaya Higher Secondary School were given a total of Rs.50000 while two stu-dents of P. S. Hr. Sec. School, Mylapore were given Rs.5000.

MTCT has received applications from two other schools and they are being reviewed.

If you wish to donate to the MTCT project, please talk to MT manager Shanthi at 24982244 / 24671122 ( 10 am to 1 pm, daily). All donations can be made online and get IT exemption benefit.

This past week, MTCT received the following donations - 1) Raman & Kamakshi, Alwarpet - Rs.5000. 2) Kalyani Chan-dramouli, Luz - Rs.2000.

Mylapore Times Trust continuesfunding students: donations welcome

MYLAPORE TIMESAugust 29, 2020 3

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Susheela Raghavan, educationist whose passion was geography

Well-known educationist Susheela Raghavan who resided in Alwarpet passed away on August 17.

Susheela was the last of the ten chil-dren of Mr. & Mrs. Bhashyam Iyengar, wife of Major Raghavan and the second daughter-in-law of T. T. Krishnamachari, former finance minister of the country.

Her father served in the Military Accounts Department. She moved to her father in law, T.T.Krishnamachari’s residence in Alwarpet after marriage and lived for over five decades in R. A. Puram.

She had recently shifted to Alwarpet. With an M.A. in History from Queen Mary’s College and a B.Ed., she went on a Government of India scholarship to the University of Southampton to study geography.

She later got a P.G. diploma in geography from the University of Madras. She was a rank holder right through all these courses.

Her early teaching was at Delhi with Armed Forces Public School (1960-63). She joined Padma Seshadri Bala Bhavan School while it was still a young school in 1966 and served there till 1978. She held several posts there and grew from a primary school teacher to become the Directress of the primary school.

After a brief stint as a part time geography teacher at Vidya Man-dir, she worked at the Krishnamurthi Foundation of India as a senior geography teacher till her retirement in 1994.

She was a member, secretary, president and a pillar of support to The Association of Geography Teachers of India which operates out of Mylapore.

Her passion for geography was very deep. In education circles, her name is synonymous with geography. She was an author of geography text and map books, articles and short stories for children. She demonstrated that if there is involvement and imagination, things around us could become teaching aids.

She would make a ball a globe, broomsticks – latitudes and longitudes, sand – mountains, and blue coloured thread – rivers! She could transform any teacher with interest into a geography teacher. She has an important place in the history of The Association of Geography Teachers of India for its growth and the network it established.

A teacher to many children and adults for over 60 years through many schools and forums, she won the hearts of her students with her unconditional love and non-judgmental attitude. Her former students kept in touch with her and she remembered each one of them, their distinct skills and talents.

Post retirement, she chose to help many schools and NGOs. The schools she taught at and that she helped establish have her imprints across many programmes.

She was the Correspondent of Chinmaya Vidyalaya, Madras. She was the Founder Chairperson of Vidya Peetam, Sholinghur from 1982-1999. From 1995, she was a Trustee of the Akshaya Vidya Trust that manages the three Vedavalli Vidyalaya School. From 2008, she was a Trustee of the Bhuvana Foundation that runs Vidya Vanam, a tribal school at Anaikatti.

She was a member of the University Women’s Association. She worked closely with the Chennai historian, late S. Muthiah on Madras projects and contributed to the geography portions.

- Written by Dr. Bhooma Parthasarathy

P. Malathi, a resi-dent of Lazarus Church Road, Mandaveli has turned into a home-tailor, this lockdown.

The 40-year-old is now providing all kinds of cloth alteration services for women and children.

She also offers em-broidery services to al-ter new/old blouses and saris. Says Malathi, a

homemaker and a mother of two, “Tai-loring is my hobby.

Since my college days, I have been stitching and embroidering all my blouses and saris.” She says she also stitches cloth bags out of leftover blouse bits.

And makes unique embroi-deries on them.

A few weeks ago, she started

a home-based stitch-ing business, as “I had enough time after my household chores.”

“My idea is just to help people with cloth (churidar, ready-made dress) alteration. Mak-ing profit is not my priority now.”

Malathi has also spread the word about her business to friends and neighbours. “There have been some en-quires. I hope custom-ers will gradually drop-in,” she says.

Malathi plans to start a small tailoring shop once life returns to normalcy.

She charges ac-cording to the kind of alteration required. People who may want her services may reach her at 9791103867 / 9443291429.

Mandaveli’s Malathi alters clothes and does embroidery for women, children

To help underprivileged students get access to online classes, CSI School for the Deaf in San Thome has started giv-ing new smartphones to them.

The first set of smartphones were given to 8 students, during the Independ-ence Day ceremony, held at the school on August 15.

