Tuesday, April 21, 2009

Land prices in Bolghatty

An adverstisement in a Malayalam newspaper says, few cents of land is availalbe at Bolghatty, at Rs 300,000 per cent.
Mind you this is an island with narrow road and bad drivers, if you happen to drive a Honda City through this road, you will come back with scrathes on the car, no matter how good a driver you are, and how careful you are.

Other drivers will try to pass you,and you will wind up with a need for a paint job.

Back to land prices, last year (2008) saw a boom and some pieces changed hands at Rs. 3.3 million per cent , at the southern tip of the Island.

Tuesday, April 7, 2009

Bend it like Bentla

Oh what a way to copy a title.

Bentlia D Couth is a female football player.
More
Bentla D Coth is a female referee
And so,
So?
She is also the first Indian female international referee to make the scene at Olypmpics.
Ah so,
She is from Bolghatty!

That is it, that why her name is mentioned in section of Blog.

The name has, so far nobody mentioned this , a Portuguese connection.

Wednesday, April 1, 2009

The Grave Yard Story from Bolghatty

If the St. Sebastian's Church is more than 150 years old, so should be the cemetary or grave yard. One point of time, it was very small, yet, in it there was a section to dump bones, for, the graves were recycled and reused, the bones, of the previously buried parishioner, picked and dumped in the bone cabin like area.

Then there was another section for the rogues bodies, called pit for rogues or themmadi kuzhi in Malayalam. Bodies of the excommunicated or of those of who committed sucide were to burried. Once a boy ate poinson fruit called othalanga and committed suicide. There was a procession of people who carried lit candles, and then I guess people buried his body in the rogues pit.

The very rich were permitted to lease a family grave for 75 years. At one point of time only such permanent grave was that of Domingo, of Veliath Azwez family, and rest of the parishers were buried in the standard graves, which could be used again and again.

The lease value was not reivised from time to time, so as value of money depreciated, people earned more and could buy (rather lease semi permanent) graves who were permanent looking graves could be built.

The first one, that of Domingo, had marble engravings. The letters have faded, rather are eroded by polluted rains, however, the engravings look bold and beautiful even now (2009).

One of the regular graves, is that of Ganet D'Souza, who died childless. His partner, was poor or dead may be, his brother picked up his body , when Garnet died in a hospital , and brought to own old parish to bury. There is no deocorate covering, like others in the grave yard, well, this is what happens if you have no children to bury you.

The permanent graves, made it necessary to expand the cemetary. These days, making or expanding a cemetary is no easy job, so many permits and approvals are needed, well, the cemetary has expanded till the easter river (back water) side, yet, it is full. Ha ha , houseful, so many dead having permaent graves over them.

Another , famous name, after the Domino, is that of Monsignor Xavier Kaniampuram, who was principal of St. Albert's College. Therae are two Joseph Kaniampuram graves, both are cousins, and Joseph is a common enough name.

Portuguese name s are there plenty, like D'Souza, Paiva, D'Silva, Sementhy, Azwes, Gonsalves, Rodgrigues.
Bolghatty is where many Portugese landed and never went back. They married locals, their children and grand children still carry these names.

Where is the bone pit gone?

Tuesday, February 3, 2009

John Ochanthuruthu

He is an academic doctor, professor, author and historian. Ask Bolghattians about John Ochanthuruth,and you will draw a blank.
Ask about joey, and you will find a varied expressions.

Joey used to live in the parish accommodation and used to be a handsome chap with african like curly hair. Those were the days , when every one knew everyone, because of the wait at the Bolghatty boat jetty. Students would walk 6 kms from the end of the island, and then cross the waters. Why walk all the distance? Ferry was free; carry normal school books, that is the id for you prove that you are a student and , noone will ask for a ticket!

Boats used to make a trip across to the high court jetty, every 20 minutes.
While waiting, every one chats with every one. Everyone looks at every one. Every one knew who is who, as for youngster, if they are not known by their own name, they will be linked to their parents.

Back to Joey, he lived in Bolghatty for a while, then disappeared. Years later, when Joey reappered in books and magazines, we knew, ha , his real baptised name is John, now is an professor, author and so.

Acha, bhai, you are part of the bolghattians.

Tuesday, January 27, 2009

St Sebastians Church, Ponjikkara

The church, this one, claims to be over 150 years old . So says , a flier ( hand bill in local English) circulated in Jan 2009.

This parish, as the name indicates, is dedicated to thier patron saint, Sebastian.

The feast on the saint is on the 20th January, and the Sunday nearest to that date is the day of fest and feast of this Parish.

The church is decorated, peforming arts conducted for about 4 days, bands play, fireworks display and imitation cannon sound rounds performed ( kathina in Malayalam language)

The parish priest DÇruz,
the "presidenthi" or presidents of events who pay and manage the festivities are

Godson D'Souza son of Labell D'souza
and
Antony Vivera son of Justin Vivera

The fathers names are mentioned because, purses belong to the them , the juniors (under 18 they are) just stand in for the parents who are to busy working!

Bolghatty, or Ponjikkar had a soul. Come the Gosree islands, the island village has lots its people and its soul.

Land prices per cent skyrocketed to 30 lakh rupees per cent, every villager sold his home and soul migrated elsewhere.

The buyers have not moved in, so one would find ghost homes in different stages of decay. Buyers are speculators, even if they want they will find it difficult to move in, the only road is not wide enough to take two cars coming in opposite directions.

It would have been possilbe to buy land at 10 thousand rupees per cent, before announcement of bridge was made. Pay for land at prevailing prices, make road, and then annouce construction of bridges, that would have made development easy.

