Remembering Mrs.S, a Family Member – Celebrating Fete De La Musique – Life & Family
The 4th anniversary of Mrs. Aruna Sunderlal's passing (1939-2016) is coming up and we will be celebrating music and her life because she passed away during world music week and just the day before that, 22nd June, Jaggi and I had visited her home and she never gave an inkling that she would faint away into eternal rest the next day. Because in that moment she was wearing a beautiful purple kurta and she asked for her lipstick. She called her help “my ducks”, Lipstick lao’ and then asked if we wanted tea and something to eat with it. Said how she really wished to be taken to the Aruna Sunderlal Auditorium to see in person the purple curtain she had specially chosen for the auditorium. She called both of us ‘lovebirds’ and sometimes called me begum and a lot like some of the ladies in my family who tell me in a very Victorian way about a wife’s duty. Her sense of humour got me giggling and arguing with her the way I sometimes argued with my Mother and Aunt who were that generation where patriarchy continued and yet they managed to balance and survive some horrible chaps in Andhra University or some swooning swains in B.Ed. courses sending love notes to a married woman with children. They balanced careers and family life and fun and frolic and greatly enjoyed their children growing up. But I can safely say that my great grandmother seemed far more rebellious than all these ladies. Her own daughter, my grandmother called her troublesome. Because every little thing that came up she would question and confront and doggedly cross question patriarchy, motherhood, independence and firmly believed that husband and wife were to lead their own lives and yet be together. Always one for her space and yet Mrs. Sunderlal’s generation also my Mother and Aunt’s balanced everything and broke the mould without challenging status quo in a lot of ways. My Mother playing Shakespeare in a play called The Queen & Mr. Shakespeare in Andhra University. My Aunt leading the singing in a lot of spaces dominated by men. Mrs. Sunderlal was someone who would drive in spite of her ailments like a rally driver through Bangalore. Someone who was so fond of watching children perform in concerts, had studied opera but given it up as she preferred administration. For all her throwing caution to the wind ways it was her personality that built BSM. If she wanted to do something, she wanted to do it. Making Western Classical music inclusive because in India it is considered an exclusive music, inaccessible to the masses. She was also fun, loved dressing up, loved eating and making merry. Generous to a fault. She also reminded me of some of the men in my family especially my maternal grandfather.
This man found a way to be a responsible family man, have great fun and do good work for people he believed in, musicians in particular. He had completely broken away, like his father, from very orthodox Iyengar (Tamil Brahmin) roots. (His ancestor, Anangacharya composed the Suprabhatam and somewhere along the way earned the title of Pratiwadi Bhayankaram or Master Orator. The title was given to this man from the South of India, who made a mark among the pundits of Varanasi in a faceoff for pundits. And the initials were attached to everyone from the family of Iyengars. Some terribly orthodox and others brave enough to marry a girl from a caste lower to his in Kerala. A Malayali Nair from North Malabar. With her parents’ consent and his father’s consent. A copy of Wuthering Heights now slightly destroyed by ‘silver fish’ is all I have with a love note, beautifully written from my grandpa to my grand mom. It starts with ‘dearest Bai, (She was named Kamala Bai). Of course the rest of the poetic words bring a tear to my eye and I’m privy in that moment of the private nature of many things I keep to remember the stories in my family. Many of them were on the brink of Indian Independence and the sense of being from village, town, city, state, country trickled slowly. (Gandhi at the helm). Trickled down to even my great grandmother’s village in Kerala, a gathering, a peaceful protest, resistance. And the village grew to town, to city, to state, to country. And they even began cooking rajma, a hitherto unknown food group in Kerala (which my Velliammamma (My great grandmother) called ‘Rajamaadhaavu’ which translated means 'Queen Mother'. Though she did resist this food group which my great grandpa insisted on being cooked at home. My great grandpa from Calicut Kerala studied Hindi, after he perfected Malayalam and English to be able to comprehend India’s national language. This move from internationalism and parochialism to nationalism in as sincere a manner as possible. He chose to go with Gandhi’s independent democratic secular republic. (A coloniser is different I believe from a collaborator and Hindutva to me today is just like any coloniser. If only it could collaborate with secular democratic processes and be mindful and respectful of the true nature and essence of Hinduism). My great grandma listened to Gandhi in Kolluncode, did not understand a word but got a Malayalam translation later and what really inspired her she said was that he wanted women to join in in the revolution or the resistance. Now, here was this young woman on the threshold of life with a sharp brain and wit, musical talent and a kind heart. I’ve been to her village, even though they were landowners and farmers, frankly it was nothing less than Okie and hokie, I won’t say Muskogee because then I would have to start singing! Back to my mother’s father, the wedding of Pratiwadi Bhayankaram Srinivasa Narasimhan to Unchakandi Vallushery Kamalabai was conducted in the office room of my maternal grandmother’s home. The village objected, both sets of parents consented. My grandma’s brother and my grandpa were friends on the training ship The Dufferin.
