Back to the past: Veritta Paitrukangal, an exhibition on agricultural implements of yore, in Thrissur.
Exhibition on agricultural tools at Sahitya Akademi draws history lovers
Intensive and extensive cultivation was practised in Kerala by European colonialists, the fruit of which were reaped mainly by the middle class, Michael Tharakan, chairman of the Kerala Council for Historical Research (KCHR), has said.
He was addressing a three-day national seminar on ‘Social changes in Kerala: The last five centuries’, organised by the Kerala Historical Research Society (KHRS) at the Kerala Sahitya Akademi here. The seminar will conclude on Sunday.
The progress of education in modern Kerala could be traced back to this rise of the middle class, he argued.
Kerala Institute of Local Administration (KILA) Director Joy Elaman delivered the keynote address.
Kerala Sahitya Akademi president Vysakhan inaugurated an exhibition titled ‘Uprooted Heritage’. KHRS president George Alex presided over the function. Joseph John Keethra, general secretary, KHRS, and C.R. Valsan, Chairman, Kerala State Textile Corporation, spoke.
At the technical session, historian M.R. Raghava Warrier said colonialism in Kerala was based on a slavish mentality in material life, knowledge life, and individual life. Colonialism uprooted occupation groups and controlled the resource base of the land, he added.
Samuel Nellimukal presented a paper on education and social progress in the 19th and early 20th century Kerala. T.R. Venugopalan moderated the session.
The seminar is organised in six sessions, and 15 papers will be presented by experts in relevant areas. At the valedictory session, Alexander Jacob, IPS, will deliver a lecture on ‘Keralam: Innele Innu’.
Veritta Paitrukangal (Uprooted Heritage), an exhibition of agricultural tools and implements organised in connection with the seminar fascinated historylovers.
The exhibition explores the possibility of attracting youth to Kerala’s history and culture, and thereby, attempts to open fresh avenues in research and studies. Indirectly, it looks forward to creating awareness among youth and the public about the State in the past five centuries.
source: http://www.thehindu.com / The Hindu / Home> News> States / October 21st, 2017
Deep within a by-lane on the Civil Line near Vazhakkala exists probably the only Xanadu for comic book fans in the city , Comic Collective , the city’s first comic book library , boasts of a selection of over 1,000 comic books .
Comic books, unlike novels, are hard to find and buy and almost unavailable in Kochi.
The two key people involved in putting together this large collection of comic books, Tony Davis and San Ramshankar, travelled to multiple book fairs and flea markets across the country in search of books for the library that opened in August.
“You will not find specific comic books that are popular in flea markets because nobody would want to sell them, so those we had to buy online,” said Tony , the library founder.
San, a software engineer who used to review comic books on his Facebook page, Kerala Comic Brotherhood, used to collect them to augment his personal collection.
Later he met Tony , who had been collecting comics to set up a library in the city , on Kerala Comic Brotherhood.
Currently , Comic Collective has stocked popular series from the major western comic book publishers such as Marvel, DC, Vertigo, Image and Dark Horse.
They also have a selection of Japanese comics (manga) apart from those brought out by Indian publishers, illustrators, and writers Bobby Creasman, an American who moved to Kochi for work and is now of member of Comic Collective, said: “I think it’s fantastic that there is a comic book library in Kochi. My kids had borrowed two Flash comics. I borrowed Ramayan 3392 AD, which is the story of Ramayan in a post-apocalyptic setting.”
The house, converted into a library , offers wide seating space. The walls are decorated with art works made by comic fans.
“Comic book fans always tend to artistically recreate what they see in comic books, where two forms of art -writing, and illustration -converge,” said San who is also an active cosplayer (someone who engages in comic book costume play). His cosplay work is also on display at the library .
The library is yet to catch the fancy of comic bo ok fans but Tony believes there is huge potential.
“Last year, we organized a Batman Day gathering and we expected around 50 people. But around 250 people showed up and they were all fans of either the cartoon, the movie or the comic.We even had a quiz and some people answered all the questions. So this year, we are planning to organize Batman Day at our premises on September 23. Hopefully , it will serve a launching pad for the library ,” said Tony , adding that it is difficult to get a sponsor to support comic book events as people consider them childish.
“Some people come asking whether we have Balarama and Tinkle but that’s not the type of comics we deal with. Comics are not just for kids, some of them have great stories, ideas and art.But explaining it is too hard, so we don’t. We’d rather have an organic growth rather than forcing it on people,” said San.
source: http://www.timesofindia.indiatimes.com / The Times of India / Home> News> City News> Kochi News / by Vikram Vinod, TNN / September 21st, 2017
Union Minister K.J. Alphonse at a function where membership of the Blind Football Academy was handed over to C.S. Falhan on Thursday.
