Woods and the Thickets

A village should remain of course as close to nature as best as it could. Our village is no doubt full of trees, but the main plantation being coconut trees, whose lean trunk grows high but with absolutely no branches, provide entirely no shield from the sun or rains. An occasional mango tree, jackfruit tea, teak or the likes are seen in private yards. There were a few inevitable banyan trees close to the temples. The other tree of any note was the bamboo groves grown with a view to producing materials for building huts, fences sheds or for making handicraft items.

Kongini (image courtesy Prasant P Jose)

Thanneer Kayal

A “Kayal” is a backwater expanse consisting of canals, coconut groves, a variety of bird life and cultivated lands.

Thanneer Kayal’s cultivable paddy fields start from Padoor and Thirunellore in the western side. The Kayal lands extends to both the Venkitangu and Mullasseri Panchayaths.

A deep trench or canal is opened to the Canolly Canal at our border with Thirunellore (see “Idiyan Chira”).

A variety of bird life still survives in these lands, although the paddy cultivation has long been in a state of neglect. The heavy infection of weeds etc. was affecting the farming until recently.

Now the situation is beginning to change and cultivation is slowly returning. The Canal in the Thanneer Kayal is now widened and strengthened with formidable dikes. It is connected to Peechi Reservoir agriculture water distribution network, so water is made available for agricultural needs during the summer months.

The People - Bombay Connection

We grew up in an agrarian atmosphere. The family yard was full of vegetation. The vegetation extended even to the fences (a fence was mandatory for every respectable household).

Made of skillfully woven coconut leaves and cut-bamboo parts and branches, the fences were extremely eco-friendly in today’s context. The fence provided an opportune space for the agrarian minded people. Climber plants of delicious fruits and edible vegetables are grown alongside these fences. Those produces come in handy during the scanty months of summer.

Prior to the Independence, the people mainly engaged in farming (usually paddy cultivation and coconut planting) and farm related jobs and enterprises and some fishing. It was much frugal and very simple existence.

Thus every inch of the available space in the house yard is meticulously utilized for producing food (not that we did have much space to talk about anyway). In such an environment finding a space for us, the children, to play was difficult. Fortunately for us, we did have a neighbor with a copiously spacious plot of land surrounding an impressive house. His house was built of rock and concrete whilst most of the neighboring houses were –including ours- made of the mud and thatched wooden roofs.

Proudly enough for me the house belonged to my maternal uncle, who made it to the riches in the rough and tough world of Mumbai. At that point of time, a decently kept and furnished house implied that a member of the family was out in Bombay.

In our mostly agrarian society, emigration had become very popular during the late 1940’s. A lot of the youngsters were out of job or were very disillusioned by putting up with rigors of the rural life. Some were incited by the usual flare up of usual youthful rebellion against an imposing hierarchy. Whatever the reason, the youths streamed to the luring metropolis of Bombay (Mumbai) in a big way during that period.

In Bombay they found employment and some went on to establish small businesses that were enough to earn them hefty profits. Our businessmen either set up a restaurant (which in Bombay terms they call a “hotel”) and kiosks that made and sold beedi (small sized cigarettes made of tobacco and tobacco leaves) or served tea at the street side pavements (out of their humble samovar). The employees were mostly manual laborers.

Not that the Bombay-ites were the pioneers in emigration out of the village. There were a handful of people who went to Malaysia, Singapore and later on to Ceylon (Sri Lanka) – all part of the then British Empire. There were a few other people who made a living as sailors in merchant marine vessels.

However, unlike their predecessors, the Bombay-ites did have a profound impact in the economy of the village. Their income become its main economic backbone and remained so for a long time to come. They were socially committed too as some of the village’s community institutions were built or run by their active support and contribution.

Gulf emigration was started in a big way during 1970s but there were a few early scouts who reached the Arabian Gulf decades before and some of whose epics rightfully warrant another chapter.

Much has been written about “the Gulf Boom” in which the village was having its natural part. As such, there is perhaps no need to elaborate on the subject here. “The Gulf Boom”, ended the prominence of Bombay as an employment destination.

Even before that the rising political and security troubles - chiefly the “son of the soil” agitation spearheaded by the Shiv Sena - were diminishing the Bombay’s charm.

However, Bombay remained the most important transit point for the Gulf migrant travelers, the city being the main gateway station to the Arabian Gulf countries, having connected by both the sea and air routes. That position remained intact until the Trivandrum Airport was accorded the International airport status in 1991.

Padoor - The Place

The legend goes that Padoor acquired its name from the combination of the Malayalam words “Padam” (paddy land) and “Ooru” (neighborhood). The name thus means the Place of Paddy Fields.

True to its name, the village used to be interspersed with paddy fields (lowlands), placed between the corridors of inhabited coconut estates (elevated lands). It almost looks like the elevated lands were man-made landfills of then originally existing paddy fields.

To cap it all, the lowlands of Thanneer Kayal (which used to be opulently cultivated rice fields) provide the boarder to Padoor at the east end.

Padoor is locked between the paddy field stocks of Thanneer Kayal at the east and the inland waterway of Canolly Canal in the west.

Thoyakkavu lies to the south and Thirunelloor (Peringadu) to the north. The boundaries on both these fronts are separated by canals; the smaller Thannolli Thodu and newly broadened Irrigation Canal - that hooks Mullasseri to the Peechi Irrigation Canal network at Elevally - respectively.