A Tale of Two Capital Cities and the beginning of My own Memories of Ammamma

While Ammamma settled into inevitable domesticity consequent upon my birth, she was however, witness to the huge riots for a separate Andhra Pradesh. Potti Sreeramulu was an avid Gandhian and a Sabarmati inmate. For a long time, he proposed the formation of a distinctive Andhra state, with Madras as the capital. The proposal, despite having Gandhi's support, went against the grain of thinking of Nehru and Rajaji. PS went on a fast and called it off when Nehru promised to consider the proposal - a promise, he had not the slightest intention to keep. Therefore, in October 1953, Potti Sreeramulu went on an indefinite fast. It lasted 58 days and culminated in his martyrdom, because the pressure of the Tamils was as strong as Nehru's own disinclination for division on linguistic basis and even more so, because there was little support within the Congress itself and compounded by the lack of unity amongst Andhras on the selection of the capital. There were many vying contenders - Madras, Nellore. Vijayawada, Kurnool and more. Which is also why not many appeared to take Potti Sreeramulu's fast seriously, that was for as a long period as 58 days. Then riots and vandalism took over, where Vijayawada was also active and much loss was inflicted on government properties as well as on innocent individuals. Ammamma narrates a story of one fellow looting some things from a shop and to his horror, found a whole lot of snakes in one basket which he thought contained vegetables! Why she remembers this amongst all the things confounds me - perhaps it is her penchant for practical jokes!

The death resolved the issue with Nehru being forced to concede the grant of Andhra state and forming the States Reorganization Committee (SRC) for division of states on linguistic basis. There were several pulls and pressures of various political parties and several regions remained in hot contention for decades later and the source of acrimonious debates between many people. Tamil Nadu did not concede Madras. Bellary was retained by Karnataka and Barampuram by Orissa. Notwithstanding the logic or propriety of issues involved, political compulsions and individuals prevailed ultimately. Andhra was carved out (sans Nizam's domain, despite it being annexed to India) and Kurnool was made the capital.

You might wonder why not just Ammamma, because of her domestic handicap, but also the Communists did not participate in the campaign for a separate Andhra. This was for two reasons - Communists talked about a larger Andhra Pradesh, including areas under the Nizam's territory, comprising of Telugu speaking people, and which they termed as Vishalandhra; and also because their rank and file were severely decimated during the Telengana Armed Struggle and the repression of Communism after the ban. For example, in Telengana alone, 4000 workers in the militant cadre were killed. It was a colossal massacre. After that, the Communist Party did not regain its strength of yore and compounded its problems by differences in ideology, till their ultimate formal split in 1964.

Meanwhile, Ammamma went about raising me and did all the things like weaning and introducing solid foods in the presence of her communist friends. I believe that my annaprasana was done my Makineni Jagadamba. Susila Gopalan visited Vijayawada and met Ammamma. After this, Ammamma and Susila Goplan did not meet till the late eighties. At a national Women's Conference, Ammamma met her again, but Susila Gopalan's memory failed her.

Anyway, when Kurnool was declared as the capital of Andhra, Ammamma and Tatayya moved there and Visalaandhra posted Tatayya its reporter in the capital. Before this, Ammamma made a round of her relatives, including her inlaws in China Pulivarru. I think she visited China Pulivarru more than my father - for some undeclared reason, he rarely visited his parents. I remember only one occasion when he went to his village and brought my grandmother for a brief stay after Maapi was born. I don't think he even visited them when grandparents died, though I do remember Ammamma and me going to the village for grandmother's ceremony, which I found quite intriguing both because of the ceremony and because Ammamma chose to do it rather than oppose it. Since she died in old age, while preserving her 'punya stree' status (i.e husband still living), most women would consider it a privilege to receive the offering made in her name from the daughter in law's hands standing in a river or pond.

