Friday, December 18, 2020
Thursday, December 17, 2020
Saturday, December 12, 2020
Monday, November 16, 2020
N Sankar, at 75
N. Sankar, at 75
V. RAMNARAYAN
If S. Muthiah was our founder, N. Sankar was our saviour. As Muthiah never tired of saying, had not Sankar stepped in at a crucial point in the life of Madras Musings and placed it on a sound financial footing with support from multiple corporate houses, the magazine would have been short lived. On the occasion of his 75th birthday, we wish our saviour and patron-in-chief many more years of good health and all happiness – The Editor
A true icon of Indian industry will turn 75 on November 19th. At the forefront of the Indian PVC manufacturing segment for over four decades, N. Sankar, the chairman of The Sanmar Group, presiding over a US $ one billion diversified multinational group, has been a role model for entrepreneurs and institution builders alike, characterised by an unusual combination of business acumen and ethical conviction – upright, farsighted, innovative. A pioneer in PVC manufacture, he was responsible for some of the most original choices made in the field including the highly integrated manufacturing processes at the numerous facilities of Chemplast, its flagship company, now over fifty years old.
Though the son and grandson of trailblazers in the history of south Indian industry and commerce – respectively K.S. Narayanan and S.N.N. Sankaralinga Iyer – Sankar was not born with a silver spoon, certainly not in a career sense. He obtained his B.Sc. (Tech) in Chemical Engineering from the AC College of Technology, Madras, graduating with distinction, and a Masters degree from the Illinois Institute of Technology, Chicago. He joined Chemplast in 1967 to help his father. In an interview years ago for Rediff News by Shobha Warrier, he recalled, “I was born in an entrepreneurial family of three generations, so automatically I also became an entrepreneur. I had no funds of my own to start an enterprise at that time. From 1967 to 1972, I worked with Chemplast, reporting to S. Ramaswamy, the chief executive of the company. I learnt a lot from him in those five years. He taught me simple things from how to draft a letter to how to manage people. Those were the most difficult times for Chemplast. But I learnt to cope with it.”
In 1972, Sankar started his entrepreneurial career, borrowing from friends and investors to acquire a majority stake in a company called Industrial Chemicals and Monomers. Determined to bring in technology to India to manufacture products of excellence as a measure of import substitution, he, all of 26 years old, was writing letters to foreign companies seeking collaboration with them, something very nearly unheard of then.
In search of mechanical seals it needed, Chemplast zoomed in on Durametallic of Michigan as its choice. Durametallic India at Karapakkam. Madras, resulted, growing into what is now Sanmar Engineering Technolgies Private Limited, an engineering group within the Sanmar Group, catering to a wide range of process industries – even India’s space missions – in need of components that principally ensure safety where the slightest risks must be ruled out. Several successful joint ventures have followed Durametallic India (now Flowserve Sanmar).
Sankar has over the decades ensured that these joint ventures with global corporations are models for emulation. He has clearly enunciated a joint venture philosophy which can be summarised somewhat on these lines: Both partners should appreciate the need for the joint venture. They should clearly agree on the way the JV will be managed, they must work towards a system based on trust and transparency. There must be appropriate interaction at different functional levels for the ongoing operations of the JV, and clearly defined high level contacts at both ends for management decision-making on important issues calling for the involvement of both partners. Finally, both partners need to be equally able to serve the growing capital needs of the JV as it expands.
Always leading the way with its concern for the environment, the chemicals division of Sanmar under Sankar has made a fine art of ZLD or zero liquid discharge at its manufacturing facilities, amidst a whole slew of steps taken to ensure sustainable growth.
Corporate governance is an article of faith with Sankar, who must count among his contribution to best practices in business and industry the manner in which Sanmar has evolved a clear-cut management philosophy, its HR policy based on competence and a performance culture, and an elaborately spelt out ethics manual that guides employees on how they can implicitly follow the group’s code of conduct in a variety of circumstances that they may encounter.
Identifying the right person for the right job and empowering his employees to function competently and ethically without fear seem to come naturally to Sankar.
“Strictly follow the law of the land, so that we can all sleep well at night” could well be defined as his paramount mantra to them.
Make no mistake, N. Sankar is a tough, demanding boss. Tasks must be completed in the proper timeframe, decisions should be based on irrefutable logic, information should be communicated clearly, honestly, and such communication has no hierarchy. It only takes him a couple of minutes to see through bluff and inadequate preparation for meetings. He is a master of follow-up, not for him dereliction in the guise of delegation. His attention to detail and meticulous planning do rub off on his managers who are empowered to discharge their responsibilities fearlessly, for so long as they do all that is required of them sincerely, failure will not be punished.
Sankar is known for his steadfast friendships and loyalties. Just as he treated S. Ramaswami, his first, and only, boss with due respect until his retirement, he developed strong bonds with his mentors and senior colleagues. If he found in any of them qualities that could serve the group well, he took advantage of their expertise and wisdom for as long as possible. His professor Dr. G.S. Laddha was one such person of eminence who served on the Chemplast board of directors for more than three decades. For all that his decisions seemed based on cold logic, they could be, and often were, tempered by the human touch – without prejudice to business sense. A sterling example was the way Sankar and his father Narayanan rallied round senior employee S.R. Seshadri, devastated by the loss of his wife while he was at Mettur working for Chemplast. They assisted his relocation to Madras and psychological rehabilitation by approving his pet project to manufacture mechanical seals, vital components required by Chemplast and the process industry in general. The end result was the joint venture Durametallic India. Firmly of the belief that public recognition and approbation are more important than monetary rewards, Sanmar not only honoured him properly during his tenure there but also posthumously by the establishment of the SR Seshadri Training Institute for its employees. Sankar also never hesitated to utilise the services of his most accomplished colleagues beyond their retirement age. Examples are S.B. Prabhakar Rao, M.N. Radhakrishnan and R. Kalidas. He also did not hesitate to reopen Sanmar’s doors to employees who left the group when they sought reentry if he felt they could serve Sanmar well all over again.
The recipient of honours and awards of every description including lifetime achievement awards from state level and national level apex bodies for the chemical industry, Sankar has been a highly respected figure while helming such bodies as Assocham, the Madras Chamber of Commerce and the Madras Management Association, besides sports bodies like the Tamil Nadu as well as the All India Tennis Association, the Madras Cricket Club and Tamil Nadu Cricket Association.
A keen sportsman, Sankar had to forego his ambition to become a top flight cricketer after polio struck him when he was 17, but a doubles champion at the university level partnering N. Srinivasan of India Cements, he continued his love affair with tennis well into his sixties, playing regularly at the Madras Cricket Club courts finding in it the perfect relaxation after a hard day’s work.
