Kodagu, KARNATAKA :
September 17th, 2013
RECOLLECTIONS : THE KHANS OF KODAGU-2
When he (Khan Bahadur) finished his narration I could understand why with regard to other things he used to be so reticent. He was so fond of talking about his exceptional experience that he appeared to be greatly exhilarated.
The next day my brother-in-law took me down to explore a part of the Coffee Estate. Going down was of course very easy but coming up was a bit strenuous. We returned to the bungalow and sat in the chairs of the verandah. Some one drew my attention by pointing his finger towards the lower part of my white pyjama and what I noticed was that on both the parts there were large stains of blood and as I rolled up the lower portions I found leeches, which having sucked my blood, had become quite large and were sticking to my body.
Hussain Khan told me that all the bad blood of my body had been sucked. I wondered whether I had any bad blood at all. However that reminded me of William Wordsworth’s leech gatherer who used to collect leeches to be sold to an apothecary so that they could be used for sucking bad blood from his ailing patients. Anyhow that decrepit old man had found a means of livelihood since he had resolved to lead an independent life without being a parasite on society.
That afternoon we went on sight-seeing to Madikeri where we visited Raja Seat and old fort regarding which there was nothing much to write home about. In the evening we returned to Abial. The Khan who had also gone to Madikeri on some office work came back to the estate with two cars full of guests picked from the town. I was told that it was Khan’s habit to entertain his friends quite regularly. In this way we had an opportunity to meet the local people.
The Khan was a host par excellence. Every time we sat at the dining table we had exceptional food. The English lexicon describes dinner as the chief meal of the day but at Abial we used to have three dinners daily, one in the morning, the other one in the afternoon and, of course, the third one at night and every time we used to have epicurean food, such a one that the very look of it would make every connoisseur’s mouth salivate.
Throughout the day tea would be served after almost every hour. I just wondered why these coffee planters preferred tea to coffee and that too so frequently. Dr. Samuel Johnson, the first lexicographer of the English language, according to his biographer Boswell, used to drink about twenty cups of tea per day while working on his dictionary but here almost one was consuming hot tea by bucket-loads, perhaps on account of chilly weather.
Khan Bahadur, renowned for his hospitality, exulted in giving parties. Under one excuse or the other he would arrange banquets. I myself was witness to such a grand party about two years later. My cousin Capt. Amir Ahmed stationed at Ambala Cantt. had come on a holiday to Mysore. He was hoping to get a transfer to Bangalore about which he made a casual reference to Hussain Khan and the latter promised to help him.
After a week, my cousin and I were invited to Abial and there we found a banquet being arranged. Hussain Khan had perhaps dropped a hint to Khan Bahadur and he had invited General K.M. Cariappa and the then Commissioner of Kodagu Mr. Bedi with some other VIPs numbering about a hundred invitees. There was as usual a great deal of bonhomie but a little restrained perhaps on account of the General’s presence. There were no speeches whatsoever but the guests were divided in groups and mixed freely with everyone and had a great time.
The party came to an end but the main purpose for which the Khan Bahadur had taken so much trouble, was not realised. My cousin didn’t get a transfer. Perhaps, the formidable General was not spoken to regarding that matter. But for Hussain Khan it was a question of his honour. Immediately, of course, he could not get my cousin transferred but he did succeed in due course, thanks to his brother’s enormous clout.
As time passed on, Hussain Khan was prevailed upon by my sister in 1952 to go with her on pilgrimage to Mecca along with Khan Bahadur’s wife who was accompanied by her uncle as an escort. I think that he did appear to have a semblance of change for the better after Haj and seemed to have shunned the primrose path. As far as his squandering habit was concerned, it was burning a deeper hole in pocket and ultimately he could not tone down his kamikaza tendencies and finally lost all his patrimony.
It is generally noticeable that a younger sister, after her own marriage, thinks that it is her duty and prerogative to find a suitable match for her own elder brother so that he may also experience conjugal bliss and so it happened in the case of my sister too.
After becoming Mrs. Hussain Khan, the loving sister started in right earnest looking for the eligible girl for me. Finally, her woman’s intuition guided her to spot one fifteen-year-old from among a host of nubile girls. She was Razia, the second daughter of her husband’s cousin Yusuf Ali Khan who was also a coffee planter with his Balayatrie Estate at Boikere near Suntikoppa. His first daughter was already betrothed to Rahmatullah Khan, the eldest son of Khan Bahadur.
