Mathan Chettan. A man for all seasons

 

She looked up from where she was cutting some firewood and saw a small ten-year-old boy in a grubby pair of shorts and a towel on his shoulder. He looked famished. Her first reaction as a widow and mother of seven children was that he must be fed.

It was my grandmother’s dictum that a full stomach would drive away most ills. He wolfed down a bowl of rice, went to the well, cleaned himself, and smiled broadly at her.

Question and answer followed. He called himself Mathan and said he had run away from home far North, cos he was beaten by his step father on a daily basis. He wouldn’t go back and offered to stay as her servant. She was horrified and said he could wait in the homestead till she decided to make some inquiries. His talk revealed that he belonged to a well to do background.

A friendly policeman neighbour dealt gently with the boy. The cane marks on his back were sufficient evidence that he had been abused. There were no legal or semi legal forums to deal with such situations then, and so a status quo was made. He would stay with my grandmother till someone came looking for him.

He categorically refused to be enrolled in the Govt school near by which the sons of the family attended. He said he had passed the 4th class

Now happy as a lark, he drew buckets of water from the well, swept the garden of recalcitrant leaves, cut firewood, swept the floors, He played with the boys and catered to every wish of the chechis. But he was always around worshiping his saviour my grandmother.

He grew tall and strong, and saw the girls of the family married off one by one. Then the house was empty but Mathan was on call as he had called himself to help whichever daughter of the house needed a hand. He refused any cajoling to get married.

My grandmother now ageing went to be with her sons.

Mathan Chettan now his nomenclature answered any call for help and in any contingency where ever it was Trivandrum or Kollam, or Thiruvalla, or Kottayam. He never asked for any favours or comforts. He had no bank balance. The only cash he had was what was gifted by those he helped just enough for bus fare, I guess. His main outfit was a white mundu and a towel on his shoulder.

He charmed the little ones and even gave them elephant rides on his back, made playthings of coconut ola or rocked colicky babies to sleep

He was now growing old but he never let a call for help go unanswered be it for festive arrangements, manning the kitchen for ceremonial feasts or even organising funeral wakes.

And then one day my mother woke up crying her heart out. Broken hearted, she said thro her tears, ’Mathan Chettan came to see me and say goodbye dressed all in white’ He came to say his last goodbye in the home of a family member far away.