Madras Day celebrations at the Government museum in Chennai took off on a dark note as the exhibition in honour of the day was inaugurated in the absence of electricity. Attributing the reason to fault in a major transformer, along with failing power backup, the organisers had a tough time in getting the programme to run smoothly.
But that did not dampen the enthusiasm of people attending the exhibition. Apart from historical and anthropological enthusiasts, it was a day out for several school children as well.
When asked about the assortment of articles on display, S. S. Jawahar, the commissioner of museum theatre, said, “The articles on display here give a three dimensional effect of the yesteryears of Madras. Other exhibitions offer photographs, but we have the actual articles or models of objects.”
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Apart from a wide variety of sketches and photographs documenting moments of Madras’ history, the exhibition had on display the first radio transmitting set, models of gun carriages, mortar cart, along with unexploded as well as fragments of Emden shells used as artillery.
The exhibition was inaugurated by assembly speaker D. Jayakumar and N. R. Sivapathy, the minister for school education, sports and youth welfare. It will be open to the public for the entire week.