Rahmatullah Khan had just then been admitted to Junior Intermediate class while I had joined that college as a lecturer in English. When once my engagement took place, Rahmath did not attend my class since, by getting married to the elder sister, he considered himself to be my senior in relationship and it would be infra dig for him to be the student of a junior brother-in-law. However, his marriage took place three days after mine and in that respect also he became my junior. But I must say to his credit that he turned out to be an affectionate and considerate relative and remained so throughout his life.
My young wife, Razia, was too young, just fifteen and was studying in the eighth standard when she was made to discontinue her studies in view of the impending marriage. However, she was a sort of linguist as she could read five scripts — Urdu, Arabic, Hindi, Kannada and English — whereas I could read only Urdu, Arabic and English. Thus to her credit I must say that she was a Jill of so many lingoes but mistress of none.
The nuns at Good Shepherd Convent in Mysore where she joined later thought that their pupil was an accomplished girl to take up the duties of a housewife. I was afraid of only one thing about her — her smattering of so many languages. John Milton, the author of Paradise Lost and Paradise Regained, though being a great scholar in Latin and Greek, was himself not in favour of teaching his daughters any language other than their mother tongue. Perhaps he thought that while knowing just one language they turn out to be such chatter boxes what would happen if they knew some more lingoes.
Most women are accused by the male chauvinist of being very talkative. But my wife came from a family where most of the women knew only to whisper and that too barely audible, fearing perhaps that their language was too unmusical or too intruding.
On one occasion my father-in-law took me to a Kodava wedding since his invitation card bore the words “with family and friends.” He also prevailed upon a foreign tourist whom he had met in the North Coorg Club to accompany us so that the Englishman could have an idea about a Kodava marriage.
As we entered the wedding hall we found the bride seated on the dais and several guests on the chairs in front of the dais. Then the invitees started moving towards the bride, some of them offered cash gifts to the bride, some sprinkled rice grain over her head and some made her sip a little quantity of milk from the feeder. Yusuf Ali Khan told the Englishman jokingly that he should also perform that ritual since it was expected of all the well-wishers.
That Englishman-stranger, who had minutely observed the proceedings, went straight to the bride, sprinkled the rice grains on her head and then put some milk in her mouth and finally placed two rupees before her as a gift.
[To be continued]
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October 03rd, 2013
RECOLLECTIONS : THE KHANS OF KODAGU-3
Dr. Zakir Hussain’s (extreme right) visit to Abial Estate. Others seen are (from left) Yusuf Ali Khan with his son, Khan Bahadur, a guest and M.I.K. Durrani.
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October 03rd, 2013
RECOLLECTIONS : THE KHANS OF KODAGU-3
[Continued from Sept. 17]
During my stay in Kodagu at that time there was a sensational news afloat that one woman in a coffee estate was living since her birth without consuming any food. The owner of that estate was very well-known to my father-in-law so he decided to pay a visit to that place and I was asked to accompany him.
When we reached the estate the owner came out to receive us and then he introduced Dhanalakshmi that unique person. She was a buxom maiden perhaps in her late twenties but looking every inch as fit as a fiddle and much healthier than people consuming food with a high calorific value. I wished if the secret behind that woman’s food-less existence could be known it would solve the food problems of the human race. However that was not to be. Subsequently owing to still greater publicity the cat was out of the bag that it was just a hoax played upon the gullible persons since it was the month of April.
One particular family trait of the Khans was their unquenchable desire to extend their hospitality to all the VIPs whom they happened to meet. Yousuf Ali Khan had a plenitude of this characteristic. If we came across such noteworthy persons at Mysore he would take them to his estate and from there to other places just for sight-seeing. One particular guest who was taken to Balayatrie in 1956 was Dr. Zakir Hussain, the ex-Vice-Chancellor of Aligarh Muslim University. It was M.A Qadir, lecturer in Urdu at St. Philomena’s College, who had introduced his friend and guest, Dr. Zakir Hussain, to Yusuf Ali Khan along with Col. Bashir Hussain Zaidi, the designated Vice-Chancellor of Aligarh Muslim University who had accompanied Dr. Hussain.
At that time I was spending my summer vacation in the estate and there I had the honour of meeting the celebrities. Dr. Hussain went round the beautiful garden in front of the bungalow and checked very minutely the plants which appealed to him most. Then he saw the rose garden at the back of the bungalow. He had a doctorate in Economics from Germany but his knowledge of various subjects was simply amazing. He could talk on any subject in an interesting and enlightening manner.
