Down Memory Lane - My Coimbatore.
Well, Let me start this Post, with the people whom I know better. That is, my own family and community.

At the time when I was born at Thomas Street in 1931, Coimbatore was a small town with a population of around 30,000, fourth big town in the old Madras Presidency next only to Madras, Madurai and Salem. But It was a big District with ten Taluqs , Kollegal in north bordering Mysore State, Pollachi bordering Malabar District in the west, Udamalpet bordering Madura District in South and Erode bordering Trichy in east.

My mother belonged to Coimbatore by her father's side. My grandmother belonged to Singanallur a small village east of Coimbatore. My grandma told me that forefathers of my grandfather had migrated from Mysore State, after Tippu's time. She herself came from Tiruppathur in North Arcot District, (according to her)which was known for good looking Brahmin girls(!) in those days. Interesting indeed. Colour prejudices were there all the time in human mind. She told that the Coimbatore Brahmins were dark in complexion and this made them to go in search of girls out side the District, mainly from Palghat area or Eastern Tamil Nadu (Chola desam). In fact my father, who was very fair, was from Tanjore District. During my younger days Brahmin population in Coimbatore was very small and almost every one is related to each other. Most of them lived in and around Raja Street, Thomas Street, Telugu Brahmin Street and Sullivan Street area. Majority of the Brahmins were in Government service or Advocates and other professionals. Not many of them are landed people. Coimbatore Brahmins were known for leading good life of eating and spending. They were generous in every thing. Good hosts, high in sense of humour and non- controversial lot. Many of them sported big handlebar mustache, not common among the Brahmins in other parts of Madras Province in those days. According to my grandma, most of the families were from old Mysore region. They loved and mingled with people from all communities easily and all others respected them. I enjoyed the friendship of people from all Communities and Castes without distinction. This is an unique trait. Honestly. till I came out of Coimbatore I do not know that so much differences existed in the minds of people in the name of Religion, Caste, Community and Language.

According to my Grandma, Coimbatore named after the presiding deity of the town "Devi Koniamman" (Koniamman puthur) was a very small town. We can walk all around the Town end to end without difficulty. According to the names of the places in the town, Coimbatore must have been formed as a new town (Puthur), perhaps after some incident. There is a Raja Street in the centre of the town and a place called "Kotemedu" (Fort mound) adjacent to that street. The names of the streets like Thomas Street and Sullivan Street must have been given honouring Sir Thomas Munro, the Governor of Madras (1820) and John Sullivan Collector of the District who brought the hill station Ooty to the notice of the public eye and layed a bridle path in 1819 in the Blue Mountain Hills (Nilgiris)

Purposely I have decided not to enter into the Histoy of Coimbatore as is known to us from books, except that this town had seen many wars and passed into the hands of various rulers, time and again till it fell into the hands of British East India Company in 1799. I would rather like to rely on the grandma's tales passed on from generation to generation about the town. Even though incidents may have been embellished with exaggeration there will be truth in the core. There is a Temple called "Thandu Mariamman Koil" in Uppilipalayam area of the town reminding the existance of a Cantonement (Thandu in Tamil) in Coimbatore at one time in the past. In olden days it was common among the people in South to establish a Temple in memory of some important incident and name the deity after the incident.

Coimbatore had a cosmopolitan population, you may find people from all religious communities, languages in the town. Even at my younger days I found Coimbatore had Tamil speaking people formed just half of the population. Rest of the population was made up of Kannada, Telugu and Malayalam speaking people. Since the northern parts of the District was with Kingdom of Mysore, the Kannadigas must have come from there. Telugu speaking people must have migrated from South when Nayaks from Madurai ruled this place. Malabar is just 20 Kms from the Town and interchange of Malayalam and Tamil speaking population was natural between neighbours.

To be continued......

posted on Wednesday, October 17, 2007 5:15 PM