THE GOOD DOCTOR

Another remarkable thing about Dr. Betty Chinniah was her handwriting. It was very clear and beautiful, writes J. VASANTHAN.





I FIRST met Dr. Betty Chinniah when she was the superintendent of the Mission Hospital, Madurai. This was just a few months after I had moved to Madurai to join the American College as a lecturer. I had been told that Dr.Chinniah was a strict disciplinarian who came down heavily on the lazy and the corrupt.

An erudite doctor


I had taken a patient to the hospital, and while the patient went in to undergo some tests, Dr.Chinniah had a brief chat with me. As soon as I introduced myself , she said that she had heard about me, and started talking about literature, art and dramatics.

I was quite surprised by her knowledge of these subjects. Later I came to know that she was a voracious reader, and that she discussed several subjects with the numerous friends who called on her at her house in the evenings. I also came to know that she never missed a single play put up by my drama group, the Curtain Club.

Good Samaritan


She had an easy camaraderie with people, and had a host of friends. She was a true friend indeed. She went out of her way to help people. When someone asked for her advice about some health problem, she suggested the right doctor, contacted the physician or surgeon and made arrangements for the treatment. Quite often the persons benefiting from these ministrations never bothered to inform her about the outcome. She would then ring up these careless characters and enquire about their present state of health. She was truly a Good Samaritan.

To the rescue


When I had a massive heart attack (myocardial infarction), she rushed to my bedside and took charge. She went about fixing a room and a doctor in a well known hospital and an ambulance to take me there. Her sister, Sweety, volunteered to be one of the stretcher bearers. Both the sisters were constant visitors at the hospital while I was in the intensive care unit.

After a couple of days the doctors there said that there was no hope, and asked my people to take me home and to intimate relatives. Everyone had given up hope, but Dr. Chinniah wouldn't give up. She rushed about hither and thither looking for a doctor. And she found Dr. Pethaperumal, a like-minded physician, who ignored protocol and took over the case. Between him and Dr.Chinniah they succeeded in pulling me through. That was nineteen years ago. And all these nineteen years of my life I owe to Betty Chinniah.

Qualifications


Dr. Chinniah was a highly qualified physician and paediatrician. Long before such things were common, she had earned her FRCP from Edinburgh and her DCH from London. These qualifications sat lightly on her. She never put on any airs.

Another remarkable thing about this doctor was her handwriting. It was very clear and beautiful, unlike that of most others in her profession.

Good Humour


Dr. Chinniah and I liked to rag each other. Once when I happened to be falling ill at frequent intervals, she also was having health problems. As she was leaving for Madras, she raised an admonishing finger and said, "Behave yourself". And I said, "Wish you the same" and got a hearty laugh in reply.

During her final illness when she was in the ICU, I peeped round the curtain, not wanting to disturb her. "Come in. Don't be scared" said the patient from the midst of tubes and respirators.

She passed away last month at the age of 82.

She loved children, and children loved her. She played with them as if she were a child too. As Dr.Chinniah's body was being removed, a little girl from a nearby house stood silently with a devastated look on her face.

That face reflected the sense of loss that all of us felt.





© Copyright 2000 - 2006 The Hindu

WITTY PROFESSORS

There were the Tamil professors who spoke only in English, and the professors of English who were at home only in Tamil.

In my student and teaching days in college I came across many types of professors. Some had a dazzling way with words, which sometimes concealed their inadequacy in their subjects. There were others who had mastered their subjects, but were often stuck for words. There were the Tamil professors who spoke only in English, and the professors of English who were at home only in Tamil.

Satiric wit


But then there were the witty professors who elicited helpless laughter wherever they were, either inside or outside the classroom. Prof. Bennett Albert of Madras Christian College was one of the wittiest professors I knew. He said very funny things with a very serious expression. He usually taught prose, and was particularly good when dealing with the English satirists.

Once while lecturing on Jonathan Swift, he referred to an incident where Swift broke up with his fianc饠who had written a hostile letter to him. Swift goes to her house with the letter, and then in the words of Prof. Albert: "He flung the letter in her face, flung a furious glance at her, and flung himself out of the room." This was said with a grim look, but when the class burst out laughing Bennett permitted himself a small smile.

One day, after I had joined the staff, Bennett and I were standing just outside the faculty room and chatting. The professors in MCC those days were always casually dressed. Bennett wore baggy white trousers with an unusually high waist. I was in a slack shirt and cotton trousers.

Another young lecturer, Abraham Eraly, came towards us in an immaculately tailored suit and a tie. Bennett's eyebrows jerked up in surprise. "Just an attempt to conceal my mediocrity, Sir" said Eraly. "Young man, I hope you will succeed," said Bennett, deadpan.

