Reg. No. TN/PMG (CCR) /814/06-08 Licence No. WPP 506/06-08 Registered with the Registrar of Newspapers for India under WE CARE FOR MADRAS THAT IS CHENNAI R.N. 53640/91 INSIDE Ballads of the junctions Letter from Melbourne MADRAS A people’s fight for space Waiting for a master plan MUSINGS The divas of dinning Rs. 5 per copy Vol. XVI No. 20 February 1-15, 2007 (Annual Subscription: Rs. 100/-) Can The Season lead to a Chennai Festival? Look at it this way... when you buy this car, you are buying his- tory! (by Sriram V.) Forever Amby...? ardly had the curtain been come forward with a proposal to The Ambassador car is all set Hrung down on the Music work with the city-based for its fiftieth birthday this Season of 2006 when the Gov- sabha-s. The Music Academy year. ernment of Tamil Nadu has apparently been asked to Isnt that something? announced an ambitious plan work out a consultation paper to work towards marketing on how the cultural organi- In a new world where a car is practically a fashion acces- what has become arguably a sations can work with the sory, filled with attributes unique cultural festival. The Government in this regard. Scenes from the Mylapore Festival ... a sign of things to come? (Courtesy: that seem more intimidating December Festival today does Such a proposal is not new. Mylapore Times. (Also see pages 2 and 5.) than strictly necessary, the not begin from 15th December An earlier attempt to create a good old Amby has stood its and end on 1st January as it did Chennai Festival around the ground, refusing to give in to a couple of decades ago; it now Music Season was promoted by this obsession for a slim, spans the period mid-November the Confederation of Indian In- sylph-like figure, staying to the middle of January, sign- dustry (Tamil Nadu Chapter), bulky and flaunting its fa- ing off with the end of the but it did not go much beyond a mous bench seat. Pongal festivities. With the few tea-and-talk sessions, Think Amby and an image of weather being tolerable at this largely because there was little sturdy stability brushed with time of the year in our city, it attempt at getting the event a nostalgia appears. has become a season for tourists broader base and wider public For the generation that now and NRIs as well. All this makes and trade participation. Writing looks back on a mostly mis- it an ideal festival package to about this in February 2002, the spent youth, the Amby is a symbol of the past visits to market and it is heartening to Editor of this journal had said grandparents, the beach, see that the Government has (Continued on page 7) drive-in restaurants, matinee shows, and shopping sprees to book or toy shops, albeit under supervision, and on a Make villages, not cities, magnets of hope very tight budget. This was the one car that was — R. Ramraju, CHAIRMAN, IIA-TN generous enough to embrace a bunch of kids, unwilling to . Ramraju, Chairman of the of Chennai, but it is now con- are available throughout the tary-General Kofi Annan that be separated even for short RIndian Institute of Archi- gested and not suitable for de- year, those glass boxes are pre- evictions or demolitions were drives. The car gave us free- tects, Tamil Nadu Chapter, cent living. Earlier, the entire ferred. Attracted by glass fa- not answers to the challenges of dom, although it had a slight speaking on Cities, Magnets of stretch of East Coast Road upto cades, we search for technical rapid urbanisation and only pro- tendency to suddenly get all Hope, the theme for World Mahabalipuram was preferred solutions to reduce heat and poor and public participatory steamed up, requiring irate Habitat Day, 2006, urged that as a peaceful weekend retreat. light and come up with costly policies could ensure more con- drivers to examine its boiling the bright lights of the cities Now, change in water quality, answers, such as sun control ducive and sustainable urban entrails beneath the yawning hood. should be created in villages of the tsunami after-effects, pri- layers, tinted glass, colour glass, developments. Ironically, ap- India to make them magnets of vacy loss due to commercial ac- double glass and reflecting glass, proaches that we adopt are al- Now theres a sight you hardly hope. tivities, etc. are forcing people only to emit more heat and light ways on the negative side. Sat- see these days. A four-fold increase in world to search for alternative week- into the atmosphere and mak- ellite towns are decided at the Apparently, the Amby, today, is population within 200 years and end retreats. ing it warmer. On the other Secretariat, where