It is very well known that Sankar has been one of the finest patrons of cricket in India. The Sanmar family started supporting the iconic team Jolly Rovers Cricket Club in 1966, when India Cements adopted the team and hired cricketers from far and wide inviting players from other states like Mysore and Andhra, with the company’s director K.S. Narayanan enthusiastically leading the search party, as it were. Jolly Rovers dominated Madras cricket for many years, sweeping the league title repeatedly.
The golden jubilee of the Sanmar family-Jolly Rovers association was made memorable by an emotional gathering at Chennai of all living members of that first champion side in July 2015 and exactly a year later by the release by the great all rounder Kapil Dev of a book Cricket for the Love of it to commemorate this record association, accompanied by a presidential lecture by historian Ramachandra Guha.
The inaugural K.S. Narayanan Memorial Oration was delivered on January 30, 2016 by former England cricket captain David Gower. Every year since then, the Oration has maintained its high standards in both the quality of discourse as well as the unimpeachable credentials of the speakers. The crowning glory was the K.S. Narayanan Centenary Oration by former British Prime Minister David Cameron on January 30, 2019.
Sankar has never done anything by half measures and the way he has honoured his father’s memory is second only to the devotion with which he cared for him in his lifetime.
With son Vijay Sankar ready to take over from him whenever he is ready to hang up his boots, Sankar can look back with satisfaction at his journey as entrepreneur, institution builder and enabler of human potential in diverse fields.
Wednesday, November 11, 2020
Thursday, October 29, 2020
Saturday, September 19, 2020
Wednesday, September 16, 2020
Tuesday, September 15, 2020
Thursday, September 10, 2020
Thursday, September 3, 2020
'PROUD OF MY HERITAGE' : KALLICHARRAN
(An interview I did with Alvin Kallicharran in 1992.)
I am very proud of my Indian heritage. I don't know whether my Indian origin had anything to do with it. But Viv Richards made a statement a couple of years ago that he was happy the West Indies was at last a full African side. That is not the way the West Indian captain should speak. Especially in my country, Guyana it is a very insensitive thing to say in view of the political situation there. Viv really hurt the Indians in Guyana.
THE BEST TEST UMPIRE INDIA NEVER HAD
IVATURI SIVARAM
By V Ramnarayan
Starting
unusually young and performing with distinction for three decades, Sivaram was
in a manner of speaking an umpire in the S Venkataraghavan mould, tall and
erect, intensely focussed on his job, firm in his decision making based on
sound theoretical and practical knowledge. In the early part of his umpiring
career, he was often younger than the players in the matches he was officiating
in, though evidently quite unfazed by that. His confidence and integrity stood
out so clearly that few players, if any, questioned his decisions, while few of
his decisions left room for dissent.
I was
always an admirer of Sivaram who stood in some of the matches I played in the
1970s. I was so impressed that I expected him to walk effortlessly into
international duty. Little did I know then that he would receive a raw deal in his career, that
umpires too were like players subject to the whims and fancies of authority, that
Sivaram would one day be “hanged without a trial,” (the headline of a TOI story
by Sumit Mukherjee of how Sivaram was axed from the ICC panel of TV umpires
without a single opportunity in a whole series) much in the manner of players
who move in and out of a 15-man squad without playing a single match on a whole
tour or in a complete tournament. Though Sivaram officiated in ODIs in India,
his Test chances never came, not even after he was unofficially asked to be
ready to umpire in a particular Test match in 1986. Not unusual in Indian
cricket, the job went to another, senior, umpire who pleaded for one last game.
“Sivaram was after all young, with a bright future ahead of him, so he could
afford to wait,” was the argument. The Test match debut never came.
Mrs I Chellayi was an A grade artiste of All India Radio and a lecturer in the
Government Music College of Secunderabad. Sivaram joined the college as a
student at age 12 and completed a three-year certificate course. He was only 22
when his hero Chittibabu allowed him to accompany him on the veena in an album
entitled Musings of a Musician, in which the percussion accompaniment was
provided by eminent musicians Guruvayur Dorai, Kamalakar Rao and Manjunath. Sivaram
cherishes the memory of “the experience of practising with my guru and those
stalwarts.”
Sivaram
was undoubtedly a boy prodigy. And not just in music, for he first umpired in
the Moin-ud-Dowla Gold Cup tournament of Hyderabad when barely 17, even before
he had formally qualified as an umpire. His inspiration came from his father,
the late IVS Sastry, an enthusiastic amateur sportsman and umpire in the
Hyderabad cricket league, and his uncle, the late Ramana Rao a BCCI umpire.
Ramana Rao first allowed Sivaram the opportunity to co-umpire a local league
match with him when he was just 15. “You will be a better umpire than player,”
he told the young wicket keeper-batsman, and before long, he was standing in
that Gold Cup match in 1971, thrilled to watch the greats of the day like ML
Jaisimha, Hanumant Singh, EAS Prasanna, BS Chandrasekhar and GR Viswanath from
close quarters. A rare combination of cricketing genes and musical genes,
Sivaram owes much in his growth as an umpire to Ramana Rao and Test umpire VK
Ramaswamy, his “role model.”
Having qualified as a BCCI panel umpire by
1978, Sivaram made his Duleep Trophy debut in 1986, and did his first ODI in
1994. He made steady progress and earned
appreciation at every stage from players, officials and visiting commentators.
A memorable stumping decision involving New Zealander Roger Twose in a 1995 ODI
that he made without referring to the TV umpire won him compliments from
commentator Ian Smith and match referee GR Viswanath. English umpire David
Sheppard was one of his seniors who had a good word for him. An unforgettable
moment came during his Duleep Trophy debut, when his explanation of Sunil
Gavaskar’s dismissal on 94 earned him an approving nod and a tap on his
shoulder. “How did I miss that ball?” the Little Master had asked the young
umpire.
It
must be a huge disappointment not ever officiating in a Test match, a rude
shock to have been dropped from the ICC Panel without a single opportunity to
prove himself on the field, but Ivaturi has taken all that on his chin like a
good soldier, secure in the knowledge that he performed admirably throughout a
distinguished umpiring career in first class matches, mentored umpires through
workshops, officiated in the inaugural IPL season and contributed in numerous
ways to improvement in umpiring standards. Now in his second innings as a
musician, he has always enjoyed the blessings of his mother who at 90 still
mentors him, and the lifelong support of wife Venkataramani and brother Kanakachalam
in all he does.
