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Friday, December 20, 2024

My childhood memories in Truchur from 1947 to 1950

I remember have been living among members of a large family at Paruvakkat House . Shoranur Riad , Trichur for over a decade .

My father T A Parameswara Iyer was officially called Commissioner, Cochin Devaswom , Trichur We used to accompany him to various temples during his tenure as Commissioner In particular we have had visits to Triprayar, Kodungallur, Vadakkunnathan.and many more .With large number of members in the family we were staying in the rented house Paruvakkat House at Truchur

My eldest brother Ananthanarayanan alias Konthai was working in Central Bank of India Trichur after completing his Physics Honours degree from Annamalai University He was married to Rajalakshmi daughter of Vaikom Krishna Iyer in 1950 and their daughter was Syamala

My next elder brother Balasubramanian after completing his BCom at Trichur was employed in Bombay We used to see him whenever he came from Bombay

our entire family attended his marriage at Cannanore with Kalyani in 1959 Their son Mohan was born in 1960

Most unfortunately our brother Kuttan passed away in Bombay in 1960 on account of para typhoid It was the most tragic event in our joint family

My eldest sister Parvathi also was married and staying with brother in law CR Parameswaran in Madras They used to visit us at Truchur occasionally

Other elder sister Bagavathi was studying in SSLC at Vivekodayam Girls High school and our next sister Lakshmi also studied in same school till 1960

Others who studied in school during my time was my elder brother Sundaram , younger brother Narayanan. Younger sister Sobhana and niece Syamala

All the family children were in Trichur till Oct 1960 when we migrated to Bangalore after tragic death of elder brother Kuttan at Bombay in June 1960

Being in Trichur till 1960 for thirteen years I have a few places and persons to remember

Manyc next neighbours and others in neighbourhood remain green in my memory

Our house situated at centre covered on four sides by various persons / offices etc

Just opposite to house was Palace Road leading to Maharaja’s guest house and famous Chakala Memorial Football match used to be an annual event at the Palace grounds . Along with other friends and classmates and siblings We used to go to the Palace grounds and play Football etc and also go for learning cycling On the way there was house of one Mr Doctor Krishna Iyer a Physician well known Again at one corner of the Road and opposite to our house was Ayurveda Hospital and another corner occupied by Land Record Office

Just to right side of house we had a hotel Nala Pachagam and a Barber shop of Neelakantan There after we had our house priest namely Pichan Vadhyar Then the Pottan vegetable shop, Dakshin Bharath Hindi pea Har Sabha , venkitchakutti, Samooha mason etc and thereafter famous Vadakkunnathan temple was nearby We had Kamala Medicals and house of Judge Vaidyanatha Iyer , Rama Iyer Mash’s house etc nearby

On the left side we had Kunnath Mana, Govindan Nair shop, provision shop, Mariyamman temple , Ayyappan’s cycle shop, etc leading to famous Thiruvavambadi Krishna temple

On the back of house was illam of kunnath mana

The house was quite spacious with a number of rooms , Koodan, kitchen, wells, staircase, first floor with three rooms , toilet etc There were a number of flowering plants in the frontage and a few at the back We had a cowshed too as we had mulch cow and the calf at home as milk of the cow was used in house There was a padippura at the entrance Again the so called latrines were at a distance in back of house The house was well electrified

In front of house was Shoranur Road a busy Road Those days some had driven rickshaws also seen now and then in front of our house

One Doctor Venkatachalam who visited us was our family Doctor although he was a Compunder.

There used to be maidservants names Kunjukutti, Karthiyayini etc

We used to get periodicals delivered weekly from Public Library

This is in brief about the surroundings I had in Trichur at Parivakkat house till 1958

In 1958,we moved to another house at Ganapathy Agraharam Punkunnam the house owned by our Manu Athan

we were there till 1960 when we left for Bangalore

From both the houses we used to walk to the school.

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