it was pro- regarded as an integral part of an eight-times increase in urban He also pointed out that by hand, our traditional architec- posed, not by Chennais people mostly government caval- cades or taxi stands, defi- population due to huge migra- spending more and more money ture adopted passive techniques or by local villagers. The fate of nitely retro in character. tion were making drinkable in the name of new technology, through forms and elements to a remote village is decided at a Never mind, Amby. water and breathable air rare materials and modernity, more absorb excess heat and light. place 500 km away from it. We commodities that would soon problems/challenges were being He further said people in the spent thousands of crores of There are those who know your be unaffordable to ordinary posed. Glass boxes in the name name of modernity failed to money year after year, only to worth, like tourists who insist on using Ambys for the true people. Reviewing the present of modern, corporate imaging adopt natural ways, which were have unused, abandoned, and Indian Experience. scene in Chennai, he said, Just and MNC glamour are drawing cheap, easily solvable and, dilapidated structures standing a few decades ago, T. Nagar was the new skyline of Indian cities. above all, renewable. in every village in the name of Happy Birthday, old friend. planned as a model Though we live in the tropics, He recalled the statement health centre, community cen- Ranjitha Ashok neighbourhood for the old city where enormous heat and light made by United Nations Secre- (Continued on page 6) CMYK 2 MADRAS MUSINGS February 1-15,2007 A Festival by the people, for the people he annual Sundaram moved cricket in Madras that is Sastriars Noahs Ark and TFinance-Mylapore Festival Chennai back to January. The drew thunderous applause. is not only growing in different Man from Madras Musings, The question-answer ses- ways each year, but is going however, still strongly feels that sion at the end showed how from success to success, The Pongal is the time to have in- extremely interested the audi- Man from Madras Musings ternational competitions in the ence was in her subject and finds. This year, the events at city. how comprehensively she had the Nageswara Rao Park, a Last year, when the match studied it. She handled every neighbourhood now managed was called off due to rains and question with ease. by Sundaram Finance, had no refund was forthcoming, MMM hopes to see more increased from morning many swore that they would of and hear Dr. Peterson and kutcheris by teenagers to vari- never again buy a ticket and her ilk in Chennai, sharing ous contests and creative work- watch matches at Chepauk. their knowledge with those shops for children. But came the day when ticket interested. With several playgrounds sales opened and the long ser- and smaller parks and quad- pentine queues clearly indi- Infinitely troublesome rangles in the periphery of the cated that public memory is at festival zone which is Sri best very short. ushing to the Roja Kapali temple perhaps there R Muthiah Library an hour before closing, The Man from can be activities in all of them Signage gone wild at Agurchand Mansion. Open House? next year. Madras Musings drove past MMM, however, has been one month, MMM has been themselves on passersby at all he Man from Madras the roundabout leading to the distressed to find there is oppo- somewhat intrigued to find a times seeking alms. The struc- T Musings was delighted to library, not once but twice. sition too to the festival. rather neat scaffolding erected ture itself is used by political hear the Madras University say All this because the signboard A few stores have mur- around both the towers. Is that parties and others for posters. that the restoration of historic bearing the librarys name had mured about the use of public an indication of some renova- The side closest to the Quaid- Senate House would be com- been uprooted, thanks to the space for the festival, stating it tion and restoration? MMM e-Milleth College is used as a pleted by the Tamil New Years ongoing IT Corridor work. hurt their business. One large hoped that the LIC had seen urinal, thanks to the privacy it Day and that the building What is more, on eventually shop even took the Mylapore the light and was taking up res- allows. No doubt fertilised by would be opened for public use discovering the turn and driv- Festival organisers to court, but toration, but the only people on all that organic waste, a tree thereafter. MMM has always ing in, MMM discovered that lost its case.