Friday, August 28, 2020
CS DAYAKAR
A Feisty All-rounder
By V Ramnarayan
Sometimes we tend to forget
quiet interventions by individuals that have life-changing impacts on our
lives. I for one have been guilty of failing to mention the crucial role CS
Dayakar, my friend and spin twin of the 1960s, played in my cricket career
while writing the story of my days as a cricketer. Looking back more than fifty years on, I realise what a gross omission that was, comparable to the lack
of selectorial recognition that prevented Dayakar from exhibiting his sterling
qualities as a left-hand all rounder to wider audiences than the
spectators watching college and league cricket in Madras during the two decades
he was active in them.
I first met Dayakar at
Vivekananda College during our Pre-University Course days in the academic year 1963-64.
We knew each other as decent cricketers, but did not have too many interactions
as we were in different groups, and while I think he was a member of the college team,
I was not. I went on to Presidency College next year, and miraculously got
selected to the college cricket team thanks to the efforts of two good Samaritans.
The first of them was another left hander ‘Alley’ R Sridhar, who made sure I
attended the selection trials after I had gone to college that day without my
cricket kit, positive that I stood no chance of being picked. Living much
closer to college than I, Alley rushed home during lunch and brought me white
trousers and canvas shoes and dragged me forcibly to the nets in the evening.
The second benefactor was the late Ram Ramesh, the captain of the Vivekananda
College team, who in the previous season had failed to convince the Physical
Director that I was good enough for his squad, and felt guilty about it. (It
was his recommendation that had facilitated my turning out, quite successfully,
for Jai Hind CC in the Madras league that same season). Ramesh was a towering
presence—literally—at the Presidency selection nets, where he stood next to
captain Bhaskar Rao and senior player Rajamani and brainwashed them into including
me in the team.
Dayakar had meanwhile lost a
year by missing the PUC Sanskrit exam. He too joined Presidency next year, in
the BSc Geology course, if I remember right—to my Chemistry major. I was a
veteran of one season when he became my teammate in the academic year ’65-‘66,
and we eventually forged what was arguably the most successful spin pair in
Madras’s college cricket circuit for the next few years. There were quite a few
class acts around, S Venkataraghavan, for example, leading a superb Engineering
College attack, but few were limited to a pair of spinners as we were, though
we too were for a while bolstered by the presence of a third spinner—in leggie PS Ramesh.
Dayakar was an accomplished
all rounder, a gutsy one who invariably reserved his best for the toughest
opposition. He belonged to a family of talented cricketers. His brothers
Ekambaram, Kothandaraman, Padmanabhan, Umapathy and Kadiresan were all
competitive and more than competent players. A couple
of them played first class cricket, Umapathy has for long been a coach in the
MRF Pace Foundation, while the youngest brother Kathiresan, an excellent
off-spinner-all rounder, was distinctly unlucky not to graduate to Ranji Trophy cricket.
Dayakar bowled his left arm
spin in a lovely arc, with a whiplash of an action that made the ball hurry off
the wicket. His length and line were spot on, and the batsman had to
contend with an awkward length that could create an optical illusion in
the batsman. Our captain Ram—N Ram of The Hindu family—relied on him a great deal,
sometimes bringing him on with the new ball. When the shine was still intact, Dayakar
bowled a deadly in-swinger to the right hander. He was in short a captain’s
best friend who posed a complex mixture of problems to batsmen. I regarded him as a better bowler than me in our college years, and I always
tried to play catch-up. He was the catalyst who—by both example and verbal
encouragement—constantly pushed me to improve. We backed each other wholeheartedly
and the outcome was a formidable combination that, with enthusiastic support
from the fielders, won many a match for the team. Dayakar’s batting too was top
class at that level—he rarely played at higher levels. He and other batsmen
like John Alexander and Alley Sridhar were consistent scorers against strong
teams, with all rounders Rajamani and SV Suryanarayanan chipping in creditably,
especially if we lost our star batsmen like Ram and Premkumar early. After these leading batsmen left college, we
found fresh batting talents in the likes of MS Rajagopal and the lefthanded ‘Chama’
K Swaminathan.
Dayakar also pushed me hard
to contribute in the batting department. We enjoyed some useful partnerships,
even if the running between the wickets at his urging nearly caused my lungs to
burst. It was an early wake-up call that forced me to work on my stamina and
physical fitness. Though I made some runs, I was never in his class as a
batsman.
Now for the crucial interventions Dayakar made in my cricket career. After my undergraduate degree, I was working at the desk in the Indian Express. It was work I had an aptitude for and enjoyed thoroughly, but I was unhappy enough with an instance of office politics to want to quit. At that precise moment came an invitation from Dayakar and the Presidency College Physical Director to go back there and do post graduate studies. With no prospect of playing serious cricket if I continued as a career journalist, I made the right decision in going back to college, as later events proved. With Dayakar and I enjoying elder statesmen status by now, we both thoroughly enjoyed resuming our partnership. Unfortunately, I had to discontinue my MA programme when my father’s poor health required my presence with the family at Calcutta, where Appa was working for Bank of India. By the time Appa got better, the first year MA exams were over, and I thought, “There goes my MA.” Dayakar waved his magic wand once again, and the college welcomed me back, allowing me to carry the three papers I had missed into the second year. Followed an excellent season for both of us, with several stellar all round performances by Dayakar ensuring that our relatively weak team often fought strong opposition gallantly and brought off a few unexpected wins. Leading the side, I had the great satisfaction of watching the considerable improvement of many newcomers we managed to enable.
One of
the open secrets of our success that season was that Dayakar and I bowled every
over from the time ‘Play’ was called in every important match, but allowed the
others totally free to “express themselves” in 90% of all our matches, never
yielding to the temptation to pick up relatively easy runs or wickets for
ourselves. This was Dayakar’s brainchild, and I carried out the plan with
conviction, but I regretted the strategy when I looked back on the season in
later years, because it denied some good bowlers like PS Venkatesh, Osman Ali
Khan and Kasi Viswanathan opportunities to prove themselves in stiff contests.
Dayakar and I were both
selected to represent Madras University in the Rohinto Baria Trophy matches
played at Dharwar, Karnataka, but my spin twin declined the offer fearing that
he would not find a place in the playing eleven. I was disappointed with his
decision, because I was keen to continue our bowling firm, which was now a
well-oiled machine of five years’ standing. I had a reasonable if unspectacular
outing for the university.
Dayakar’s final intervention
in my career: Despite consistent success in college cricket for four
consecutive seasons, I had been content to play in the lower divisions of the TNCA
league, partly because I believed some people I trusted when they told me I was
not ready yet for the First Division. Nothing could have been more absurd, and
I was missing opportunities by underestimating my ability. It was Dayakar who
bulldozed me at the start of the 1969-70 season into joining him at Alwarpet CC
being led by our former college captain
N Ram. That was the first tentative step I took towards entering first class
cricket.
