When Kengeri was the silk capital

Few know that Tipu Sultan introduced silk in Mysore and he gave an impetus to silk cultivation in his kingdom and fewer still know that Kengeri, now a part of Bangalore and then a small village, was one of the most important centres of raw silk trade then.

When Tipu introduced silk in his kingdom, Kengeri quickly emerged as a major centre and for a brief while it also emerged as the seat of raw silk trade.

The Mysore Gazetteer reveals how Tipu changed the face of Kengeri, but once he died in 1799, the silk industry fell into disrepair and it almost vanished from Kengeri.

The British made no effort to revive silk and Kengeri continued to languish. It was only in 1866 that Major A.P. De’Vecchj de Piccioli, an Italian, who had come to India, noticed the drastic fall in the production of silk in Mysore.

He also saw that the silk industry in Kengeri had almost degenerated and that the silk worms were diseased and weak. The silk worms in the Mysore state had a higher mortality rate than other places.

De Vecchj studied the silk scenario and he attributed the mortality of the silk worms to degeneracy owing to continued propagation from the same stock, feeding on inferior species of leaf and also due to lack of adequate care in rearing.

He also noticed that the raw silk was of poor quality. He then imported silk worm eggs from Japan and he freely distributed them to silk farmers in and around Bangalore, Chennapatna Ramanagar and other places.

He also set up a steam factory for silk filature in Kengeri and employed orphans from the Bangalore convent. The fresh lease if life once again gave an impetus to silk and Kengeri once again regained its place as a major centre of sericulture.   

Vecchj had the backing of then Chief Commissioner of Mysore, Lewin Bowring, in changing the face of Mysore silk.

Bowring gave two plots of land in Kengeri, free of cost, to the Italian, who wanted to break the monopoly of Japan in silk and he had therefore chosen Kengeri. 

In the steam filiature in Kengeri, Vecchj introduced Italian and Japanese worms for crossing.  He also brought in large quantities of raw silk to Kengeri from Mustan farm in Chennapatna.

He also ensured that good quality mulberry was imported from Japan and China 

The filature had facilities for rearing and for reeling, laboratory and a mulberry garden. The filature had 80 basins and commence production in 1866.

He also conducted field trials for his mulberry cultivation, rearing and breeding silk worms. He supplied Bowring with cartons of eggs of the cross-breeds that he had managed to produced in Kengeri. These were to be hatched and reared  in Closepet (Ramanagar) and Hoskote taluks. This experiment unfortunately  failed and it was blamed on the monsoon.

During this time, Bangalore was second only to Mysore in  mulberry plantations, with 6,150 acres as against 11,013 acres of Mysore. The other two districts where mulberry were grown were  Kolar in 1,215 acres and Hassan with 45 acres.

Another experiment was conducted in 1867 but this too failed to yield the desired results.

In 1868, Vecchjs established the Madras and Mysore Silk Company near Madras. He then once again left for Japan to bring back cartons of silk worms. He wanted to replicate the silk industry that Tipu had initiated.

By then, Bowring had given way to Col Meade as Chief Commissioner and he too expressed interest in reviving the silk industry. Vecchjs distributed many hundred silk worm seeds throughout Mysore state, including Kengeri. He also wrote in 1876  

a manual for Sericulture in Mysore.

Over the next few decades, silk rearing and weaving took off in Bangalore, Mysore, Mandya and Kolar districts  and the Ramanagar-Chennapatna-Maddur area became the new engines of growth. Kengeri slowly and steadily pulled back and today there is not much left of the silk industry. Of  Vecchjs filature, there is no trace.

Leopards once roamed here

Just a century ago, this land was full of forests and the bustling locality that we see today was a small village. The village had a historic importance since ancient times and it was part of the kingdom of the Gangas, Cholas, Vijayanagar, Adil Shahis, Hyder and Tipu and finally the Wodeyars.

Though there is not much of history left in this place, the Eshwara Temple here has an inscription dating back to the period of the Cholas. It was at this temple that one of the greatest Chola Emperors, Rajendra Chola, erected a stone inscription in 1959 AD,  giving details of the grants that had been made over to the temple.

After the Cholas, this place and the surrounding provinces came under the control of Kings of Kukkalanadu, who had Kithnahally near Tavarekere as their capital.

The Kukkalnadu rulers lorded over Nelamangala, Ramanagaram, Bangalore south and Magadi taluks. Then came the Hoysalas and the Vijayanagar Empire. After the fall of the Vijayanagar Empire in 1565, this area came under Kempe Gowda and later for a short period under the Adil Shahis.