First member receives membership
C.S. Falhan became the first member of the Blind Football Academy when he received the membership from Union Minister K.J. Alphons here on Thursday.
Sunil J. Mathew, Indian Blind Football Federation sporting director; Fr. Robin Kannanchira, director, Chavara Cultural Centre; and M.C. Roy, attended the event. The academy, which has been established by Indian Blind Football Federation, will be opened on Friday at Jogo Football arena near Bund Road at 4 p.m.
source: http://www.thehindu.com / The Hindu / Home> News> Cities> Kochi / by Special Correspondent / Kochi – September 14th, 2017
The location code granted to the new airport is ‘CNN’, which is the short for CaNNanore
Kannur :
Kannur international airport, which is expected to be commissioned next year, has got the three-letter location code from the IATA (International Air Transport Association).
According to a communique from IATA, the location code granted to the new airport is ‘CNN’, which is the short for CaNNanore, said P Bala Kiran , managing director of Kannur International Airport (KIAL). He said though the KIAL was keen on getting the code with ‘KN’, the codes were not available and hence CNN.
“The location code is unique to every airport in the world and it is like Aadhar for an individual,” he said.
He also said the new website of KIAL, with the ‘.aero’ domain name will be online soon, and the new URL will be ‘kannurairport.aero’.
According to the KIAL MD, the work is progressing fast and in all probability, it will be operational in mid of 2018. The terminal work will be completed by October and the runway would be over by December-January, he added.
Then, the Aerodrome Licensing Authority of the Directorate General of Civil Aviation must inspect the airport before giving the license. Also, the Instrument Landing System (ILS) at the airport has to be finalized by the Airports Authority of India (AAI) using the calibration flight, which would take a few months after the completion of the civil works.
As of now, twenty passenger airlines and two cargo airlines have expressed interest to start operations from here. Further, though the airport will operate with 3050 metre runway in the first phase, the land acquisition process is on to extend its length to 4000 metres, said Bala Kiran.
Once fully operational, the airport is expected to handle 4.67 million passengers and 60,758 metric tonnes of cargo in a year, with 39,638 aircraft movements, according to KIAL authorities.
source: http://www.timesofindia.indiatimes.com / The Times of India / News> City News> Kochi News / by P. Sudhakaran / TNN / July 27th, 2017
Students of Holy Angels’ Convent greeting K. E. Mammen on his 94th birthday in Thiruvananthapuram. File Photo
The Kerala native had participated in the Quit India Movement
Freedom fighter K.E. Mammen, who had participated in the Quit India Movement, passed away here on Wednesday morning. He was 96. He had been under treatment for age-related diseases at a private hospital in Neyyatinkara for the past three months.
Mr. Mammen had always followed Gandhian principles. He became active in the freedom movement as a college student. He was first jailed for taking an open stand against C.P Ramaswamy Iyer, the then Dewan of the erstwhile Travancore state. After being denied an opportunity at continued studies here, he shifted to Madras Christian College in 1940. He was ousted from there too, following his participation in the Quit India Struggle.
In recent years, Mr. Mammen had been active in anti-liquor struggles in the state.
source: http://www.thehindu.com / The Hindu / Home> News> States> Kerala / by Special Correspondent / Thiruvananthapuram -July 26th, 2017
She was the daughter of Sethu Lakshmi Bayi, Queen Regent of erstwhile Travancore.
Indira Bayi, daughter of Sethu Lakshmi Bayi, who was Queen Regent of erstwhile Travancore, died in Chennai early Thursday. She was 90.
Wife of the late K.K. Varma, founder-chairman of the erstwhile India Meters Ltd, and long-time chairman of the Madras Kerala Samajam, she is survived by son Shreekumar Varma and daughter Shobhana Varma. Indira Bayi was born during the regency of her mother (1924 to 1931). Years later, she would become the first woman from the royal family to enrol for college education. Some of her short stories have appeared in a few magazines and two anthologies of her stories have been brought out.
The cremation will be held at the Besant Nagar crematorium at noon on Friday.
source: http://www.thehindu.com / The Hindu / Home> News> Cities> Thiruvananthapuram / by Special Correspondent / Thiruvananthapuram – Chennai / July 21st, 2017
Union Minister for Science and Technology Harsh Vardhan visits the Stratosphere-Troposphere Radar Facility at Cusat in the city on Tuesday
Union Minister says researchers must work towards people-centric science
Union Minister for Science and Technology Harsh Vardhan has said that scientists and researchers have to work towards a people-centric science and emphasised the need for scientific social responsibility on the lines of corporate social responsibility. The Minister was speaking at a press conference after the dedication of the Stratosphere-Troposphere (ST) Radar Facility at the Advanced Centre for Atmospheric Radar Research at the Cochin University of Science and Technology (Cusat) here on Tuesday.