I left Chennai in December
1970 to join State Bank of India in Andhra Pradesh, and wound my way soon to
Hyderabad, where I made my Ranji Trophy debut nearly five years later, after long
struggle. Dayakar joined Indian Overseas Bank, Madras, where he was a key
member of the cricket team for a long time. Busy with my own cricket, family and
banking career, I no longer followed Dayakar’s cricket closely. Was he ever
considered fit material to represent the state in first class cricket? I have
no doubt in my mind that Tamil Nadu let him and itself down by failing to
acknowledge the merit of this fighting all round cricketer.
Sunday, August 9, 2020
Saturday, August 8, 2020
SO NEAR YET SO FAR
Jyothiprasad’s narrow miss
By V Ramnarayan
The scorecard does not always tell the whole story. For
example, the card for the second innings of the Kerala vs. Hyderabad Ranji
Trophy match at Warangal in the 1976-’77 season opened with the bland statement
OK Ramdas/ caught Narasimha Rao/ bowled Ramnarayan/ 22. It failed to mention
that the catch was off a ricochet after Ramdas picked me from outside the off stump and nearly decapitated short
leg Jyothiprasad with an almighty sweep I can still hear 44 years later. Poor
Jyothi, my partner in crime on so many occasions, with his brilliant close-in
catching, rarely took early evasive action, preferring to keep his eye on the
ball longer than most other short legs. This time OK gave him no chance, and I thought
I would never be able to bowl again, so distraught was I. Joe, as we called
him, was leaving for Baroda the next day to represent South Zone in back to
back Deodhar Trophy and Duleep Trophy matches against West Zone. He left the
field immediately after the injury, probably on a stretcher, and once in the
dressing room, treated himself to some
inspired self-medication—a quarter bottle of Hercules XXX rum neat. All of us
followed Jyothi’s fortunes anxiously after we disposed of Kerala and returned
to Hyderabad, and we received both good news and bad news. Jyothi had a
spectacular Deodhar Trophy match with five wickets, including the prize scalp
of Sunil Gavaskar, whom he bowled for zero. His Duleep performance could have
been equally dramatic—with a little bit of luck. He bowled the first ball of
the West Zone innings, and surprised by a powerful straight drive, dropped the catch. The
batsman was again Sunil Manohar Gavaskar—who went on to make 228. Earlier, Joe
(40) had been involved in a fighting eighth wicket partnership of 102 with
Brijesh Patel (85) in South Zone’s first innings total of 236.
Coming back to the Warangal match, I had a decent match with
the ball except for the injury to Joe, with 4 for 31 and 1 for 1. I however sustained
a bruised ego, because I had always prided myself on my clean record of
close-in fielder safety while I was bowling. (The only other aberration
occurred years later in a local match at Chennai, the unlucky short leg this
time MA Sriram, a talented left handed all rounder who now lives in the US).
Ramdas was not the only sweep specialist in the Kerala side. The talented
Ramesh Sampath, a cousin of S Venkataraghavan, and an engineer working at ISRO,
was making waves with his attacking batsmanship. A compulsive sweeper, he had
an excellent record against the Karnataka and Tamil Nadu bowlers whom he must
have irritated with his irreverent shotmaking regardless of the bowlers’
reputation. Thanks to my captain Jaisimha’s expert mentoring, I knew a thing or
two about how to counter sweep specialists. Ramesh was a good friend, and in
the course of breakfast table banter, he said to me, “Ram, don’t get me out
today.” Remembering that he had got out to me sweeping on my debut the previous
season, I shot back, “Don’t sweep me, and I promise not to get you.” Sure
enough, when he came into bat, Ramesh swept me first ball—straight down square
leg Noshir Mehta’s throat. Ramesh seemed to have a bright future in cricket,
but tragically drowned at a Goa beach a couple of years later.
My debut season had been a happy experience, and team morale
had been pretty high, umtil we crashed out in the quarter finals after gaining
a first innings lead against Bombay. This year, I had missed the disastrous
season opener against Andhra at Eluru, away playing for Rest of India versus
Bombay in the Irani Cup at Delhi. When I joined the team at Warangal, I found a
strange mood of negativity and what seemed like lack of cohesion following an
alleged attempt by wicket keeper to replace Jaisimha as captain. It was all
very disappointing. Murti was a close friend of mine and quite a protégé of Jai
as well. Playing for Hyderabad was never again going to be as consistently
fulfilling and thrilling as during my first season, though there were to be
many happy moments along the way. Tiger Pataudi and Abbas Ali Baig had retired
at the end of the previous season, and Jaisimha would hang up his boots at the
end of this one. He had led the team for nearly two decades.
Sunday, August 2, 2020
Saturday, August 1, 2020
VARALAMA?
Sarvam Thaalamayam
A Film by Rajiv Menon
I finally got round to watching Rajiv Menon’s inspirational feature film Sarvam Thaalamayam (STM), a sensitive treatment of the subject of caste and elitism in the world of Carnatic music, the classical music of south India. It also highlights the sweet taste of success that passion and love for your art can bring against all odds, and despite chicanery and opposition at every stage.
The movie is about
the obsession of a young lad hailing from a dalit Christian family—mridangam
makers for generations—with learning to become a concert percussionist in
Carnatic music. Rejection and ostracism all round, with his parents and finally
even his compassionate guru joining in a shattering chorus of disapproval, almost
crush his dreams. He despairs of ever finding a teacher as great as his
erstwhile guru, but in a moment of epiphany, follows the selfless advice of his
godsend of a girlfriend and seeks teachings from the bewildering variety of
musics—folk, devotional, romantic, martial, festive—that India abounds in. The
miracle that reunites him with his guru who relents from his earlier orthodox
contempt for reality shows and trains him for one, and the boy’s eventual
triumph in the contest make for a memorable climax. In the finale, even a wily judge
opposed to him is moved enough by Peter’s extraordinary originality (inspired
by his eclectic journey of discovery) to award him a perfect ten.
The movie does not follow a hardline narrative. Nowhere is
caste even mentioned. Though we know from Johnson’s name that he is Christian,
we only learn he is dalit by inference—the community are known in the south to
be makers of the mridangam requiring the usage of the skin of cattle, and Peter
and Johnson Senior are served in plastic cups, not the usual glasses, in a
teastall. What I like even more are the lack of condescension in the manner the
screenplay treats the protagonist’s hysterical affiliation to popular film star Vijay’s fan club and the absence
of melodrama in scenes showing blood donation to child cancer victims and other
good deeds of the street fighters of the movie. Of humour, there is no
shortage. As when the venerable mridangam guru fails to suppress his mirth at Peter’s instant
recognition of Vijayadasami day. “June 22, sir, it is Vijay sir’s birthday!”
