“Newly recovered from a fierce attack of influenza, I sat in my office adjoining the Admiralty Archway... I was wholly concerned with my near future: to go or not to go?”
These are not the opening sentences from a novel of magical realism, nor are they from a post-COVID-19 autobiography. The lines are straight out of Cochin Saga (1959), recollections of Robert Bristow, who arrived in the early months of 1920 from Madras on a commission to build a port in Kochi.
It is purely a matter of chance that he is being remembered in the midst of a crisis triggered by an unprecedented pandemic. However, unlike Sir Bristow, the world is yet to recover from the flu.
When he was posted for harbour duties in Madras presidency in early 1920, there was no hint of what the future held. He says in his recollections that the years 1919-20 “brought quick change in the static calm of Cochin” with the arrival of a new governor, Lord Willingdon, for the presidency. The Governor was keen on pressing forward the industrial importance of the presidency, to improve its ports and roads.
At 39, Bristow was an admiralty harbour engineer with qualifications in architecture, surveying and administration. He left Madras on April 12 and arrived in Kochi the next day where he recalled, “It seemed as if all the blue lagoons of the southern seas had come to rest in the wide bosom of Mother India at Cochin.”
A prophetic vision
The two-decade-long (1920-40) struggle to build the port is the story of Bristow’s vision. When he left in 1941, the port was doing business of one million tonnes. But his vision proved so prophetic as the post-war years saw cargo throughput soar past the million-tonne mark, reaching the two-million tonne mark about 1956-57. The volume hovers around 32 million tonnes a year now, along with a flourishing container transshipment terminal.
“Bristow has stunned us with his vision, grasp of technology, and perseverance. The Kochi port is a marvel and it will continue to be one,” says K.J. Sohan, former mayor of Kochi.
P.A. Mohammed Haneef, trade union leader, calls Sir Bristow an ever-growing presence. The port determined the course of Kerala’s economic growth. It set the tone for industrialisation ranging from the establishment of the oil refinery as well as the major fertiliser factory in Kochi, he says.
