Tuesday, August 21, 2018

Thankanna


Thankanna

BY
P.R.Ramachander



   Thankanna was the first son of my father’s athan ProfC.V.Subbarama  Iyer.His mother died   on the day  that he was born .His father was at that time Professor of  Mathematics   at the University   college Trivandrum . Finding it difficult to bring up the motherless baby  , his father married again  and they called  the baby boy as Thankappan  and  to all of he was Thankanna.
       Today is Thankanna’s 100th birthday. Thankanna was brought up  in Trivandrum  and  he used to tell me that he had attended the marriage of my parents. He must have been around  14 years then. Later  he took his Ph.D.   in mathematics   and almost life long worked    as Professor   and   Head of the department of mathematics  of Sri  Keraka  Verma  , College  , Trichur. Prof.Subbarama Iyer became the Principal of university college and  after   retirement  settled down in Chelakkara. During school vacations when I used to visit Chelakkara  , I was constant vistor of Athan’s home   with an intention of playing  carom with his sons and also read   books from the huge library that he maintained. It was in this house  that I met Thankanna and Manni first. The love between us was at the first sight .Thankanna and manni liked me and i liked them.
     After a few years I joined  intermediate  in Sri Kerala  Verma college  and Mathematics was one of my subjects and as fate   would gave it, My thankanna   taught me  mathematics ,He always  wore a well maintained suit   and always used to come  to the college  in a Rickshaw drawn by a very old man.   To all my classmates  who attended classes in Dhothi he was  Mountbatten Prabhu. I as the Ammanchi Kutti of Thankanna knew that the  Rickshaw  travel was  only a  method adopted by Thankanna    to finance the old  Rickshaw  puller. Most of the time he used to walk  and empty Rickshaw used to follow him.
     In the college Thankanna  used to tell me very often   that Manni wanted me to visit his home ,These  visits made me close to his elder children Nringa and Babu   ,As a great teacher  Thankanna had very many great people as his students including several ministers and senior officials. All of them  were  happy only when they get blessing from their Venkatraman Sir. Manni used to tell me   that unexpected guests to feed was a  rule not exception in their house .
   Thankanna   did build a  home of his own in poonkunnam,He called this house  Epsilon. Once i asked him why   and he said it was  “as small   as he liked” like epsilon
In the nineties my Thankanna passed away  and whenever i used to pass through Trichur , i used  to make  it a point to meet manni.Always she to welcome me   with her trademark smile   and make me very comfortable,
  Manni is also  no more  and today it  is the hundredth star  birthday  of my Thankanna
 You can read   about him and his achievements  in  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C._S._Venkataraman


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