He said scientists and researchers had the responsibility to give back to society. The scientists behind the achievement had to be congratulated because they had followed the call for ‘Make in India’ and the effort had been appreciated internationally by countries such as Japan, Korea and Sweden. He said climate science was doing well in India, and the country had entered into high quality collaborations with countries like Israel recently.
A handout issued at the dedication of the facility at the university said that it was the first stratosphere troposphere wind profile radar operating on 205 MHz installed in the world. The facility will aid monitor atmospheric wind conditions across altitudes up to 20 km and beyond. The research has applications in meteorology, cloud physics, thunderstorms, convections, atmospheric electricity and climate change.
Mr. Vardhan said India expected to provide optical fibre cable facility to all panchayats in the country by 2018. The 38 CSIR laboratories will be made accessible to students in Kendriya Vidyalayas for two to three weeks to create awareness about the work being done in the laboratories. The programme will help familiarise people with the scientific research being done in the country. The government wanted to create a passion for science among students, the Minister added.
Director of the Centre K. Mohankumar and Cusat Vice Chancellor J. Letha were among those present at the dedication of the facility.
source: http://www.thehindu.com / The Hindu / Home> News> Cities> Kochi / by Special Correspondent / Kochi – July 12th, 2017
Some of the rare books in Malayalam language would have been lost if Herman Gundert, the German missionary, had not taken the trouble to transport them to his home town Calw. The documents preserved by Gundert, who was also a scholar credited with the first Malayalam-English dictionary, included nearly 80 manuscripts and 150 printed works. Some of the available palm leaf manuscripts run into 42,000 pages. These books have been archived in the Gundert archive of Tubingen University which has also taken steps to digitise the documents. The Thunchath Ezhuthachan Malayalam University, Tirur, established in 2012 to promote Malayalam language, has received access to the documents through an MoU signed with the Tubingen University.
Mr M. Sreenathan, professor of language at the university, told Deccan Chronicle that it all started with Dr Scaria Zacharia, a Malayalam professor who visited Germany in connection with the meeting of the World Malayali Council, visiting the archives of the university in 1986. He published books like Pazhassi Rekhakal, Payyanoor Pattu and Thalasserry Rekhakal from the university. Some of the other books that were discovered from Tubingen included Nalacharitham Manipravalam and Sheelavathy written by Mannan. The first version of the Mahabharatham Killipattu, Krishnagatha, Thulalkadha, Panchathantram and Ekadeshi were brought to the state from the archives. The copy of Meenakshi written by Chathu Nair and published in 1890 was also discovered from Tubingen, Mr Sreenathan said.
Another finding was Keralopakari, an illustrated weekly published in 1870. There has not been much reference about this weekly earlier. A copy of Krishi Pattu was also preserved at Tubingen. The specialty of the copy of Krishi Pattu, an agriculture verse popularly known as Krishi Geetha in the state, is that it was published from Kozhikode before the advent of Chandrakala in Malayalam. Another significant discovery was Kerala Natakam. This book republished by the university was released recently. Many people, including historian M.G.S. Narayanan, have said that they have seen the book. However, the book was not available anywhere in the state. It was also received from the archives of Gundert. Many literary historians, including Ulloor Parameswara Iyer, have mentioned about this work. There are differences among the historians about who wrote the book.
Some believed that this was written by Thunchath Ezhuthachan. However, Ezhuthachan had not written anything other than poetry. The book was published by Basel Mission. Ulloor had disagreed with the theory that it was written by Ezhuthachan. The book was in the handwriting of Gundert himself. The language of the book proved that it was not written by Ezhuthachan. However, it has many similarities with another work of the period named Keralolpathi. But there is one major change. This is in the chapter Kulakrama Vivaranam which in Keralolpathi was based on Sankaracharya’s Kulakrama Vivaranam. However, the Kulakrama Vivaranam chapter in Kerala Nadakam dealing with the origin of caste was more in the nature of folklore, Mr Sreenathan said.
The documents in the collection of Gundert can be classified into three: printed books; books that had been transcript by Gundert himself or using the service of a scribe; and books in Thaliyola. Many books related to subjects like Manthravatham and on Christianity, including Puthiyaniyamathile Lekhanangal and Sathyaveda Ethihasam, are at the archives. The university is the only one in Europe that teaches Malayalam as an optional. It has also set up a Gundert chair. “I visit Tubingen as a faculty of the university and Mr Scaria Zacharia goes there as an outside academic. The Malayalam and Tubingen universities also have student exchange programmes,” Mr Sreenathan said. He will visit Tubingen soon to identify the original version of the works of Ezhuthachan, including Adhyadhama Ramayanam. Mr Scaria Zacharia said that the access to Gundert archives had begun in 1986. Many books like Pazhassi Rekhakal, Payyanoor Pattu, Thacholli Pattu and Thalassery Rekhakal were published from the archives. However, it was only recently the efforts were noticed in the state, Mr Zacharia said.
