During the working years of my father, I could rarely see him for most of the times. He was working so hard that he used to return home quite late in the evenings; very often necessitating me to keep awake, so that I can just see him.
Sometime during November-December, 1967
my father became busier as he was doing sort of a trapeze act with his work.
Before I proceed further, I think it is
necessary for me to explain a bit of what my father did for his living, at
that point of time. He was working as a manager for SYGA Corporation and as an Associate Director for SYGA Movies.
The word SYGA is an acronym made of the
first letters of the names of four members of a family comprising of Late (all) Shanker
Giri, Yamuna Giri, Girinath Giri and Amarnath Giri, the son, daughter in law
and grandsons of Late V. V. Giri, the former President of India. Later when
Late V. V. Giri went on to become the President of India, Late Shanker Giri
became the Member of Parliament (MP), from Madhya Pradesh, my father had an
additional designation, PA to the MP of MP. As Late Shanker Giri also became
the PA to the President of India, my father was the PA to PA of President of
India.
SYGA Corporation was the Indenting
Agency for procurements of Gwalior Rayon Silk Manufacturing Limited, Mavoor,
Calicut (Kozhikode), Kerala (now Grasim Industries) and SYGA Movies was the film making unit which produced two movies – one in English
called “Epistle” where, along with Late J. Jayalalitha, yours faithfully also
debuted and the other one in Kannada called “Vagdaana”. Both the films did not
do well at the box office though, but that is a subject for another story.
Now, coming back to the original story, my father used to finish his household duties, as we had three tiny tots in the house and challenging to manage by my mother all by herself (necessitating lending hands from my father and myself), go to office and do the regular work that is needed to be done and go in the evening to the market for collecting quotations etc., for material needed by Gwalior Rayons…
But
then during November-December, 1967 my father had an additional responsibility
of ensuring the construction of a pavilion for Gwalior Rayon Silk... at the ‘forth-coming’ “Indian
International Trade and Industries Fair 1968” at a godforsaken place in Madras (as Chennai was thus called earlier), comprising
of ponds and swampy area, beyond Amaindakarai (Aminjikarai). My father’s
homecoming from work was becoming more delayed.
Finally, the trade fair was inaugurated on a Sunday, the 21st January, 1968 by the Vice President of India (at that time) Late V. V. Giri. My father’s work quadrupled. But he managed the stress. Today, for such strenuous work, people need comforts like AC Cars etc. All my father had was an old Raleigh bicycle and he managed. When comparing to such efforts, the tantrums being thrown by the new-gen workers, for the least stressful works make me laugh, truly.
Info / Photographs courtesy: Mr. P. V. R. Rao, from his Facebook (Meta) post on 6th July, 2021, in the group ‘Madras Local History Groups’ (who seems to have used photos from Madras Friends group) - Thanks to him/them
Once the fair was inaugurated, my father
had to man the stall/pavilion of Gwalior Rayon silk... and every day the fair used to
close after 10.00 or 10.30 pm depending on days and crowds. He had to ensure that the stall was closed properly and
then bicycle it all the way home through Chetpet, Nungambakkam, Kodambakkam and
Vadapalani. I remember a day, when his bicycle had developed a flat wheel, in the
night and he had to push the vehicle all the way from the exhibition grounds to
home because at that time of the night even "pavement bicycle service guys" were hard asleep.
Interestingly, we could see the lights around the fair, and especially the well-lit Visweswarayya Tower
from our house, but the way between our house and the fairgrounds was filled
with pits dug by brick kilns, lot of bushes and especially snakes. So near and yet so far (today in Kms it would be perhaps about four to five kms of distance from our house).
Finally after a couple of months, the
fair came to a successful end and many pavilions were dismantled. Later, the area, well developed for the fair, was converted into a housing layout, by the State government and plots were
sold at around Rs.10,000/= per ground (as I remember, but I might be wrong
about the pricing). As is wont of, the most influential people of the city
could manage to wangle prime spots by ‘arrangements and adjustments’ and straightforward
and lesser fortunate people got plots in different sizes and shapes and in
insignificant corners of the area. Over a period, it has become a prime
property to be known as THE "Anna Nagar”, the prime property location in
Chennai today.
That is how the story of an
insignificant location of Chennai became a prime property locality thanks to
one intervention of an International Trade Fair. Sometime in November, 1972,
Pragati Maidan opened in Delhi and after that, to the best of my knowledge,
belief and Trust, no other international trade fair ever took place in any of
the other states in the country. That way this fair was “never before and never
after, till now”.
Surely there must have been any number
of people who toiled for the success of this fair, directly or indirectly, like
my father. Some of them may still be around too to relate the memories. But for
me, my father who worked so hard for his family, left us all on this day, nine
years ago, leaving us with waves of memories about him.
Wherever he is and whatever he is doing
now, I do hope that he possesses the same cheer, curiosity for life, energy, enthusiasm,
excitement and a zest for life. But, I will take comfort to know that he had
attained Sadgati.
God bless him!
Until the next, I remain with,
Krutagjnatalu (Telugu), Nanri (Tamil), Dhanyavaadagalu
(Kannada), Nanni (Malayalam), Dhanyavaad (Hindi), Dhanyosmi (Sanskrit), Thanks
(English), Dhonyavaad (Bangla), Dhanyabad (Oriya and Nepalese), Gracias
(Spanish), Grazie (Italian), Danke Schon (Deutsche), Merci (French), Obrigado
(Portuguese), Shukraan (Arabic and Sudanese), Shukriya (Urdu), Sthoothiy
(Sinhalese) Aw-koon (Khmer), Kawp Jai Lhai Lhai (Laotian), Kob Kun Krab (Thai),
Asante (Kiswahili), Maraming Salamat sa Lahat (Pinoy-Tagalog-Filipino), Tack
(Swedish), Fa'afetai (Samoan), Terima Kasih
(Bahasa Indonesian, Bahasa Malay and Singaporean) and Tenkyu (Tok Pisin of
Papua New Guinea), Malo (Tongan), Vinaka Vaka Levu (Fijian)
Hemantha Kumar Pamarthy
Chennai, India