Anyway, going back to that day, my grandparents wanted me, a one and a half year old toddler, to be left behind to be taken care of by them. It is not unusual for grandparents to bring up grandchildren and Ammamma appeared quite happy to oblige - I am sure she felt claustrophobic being cooped up and also worried sick of taking proper care of me. She was petrified that something would happen to me because of the death of her first two children. Can you imagine this fearless lady hiding me from public health officials when they came to vaccinate? This lady, who was such a daredevil for everything else, was ultra sensitive when it came to her child. She had the same sensitivity decades later, when I was giving birth to Sweety and Dr Rekha Arke finally decided that I needed a Ceaserian section as mother and baby were under distress, Ammamma cried and was scared of the operation! Tatayya was worse - he went home and took a sleeping tablet and slept off and did not know about his first grand child's birth till ten hours after she was born! So girls - before you get irritated next time with my and Maapi's anxieties, please understand - such is the vulnerability of a parent's heart that it can be very tough when it comes to facing anything in the world, but crumbles like powder concerning anything with their kids. Also, Ammamma had a near miss with me too apparently - I was in pain and crying continuously and a local compounder in Vijayawada had pronounced a few hours of life only for me and I had to be rushed to the Nursing home where I was born, to be assured that it was a false alarm. By the way, the health officials did come home and forcibly vaccinate me in both arms! Public health in action those days was actually visible. I remember municipal employees coming to houses to take details of malaria and other diseases.

Anyway, Ammamma was also exasperated with the responsibility of looking after me, specially because I would not give her even a minute for mixing my feed, I used to bawl at the top of my voice. I was also a light sleeper and everyone, including neighbours had to be silent when I slept, otherwise, of course I would start my bawling. It was also a period of shortages of milk powder. Decades later, I met a journalist called Rambhatla Krishnamuthy (in Granite's sister's wedding), who told me how he and Tatayya used to scout for shops where stocks of Glaxo milk powder were available. It was incongruous to hear of it when you are 50+ years of age!

Alas, Ammamma's joy of being free of me lasted exactly for two days. Ankineedu Bavayya (my cousin from father's side), had to bring me back because I just wouldn't stay without Ammamma. That poor boy (must have been around 19 then) had to tend to me all along the train journey, including washing me several times as I had a stomach upset!

In Kurnool, Ammamma and Tatayya set about finding some stability for their livelihoods. Initially, Ammamma worked for a month in the newly constituted Assembly Library for a one month temporary job. The neighbours agreed to look after me, since it was a matter of one month only and not actually realising what it would entail. After a few days, the neighbour lady used to wait for Ammamma to come home and hand me over immediately. Sometimes she would make me cry so that Ammamma would take me away faster. I see a replay of this whenever any of our maids have children - they can work only if they have cooperating neighbours. In India - neighbours, and not just extended families play an important part in providing support systems to working women. Ammamma then started studying for her Bhushan - Hindi exam and passed it. She also wanted to do BA from Andhra University - she wrote to them but got no response. In Repalle, Ammamma had discovered her alternative vocation in teaching. Through her own acquaintances in Assembly and Tatayya's contacts, Ammamma met the District Public Instruction Dept and through their offices got a job, first in Cole's High School and later in St Joseph's High School as Hindi Teacher. Since she was untrained (no B Ed degree), she got a temporary job on a lower salary. Here, she was quickly recognised by one and all as a competent person and several students took interest in studies. Here also she was the School Inspector's highly commended teacher. Kurnool being a small town, and yet the capital city, these two schools had the children of the elite also studying alongwith the middle class and commoners. Among her students were Sudhir and Amaravati - Neelam Sanjeev Reddy's (CM) children, Chief Secretary M T Raju's daughters and so on and so forth. She narrates the story of a poor boy who was a friend of Sudhir, who went to visit him at his residence and the security booted him out - Sudhir came out to personally invite the boy into his home after that. The story must have made an impression on the socialist side of Ammamma, which is why it is still etched in her memory.