While having lunch he started extolling the virtue of eating bananas. There were on the table the famous Nanjangud bananas and as he tasted one he advised us that after eating one we should go for a second helping since one banana would be feeling very lonely inside the belly and it needed company of another to provide maximum energy. Listening to him with rapt attention we could find him to be a brilliant conversationalist. Col. Zaidi was however comparatively very quiet.
Next morning after a clean shave and a bath, Col. Zaidi sat before the mirror of the dressing table and started the ritual of getting ready for the day by attending meticulously to his facial. I was just astounded. Never before had I seen the male of the species using different beautifying aids. Time may be the greatest healer but he is certainly no beauty specialist and Col. Zaidi, in my view, could not revive the long last youthful looks, still he seemed to be happy that his face had successfully withstood the ravages of time. If Zakir Hussain had a doctorate in Economics, Col. Zaidi seemed to be a past master in cosmetics.
Khan Bahadur Abdul Rehman Khan had arranged a grand party in honour of the visiting luminaries and all of us went to Abial Estate for lunch. Once again most of the conversation was monopolised by the visitors. Then started a photo session where all the cameras were taken out and all the young men started clicking so that they could record the visit of such renowned scholars for the posterity to feel proud about. We stayed there up to the evening.
Dr. Hussain had heard a great deal about Kerala, God’s own country and now after having come so close he expressed his desire to visit Cannanore. Yusuf Ali Khan readily agreed and next morning we started on our journey.
Quite often the guest would ask his host to stop the car. Then he would get down looking for some rare ferns which grew on the sides of the road. The most surprising thing was his knowledge about the botanical names of those plants. Throughout the route we used to notice small hamlets where there would be at least one tea shop showing the enterprising Malayalis. It was a pleasant drive throughout the journey. We found verdant scenic beauty welcoming us.
After reaching Cannanore we got accommodation in a posh hotel but the food was highly disappointing because almost all dishes were cooked with coconut oil. The food might not have been up to the mark but the company of Dr. Hussain by itself was very exhilarating, educative and thoroughly rewarding. However, after one day we found the weather to be too sultry and humid therefore the journey was cut short and we returned to Mysore.
At a distance of about 20 km from Balayatrie Estate, Yusuf Ali Khan had wet lands in Rasulpura, a small village on the Kushalnagar-Siddapur Road near Guddehossur and that perhaps was the only village in Kodagu named after an individual. Late Rasool Khan was the father of Yusuf Ali Khan. He had built a very fine farm house at a high altitude from where he could have a panoramic view of the paddy fields. Right behind the house there was the Cauvery with a sandy bank.
During summer there used to be five streams flowing downwards but during the rainy season Cauvery would be making merry in all its glory. The water of the river some times used to touch the kitchen door at the back. Many of the guests preferred that spot to the bungalow and the garden at Balayatrie. Children, in particular, always had a very good time crossing the five streams and going over to the other side. Even to this day under the personal management of Afroz Mohammed Khan, the youngest son of Yusuf Ali Khan, the traditional hospitality of the Khans is extended to all the visitors to that place.
Yusuf Ali Khan, being a progressive farmer, used to experiment with the planting of exotic fruit trees in his Balayatrie Estate but that was just for the consumption of his own family and friends. But at Rasulpura he had selected a particular spot for the cultivation of a particular variety of bananas which were called cavendish bananas. The exotic bananas were giant cavendish. By eating just half of it one would feel so full. Following the advice of Dr. Zakir Hussain, eating two bananas would be out of the question!
The cultivation of those delicious bananas of extraordinary size became the cynosure of all eyes in the neighbourhood. Farmers started visiting the farm from far off places. Even S. Nijalingappa, the then Chief Minister who himself was a keen agriculturist, paid a visit to the grove in the year 1962. He was much impressed by the size of the bunches just harvested and congratulated Yusuf Ali Khan on his dedication to agriculture.
A great horticulturist that he was, he used to participate in almost every competition and won hundreds of medals, cups and trophies which used to be displayed on the mantelpiece in his bungalow at Balayatrie. His son F. M. Khan was with his father at Balayatrie when his father had a massive heart attack and succumbed to it on the last day of the fasting month. His body was brought to Mysore on 22.12.1968. The next day was the Eid day. So at the Eidgah grounds after the Eid prayers the assembly of 30,000 people took part in the funeral prayers for the departed person. May his soul rest in peace. Amen.