My grandparents married and soon moved to Vishakhapatnam (Vizhag) port. My granddad being the winner of the Digby Best Gold Medal for excellence had a choice of ports and yet he chose Vizhag not wanting to be close to any of the other ports that had the dreaded interfering family members from both the families. Vizhag, a new start, bride-in-tow, tin trunk (I still have the tin trunk from the 1930s). Home was what he missed growing up. His mother and step mother died and then it was the Dufferin as a young teen. So he chose a shore job after getting married because just before that he was the youngest captain of a ship torpedoed at sea during WW2, marooned on a lifeboat , he brought every man back to safety after being marooned at sea for 12 days. He never went back to sea. He grew roots in Vizhag, never venturing out of India, in spite of several offers. He led a life of contentment. He would also tell my very ambitious grandmother that he was content and she in turn grew relatively content. His gift to me was music, jazz in particular. From everywhere, playing on a Grundig which I still have and a gramophone player (with a broken needle) used as a prop on stage in the KE Auditorium of Christ Univ, dept. of Theatre studies where Jaggi and I are guest faculty (music for theatre).
Our students to their credit guarded it with their life after I gave them the ‘gup’ behind the gramophone. I learn constantly from students. They are not what they seemed initially. Initially I’m suspicious, expecting the worst, giving orientation speeches so they get the general idea of what to expect or what is expected of them and even a Grinch like me gets a warm fuzzy feeling when they display their imagination and fresh perspective in these jaded times we live in. My maternal grandfather is always in my memory. In my library, in my ‘museum’ room, junk for everyone else, for me precious memories that climb out of books and tin trunks, Grundigs and gramophones, home movie projectors and albums. Copper colanders and aluminium dabbas, Gandhi glasses, mortar and pestle. A skillet pan from Mexico. Magnets from yoga. Earthen ware used to store Kodampulli and other things when there were no refrigerators. Letters and letters from people. Some still there and some I never met. They passed on before I was born. A Sabha in Vizhag founded by three friends including my grandpa and their wives to host great Indian artists (who came by train) never asked for 1st class or ‘business’; greats like M.S. Subbalakshmi, Bade Ghulam Ali Saab, Mandolin Srinivas, Bhimsen Joshi and so many others. During my holidays I got to experience U.Srinivas and MS live. Then on the Grundig it was Paul Robeson or Ella or Billie or Sara, Nina Simone, Count Basie, Duke Ellington, also Shirley Temple, Paul Mauriat, James Galway. My Grandmother honestly said she only tolerated jazz and was not crazy for it like my grandfather (a wonderful harmonica player). Dad’s dad was the same, excelled in his career, chose never to leave the country and yet travelled all over and died so young at 44. He had accomplished what men do just before retirement. I never met him but his photograph as the youngest and first Founding Chairman and MD of a public sector enterprise in Bangalore. (My Aunt Shyamala told me he was a doer, a doer, a doer) An irreplaceable family man, an honest responsible ethical worker. A fun person who loved music and singing, bridge and tennis. Parties were singing sessions around pianos in the homes of both my parents. Mum could have taken up piano but never did, much to the disappointment of her tutor Sister Joanna, or ballet or Indian dance which she excelled in in her youth. In her retirement, she gave piano lessons to children for fun initially. Then the demand began getting more than the supply! She would request parents to give these children advanced lessons with someone else as she said it was beyond her purview. Also age was catching up, illness and finally disability and much to our chagrin, parents still clung on. Every puja season, some