A teacher called Sulochana was active in the Ladies Club and she invited Ammamma to some of the functions, particularly when someone had to give a speech in Hindi when the Governor's wife Mrs Trivedi graced the occasion. The DPI also organized several programmes for children and Ammamma was an active participant in all these programmes with her students. She ended up giving welcomes and vote of thanks in these functions after her students performed well. For working in the schools, Ammamma employed a young Muslim girl to look after me. She and I used to play in the verandah, and, though the key of the house was with this girl, she would not allow any relatives also to enter the house when Ammamma was away at school. Incidentally Ammamma met Sulochana once again in her life, probably in 2002 in Hyderabad, when both arrived at a marketing event for senior citizens organized by a real estate firm! (Preeti got the form for Ammamma for this when she bade her to do it!).

From here, I have my own memories of Ammamma, even though I was here upto the end of my third year. I remember a few things - Tatayya lifting me an showing me porcelain figures of two swans, two ducks, two rabbits and one squirrel (spoiling the Noah's Ark concept!) in the top shelf of the almirah - telling me they are mine but never letting me touch them because they were ceramic; trying my best to eat bitter gourd curry because Ammamma told me it was very good for health and I was in awe of her (I was never scared of my father, it is my mother who I was afraid of and always wanted to please her), I remember now helping myself to the food and eating by myself (at this age I wonder how a three year old was left to do this), running after cinema promotion rickshaws and collecting pamphlets, going off to movies and slipping in because everyone assumes that a three year old would be accompanied by an adult and watching movies or sleeping off (usually with another playmate Radha - an IPS officer Seethapathy's daughter and of my age). Several times we had police teams looking out for both of us. Once we also went away to the river Tungabhadra and played on its banks. Every escapade of mine must have made Ammamma and Tatayya loose many heartbeats. Even now this anxiety has not completely gone. Whenever I am late coming back from my Book Club, Ammamma is even now worried and keeps calling me on my mobile! And I am now 57! One image that is distinct on my mind is one in which I am being butted by a goat (or maybe it was a goatkid, at that age it must have looked like a big goat to me) and instead of rushing to protect me, Ammamma was standing in the doorway and laughing and I couldn't understand it. She probably thought this would build my character! Anyway, I was pretty upset with her then. In return, she was exasperated once when she went to a watch repair shop to fix her watch and I insisted that we buy a radio on display there and no amount of cajoling would quieten me and my crying lasted a whole four hours. But I didn't get the radio because we simply could not afford it. Tatayya left Visaalandhra on a difference of opinion and for some time was freelancing. He then joined Deccan Herald as stringer and later still joined Andhra Prabha.

In 1956, due to several discussions and efforts by many leaders also in Telengana, such as Burgula Ramakrishna Rao, Konda Ranga Reddy, Ramananda Teertha and others, it was agreed that the Telugu speaking areas would join Andhra and the new state of Andhra Pradesh was born with Hyderabad as the capital. The non Telugu speaking people did not like this and they used call this Andhera Pardesh for some time, innocently and deliberately as the case may be. Ammamma chose to shift to the capital city while Tatayya was still thinking about it. She moved with me to this new city with just two contacts - a compounder in a paediatric doctor's clinic whose relative was in Kurnool and a journalist Vaman Rao (he is currently the President of Journalist's Colony where we are staying), who was working for The Hindu then. She was shown a very nice house by Vaman Rao near Public Gardens for Rs 40 a month and the compounder showed an apartment in the first floor above shops in Charminar for Rs 20. Ammamma chose the Charminar house, and thus I got to use Charminar and Mecca Masjid as my childhood playgrounds, alongwith the heavenly sandalwood aroma and wonderful prasadam of the Shiva Temple down below. I also saw gold and silver jewellery being made and watched samosas and pooris being cooked in roadside bandis, and the annual chestbeating, back whipping Muharram procession and the road promos of rat poison, including one promo which had a live tiger in a cage being brought on to the road. I learnt the customs of Muslims and the Hindus who were in abundance equally in that area and we all had a pretty good time, despite the fact that the painful separation of Pakistan had cast its long shadow on Hyderabad a few years back. The compounder also led me to my doctor, who was a very popular doctor, and I needed treatment very often, as I fell sick time and again. Whooping cough, typhoid, innumerable chills and fevers and each time all his staff was required to hold me down when he examined me and gave me an injection. This doctor had an ingenious way of dealing with a crowd of patients. He had a chair with wheels that he used to move along an assembly line of patients - he would put thermometers in each of the mouths and slide along with his stethoscope and deal with a minimum of 6-8 patients at one go. I later met his daughter when I joined ASCI when her husband Shashi Karan became my colleague.

