Many happy returns of the day, Chennai.

Yesterday was Madras's 382nd birthday. We have to admit that the 381st birthday passed in a collective Covid daze. There was not as much as a celebratory cheep, since the inhabitants were too busy counting the spikes in Covid cases. (Naive mathematical question: How can you possibly have a spike every day? If it goes up every day it's an uptrend! Well, this digression closes here, together with this bracket). 

 

This year the city is recovering, or at least is somewhat vaccinated, and normalcy is rearing it's head beneath it's face mask. So the annual celebrations have resurfaced, albeit in a socially distanced way. As always, the leading light in the festivities is the MahaVishnu of Mount Road, the redoubtable newspaper, the Hindu. The Hindu is taking the online route to celebrations, with an article every day to remember past pandemics and disasters. These include articles as varied as the yeoman service done by the King's institute in Guindy, and the Communicable Diseases Hospital in Tondiarpet for the eradication of small pox, and the fight against influenza, to boxing and music, to the long lived restaurant, the Waldorf. They have even waxed forth on the history of Section 144! Meanwhile the U.S. consulate has also got into the act, and of course the Greater Chennai Corporation (GCC). They have started several beautification projects. We wish they would give a park to South Chennai and illuminate all the beautiful Indo-Saracenic buildings in the city, starting with Central Station. Here is a suitably sepia tinted photo.

This blog post is by Neelima Gupte and Sumathi Rao.

Tailpiece: While Madras is 382 years old, Chennai is 25 years old. The Government of Tamil Nadu issued the notification that Madras will hence be Chennai in 1996 (incidentally, the year I moved to Chennai!). The Madraspatinam/Chennaipatinam story is reiterated every Madras day! Institutions like the University of Madras and IIT Madras, have adhered to their old names, Madras became Chennai only in their addresses. MAS stayed MAS in our baggage tags, it still stays. Chennaiites are somewhat different from Madrasis, viva le difference. நேரடி வேறுபாடு or to put it another way Nēraṭi vēṟupāṭu. -Neelima.