Christian missionary turned linguist
Herman Gundert, who left Germany at the age of 23 for missionary work, had planned to go to Calcutta and gained working knowledge in Bengali, Hindustani and Telugu even while travelling by sea. However, he landed in Madras in 1836 instead of in Calcutta. Gundert learnt Tamil while working in Chittoor, Andhra, and Tirunelveli, Tamil Nadu. During his work in Mangalore, he had a chance trip to Thiruvananthapuram where he had an audience with Swathi Thirunal, the ruler of Travancore who himself was a scholar. Gundert was attracted to Malayalam and became a scholar in the language in a short span of time.
Born in 1814, Gundert is the grandfather of 20th century Nobel prize winning novelist Hermann Hesse. Gundert had studied theology and Sanskrit in Tübingen University before completing his doctorate in theology in 1835 and joining the Bassel Mission in which he worked in Thalassery from 1938. Apart from authoring the first Malayalam-English dictionary, he translated the New Testament into Malayalam. He left India in 1859 due to illness. Most of his Malayalam books, including his Malayalam-English dictionary and hymn book, were written when he was in the south western German town of Calw.
He worked primarily from Thalassery where he compiled a Malayalam grammar book, ‘Malayalabhaasha Vyakaranam,’ published in 1859. He lived at Illikkunnu near Thalassery for 20 years spreading the gospel among the natives and writing 13 books and a translation of the Old Testament from Hebrew and New Testament from Greek. He attempted a systematic grammar of the language based on non-Sanskrit-based approaches to Indic grammar as he considered Malayalam as a branch of Proto-Tamil-Malayalam, or Proto-Dravidian. It was Gundert who used punctuation marks like full stop, comma, colon and semicolon for the first time in Malayalam. In recognition of his contribution to Malayalam, a statue of Gundert has been erected at Thalassery.
source: http://www.deccanchronicle.com / Deccan Chronicle / Home> Nation, In other news / by Sabloo Thomas, Deccan Chronicle / July 05th, 2017
The Ponnurunni Grameena Vayanasala will launch programmes for children and the elderly soon, says its president.
Grameena Vayanasala looks for ways to expand
At 70, the Ponnurunni Grameena Vayanasala is looking for more space. It is a measure of its success that the office-bearers of the library are trying hard to find more space in the two-storied structure that has stood as a tower of light and entry into the world of letters for hundreds of people in the locality.
President of the library and a former government official M.K. Saseendran says the library has a stock of 17,000 books and more than 250 steady members, who turn up at the library regularly. More books mean more space, he says, a little perplexed about finding a way to add some more space.
The number of activities is being expanded. Not only does the library now offer books, newspapers and periodicals. It will soon launch programmes for children and the elderly, says Mr. Saseendran.
A visit to the library on Sunday showed how involved the library is in the lives of the local people. A group of students, who came out in flying colours during the last public examinations, are being felicitated. Hardly 40 people can sit in the hall, says library secretary K.K. Gopi Nair to highlight the need to find more space for future activities.
Mr. Saseendran says the Ponnurunni library is more than 85 years old, given the oral tradition related to it. It started with a table and a few chairs and operated out of rented one-room facilities. It is possible that registers and other records could have been lost during frequent shifting of the library until a permanent building was acquired. It was later registered in 1946, and it received 1.5 cents of land against a payment of ₹50 in 1967. The year also saw people making contributions to have a tile-roofed building for the library. Since then the library has steadily grown in popularity and stature.
source: http://www.thehindu.com / The Hindu / Home> News> Cities> Kochi / by Special Correspondent / Kochi – June 11th, 2017
Educationist, administrator and founder of several institutions, Fr Gabriel Chiramel CMI passed away at Amala Bhavan here on Thursday.
He was 103-years-old. Fr Gabriel, who was conferred with the Padma Bhushan in 2007, was the founder principal of Christ College (1956-1975), Irinjalakuda.
Known for his administrative acumen, he served as the provincial of Devamatha Province, Thrissur. It was during this time the Amala Cancer Hospital was established.
He was also instrumental in establishing several other institutions such as St Joseph’s College, Irinjalakuda; Carmel Higher Secondary School, Chalakudy; Bharat Matha School, Palakkad; Catholic Centre Irinjalakuda and Deepthi Cultural Centre, Kozhikode.
Fr Gabriel’s funeral will be held at noon on Saturday.
source: http://www.newindianexpress.com / The New Indian Express / Home> States> Kerala / by Express News Service / May 12th, 2017
