The government should take over the ancestral house of Chattambi Swami, one of the leaders of the renaissance movement in the State, at Ponniyam and build a memorial, a report by District Collector Navjot Khosa has recommended.
Ms. Khosa visited the house, located at Machel Kulangarakonam in ward three of Pallichal panchayat, on Saturday. It was consequent to a plea by I.B. Satheesh, MLA, to Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan, Minister for Culture A.K. Balan, and Minister for Archaeology Kadannappally Ramachandran to take over the house and conserve it as a protected monument that the Collector visited the house and submitted the report.
The Chief Minister had, on the occasion of unveiling of a sculpture of Sree Narayana Guru, declared that a memorial to Chattambi Swami would be built.
Dilapidated state
Following the MLA’s plea, the Culture Department had submitted a report to the government that the site could be taken over and a memorial built there. The Archaeology Department had informed that as the building was in a dilapidated state owing to the ravages of time, it could not be conserved as a protected monument.
Chattambi Swami spent his childhood at the house at Ponniyam that was his mother Nangadevi’s family home. The house is currently in the possession of fourth generation descendants of Chattambi Swami.
Mr. Satheesh had requested that the house be acquired and turned into a memorial, besides a study and research centre to keep alive Chattambi Swami’s legacy. He had sought that a digital museum be set up there so that Chattambi Swami’s life and work could be made familiar to future generations, a statement here said.