parents would come with their children to take her blessing. She would be mighty embarrassed, because these parents insisted the children touch her feet which is a mark of respect in India shown to parents and teachers or gurus. My Mother and a group of Senior Citizens volunteered in their retirement in hospices and government schools. Till the very end, Mother took her last piano lesson. A cute little boy named Divyan, cooked her last Khichdi for us and a soup for my grandmother with my help. A few days later, she was in hospital for the next two months, bedridden and yet surrounded by people closest to her and finally a little after Jaggi and my brother left, just me. It will always be the greatest honour and privilege of my life to have been there to see my Mother off on a journey. Someone who had seen me in when I began mine. My Mother’s aunt and uncle suggested naming her ‘India’ as she was born on the eve of Independence. Instead my grandparents chose Usha (dawn) as she was born on the dawn of Indian Independence. Usha is a popular Indian name, the Goddess of dawn is Ushus. But her name was given to her to signify an Independent India, a few years before 1947 which is when India got independence.
Two of my maternal grandad’s friends, one who married my grandmother’s sister were men I used to barge in on as they chatted with my granddad. Eshwer Sagar of The Hindu, their correspondent from Washington who reported and covered revolutionary events like Martin Luther King Jr.’s ‘I have a Dream’ speech and JFK’s assassination. The other, C.G.K. Reddy was a staunch Ram Manohar Lohia supporter. In their sunset years, these old men were amused at a teenager’s interest in their stories of a past where people had the courage of their convictions to spark off or support or standby a necessary revolution or resistance or movement. No one wants anarchy, but if oppression continues, be empathetic, what if it was your own mother or brother, son or daughter, wife or husband, being suppressed, oppressed, repressed or what if it was your own garden or tree or pet that was maimed, marauded, maligned, neglected. I can only speak for myself and even if I’m completely against a last resort anarchy, I often wonder if I may choose anarchy as an option if I was oppressed beyond repair. Empathy is a strange thing. Every time my grandmother Radha told me about her sorrow of losing her husband, my grandfather, when she was just 39. It once hit home the hardest. She once looked at me and said, ‘I was just about your age and every dream of mine had died.’ When I watched Mrs.Sunderlal bash on regardless in spite of so many people having disappointed her. With her never-say-die attitude, never refusing a person in need. Even if people just rough shod over her organisation. In spite of all that she would giggle and say “stop being a bleeko, let’s eat a Kaati roll, let’s go and get some jewellery together” . And then she was so disappointed that I never wore any of the family heirlooms, jewellery and sarees that are still preserved in pristine condition. From Tanchois to Kanjeevarams, from Kasauti work on cotton, to Benaras works of art. All these people have one thing in common. They led the best possible life and became the best possible human beings they could possibly be. Right till the very end, made themselves useful to their families and society and kept a lot of us staying afloat even when times were hard, finding joy, singing and dancing, working very hard. They really finished the race, fought a good fight and kept the faith. In this time of Corona lockdown, it’s a time to open our minds, staying at home and social distancing, it’s a great time for psychological coming together to rebuild lives, rebuild love, rebuild peace, and rebuild hope and harmony. So for this Fete De La Musique, remembering BSM’s founder, Aruna Sunderlal, musicians and artists can with weapons of mass construction, peacefully grow and nurture a revolution. As Africa’s Angelique Kidjo puts it so intensely “Music is the ultimate weapon of peace.