Dr V. Saroja, state minister for Social Welfare and Nutritious Meal Programme, presided for the event and presented the phones to the students. Says James Albert, headmaster of the school, “We started online classes a few weeks ago. However, students from

poor backgrounds were unable to attend classes as they did not have smartphones or computers. So we have begun giving them new phones in batches.”

He says they are initially providing phones to students from classes 10, 11 and 12, as they will be attending board exams, this year.

“In the first batch, 6 students from class 12 and 2 students from class 11 were given phones.”

The headmaster says the school will also support these students with cash, required for internet connectivity.

CSI School for the Deaf provides smartphones to poor students

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MYLAPORE TIMES August 29, 20204

SOCIAL HISTORY PROJECT: TELL US YOUR STORYMylapore Times is documenting the lives and times of its people

and places, specially those of the less known and less seen. The stories we gather and write are posted online. You can read the stories at - http://my-mylapore.blogspot.com

The collection of original photos / leaflets / booklets / souvenirs / land documents / bills on books, rent, education are passed on to the Roja Muthiah Research Library, Taramani, our collaborator for digitised documentation.

Such recording of local histories are very important and this newspaper is keen to do it.

So if you / your family lived here over 60/ 100/150 years and want us to document the stories or you have photos and documents we could copy, ping us at 24660269 or mail us at mytimesedit@gmail.com

LIFE OF KENNEDY STREETS ZONE. IN EARLY 20th CENTURY.

Reported by Dheepthi O. J.

Kennedy Street. There are two of them (the 1st and the 2nd) that runoff from the road that leads you to the Our Lady of Light Church in Luz, which traces its foundation to the early 16th century.

These are very narrow streets - good enough for a modern-day car to drive down, but slowly. Though one street is for movement that is North-South and vice versa, traffic violations are often the case here. The streets hold lots of social history. Streets that were carved out of mere scrub jungle which over time, made way for some of the palatial bungalows of Mylapore’s then elite.

And as land parcels broke up into smaller plots, came smaller inde-pendent houses. Most made way for apartments blocks. But the Kennedy Streets hold social histories that go back beyond a century and more.

One big story of that era is shared by Vijaya Sridharan, who currently resides at Srinekethan Apartments in Venus Colony, Alwarpet. Vijaya is one of the great grand-daughters of Janakiammal, who hailed from Srirangam and who came to live in Luz and owned many ‘row houses’ on these Streets. (Row houses are a cluster of small and big houses linked together by either one or both of their side walls.)

Janakiammal is said to have moved to Luz in the 1920s. Janakiammal got married when she was about three years old. Her husband passed away when she was very young.

The couple had a son - Narasingham Iyeng-ar (known as Singam Iyen-gar or Singam). To provide a good education to her only son Narasingam, Janakiam-mal shifted from Srirangam and came to Madras. They lived at No.6, Kennedy Second Street, Luz. Later, Janakiam-mal went on to buy the houses on Kennedy First Street and Kennedy Second Street one by one.

Vijaya believes Janaki-ammal would have bought the houses with the monies she made from the sale of ancestral property she had owned. Vijaya says that each house on the Luz streets had a traditional architecture with verandah and thinnai. Some had tiled roofs. Middle-class families lived in these houses. “My great grandmoth-er rented them all and made a living with the vadagai (rentals).”

Gardens, she says were an integral part of every house. “Each house would have had at least a small patch of greenery around it.”

Vijaya recalls that when she was around 10 years old, she used to go with Janakiam-mal to collect the rent from all these houses. “I recall that the vadagai ( rent) was Rs. 75 for one of the houses,” she says.

Narasingam Iyengar completed his studies in law. “But as he was passionate about journalism, he worked for a Calcutta magazine and then, for the Thamizh maga-zine ‘Ananda Vikatan’,” Vijaya says. His contemporaries were V. V. Srinivasa Iyengar, V. C. Gopalratnam (a resident of Lady Desikachari Road), N. Sivaraj (who served as Member of Parliament from

1957 to 1962 representing Chengalpattu constituency), and C. Ramaswami (cricketer). Narasingam got married to Kanakavalli (Vijaya’s grand-mother) and had four children (two daughters and two sons - both sons are no more). Vijaya is the daughter of the couple’s second daughter Sundaralak-shmi. Vijaya had an elder brother Srinivasan, who used to work for the India Cements Ltd. (He is no more now)

Sundaralakshmi married T. S. Parthasarathy when she

was 16. The marriage hap-pened in 1937 in the heritage bungalow called ‘The Luz’ on Oliver Road that is now called Musiri Subramanian Road. It still stands on this road where Vaigai Sanitation runs its business now. Vijaya says that all marriages of the neighbour-hood took place in this vintage bungalow then.