October 30th, 2013
RECOLLECTIONS…: THE KHAN OF KHANS
So you are going to stage Hamlet without the Prince of Denmark?” asked my wife as I returned home at 5.30 pm. After my late afternoon prayers she was still holding the copy of Star of Mysore in her hands obviously she had finished reading the last part of my article on her relatives entitled ‘The Khans of Kodagu.’ She seemed to be vexed on not finding her brother F.M. Khan’s name in that small galaxy of the Khans who had made a name for themselves. And certainly F.M. Khan was the most famous of them all. Whereas the reputation of the other Khans was confined only to Kodagu or at the most to Mysore and Bengaluru. F.M. Khan, in spite of his short political career, was well-known through out the length and breadth of India as belonging to Sanjay Brigade and hence a very influential person. I could, of course, understand why she was sulking and becoming hypersensitive to her familial sentiments. I think that her feelings towards him were almost maternal.
Though the difference of age between them was just two years she used to attend to him from his infancy. She loved him very much. Perhaps forty thousand sisters could not (with all their quantity of love) make up her sum. My readers may perhaps accuse me of resorting to hyperbole but in my defence all I can say is that it is just a matter of poetic-licence. If Hamlet says forty thousand brothers why can’t I substitute it with forty thousand sisters. William Wordsworth says with regard to daffodils that he saw ten thousand at a glance, and nobody accuses him of exaggerating the number. However just to mollify her I said how I could forget Faiz who, as a mischievous element, always tried to pull a fast one on me. Those Khans, his predecessors, mentioned in the earlier article were long since dead and gone, and even their perturbed spirits would not visit their once beloved abode. Further, I needed no ghost come from the grave to tell me that nothing was rotten in the estate of Balayatrie in spite of there absence.
However there was something disturbing me very much. “To write or not to write” was not the question. To write about him was perhaps preordained and I had to bow to the inevitable. But the conundrum was “What was right to write about and what was not?” Because as the saying goes “No one is a hero to his valet.” In Urdu language we have a better equivalent which says “Ghar Ki Murghi daal barabar” (meaning a chicken reared at home is as good as the humble daal) or “Ghar ka pir maskara” (meaning a saintly person in his own house is like a clown). So I decided to be circumspect regarding the usage of words and narration of events so as to avoid inadvertent puffery or criticism of any kind. Further I didn’t wish to lose touch with the power and allure of the written word and at the same time I didn’t want to indulge in unnecessary verbiage.
Born in 1938 to Yusuf Ali Khan, Coffee planter of Balayatrie Estate at Boikeri, near Suntikoppa in North Madikeri, Faiz was the eldest son, born after two successive daughters. The full name given to him was Faiz Mohammed (Faiz meaning gift — gift from Mohammed, the Prophet). All the elders called him Faiz and the youngsters addressed him as Saab Bhai and that moniker became very popular. Already there was one Saab (Hussain Khan) in the family and here was another with the suffix bhai (meaning brothers).
It was in the year 1951, after my marriage with his sister, Razia, that I came in contact with Faiz and at that time he was just an adolescent — almost a spoilt child, full of puckish pranks which used to be camouflaged by “boys-will-be-boys-you-know.” I myself had been brought up in an altogether different environment where children’s disciplined behaviour used to convince the visitors that the rod had not been spared.
When Dr. Zakir Hussain, after relinquishing his pot as Vice-Chancellor of Aligarh Muslim University had visited Balayatrie, I was very particular that I should have some photographs with him. But every time I posed for the picture Faiz would crack a joke in such a manner that I could hardly restrain myself and the whole picture would be spoilt. So, later on I stopped trusting him with my camera. There were others who knew how to comport themselves with decency. Perhaps it was for the first time in my life that I had seen so young a boy being so uninhibited.
