Col. Manakampat Kesavan Unni Nayar (1911-50)

A Revered War Correspondent This young daredevil from Parli, near Ottapalam, charmed men and women alike, hobnobbed with royalty, prime ministers, presidents, Nobel prize winners, and generals, was articulate and not only spoke well, but was also a popular writer, a journalist, and a news reporter b…

M Sivaram – The Consummate Journalist

SE Asia’s roving newshound News used to be reported from the source with engaging text by journalists, and the challenges they faced and the risks they took are fodder for so many thrilling tales. These days, however, distant back offices help complete news bits with little personal involvement, and…

Conceição – Our new book

The Sad Story of the Conceição – Published by the Chagos Conservation Trust (CCT) Sometimes I wonder at the surprising turns that life takes. I was researching for material to add meat to the article that I was preparing on Deigo Garcia and chanced upon a site related to the Chagos Archipelago, wher…

The Ceylon Malayalees

Travails of the Kochiyan… It is difficult to quantify the waves of migrations between Kerala and Ceylon – Sri Lanka over time, and the lines are quite blurred, but then again, there was a time when the relations between Malayalees and the Sinhalese in Ceylon, became intensely turbulent. Though there…

The Harmonium

And its checkered history in India It would surprise many readers that this musical instrument, so common to the music scene today, had such a troubled past. Born in France and further modified to meet Indian requirements at Calcutta, to be mass produced and sold in in the thousands, this humble han…

White and Whitefield

 An Anglo Indian Colony in Bangalore The story of Whitefield in Bangalore starts with DS White, a resident of Madras, who held the welfare of the marginalized Anglo Indians or Eurasians, wallowing in the twilight period of the British rule in India, close to his heart. A few villages or colonies wer…