Children afire with zeal for community cooking

Government Smart Primary School organises ‘kootanchoru’

Students from Government Smart School in Pangur participating in a community cooking (Kootan Choru) at the Ashram Flower Garden in Puducherry. Photo: S.S. Kumar

“I brought the drumstick and curry leaves, while my friend brought rice and dhal from home. Once we came here, we started chopping vegetables and our teachers helped us with the difficult work like draining the water from the boiled potatoes,” Subadhra from the Government Smart Primary School in Pangur explained.

At the end of the day, this was the best meal we ever had. Now we should plan this every year, she squeaked excitedly at the end of the community cooking or ‘kootanchoru’ session the school organised in the Ashram flower gardens recently.

All the students of the school brought in vegetables, pulses or rice from their homes. They all got together to make sambar, rice and potato

poriyal.

The idea of community cooking has been around for centuries, with people from around the world practising ‘kootanchoru’ in some form or the other.

The idea of ‘kootanchoru’ comes from redistribution of food that is in excess and it is a legacy of the tribal communities, S. Bhakthavatsala Bharthi from the Pondicherry Institute of Linguistics and Culture explained.

In a tribe, the men would go hunting and the women would gather. Once they came back from their expeditions, the entire community would pool in whatever they had managed to catch for the day and as a community they would cook.

Another modification of the ‘kootanchoru’ concept takes place till this day at Amman temples during the festival known as “Mayanakollai.” Every year, people bring in offerings to the God during this festival. People bring in whatever they have in excess like mangoes, rice or other vegetables. These offerings are then given to those who do not have anything, he explains.

A form of ‘kootanchoru’ is also seen in houses where a death has occurred. The family of the person who has passed away is not allowed to cook and the close relatives bring whatever food they have in order to feed this family. This is also another form of community cooking, he said.

Community cooking is also a way to promote the idealistic egalitarian society, he said.