Even Mani, the most villainous character of the film is not all
bad. Here again, the director makes no attempt at showing ‘the villain’s’
transformation when he redeems himself in the final scene after scheming to get
Peter defeated by his disciple—one he stole from under his guru’s nose. He is
instead seen as won over by the sheer brilliance of the new champion’s
percussion. The loser, too, is a gallant runner-up, not an object of ridicule.
Rajiv Menon has extracted exceptional performances from an
ensemble cast coincidentally represented by the greatest diversity of caste and community imaginable. Nedumudi Venu breathes life into the role of eminent mridanga
vidwan Vembu Iyer, an unbending traditionalist wedded to his art, who can spot
talent no matter where it resides, while Vineeth as his senior sishya Mani jealous
of new arrival GV Prakash Kumar is unrecognisable from the matinee idol we have
known in the past, Prakash himself effortlessly straddles multiple
personae from Vijay fan through hip hop drummer to street fighter to obsessive
convert to the magic of classical mridangam and Kumaravel is effortlessly credible
as Johnson, the inheritor of a legacy of mridangam-making that allows him no
self-indulgence, no illusions about acceptance into the exalted world of
classical music. Sumesh Narayanan, an accomplished vidwan of NRI origin, brings
dignified credibility to his role. Shanta Dhananjayan and Aparna Balamurali
quietly lend substance to their roles as the women who intervene strategically
in Peter Johnson’s journey towards fulfilment. Vocalists Unnikrishnan, Sikkil Gurucharan and Srinivas play delightful cameos as judges at the reality show. The music direction by AR Rahman
is impeccable and appropriate scene for scene, shot by shot. The Carnatic music
segments are totally authentic, with no attempt to woo the box office.
The main reason why I took so long to watch STM was that I
mistook it to be a new avatar of a Rajiv Menon-made documentary on mridangam
maestro Umayalpuram K Sivaraman, which I had seen a few years ago. I was
delighted to see UKS’s name in the credits to STM. His inputs and personal
example are clearly evident in the film. Sivaraman did impart his art to his
dalit mridangam maker’s son, didn’t he?
I think STM is an important step towards inclusiveness in
classical music. Elitism and casteism are indefensible in any walk of life, but
to paint whole generations of classical musicians as blatant perpetuators of
discrimination and indulge in strident name-calling would seem to be just so
much posturing rather than a sincere attempt at reform. The enlightened among
our musicians, in both the north and the south, have embraced diversity in their
art as well as their fellow artists. STM ends on a positive note, which is not
to say that it offers easy redress to centuries-old injustice. Instead, it
suggests that together we can overcome rather than annihilate.
In an online or TV discussion, Rahman and Menon disclosed that the
film was originally tentatively named “Varalama?” the opening word of the beautiful
title song, apparently inspired by Gopalakrishna Bharati’s classic ‘Varugalano
Ayya’ from the movie Nandanar Charitam. While Nandan’s song in Dandapani
Desigar’s bell-like voice was a plaintive appeal to Nataraja to let him enter
the Tillai temple, ‘Varalama’ is a plea by an outsider to be admitted to the
exclusive sanctum of classical music. ‘Varalama’ more accurately describes the story
of Johnson’s yearning than ‘Sarvam Thaalamayam’, which stresses the presence of
rhythm in every aspect of life.
V Ramnarayan `
Friday, July 31, 2020
BABUJI
Life with Grandma
By V Ramnarayan
My late friend Mohan Ramalingam, then secretary of the Mylapore Club, brought me my fifteen minutes of fame as moderator of a Chess-Bridge conversation on stage between Viswanathan Anand and KR Venkataraman about a decade ago. Both the speakers were extremely articulate and passionate about their sport, with Anand frequently bringing the house down with his scintillating wit. Among other things, he gave us an elaborate description of the enormous amount of team work that goes on behind his major campaigns including the computer analysis of hundreds of games involving Anand as well as his opponents, and the intricate post mortem that follows his most recent contest. Anand could not suppress a smile when I reminded him of his earlier statement that chess was a lonely game. Women's chess was one of the topics of the evening, and while the question of why in a mindsport, no woman had so far been crowned world champion against all comers, men or women, came up, Anand expressed the hope that such a prospect, though distant, was not to be ruled out with more and more girls taking to chess the world over.
Anand regaled us with some hilarious stories. One of them involved a train journey during his childhood. “What do you want to be when you grow up?” asked an older co-passenger.””A chess player, “ was the instant reply from the boy. “I understand. You love chess, but it is a hobby, a sport. What do you want to do after you graduate? What do you even want to study, engineering, medicine?” “Play chess,”Anand, the junior national champion persisted. Finally the man gave up. “Do you think you are Viswanathan Anand?” he blurted out.
My mind went back to a train journey in the mid to late 1970s. My daughter Akhila, all of four or five, was travelling with her mother Gowri from Hyderabad to Bombay. It was August 15 and one of the ‘uncles’ in the compartment asked Akhila, “Do you know why today is a special day?” “I know. It is Independence Day. My grandfather got us independence from the British,” my daughter informed her by now growing audience. The uncles were pleased no end. “Yes, Gandhiji was your grandfather, my grandfather, everybody’s grandfather,” one of them piped in.
Little did that group of patriotic Indians realize that Akhila was actually referring to her great grandfather Kalki Krishnamurthi, the famous author and freedom fighter. Mrs Kalki, Rukmini Ammal, widowed in 1954, came to live with us in Hyderabad when Akhila was a baby, and took firm control of her education even before she started school. That is how little Akhila came to speak Tamil fluently and like a proper mami typical of Tamil households. “Appa, Amma, come out and watch iyarkai arpudam (nature’s miracle),” was par for the course every time Akhila wanted us to share in her excitement in watching a flower or a bird or a sunset.
And Babuji—as we called Gowri’s late grandma, and thereby hangs a tale, to be told later—completely brainwashed the child into believing that Kalki was the greatest hero of India’s freedom struggle, India’s finest writer, besides being the perfect family man with unsurpassed virtues. With such a hard act to follow, Gowri and I were constantly up against it as young parents.
We once had two American girls staying with
us in our tiny three room apartment. Mornings were hectic with Gowri busy in
the kitchen and multitasking, and me getting ready to go to work. The guests
were sipping their tea daintily while the pop-up toaster failed to pop and the
toast was burning and sending smoke and flames heavenwards. All the ladies needed to do
to put out the fire was reach out and switch the toaster off. Instead, they sat
there and gently called out “Go-owri! Go-o-owri!” while Gowri was battling with
her kerosene stove in the kitchen. Babuji chose that moment to make a dramatic
entry. She gave the girls the angriest glare she could muster, stood there with
her arms akimbo and declared in her deepest, grimmest voice:”Rotti pinishdu!”
