All things change. A truism on that observation comes from Robert Oppenheimer: “The one thing that is new is the prevalence of newness, the changing scale and the scope of change itself, so that the world alters as we walk in it, so that the years of a man’s life measure not some small growth or rearrangement or moderation of what he learnt in childhood, but a great upheaval.”
Cities change too. Most would view that process as normal and not obsess about it. The one notable exception is Chennai, obsessed both with the idea of its past and its changing present. It’s the one city with its own historian, S. Muthiah, who writes a weekly column Madras Miscellany, chronicling that past. There’s even a fortnightly, Madras Musings . Not ‘Chennai Musings’, mind you. “We care for the Madras that is Chennai,” is the tagline. The past that is the present.
Try imagining a tagline, “We care for the Bombay that is Mumbai”. Mumbai, with its obsession over dhandha and markets, which are always about the present and the bridge to the future. Nah .
There is an element of nostalgia to all this. Sometimes it’s even Raj nostalgia, but now it’s spilt over into nostalgia for the 1970s. Consider the ‘heritage walk’ to take in the long-gone cinemas on Mount Road, now Anna Salai. Senior folk wax eloquent about bunking school to watch Ulagam Sutrum Valiban at Devi Paradise (which is still around), or the joys of watching S.S. Vasan’s movies at Wellington (which has made way for an office complex). There’s even a Madras Day, now expanded to a popular Madras Week. Something’s going on here.
Yet the nostalgia meme trails off in the 1970s. Perhaps the reality of the Dravidian movement and its hold on the city is simply too recent to be sepia-tinged. Besides, that reality still includes the weather, the water — and the autorickshaws.
Architecture and layout play a big role in all this. Mumbai was a dowry acquired at one shot. Mumbai has a compressed area around Fountain where the Raj architecture reaches its height. The rest of the city is a concrete bog that oozes people. British-built Delhi — inaugurated in 1931 — is the only capital built to intimidate an entire nation; it simply does not count because of its sheer artificiality. But in Chennai the piles of the past lie all around, part and parcel of its present, allowing an easy absorption. Chennai has no real centre or downtown, which is a reflection of how the city grew out and absorbed peripheral villages.
Chennai’s obsession with its past carries over into the idea of its own change. Yet Chennai pulls off its fascination with the past and its obsession with a changing present without sounding sententious about it. Chennai’s obsession with the idea of its own change has an enduring premise. Tradition balanced with modernity seems to be the dominant theme.
Oppenheimer’s “great upheaval” would be almost threatening to Chennai’s idea of change. Here the present must be blended with — and take its cue from — the past, almost self- consciously so. And the change of the present must be juxtaposed against that past, a subtle pastiche showing conservative Chennai is not what it seems.
Is Chennai conservative on the outside and bold and forward on the inside? Or is there something else? Surreptitious, but not subversive? Change is fine, but it cannot be wrenching change. It must appeal to tradition, and take place under its patina, indeed be almost sanctified by that association.
When this awkward balancing act doesn’t happen, it results in the dazed disbelief with which the Chennai-ite views changes in his city. Another result is the occasional lament for the old days and the nostalgia trips listed above. And yet that balancing act happens as a sort of relief. Subramanian’s niece’s sangeet with its alcohol and loud music was a little much, so he withdrew to the comfort of keeping the beat at the kutcheri during the Madras Music Season.
More intriguing is the attempt of many people to use both names — Chennai and Madras. Almost as though it’s a sign of upbringing to keep using the old name, Madras, despite what the politicians say. That Madras invites you — and itself — to defy the stereotypes of “conservative Chennai” that others hold of it.
Madras agreeably surprises the newcomer labouring under those stereotypes, forcing that newcomer to confront a changing reality; a reality that is changing just so, but at Chennai’s pace and not anyone else’s tempo.
Waffles for breakfast or a sangeet would make the Mumbaikar yawn. But there’re also woman autorickshaw drivers and smart card vehicle registration books. Namma Madras.
(a_rustomjee@hotmail.com)
