The Death of Memory

“People have two deaths, the first at the end of their lives. The second, at the end of the memory of their lives.”

Raghu Karnad, 'Farthest Field'

A chance remark by my grand daughter sparked off this trilogy.  Here's part I. For my defense, I say only this :

"Just write the truth! But truths are many, and that is the problem. Memory is treacherous, as distinct from history as emotion."

Cohen, Roger,  'The Girl from Human Street.' 

“Naani”, asked my five year old granddaughter, in all her worldly wisdom, “Where are my Great Grandparents?  Do you think they love me?” As I prepared to answer her inquisitive queries, my mind wandered, to my Great Grandparents! Who indeed were they! What a profound chord her innocent words had touched! What did I know of my  great grandfather, who had lived and died before I came into this world!

Kachapeshwar Iyer was my great grandfather's name. Eshwar for short. I know for sure. My grandfather carried his name in his initials, it was also my father’s name. In those days, grandchildren were always named after their grandparents. But I know little else for sure. Except bits and pieces from memory, from what my father and grandmother told me, but mostly what my mother told me.

Great Grandfather Kachapeshwar Iyer was the only child of his parents. They were rich landlords and he inherited vast fields of fertile land and the huge family home. Also chests of gold ornaments- somehow my mother always said – Buckets of Jewellery – stored away in a small store room in the large house. Who were his parents and from where did they hail? Nobody knows. Perhaps my grandfather knew. But he left my life for good when I was twenty five years old, when these questions never entered my head!

So, when was Kachapeshwar Iyer born? Definitely around 1880 – in Palakkad? Who knows! But his fields were in Old Kalpathy Village of Palakkad. His home and family, all thrived for decades in this cool green mountain pass in the Upper reaches of the Western Ghats, on the banks of the river Kalpathy in Palakkad. That’s the home of the quintessential Palakkad Tamil Brahmin Iyer.

Palakkad Iyer culture is inherited and passed on in unique ways. I have grown up, believing in the Palakkad Pride, our claim to fame being that we were highly intelligent, educated, well off and successful.  We spoke Tamil with a Malayali accent, our wholesome food contributed to our health and happiness. And for this proud inherited heritage, I am indebted only to Kachapeshwar Iyer. For the later Eshwar clan: my father, I and my children were all born in Jamshedpur, erstwhile Bihar.

 My great grandfather was born with a silver spoon, rather a golden spoon would be more appropriate! He lead a king’s life, a true blue zamindar. An aunt remembers that he had his own bullock cart and he got their large showy horns encrusted with gold.  He was a very rich man.  My mother told me that he lived his life without having done even a day’s work with his hands. He inherited wealth, sadly, he never learnt how to earn it or manage it.

The next part of his life sees the entry of my Great grandmother into his life. Because every generation of this family has a granddaughter named Parvathy, I have concluded that Kachapeshwar Iyer married Parvathy and brought her home. She was in many ways the Ideal wife – managing home and hearth and a family which multiplied almost every year, with a large retinue of helpers and an absentee husband. Even in the patriarchal system we live in, I'm happy to note that her name and memory live on!

Kachapeshwar Iyer was a ‘Vaid’, an Ayurvedic doctor, by choice. Being a Landlord , afforded him the freedom to indulge in this passion. He believed only in philanthropy – ministering the sick and needy in his village. He collected herbs, leaves and roots, he would grind, pound and decoct them to prepare potions. And when his stash was over, he would begin his annual retreat – and was away from home for months at a time, in search of those rare but precious plants.

He was very proud of the repository of ancient medicinal knowledge he held and refused to pass it down to future generations. Many in his family were keenly interested, including his favourite granddaughter. He refused to pass on this science, saying he could foresee the advent of allopathy and the decline of naturopathy, as a curative science. How true were his predictions! Thankfully, Ayurveda has seen a resurgence in the last few decades, and Great Grandfather's 'jadi-buty' has made a comeback!

Now, going back, Great Grandfather never carried food during his long sojourns, much like the modern forager. My mother told me that he could identify numerous food plants and gather their special leaves, and soak them in water. It would turn into jelly and I would imagine him enjoying a variety of natural puddings. He would traverse through Burma, Indonesia and the lower Himalayas, returning with his yearly cache of herbs.

But good times were not going to last forever. Rains failed over successive years and his vast lands yielded meagre crop, barely enough to sustain his large growing family. Over the years, his family had expanded to include three sons and five daughters and it was time for wedding bells in the family.

This is when Great Grandmother discovered, to her shock, that the chest full of valuables, had somehow and sometime, vanished. Those were the days of innocence and people would borrow jewellery to decorate the temple deity or even adorn, temporarily, a poor village bride. Someone had pilfered them all, leaving the family to face the stark reality – no food and no money to buy it either. It was impossible for the whole family to continue living in Palakkad.

And thus, in 1917, my grandfather, Kalpathy Eshwar Krishna Iyer, (K. E. Krishna Iyer) left Palakkad, at seventeen years of age, to work in the Tata Iron and Steel Company, set up in Jamshedpur (Jharkhand). With the help of benevolent friends and family, he joined the accounts department, armed with a high school degree. By this time, his elder sister was married and so were his younger sisters. Some had been married to distant cousins and thus the family stayed together in this hour of need. One by one, each of the sisters moved out from Palakkad and into Jamshedpur, where their families grew exponentially.

My mother told me that Kachapeshwar Iyer spent his last days in Jamshedpur. From then on, he is no more an enigma. It is said that he was a short tempered man and everyone, especially the children were afraid of him. My cousin learnt from her father that he would try to win them over by placing a sweet on his head,  with varying degrees of success. His wife, daughters and granddaughters, were now tasked with grinding and pounding the medicines, it was a rough and difficult task, and given their age and large families, they found it very distasteful. 

Now Kachpeshwar Iyer was a tired old man, lost and bereft of his moorings. Whatever was left of the hearth and home, he had left it in the care of one of his daughters who stayed back in Kalpathy with her family. Penniless and dependent on the ones who saw him as a waster, and perhaps, sick in body and mind, Kachapeshwar Iyer and Parvathy left behind sad memories of their final rift with Palakkad.

Decades later, my grandfather Krishna Iyer faced another sad truth- he had lost all claims to his ancestral property when he came to hear that it had been sold. Who sold it, when, why and for how much, no one would tell him. His sister and her family remained incommunicado. Kalpathy, the village and home, today live only as memories, waiting for a few more years, before they are finally forgotten.