Thursday, July 30, 2020
LIFE BEGINS AFTER TEST CRICKET
A "Novella" By Carolyn Gupte
The Story of Subhash and Carol Gupte
The romance of cricket has always held an irresistible
attraction for me. The on-field exploits of its greats and not-so-greats that
ensure the glorious uncertainties of the game have never needed the collateral
support of love stories beyond the game to cast a spell over me. True, one has
been aware that some great romances through the ages have served to enlarge the
aura around some of our most enduring icons, but I have rarely been curious to
know the details of the love lives of my cricketing heroes—until the daughter
of one of the all time greats of Indian cricket and his West Indian wife of
Indian origin decided to ‘semi-fictionalise’ the classic love story of her
parents. It is a story of the overwhelming odds they had to fight to marry each
other, of their steadfast devotion to each other, of the depth of their
feelings for each other.
The premature end of Subhash Gupte’s Test career was not
only one of the great tragedies of Indian cricket but also an example of gross
disrespect and rank injustice, by an uncaring, insensitive administration. After
watching his series-winning exploits in the 1955-56 season against New Zealand—overshadowed
only by the Mankad-Roy world record opening partnership—on my debut as a
spectator, I had come to expect nothing short of greatness from this diminutive
wrist spinner Sir Garfield Sobers rates higher than Shane Warne. Gupte did not
disappoint. His 9 for 102 in the Kanpur Test against the all-conquering West
Indies was the best of his heroic bowling performances in that series, but the
visiting batsmen led by Garry Sobers and Rohan Kanhai stole the rubber away
from India with some magnificent batting that rode a wave of hostile bowling by
the likes of Wes Hall and Roy Gilchrist. The Madras Test of that series was the last
time I saw Gupte in action, and with a four-wicket haul in the second innings,
he did not disappoint me, his young hero-worshipper.
It was during the 1961-62 tour of India by Ted Dexter’s MCC that
the cricket board destroyed Gupte’s Test career in one fell swoop on
disciplinary grounds. He and roommate AG Kripal Singh were suspended following
an alleged act of indiscipline in which Gupte had no part. While Kripal came
back into the Test team a couple of years later, Gupte emigrated to the
Caribbean with his wife Carol, whom he had married on 1st April
1957. She had been Carol Goberdhan when he first met her on the 1952-53 Indian
tour of the islands, a tour during which he had been quite the star attraction.
At age 33, he had played his last Test match, and barring local games in
Trinidad, the only cricket he would continue to play consisted of his
professional Lancashire league stint with Rishton, where he spent a happy time
with his wife.
Upsetting as it was to find Gupte’s name missing among the
dramatis personae of India’s Test performances, I soon learnt to discover new
Indian heroes even during the disastrous tours of the 1960s. Gradually, one
became accustomed to his absence in the Indian team. To learn that ‘Fergie’
Gupte and his wife played host to Ajit Wadekar’s men in Trinidad in 1971, or
that every visiting Indian cricket team made its pilgrimage to the Gupte home gave
one no hint of the romance and longevity of their relationship, nor of the
opposition the couple had had to face from their families during their
courtship.
A large gap in one’s insights into the Gupte adventure has
now been filled by reading Love Without
Boundaries, the affectionate retelling of ‘the 49-year partnership of Subhash
and Carol Gupte’ by their daughter Carolyn Gupte. The novella, as the author
calls it, is not the story of Subhash’s stellar cricket career, but a moving
account of the family values, strength of character and singleness of purpose
that went into their journey together, Gupte’s pride in his wife’s many
accomplishments crowned by her successful running of the school she established
in September 1972, AC Goberdhan Memorial School, and his wholehearted support
of all she did. It is also the story of the tremendous fight Carol made to
rebuild her life after suffering the worst injuries in a horrendous car
accident involving her, Subhash and daughter Carolyn in 1977.
‘Outfitted with a skull cast”, Carol was hospitalised for
three months, but once discharged, made a strong comeback. “With skull cast
firmly in place, and jaws wired shut, she returned to work and conducted the
daily business of running her home and school from an upstairs bedroom at Five
Gables, the original family home where the school was located. In 1987, after
the Guptes moved into their own house, Subhash sustained a crippling hip injury
that made Carolyn—who had graduated in London—decide to give up her burgeoning
public relations career to become her father’s primary caregiver, playing that
role to perfection till his death in May 2002.
Make no mistake; this is a love story, an unusual one in
that it is told by the daughter of the protagonists. The hero and heroine are
very special people, achievers in their chosen fields. There is no attempt in
it at establishing the greatness of Subhash Gupte, the world class leg spinner.
It is as if the author believes the reader knows that and does not bother describing
his art. The book is about the Guptes as flesh and blood people, vulnerable,
“flawed” even, about their total love for each other and their families. For
Carol, life with Subhash had been “a constant barrel of unexpected surprises and
a bellyful of spontaneous laughter—(he was) an imperfect man, a flawed man,
but… blessed with such a good heart…”
Carolyn Gupte writes effortlessly. Her admiration for her
subjects is obvious, and she writes glowingly of her parents, miraculously
avoiding sentimentality. The book has the makings of an engaging film script.
An altogether lovely read.
V RAMNARAYAN
Wednesday, July 29, 2020
MUSIC KEEPS HIM ALIVE
TANJAVUR SANKARA IYER
By V Ramnarayan
I reproduce here a tribute I wrote many years ago to one of Carnatic music's living greats.
“Look
up the meaning of the Tyagaraja kriti Sangita gnanamu in the book there ,” the
frail old man bundled up and blanketed in the chair in front of me said, a
minute after I entered his bedroom in his nephew’s house inside Sankarnagar,
Tirunelveli, when my friend Sampathkumar and I visited him earlier this month.
Near-nonagenarian and confirmed bachelor Tanjavur Sankara Iyer may be a very
sick man today, needing the constant care of a loving nephew, his wife and his
daughter, but his musical creativity and devotion to past masters including the
Trinity remain undimmed. True to the words of Tyagaraja, he still pursues
sangita gnanamu with fervent devotion, still composes his own bhava-rich
compositions and still sings and teaches everyday. The object of his love and
affection and guru kripa is his 12-year-old granddaughter Aparna, on whom he
pins his hopes for the future.