In those times, all families used to follow some unique wedding practices - one was held before the bridegroom arrived at the venue for the marriage ceremony. After a special ritual at a nearby tem-ple, the groom would be seated on a ‘mottai vandi’ (open car) and would be brought in a procession to the bride’s house, where the marriage used to take place. The groom’s family would accompany the car with ‘mela talam’. While the proces-sion went by, local residents would come out, holding gas lights to look at the groom and wish him. The ‘open car’ tradi-tion, she says was followed to make sure the boy was of good character and respected. “If any person from the public had known or seen the boy in any other relationships or have seen him indulging in bad habits, they would inform the girl’s family and the mar-riage would be called off im-mediately,” recalls Vijaya.

Parthasarathy worked for the Indian Railways. But he was best known in the Car-natic music and Bharatanaty-am world for his scholarship, research and writings on Carnatic music, having documented extensively on composer Thyagaraja’s music among a big body of work. After his retirement, he became the secretary of The Music Academy, a post he held for 18 years. Vijaya says, “My father was also a passionate musicologist. He guided scores of people who practiced or studied classical music and dance.” All the children in the family were born in the house they lived in - No.6, Kennedy Second Street.

1. Vijaya showing the location of the house they lived on Kennedy Second Street.2. Vijaya’ s parents T. S. Parthasarathy and Sundaralak-

shmi soon after they were married.3. Young Vijaya dressed as Radha standing with group of women, all set to invite their neighbours for Navarathri festival.4. Vijaya with the then Education Minister of the U.K. at an official trip to this country in the 1990s.5. The heritage bungalow called ‘The Luz’ where Vijaya’s parents got married in the year 1937.6. Vijaya holding her undergraduate Home Science degree in the year 1961.

l Contd. on pg 5

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MYLAPORE TIMESAugust 29, 2020 5

“A mid-wife, who was then believed to have kairasi would come to help in the home delivery of new-borns.”

Vijaya was also born in this house in 1942. She excitedly shows us her birth certificate that she has preserved care-fully all these years. “The days leading to my delivery, my parents were living at Bezawada (Vijayawada) in Andhra Pradesh as my father was posted there. My mother had come to Madras for the home delivery. Later, for some years, we lived at Venkatachala Mudali Street near Sanskrit College, Mylapore” Vi-jaya says she did her schooling at Good Shepherd Matriculation Higher Secondary School in Nungambakkam; (Vijaya says that the school was located at a different location from where it stands now ( “It was close to a canal then.”).

“We used to visit our great grandmoth-er’s house during school holidays.”

Vijaya recalls that opposite the fam-ily house in Kennedy Second Street, the famous Bharatanatyam dancer and guru Kalanidhi Narayanan and her family lived. “We were close friends with Kantu’s (Kalanidhi Narayanan’s pet name) fam-ily. My mother’s sister Rajalakshmi used to sing for Kantu’s dance performances.”

To buy a piece of land next to Our Lady of Light Church, Janakiammal is said to have argued hard with the then parish priest of the church, “Later, she built a bungalow on that piece of land. To please the priest she gave it an English name as Crossleigh. S. B. P. Pattabhi Rama Rao, who was the minister of com-posite Madras state (1952-54) resided here. The bungalow with that name board still stands on Luz Church lane.

Luz Church was surrounded by a dense scrub forest. It was and still is, called as Kattukoil. “I remember watch-ing the festivities of this church from our house,” Vijaya says. “During Christmas, lit stars and serial lights would be hung up around the church. A big crowd used to gather at the church during all the cel-ebrations. Women would dress up in large gowns. Vijaya says that the front portion of the church was largely muddy.

“Hawkers would put up stalls and sell toys for children, snacks and photos of the Christian saints. It was one of the hangout spots for us kids.”

Next to ‘Crossleigh’, in a small house rented by Janakiammal, lived the

Travancore Sisters - Padmini, Lalitha and Ragini who were actresses

in Thamizh, Malayalam, Telugu, Kannada and

Hindi films and dancers and performers. They lived here with their mother.

One of the tenants on Kennedy First

Street was Kaliyur Srinivasachari, a famous

astrologer. “He was one of the few astrologers who

would undertake to match horo-scopes for marriages at that time.”

Nageswara Rao Park did not exist in those days. It was just a small kut-tai (pond) that was surrounded by thick vegetation. “We used to call it ‘Arathakut-tai’ “, Vijaya says. “We never visited the area fearing attack by animals especially at night. We never got to see any animals but the elders kept telling us they were there!”.

Next to the kuttai, there were the bungalows of leading advocates includ-ing Sir K. S. Aravamudan Iyengar. It was at his car shed that the Dindigul-based businessman Rangachari first started his saris shop. “Women used to fondly buy saris from him.” Rangachari continues its business in this area, successfully.