Subsequently, the area was conquered by the Mughals and then came to the Wodeyars. Hyder seized control and till 1799, it remained with his son Tipu after which it was handed over to the Wodeyars.      

Tipu had taken shelter in the fort here during one of the wars with the British. However, there are no remains of the fort though one of the areas in the bustling locality here is called Kote.

When the British set up Cantonment in Bangalore, this area slowly began emerging from the shadows and it began gaining an identity of its own. Today, it is one of the important parts of Bangalore and a bustling locality. This is Kengeri, which is often labeled as the first satellite township of Karnataka.

Today, Kengeri has thrown away all the vestiges of its past. There are only small traces of the jungles that it was and even today old timers recall with a tinge of sadness the days of yore when panthers, leopards foxes, bears and other wildlife and plenty of birds and reptiles could be spotted in Kengeri.

 Even till the 1980s, residents of Kengeri could spot wildlife.      

Then this area was full of shrubs and bushes, thorns and patches of deciduous green.

For the Cholas and Kempe Gowda, the locality of Kengeri was an important outpost. The Adil Shahis had granted Kengeri as part of the Jagir of Bangalore that had given to Shahaji, the father of Chatrapathi Shivaji.

Tipu Sultan took shelter in the Kengeri Fort while at war with the British. When the English captured Bangalore in 1791, Tipu dismantled the fort at Kengeri to prevent the British from making use if it. By the way, Tipu had set up a silk centre in Kengeri.  

In the survey report prepared by Colonel McKenzie and Bakunin soon after the death of Tipu on May 4, 1799, there is mention about remains of Kengeri Fort. This is the very area that is now recognised as fort (Kengeri kote).

Unfortunately, both the jungles and the remnants of the fort have vanished. One of the eminent Kannada writers and Jnanapitha award winner Chandrashekara Kambar, who is settled in Kengeri can testify to the change that the area has undergone.

One of the early residents of Kengeri still recalls how a reporter affiliated to the Indian Express in the late 1980s helped catch two leopards.

Today, the park in the Kengeri township is the only remnant of the green that encircled the village. The lake adjacent to the busy

Bangalore-Mysore highway was once a host to a variety of birds and small wildlife. The lake today needs an immediate overhaul as ornithologists have identified 40 species of birds.

Once considered an outskirt of the city, Kengeri is now an important satellite town and today it is very much within city limits. There are several myths about the origin of the name Kengeri.

Kannada writer and critic Chidananda Murthy claims that Kengeri comes from  Kempu Neerina Kere or the Red Water Tank situated in the locality. Over time, Kempu Neerina Kere became Kemkere and finally Kengeri.

Others say that the abundance of coconut trees in the locality gave Kengeri its name. The name Kengeri comes from the words Tengu meaning coconut and Keri meaning place

The Gandhi Bhavi

While Mahatma Gandhi’s five visits to Bangalore have been fairly well documented, very few people know that the Father of the Nation also spent time in Kengeri, which then was a small village on the outskirts of Bangalore.

Gandhi paid two visits to Kengeri and each of them can be described as a path breaking event. The first time he visited Kengeri was to spend some time at the Kengeri Gurukula Vidya Peetha which was founded in 1926 by freedom fighters and Gandhians like Dr C B Rama Rao, Swamy Vishwananda, T Ramachandra and K B Purushottam.

These Gandhians wanted to motivate youngsters undertake selfless service and inculcate in them the Gandhian principles.

Gandhi visited the Gurukula again and this time it was on June 1, 1934 when he advised the inmates and others to visit villages and organise people to tackle socio-economic problems through village cooperatives.

Even today, a memorial building stands at the premises to commemorate the two visits of Mahatma Gandhi.

The Vidyapeetha, an NGO, runs an orphanage, free residential school and a short-stay-home for underprivileged women.

Gandhi’s 1934 visit to the ashrama or gurukula saw him speak eloquently about the evils of untouchability and the need to root out the caste system.

He opened a Gram Seva Kendra and also inaugurated a well constructed by the then Bangalore District Board for marginalised people, which today is located next to the busy Bangalore-Mysore highway.

Gandhi had led a large number of Harijans to the well from the highway. He himself drew water from the well in a silver mug and gave it to people gathered there, including the Harijans or untouchables. When the gathering quenched their thirst, Gandhi stood up and gave a small but inspiring lecture on how untouchability needs to be abolished and how Harijans, as he called them, should be treated as equals.