Ammamma now had to search for a job in earnest. She had to fall back on her teaching, as other jobs would have meant knowing the right people and Hyderabad was a new and vast city, already established as a capital, unlike Kurnool. She responded to an ad in the paper for a primary school teacher for a new school in Secunderabad near the Clock Tower. She got the job and also a promise to help find accommodations closer to the school. However, she quit the job within days when the Promoter started dropping hints like he has undergone sterilisation operation, etc. While she was attending school here, I was again looked after by neighbours and I used play with their boys who were my age. I was also put in their school - a government school in Chaderghat but was withdrawn by Ammamma within three days as she did not like the school. I did not know about this fact of my life till recently.

Responding to another ad, Ammamma applied for and got a job in the Aga Khan Diamond Jubilee School (run by the Khoja Ismailis) in Chirag Ali Lane. I was also put in the same school in the nursery. She gave me a zero in Hindi because in Hyderabad, Hindi was first language and I did not know any Hindi. For God's sake - how much can a nursery child know?? Here also Ammamma's teaching skills were highly appreciated both by the management and the Inspectors. She also had the opportunity to see the Aga Khan and his son Karim Khan when they came visiting from Iran. My memory of this school is that of a story of regarding the Aga Khan, a student running after my Mother and the admiration in his eyes, and attending a Muslim marriage function (of a teacher's brother). The story about Aga Khan is what normally constitutes folklore and told with such great conviction that listeners have to believe that it is the truth - 'when the Aga Khan ate pan, you could actually see the red liquid coursing through his throat because he was so fair' - for days I tried to imagine it and wondered if I would ever see it actually happen. Our story tellers act so naturally! The Muslim marriage function was fascinating, though I could not understand why, when the groom had to lift his bride and bring her in, he had to dump her on the bed with great force and pride and not lay her down gently. Of course I was unacquainted with the manifestations of macho behaviour then, but I did feel that something wasn't quite right.

Ammamma was equally at ease making friends with people of all religions and I had no preconceived notions about people before I became friends with them. One legacy I am happy about is my ability to talk to everyone around me that can be totally attributed to her. I also remember the high school student who saw Ammamma and me on a train bound for Nizamabad and came running along the running train to ask her where she was going. There was so much of respect and admiration in his eyes. Ammamma was very pleased, but she seemed oblivious to the danger of the boy hanging on to the running train and she took her own time answering his question. I was petrified of running trains and was worried sick that the boy would fall off. Fortunately, he didn't. This boy was punished many times by Ammamma for not doing well in tests, including rapping on his knuckles with a wooden scale, but that did not lessen his respect for her and this made a big impression on me. However, Ammamma's competence and popularity in teaching did not help her in getting a raise at the school and she quit. I was also removed and admitted in the nearby Rosary Convent High School (The Most Holy Rosary Convent Multi Purpose High School is what I used to recite!). She met the DPI, who said that in Telengana region untrained teachers were indeed inducted and he would be able to give her a job if she initially accepted a posting at Adilabad. She did not want it and therefore, he helped her get a job in a private school called Madapati Hanumantha Rao Memorial High School at Narayanguda. This was a good break as she had some of her best teaching moments here and students to this day remember her. I received special affection from many even after so many years just because I was Savitri Teacher's daughter.