As Faiz grew up his mischievous nature also tried to innovate and experiment with unimaginable situations. Once during the summer vacation I was staying at Balayatrie bungalow along with my wife and three young children. Faiz was supposed to be in charge of hospitality. He had nothing to worry about since there was a very experienced cook in charge of the kitchen. The bungalow had two very large master-bedrrooms and another four smaller rooms in addition to servants-quarters in the rear. Between the two master-bedrooms there was a spacious dining room with a fireplace (of course without any fire at that time) and a beautiful mantel piece over it. I was there sleeping with my family in one of the large rooms and Faiz was in the opposite bedroom. The generators used to be switched off at 9 pm and we had to manage with the kerosene bed-lamp during nights. At about two ‘o clock the kerosene oil in the lamp was exhausted and there was total darkness. I got up from the bed to fetch the matches and kerosene from the
mantel piece where it used to be kept. It was pitch dark and I couldn’t see anything and banged my sine against a chair but continued to move towards the door of the dining room which I opened very carefully since the children were fast asleep. As I opened the door and stopped towards the fireplace, suddenly before I could even open my eyes fully, two arms from nowhere took me in their hold and hugged me with a vice-like grip. I knew that the only ghost in that lovely place could be no one but the one and only upstart that was there. With a sense of indignation I muttered, “stop it, I say, you can’t scare me in that puerile way.” He just giggled sheepishly. He had plotted the entire course of action to frighten me. He was responsible, I knew, for reducing the quantity of kerosene in the lamp. But his plan fell flat and I had not screamed like some others on whom Faiz had many a time played that kind of risky prank. Then the devil’s incarnation had realised that I had the last laugh.
In the year 1957 I had brought from Bangalore the latest model of Lambretta scooter and that happened to be the only one scooter in Mysore of those days. Formerly I used to ride a Raleigh bicycle whenever I went out. But now having the one and only scooter in the city I took it to my father-in-law’s house, situated in Arch gate road and had it parked in the compound of the bungalow. Faiz and his young brothers along with their friends stood admiringly around the two wheeler. Then Faiz started trying to locate the different cables, like the gear cable, brake cable and clutch cable which were concealed under the shield of the handle-bar. Leaving the admirers there I went inside the house where at that time my family was staying.
After a few minutes, I heard the sound of clapping. A group of boys was standing on the footpath and they were vociferously applauding Faiz who had taken my scooter out and was riding at breakneck speed on that traffic-free road from the Arch gate to the Five-light circle and then returning at the same speed. And the wonder of wonders was that he was not seated but was standing on the chassis-platform of the scooter with his arms outstretched above and I, with my heart in my mouth, was just watching the riskiest feat. Thank Heavens, nothing untoward happened. It was a close shave but Faiz was immensely happy as he was a hero’s welcome by the whole caboodle.
Another time Faiz came to my house by Dodge Kingsway which his father had just then bought. He asked me to accompany him to Bengaluru where he intended to attend the Maharaja’s Gold Cup race. I was always game for such outings. Along with him there was his Kodava friend in the back seat. We were passing through Srirangapatna when Faiz asked me to watch the speedometer which showed that the maximum speed would be 12 miles per hour. There was a fine stretch of concrete road for about ten miles from Srirangapatna towards Mandya. At the commencement of that stretch Faiz suddenly pressed the accelerator and the brand new car vroomed and the needle touched the figure of 100. I started shouting at him to slow down. In a matter of no time we had covered that stretch. I told him that I didn’t want to take any risk since I was a man with a family, having my own commitments and further my insurance was also just for a pittance. If anything were to happen to Faiz it wouldn’t matter much since he was still a bachelor and
he had four more brothers and seven sisters. So I warned him if he tried to scare me again I would return home by bus. With his usual disarming smile he formally apologized to me and promised that he would not further offend my sensibilities.
Then there was to be a motor cycle race in Mysore sponsored by F.K. Irani of Ideal Jawa. Even some foreign ace racers were expected to take part in that competition. Faiz bought a very powerful motor-bike for the nonce, and he gave it to his trusted mechanic to tune it up. That mechanic himself was to be one of the competitors. On the eve of the competition both of them had a trial run in which Faiz had beaten him hollow almost by a street.
On the D-day all the members of the family went to the special racing track to witness the race. We located a vantage point and settled down there anxiously waiting for the start. My wife Razia was seated along with us but with folded hands and half closed eyes as though in communion with Allah on behalf of her dear brother. Then it happened. The signal was given. Faiz’s bike vroomed past us like some flying object, far ahead of all the other competitors. It seemed as though he was going to win hands down but within a few minutes, to everyone’s shock his bike stopped as the engine had seized up. And the winner of the event turned out to be Faiz’s trusted ever smiling mechanic. That was indeed a bitter lesson that our very own speed merchant had learnt, along with the realisation that one may smile and smile and be a villain.
by: Professor MIK Durrani
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source: http://www.facebook.com / Professor MIK Durrani (written in segments from September 17th to October 30th, 2013