He then auctioned a small statue of himself  and the Rs. 25 that it fetched was the beginning of the fund that he created to fight untouchability.

As soon as Gandhi departed, people of Kengeri and the Gurukula began addressing the well as Gandhi Bhavi or Gandhi well. The well stood as a test against untouchability and slowly but surely it began to manifest as a symbol of hope for the poor and downtrodden.

However, once Indian gained Independence, and politicians-bureaucrat nexus began ruling the roost, all that Gandhi stood for merely became symbolic and what should have been a protected well soon became a disused watery structure.

Soon, the well remained lost in history and it became a place where debris, filth and garbage was dumped. The water too disappeared as there was nobody to care for it and clean the well.
The insensitivity of the people is also matched by the callousness of our rulers and today the well is in need of  permanent preservation.

When I last saw the well, I found one of the sides of the structure had developed cracks and that there was no water. The area around the well looks unkept and there were weeds. I was told that the weeds can be cleared twice an year.

Today, all that remains of the well is the inaugural stone with the name of Gandhi on it. The Kengeri Gurukula Vidyapeeth Ashram, which owns the land, have plans to convert the well and the area around it into a Gandhi memorial. But who is there to support them, Certainly not our politicians.   

The Ashram is located just 1.5 km from the busy highway. But as expected not a single vehicle takes the deviation to the Gurukal. It seems we too have forgotten our duty to the Mahatma. For Gandhi, the self always came last. For us, self always comes first.

Gandhi also addressed the Harijan Workers conference that was organized in Kengeri on June 10, 1936. He also gave an interview to a delegation from the Adi Karnataka Sangha. Two days later (June12), he again addressed the Harijan conference in Kengeri.

By the way, it was in Bangalore that Gandhi received news of his son, Hiralal, converting to Islam. It was on May 29, 1936 that Gandhi was told that Hiralal had taken the name Abdulla.

Gandhi also met Dr C. V. Raman and visited the Indian Institute of Science.   

Dignity in death for pets

Two days ago, the pet Doberman of my neighbour died. The owners were grief struck and after some time they decided to dispose off the body.

Since their house was small, they could not bury the dog in their house and they wanted to dispose off the pet in a dignified manner as the dog had kept them company for nearly two decades.

When they tried to get a place to bury their pet, the reality that Bangalore does not care about animals-of course it has for long stopped caring about humans-hot them hard.

Calls to the BBMP to find out from them if there was a cemetery evoked unsatisfactory answers. The first time around, the person manning the telephone at the BBMP office did not know of any such cemetery in Bangalore. The second call was a little more helpful.

The man said there was a pet cemetery at Kengeri and that we could get the telephone number from the directory. A frantic search revealed to us that there was a cemetery for pets and that it was being operated by People For Animals (PFA).

We buried the pet at the PFA cemetery and I must tell you that is a very decent place for burying pets.

The only problem is the distance. It is almost 20 kms from Bangalore and it has witnessed more than 500 burials of  pets, most of them dogs, cats and birds.

You can either simply bury your pet here or you can get a stone inscribed over its grave. Of course there is s small fee for it and for he burial too.

You have to call PFA before you take your pet for burial. They do send ambulances to ferry your pet but this is only in exceptional cases. In case you want to pet to be covered with granite stones and its name inscribed, the cost is three and half times more than normal burials which costs upwards of Rs. 3,500.

The receipt given for burial can be used for seeking tax exemption from the Income Tax authorities or when you file your tax returns. The cemetery is recognised by the Central Zoo Authority of India.

The pet cemetery was started on a one acre plot in 2005 and since then it has become the last refuge for pet lovers who otherwise would have struggled to find a decent place to bury their pets.

The PFA team of  Namrata Dugar, Alpana Bhartia, Gauri Maini and Arushi Poddar were involved in the project of conceptualizing, designing and constructing the cemetery.

The money from the burial is used by the PFA to treat ailing and injured animals in its animal hospital.

The cemetery can be reached at 28603986 or 28612767.

Many people claim that this is the first cemetery of its kind in south India. While this may be partially true, the real fact is that the BBMP did have a cemetery for burying pets in Mattigere near Yelahanka off Bellary Road.  

This site had been exclusively earmarked by the BBMP for burying pets and it covers two acres.