Now it is a stalemat, or logjam, whatever. Government cannot pay for land, at current prices. If only the Government had made a road first, and then made bridge, it could have even levied a cess on appreciated land values and used this for more road. That would have been a win win situation for every villager.

Sunday, January 18, 2009

Madamakkals of Mulavukad, Ponnarimangalam aka Bolghatty

They came from some other islands. Ochanthuruthu in Vypeen one should say.

Not much is known about Avira (Abraham )

His Son Mathan ( Mathew ) was in copra business. Buy coconuts, peel them open, dry coconuts, when dry, and almost all the water is gone from the coconut kernel, remove shells and sell the copra to mills at Ernakulam was the business.

Small and big land owners, would fell coconuts, and send word to Mathen Chettan about avaialability of coconuts. One servant with a huge basket would go to the coconut seller and carry them to a copra yard (kalam ) where the processing was done.

The coconut shells were sold as fire wood, expecially during rainy season, the coconut husks were buried in the muddy backwaters to soften and then extract coir fibre from them.

The coir woulbe bought and sold by other traders and exported.

Mathen Chettan was rich and also known as "muthalali"

One with money as capital was known as "muthalali" and workers were known as "thozhilali"

Mathew Madamakkal had several sons and two daughters.
sons :
Abraham
George
Francis
Mathew
John
Thomas
Lazar

daughters

Bawa
Angela

Abraham Madamakkal was a freedom fighter, was jailed by the British and spent time in jail with K. Karunakaran ( later chief minister of kerala )

Abraham Madamakkal was a poet, journalist and news paper editor.
He edited "Deepam" an eveninger from Market Road, Ernakulam. When Deepam was closed down, he moved to Mathrubhumi Ernakulam

Veliath Assuez ( Asuves ) Family

Lt. Col Mathew Daniel has written about his own family and people. They were ( were but not are ) people linked to (born there, or had parents born there) Bolghatty.

These days, Meenakshi Reddy Madhavan, daughter of N S Madhavan is famous for her bloggings. This gentleman, Madhvan from the Indian Administrative Service ( IAS) has written a book based on the history of Bolghatty. Refers to gentlemen engaged in ship building. Did he know about the story of Portugese sailor who married a nair woman, sired children who later day carried title and surname like Veliath (nair) Ausuez ( Portuguese ) like a double barrel surname.

The family branch of Lt. Col. Mathew Danel Veliath, is said to have, dropped the assuez idenity and retained the Veliath part, when sarong worn by Anglo Indians because expensive. This story could be joke, because, the Current day Veliaths were land lords and affluent.

There are few families with the name Assuez and some with only Veliath.
The Asuez families are Anglo Indians the Veliaths are simply Latin Catholics. (they all go to the same church any way)

The Veliaths are mostly migrated and gone to far awaylands of the US and UK.

Col Mathew Veliath himself lives in Maradu.

Madhavan KK and Dakshayani

In the State of Cochin, at the time of Maharaja rule, one of the rajahs had forbidden any meeting of the untouchables, on “his land”. The waters were mentioned, so, a member of Pulaya Community in Mulavukad island (aka Bolghatty) assembled a flotilla of rafts in the back waters around Bolghatty and convened a meeting. The hero here was Kallachamuri Krishnaadi Asan. The first ever graduate from Pulaya community was his grand niece Dakshayani (she was an MP I guess). Dakshayani’s brother, K K Madhavan (master ) was a lawyer, MP and editor. When Madhavan Master was admitted in the Sudheendra Hospital at Chittoor Road, Ernakulam, KR was on an official visit to Kerala. Mr. Narayanan, then President of India, indeed paid a visit to the hospital. Guess they were friends.

Like most of the sons of Bolghatty, KK Madhavan had moved to the mainland Ernakulam, probably lived somewhere in Kaloor. In the Elamakkara area there is a lane named after "KK Madhavan Master""

Dakshayani's children were educated in Delhi. One is/was in the airforce, and another joined the Indian administrave service (IAS).

Friday, January 16, 2009

Judge Babu Mathew P Joseph

Judge Babu Mathew P Joseph had his moment of fame when he read out judgement on the Marad massacre.

After reading a Malayala Manorama report on the 16 January 2009 (by line Kozhikode) a friend of mine from Bolghatty / Mulavukad disagreed.
u
"Babu is my country cousin" he protested. Protested because, the Manorama report mentioned Babu ïs a native of Kakkanadu"

Judge Babu was born in the island of Bolghatty, Ponnarimangalam area, Mulvaukad post, Ernakulam District. After his graduation and marriage, he moved to Kakkanad, where his wife had some property.

This is usual practice.

Famous islanders very often moved out of these god damned islands, where life was tough. Water was one problem. People from Vallarpadom had to go to Mulavukad for drinking water. Canoes called "vanchi" for transportation, and clay pots called "maatum" to store water.

Water in ponds ( kulam in Malayalam) had its share of muck, surprsing nobody died of any disease like diarrhoea. Villagers very reistant to diseases one should say!

It is important to mention some famous names linked to Mulavukad island, now famously called Bolghatty.

Suresh Kumar IAS (kamikaze soldier of V S Achuthanandan
M M Lawarence (ex MP, Communist Marxist Party Leader and Labour Union Chief of CITU -Centre of Indian Trade Unions)
Gaspar De Silva (Anglo Indian representative in the Ministry of Panampilly Govinda Menon while he was "Prime Minister" of Cochin State
Vallon MLC (member of legislative council that is, need to investigate more on him, who can help?)

KK Madhavan MP

Current day Anglo Indian MLA Simon Britto's mother is from Mulavukad

Ponjikkara Rafi was born here, his wife Sabina Rafi lived here.