There was also the bungalow of advo-cate Alladi Krishnaswamy Iyer. Opposite this house, were the houses of M. Patanja-li Sastri, second chief justice of India, and C. A. Vathiyalingam, ICS officer (Indian Civil Services) - the latter lived in a big bungalow surrounded by verdant garden.

Vijaya was 12 years old when her great grandmother passed away. The houses owned by the grand old lady changed hands. All have been developed into independent houses or apartment blocks. “Our house with door number 6 has been converted into three houses with door numbers - 6/1, 6/2, 6/3,” she says.

In 1964, Vijaya got married to D. Srid-haran. Sridharan was a IAS officer who went on to be in the grade of chief secre-tary and when he got to work in Delhi, the couple mostly stayed in Delhi. He retired in 1993 and passed away in 2007.

“During Sivarathri, to stay up all night we used to walk to Kamadhenu Theatre, Luz Church Road to watch movies from 12 pm to 3 a.m. We would watch films of M. K. Thygaraja Bhagavathar and K. B. Sundarambal. Kai-rickshaw ( hand-

held rickshaw) was the only means of transport at that time. In 1942, when my mother was pregnant with me, my great grand mother asked her to stay put at Thiruneermalai as the War was around us in the city.”

Every day, Vijaya says, Jana-kiammal used to travel by a kai-rickshaw owned by Thanjappan who was a regular to the family who took

take her to Thiruneermalai that was over 14 kms away. Another popular mode of transport Vijaya says was the tram’. Says Vijaya, “Every day, my father used to walk to Dr. Radhakrishnan Salai to take the tram to his office at Central railway station. The tram shed was located where TANGEDCO’s sub-station stands now.”

Vijaya vividly recalls that one of her father’s tram mates was the well-known Carnatic musician and painter S. Rajam. “On my father’s request, he gifted one of his paintings that featured Ramanujar. It was one of his oldest paintings where he had signed the painting upside down.” Vi-jaya has carefully preserved the 85-year-old painting in her pooja room.

For Navarathri, each family would dress their children as Radha and Krishna. The women in the family would accompany the children in that avatar and invite the neighbours for the nine days kolu festival. “We would spend the evenings in the muddy open area in front of Luz church. Aadupuli attam and pallanguzhi were some of our favourite games. Girls would also pluck jasmine and kadambam flowers from our garden. It was used for pooja.”

Vijaya graduated in 1961. She was a teacher at P. S. Higher Secondary School, R. K. Mutt Road in the 1980s. A post-grad-uate in history and English, she taught both these subjects at this school. She lat-er was the high school teacher at Padma Seshadri Bal Bhavan School in Nungamb-akkan and for a short period, the principal at Chettinad Vidyashram, R. A. Puram.

The family does not own any houses on the Kennedy streets now.

The apartment where Vijaya resides today (Srinekethan Apartments, Venus Colony) was built some 12 years ago. Spread across five grounds, it is constructed between two roads. “It once used to be the office of ‘Ananda Vikatan’ magazine.

It was locally known as ‘booth’ (ghost) bungalow, as it was amidst a large plot with thick vegetation. As the office worked only from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., it used to be pitch dark after 6 p.m., hence to avoid children from wandering in that campus, elders tried to frighten them.”

Today, Vijaya spends her time attending concerts at sabha halls. She enjoys setting up theme kolus for every Navarathri. Her daughter Kalpana works for Intel in Bengaluru.

l Contd. from pg 4

LIFE OF KENNEDY STREETS ZONE. IN EARLY 20th CENTURY. Three restaurants

in the area are offering special Onam ‘sadhya’ for the festival.

At Thaligai res-taurant in Luz Church Road, sadhya will be offered on August 29 and 31.

Chakka/palada pradhaman, kaalan, olan, varuthu aracha sambhar, red rice, and pineapple rasam are some items on the menu.

One can dine-in to have sadhya here from 11.30 am to 3 pm, on these days.

Takeaways offered. Price – Rs 525 for dining. Takeaways - Rs 575. At 60, Luz Church Road, Mylapore. Ph: 9791272888.

The Onam special sadhya at Ente Ker-alam restaurant in Alwarpet will have some 30 dishes. It will include nei paruppu, aviyal, thoran, kalan and 4 varieties of payasam and more.

Sadhya is on offer from Aug.21. A spe-cial sadhya with ad-ditional dishes is up on Onam day (Aug.31)

Price – Rs 399. Special sad-hya - Rs. 699. Call 6374999504/42328585. Door delivery available via Swiggy or Zomato.

At No. 1 First Street, Kasturi Estate, Poes Garden, Alwarpet.

Nithya Amirtham restaurant, Mylapore offers Onam Sadhya on Aug.31 and Sept.1, 12 noon onwards.

Dine in - Rs.200 | Takeaway - Rs.250. For reservations for dine in call - 7550020035 | 8056167327

Onam ‘sadhya’ at local restaurants