KP Sivasankara Kurup, husband of the late Leela Kumari (The second daughter of PN Panicker and Chempakakkutty Amma and my mom, Chandramathykutty Amma's immediately younger sister) passed into the mist of time this evening, around 1930 hrs, at the Thayabji Hospital at Paravoor of Kollam district. Of late, he has been ailing from old age related illness. He was 94.
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As I go back in years, I'm trying to focus my thoughts on my first sight of Kurup Kochachhan way back on 22 May 1958 when he got married to my ma'asi, Leela Kunjamma. The marriage party consisting of the PN Panickers, my mom, dad and of course, the bride, maman and me - I must have been about 31/2 years of age, then and all excited about the journey - had left our house, TC 804 at Thycaud soon after dinner in a black Chevrolet(the sloping rear end) car. It was owned by Muthachhan's friend. The destination was the famous Shiva temple at Ettumanoor in Kottayam district.
The drive was smooth but I remember being woken up around midnight when the Chevy had broken down at Chadayamangalam. It was my first taste of Muthachhan's abundant resources and tremendous reach. He'd dispatched Narayana chettan, his Man Friday, back to Thiruvananthapuram on a KSRTC bus to work out alternate arrangements - those days there were no telephones available as freely as we see today. Before long, we were on the move yet again in a blue and off white Studebaker car and reached our destination, half an hour before the muhurtham!
Kurup Kochachhan was short statured, handsome and sported a thin moustache. He had already acted in a few movies and many plays. His mastery of the English and Malayalam languages was par excellence. He and I became good friends at first sight and everyone was impressed with his tremendous sense of humour. My mom and he got along like a house on fire and the foursome of Dad-Mom and Kurup kochachhan-Leela kunjamma used to go for movies and shopping whenever they were together, when dad was on leave. He loved having a tot with my dad on occasions!
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Kurup Kochachhan and Leela kunjamma had stood in, for my parents, by being my guests during the Annual Sports Meets and Speech Days during my days at the Sainik School, Kazhakkoottam. And I used to feel damn homesick after their departure and it took quite a bit of effort on the part of my Matron to get me back to normalcy!
They had visited us during 1994-'95 when I was posted at New Delhi. During their one week's stay with us, they could see most of New Delhi and had also made a trip to Agra to view The Taj. They were also fond of our Doberman, Bruno!
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He'd come along with us on our initial Sabarimala treks. I still remember, vividly, his answer to my mom's query as to how the Sabarimala pilgrimage had gone, "Chechi, I trekked uphill viewing Rajeev's feet and found that it was the best way to do it". My mom was thrilled with that answer!
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When Leela kunjamma passed into the mist of time in Oct 2011, he was a broken man. I was always under the impression that he had a good control of his emotions but he showed as to how dependent he was on her and I don't think he ever came to terms with her loss.
He'd come and stayed at our 2C, Panampilli Nagar flat at Kochi for a week, sometime in Jun 2012. I will never forget his meeting with his cousin, Kamalamma Pillai. They talked on and on regarding their younger days at Paravoor and prior to leaving her, he borrowed some money from me and gave it to her as a token of love, which she had received with a lot of emotions and gratitude.
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He had promised to visit us at Guruvayur more often, when he had become a member of the Kerala Sangeeta Nataka Academy in 2013. However, he had visited us only twice during the period. For me it was always a pleasure to sit with him and ruminate on many historical events and our own family happenings.....he was a master story teller.
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His greatest show was as Munshi, in the 5-minute clip just before the commencement of the Asianet News, during prime time. I am not saying this because he's my uncle but he was the best and the most impressive of the Munshis, who delivered the punchline towards the end of each episode. Unfortunately, he had to leave it midway, much to his angst, because of some ego hassles of the director, Anil Banerjee. I've explained the ego hassles, at length, in an earlier post of mine and do not want to repeat it here.
RIP Kurup kochachha. My tears and prayers. Here's wishing that God give strength to everyone in the family to tide over your irreplaceable loss.
Tailpiece.
Got up at 6, the chores and was ready by a half past 9. It was a quiet day.
Participated in the Aazhchakkoottam on "Poetry and culture" by Dr VP Joy, IAS, Addl Cabinet Secretary, Govt of India from 1615-1730 hrs. It was a very interesting session!
Indira kunjamma had passed on the sad news about Kurup kochachhan's passing away, around 1930 hrs.
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