For those unfamiliar with Sankara Iyer’s contribution to Carnatic music, I
reproduce below a brief extract from a Sruti (issue 195) profile of the vidwan
by Lakshmi Devnath:
"Sankara Iyer is a highly respected vaggeyakara. His compositions have
been a source of delight both to the vidwans and to the general public, but he
himself speaks with great modesty about his works. “I should not be bracketed
with the Trinity or other famous composers of the past. But I can say my
compositions are rooted in sampradaya, as theirs are, while they cater at the
same time to evolving needs without being light. Shall I say, my compositions
are a bridge between the old and the new!”
Anyone who has listened to Sankara Iyer’s vocal concerts, lec-dems and his own
compositions, will readily agree that he is indeed a bridge between the old and
the new.
My planned interview with Sankara Iyer never took place, because, thrilled to
meet visitors from Chennai, he was keen to demonstrate his granddaughter’s
singing, and more important her ability to absorb his lessons on sruti suddham,
raga lakshana, and clear enunciation of sahitya. He stressed the vital
importance of the last of these aspects of music, but was quick to point out
that on his list of priorities, the raga overrode the bhakti emanating from
understanding of the lyrics. “The lyrics could be about Rama, Krishna or
Karuppannasami; it’s the musicality that matters.”
We were fortunate to catch glimpses of his highly evolved sense of aesthetics
through his profound enjoyment of the beauty of both verse and tune, whether by
the Trinity, Sankara Iyer himself or Kalki Krishnamurti, whose Poonkuil koovum
pooncholaiyil orunal, he taught Aparna with obvious relish. “What a wonderful
poet!” he exclaimed.
When I reminded him about a T Viswanathan concert he had attended more than a
decade ago at my Chennai home after which I dropped him home, he instantly
recalled, “Muktha was in the audience, wasn’t she? And I remember she joined Viswa in a song
whose words he momentarily forgot. In the car, you asked me if I would perform
at your residence. What happened to that offer?”
That was indeed a doosra from the veteran. I had no answer to that.
Saturday, July 25, 2020
Thursday, July 23, 2020
Wednesday, July 22, 2020
Thursday, July 16, 2020
Wednesday, July 15, 2020
MARTHANDA VARMA
A Gracious Ruler
By V Ramnarayan
I am no fan of royalty, though I used to believe in the
superstition that that was the way authors were rewarded by publishers. I have certainly
not been in awe of princes, nawabs and rajas, with the notable exceptions of
Ranji, Duleep, Pataudi and Hanumant Singh. It was but natural for me then, when
invited to be part of a weeklong celebration of the GNB Centenary in January
2010, each day inaugurated by an erstwhile raja or maharaja of one of India’s
princely states of yore, not to be overly excited. I had around the time
embarked on the enjoyable adventure of translating into English a slim biography
of the iconic GN Balasubramaniam, the matinee idol among the great 20th
century Carnatic music vocalists, and that was enough reason for me attend the
lectures on him every evening.
The princely chief guest on one of those evenings was
Marthanda Varma of the former Travancore court. As I was leaving home for
Narada Gana Sabha that evening, my mother said to me, “If you get a chance to
meet the maharaja, please talk to him about your grandfather. Like everyone in
the family, she referred to her father as Anna, and continued, “After retiring
as Inspector of Schools in Trivandrum, Anna was appointed as the maharaja’s
private tutor for sometime, and Marthanda Varma even mentioned him to a
Malayalam magazine once.”
The programme that evening was pleasant enough and the
maharaja made an excellent speech, keeping it short and sweet. I had no chance
of meeting him, and was sorry I was going to disappoint my mother. After the programme,
I stopped at the open air cafeteria for a cup of coffee, and lo and behold,
someone seated the chief guest next to me while he waited for his car. My
esteemed companion seemed friendly enough, so I made bold to bring up the topic
of grandfather Sivaramakrishna Iyer. The maharaja not only remembered him with
some pleasure, but asked me if I had with me any photograph of him belonging to
that particular vintage. Even as I was preparing to reply, he said he would
send me a photograph of them both. Just then, one of the organisers came over
to inform Marthanda Varma that the car was ready to take him home. “You spoke
so well today, Sir,” he added. “I owe it all to this man’s grandfather Sivaramakrishna
Iyer. He transformed me from an indifferent student into a scholar.”
The promised photograph never came, but I can never forget
Marthanda Varma’s warmth and grace.
‘
Tuesday, July 14, 2020
Sunday, July 12, 2020
Friday, July 3, 2020
A CLASS ACT
MS, apropos nothing
By V Ramnarayan
It was said of Madurai Mani Iyer's music that it pleased not just the connoisseur, but even the man on the street. There's this charming story of a rickshaw puller outside Rasika Ranjani Sabha, Mylapore, who asked a customer to wait while he listened to his Eppo varuvaro (or was it his English note?) Perhaps, the only other Carnatic musicians with such a mass following have been those who first made their name as film singers.
MS Subbulakshmi had a similar impact on lay listeners when her songs in the film Meera took the country by storm. Audiences in the north equated her with the Rajasthani mystic herself, with hundreds of devotees falling at her feet during the shooting of the film on the streets of Rajasthan. Songs like Katrinile varum geetam (in Tamil Meera) and, decades later, Kurai onrum illai have also captured the imagination of millions of fans, affirming the power of emotion and language in making music accessible to common folk. (In the extraordinary reach of these songs lay a huge opportunity to take Carnatic music beyond the confines of elitist audiences, but we have made no effort to convert these fans into hard core Carnatic music rasikas). On the contrary, her immense popularity only gave critics the licence to dub her music as populist, allegedly lacking in the technical sophistication of so-called musicians' musicians, though genuine, unbiased followers of Carnatic music know otherwise.
The large number of mourners who thronged the MS home at Kotturpuram when she passed away in December 2004 came from all social classes. The visitors must have included every musician and every one connected with music, especially Carnatic music. As evening fell, and the cortege was about to begin its slow procession to the cremation ground at Besant Nagar, there was a surge of mourners anxious not to miss a last glimpse of the songstress who had added meaning to their lives. Many apparently poor men and women were part of this group of late visitors, possibly rushing from their labours at the end of the day. Their tears were quiet and dignified, not the kind of breast-beating we are so accustomed to at funerals. When will we see another like her, was the common lament.
These were obviously not her regular concert audiences. What was their connection with her, then? The answer perhaps lay in the devotional music they heard from her cassettes every day of their lives. I remembered the Vishnu Sahasranamam or Venkateswara Suprabhatam in a continuous stream of radio broadcast I heard as I daily crossed a long row of homes in a poor quarter of Tiruvanmiyur on my way to the bus stop. Though MS's charitable work reached vast numbers of people, the poor who came to pay her their last respects were probably not even aware of the extent of her munificence. Many of them were there that evening as a token of gratitude for the solace her devotional music brought them. No matter what their caste or creed, she had touched their lives with the sublime prayer of her songs in several languages.
