nila foundation
Bharatapuzha | Foundation | River Musings | Near the River | Contributions | Contact | Media
River Musings by Anita Nair
The river Nila
Sand banks rising yellow and gritty
Once flourished triangular hate
The cow worshippers, the pig haters
And the sunshine-haired cow eaters.
No one knows who did what.
A thousand men piled into a carriage
Trundled and truckled, gasping for life.
When they opened the doors,
The stench, they say
Made people gag a mile away.
In Malabar, they cannot forget,
Sometimes the soft breeze smells of blood.
Malabar was once a British Principality of India. After Independence,
Malabar as a state was no longer recognized and the region was divided to
form the northern part of what is today called Kerala. Though Malabar has no
geographical boundaries, no presence on a map of India, it still exists as a
state of mind: laid-back, slow, to live and let live. Not surprisingly the
river that feeds this region whether it is in the physical or imaginative
realm, the river Nila shares this same attribute of Malabar. A river that is
laid-back, slow, and meanders along dividing itself into many
tributaries....and like Malabar, the Nila is almost a phantom river.
Existing only in the memories of those who had seen it when in full spate,
swift and brown and sweeping into its waters all that dare stem its flow.
For as long as I can remember, when the Mangalore Mail stopped at Ottapalam
station, I would crane my neck for a better view of the river. Was it in
full spate or dry? And what I would see would prepare me for what the river
would be like when we reached Shoranur.
Bharathapuzha or the Nila was the river that excited my imagination. In its
depths my father almost drowned. On its banks, my uncles and he leapt and
jumped and did as boys do....As children, we longed to be the children that
they were. And so we coaxed our parents, my brother and I, to walk to the
river. First we would stand on the bridge and stare at the western sky.
Behind us on the railway bridge, a train, as in a silent movie, would hurtle
past noiselessly.
When the sun began to set, we would clamber down the slopes, alongside the
pump house to the riverbank to frolic in its shallow pools.
When we returned home, my grandmother would make us empty pockets and dust
the backs of our legs. The sand, fine creamy grains clung to our clothes and
skins as if they knew that it would be their destiny to leave their beloved
Nila and Shoranur someday soon.
There isn’t a river bank anymore. Lorries have carted away most of the sand
and the bridge connecting Shoranur to Cheruthurthy seems to have shrunk.
Last week driving across the bridge, I paused for a moment. Beyond the
railway lines was the riverbank. Or what was left of it. Most of the sand
had been carted away to build homes. This is the river that when it was
swollen with the monsoon rain crept into the houses that lined the
riverbank. It found its way into the home of an aunt and took away all that
she had collected over several years of relentless collecting. Where is that
river now?
I stood there and took a deep breath. I tried to see the view as if I was
seeing it for the first time - the gleaming line of water, the many pools
that dotted the river bed, the herons fishing, breeze ruffling the tops of
trees and tall grass that grew alongside the river, the distant hills and
the clear blue skies…
And I think despite everything this is perhaps the only geographical feature
that will summon for me the image of Kerala, the image of home….
More on River Nila by
Anita Nair