The humour of Prof. Chandran Devanesan was of a different type. He was a bon vivant, and enjoyed life thoroughly. He wrote the Bishop Heber Hall song. (If you want to marry, My darling, and to marry well/ stick to a Heber lad and send the rest to hell) Chandran Devanesan had an M.A. degree from Cambridge. (He later got a Ph.D. from Harvard). One day he was holding forth in the staff tiffin room. "In Cambridge they don't sit and value papers. The professor piles up all the answer books on top of a staircase and aims a mighty kick at them. The papers that go all the way to the bottom of the stairs get first class, those in the middle second class. And those that don't move from the top get fail marks."

Professor Gift Siromoney winked broadly at us and said, "So that's how they get degrees from Cambridge!" "That is only at the undergraduate level," said Devanesan with a mock huffiness.

Quick-wittedness


Prof. R. Suriyanarayanan (RS) taught us Physics in the American College. He was always dressed in freshly laundered white jibba and dhoti. He made Physics very simple and digestible.

One day while he was teaching us Dynamics, he turned to the blackboard and started writing some formulae. A student from one of the back rows let off a paper arrow that soared over us and hit the blackboard very close to the professor's head. RS bent down and picked up the arrow, and the class became tense. He held the arrow in his hand and faced the class. There was pin-drop silence.

And then he said: "If this arrow left that gentleman's hands with an initial velocity,

`u' and reached the board with a final velocity, `v', then v2 - u2 = 2as. The class burst into relieved laughter. I never studied Physics after that, but I still remember that formula.

All these witty professors are no more. One can't help feeling that a little bit of light and laughter went out of this world with them.







J. VASANTHAN

HEROINES OF THE PAST

Heroines of the past were certainly more modern.

I saw a film when I was a youngster that impressed me very much. `Mangamma Sabatham' (1946) made by Gemini Studios and starring Vasundhara Devi (Vyjayanthimala's mother) and Ranjan was a great hit and ran for one and a half years in a Madurai theatre.

Those days Gemini films were mostly based on folk tales, and so had rather far-fetched stories. But the values propagated in them were more relevant and modern than those in films today. Moreover the heroine had equal, if not greater, importance than the hero.

A tale of true grit


Mangamma belongs to a place where people live in constant fear of the lecherous prince of the kingdom who preys on women ruthlessly. So women hide in their houses whenever he passes by. Mangamma goes looking for her dove in the palace grounds, and is spotted by the prince, who immediately is smitten by her beauty and makes overtures. Mangamma pushes him away and makes good her escape.

Later, he tries to meet her again, and gets rebuffed once more. Enraged, the prince makes a vow that he would marry her, lock her up in a distant mansion and deprive her of marital bliss (vaazhaavetti) for the rest of her life. Mangamma vows that she would marry him, have a son by him, and make the son whip him in public. That is the basic premise of the story. How Mangamma makes good her promise forms the rest of the film.

She ingeniously tricks the prince and has a son by him. She achieves her vow when the son grows up and is ready to whip the roguish prince. The townsfolk gathered in large numbers wait to watch the prince get his comeuppance. But Mangamma appears on the scene to stop her husband being humiliated, thus showing magnanimity in victory. And then they all live happily ever after, presumably.

Though the story is a bit unbelievable, the message gets carried through. The point that is being made is that a woman, however low her origins may be, can overcome the powerful male chauvinists on her own. Mangamma never asks for help from anyone. She manages splendidly all by herself.

Two more go-getters


Gemini Studios also made `Chandralekha' (1948) where the heroine faces overwhelming odds, but finally defeats the immoral schemes of the villain (Ranjan again) to live happily with her lover (M. K. Radha). Incidentally, the film had as a climax the longest and most thrilling sword fight in the history of films. There was a feeling that this fight might have been influenced by `Scaramouche,' which had the longest sword fight in the history of Hollywood - seven minutes. But `Chandralekha' was made three years before `Scaramouche.'

Chandralekha single-handedly thwarts the nefarious designs of the prince, saves her lover from a cave, devises a scheme to bring in an army in drums, like the Trojan horse, and wins in the end.

All Gemini films were noted for their spectacular sets, galloping cavalries, thrilling duels and so on. But the determination and resourcefulness of the heroine is never lost sight of.

Vijaya-Vauhini's `Missiamma' (1955) has the heroine going boldly to a village with a young man, pretending to be his wife in order to get jobs as teachers.

"I will come with you to the village, but you must assure me you will not take advantage of the situation," says the heroine. "Of course," says the young man (Gemini Ganesh). "Would you like to see my conduct certificate?" Anyway, the heroine manages things without losing her virtue or self-respect. Savithri, perhaps the subtlest actress in the country at that time, played the title role.

Delicate dolls


Today's heroines are bold only in the way they dress and the way they dance. But the moment some danger crosses their path, they become helpless, wringing their hands and calling for help. (Kaapaathunga!). Only the hero has to do all the work and save the helpless darling. With Women's Lib and equal rights and so on, this kind of heroine seems incongruous in our times.

The heroines of the past were certainly more modern.

J. VASANTHAN



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