''It took me a year of practice to get it right.'' This is what a veteran vocalist said at a recent programme that showcased the most striking examples of MS's classicism. Vijay Siva had just been complimented for the majesty of the opening notes of the concert. His statement spoke volumes not only of the humility of this confident, accomplished musician, but also of the needle-sharp precision and resonant sruti suddham of his first phrases Namo namo raghukula nayaka that equalled MS's.
There, however, prevails a quite contrary view among some of the cognoscenti that MS's music was all about her majestic voice. The fact that some of her music appealed to common people not versed in the arts is what must have caused the less than fair high brow critiquing MS received.
Many of the articles the monthly Sruti published during her centenary year tried to right that wrong. They stressed that MS was a consummate musician in the classical tradition, not just a possessor of a golden voice and purveyor of relatively light fare. They spoke of the assiduous practice and systematic preparation that ensured the maintenance of that golden voice in tip top condition all her life, the trouble she took over correct diction and perfection of emphasis on phrases long and short, her understanding of raga both cerebral and intuitive, her refusal to overdo or misuse sangatis, her melodic and rhythmic precision and her complete surrender to the music
Violinist RK Shriramkumar who accompanied MS in many concerts remembers her special qualities as a teacher. "A stickler for perfection and meticulousness, she would grasp every nuance," he said in his Sruti article, and "she would impart with utmost detail and watchfulness, whether it was a special sangati in the kriti Sree Ganapatini she had learnt from T. Brinda, or the need to avoid an excessive gamaka in Todi, or a vallinam-mellinam in a bhajan, or even a silent pause between two phrases in a song."
Young vocalist Navaneet Krishnan, who described MS as an eternal student, marvelled at her breath control. According to him, '' it was almost impossible to hear her taking a breath while singing.'' He described her music as a rare amalgam of voice, veena and nagaswaram.
Author Indira Parthasarathi saw the highest form of spiritual bliss in her ''total identification with the Muse of Melody.''
Seetha Ravi marvelled at her total commitment to her art that made her insist on recording the Vishnu Sahasranamam in one go, the way it ought to be chanted, not over numerous sessions.
Kanniks Kannikeswaran speculated if MS's Vishnu Sahasranamam was heard at any given time in some part of the world, much like the British empire where the sun never set! He spoke of Subbulakshmi's ability to sculpt a soundscape that subconsciously became part of our collective memory.
Gowri Ramnarayan learnt from her that music should eschew excess regardless of the musician's particular gifts, which must be underplayed. She gave a detailed account of MS's role in the Tamil Isai movement.
Sangita Kalanidhi R Vedavalli who called her the polestar of Carnatic music, described her preferred kalapramanam as well-toned madhya laya. Revelling in the major ragas led by her favourite Sankarabharanam, MS did not favour vivadi ragas with the possible exception of Varali, Vedavalli said, while praising the viruttams MS sang before songs like O Rangasayee, or the Kamalamba navavaranam Dakshinamurte.
The late Thangam Ananthanarayanan, a relative, had once recalled how MS's mastery of briga and alukkal sangatis impressed Hindustani vocalist Siddheswari Devi with whom she repeated each phrase 108 times every morning during akara sadhakam in a variety of ragas.
Manohar Parnerkar reminded us that it was also the centenary year of another female icon, Shanta Apte, who appeared with Subbulakshmi in the film Savitri, and did not know a word of Tamil, but in true MS style, learnt the language "assiduously and enthusiastically" to be able to render both dialogue and songs in the film. Apte was a liberated woman in the Germaine Greer mould, he said, almost antithetical to MS, but both had several things in common, both smashed the gender barrier, and both sang in several languages, handling Rabindra Sangeet with elan, for instance, "as if to the manner born."
Musician and innovator Ramesh Vinayakam applauded her perfect kalapramanam among other things. "She maintained the same pace, right from the start of the pallavi through the niraval, through the kalpanaswaras until the very end." He was citing her rendering of Pakkala nilabadi in Kharaharapriya in a Music Academy concert.
Vocalist Vijay Siva recalled a rare instance of outrage on MS's part, when she let loose a shower of invective against Osama Bin Laden while speaking to a foreign visitor. While listing her numerous musical attributes, he stressed how she demonstrated the importance of full throated vocalisation from the diaphragm.
"Can we emulate her in generosity?" asked Sruti's US correspondent Shankar Ramachandran, who proposed that rasikas at MS centenary concerts be asked to donate to some of her favourite charities.
Music lover S.M. Sivakumar related the story of a concert in Ernakulam he had helped organise as a sabha secretary in 1976. MS was of course reputed for the many charities she supported in a big way through her concerts, but the proceeds of this concert went to discharge the debts of the family of a young musician who had played the tambura for MS.
To add a personal touch to this tribute, I had the good fortune of listening to her up close, at home--both hers and ours-- many times. The occasions when she and her guru Semmangudi Srinivasier sang together impromptu or more formally during a wedding for a small family audience were unforgettable. We all know that the tape of one such "jamming" session at KR Sundaram Iyer's residence was remastered years later with violin (RK Shriramkumar) and mridangam (KV Prasad) added and made available commercially. "Divine Unison", the result of that collaboration is a collector's favourite today.
MS also sang in the company of family members--daughters Radha Viswanathan and Vijaya Rajendran, Anandhi Ramachandran, Gowri Ramnarayan and others, and these were very special experiences for whoever happened to be around. Of course, there was nothing casual about any of these song sessions. They were always in perfect sruti and rhythm, with the tambura drone virtually mesmerising the listeners. Whether it was a brief song at a cradle ceremony or the swing ritual at a wedding, the MS stamp was never missing. It had class writ large over it. One of the most memorable oonjal songs by MS has been a composition of Pillai Perumal Iyengar, which was first rendered at the wedding of Vijaya and Kalki Rajendran's daughter. Tuned by Kadaiyanallur Venkatraman, the song was unfurled after rehearsals by the many women from the family who participated. The song was recorded by MS and Radha for All India Radio as well, and is available on youtube and the portal msstribute.org as well.
A personal favourite among all these informal singing sessions was when MS walked up over a rough flight of stairs yet unguarded by a banister, stood by a temporary alcove with pictures of gods and goddesses in a still unplastered house, and sang a few songs in an act of blessing for the griha pravesam ceremony in late 1992. I had lost my father a couple of months earlier, and the sheer beauty and power of her singing brought me memories of him in a flood of emotion. It was a moment of sublimation.