Land owners Archives - INDIAN MEMORY PROJECT

The Gifted Surgeon of Poona

Born in 1932 in Chikodi village, Belgaum on the current Maharashtra-Karnataka border region, Annasaheb was born in a multilingual environment. My great grandfather Gurunath, was a zamindar (large estate owners) and owned lands in the fertile zone on the banks of River Krishna, where production of cash-crop tobacco was extremely lucrative. The Shahade family was prosperous and socially influential. Gurunath was an ardent supporter of Mahatma Gandhi and agreed to give up his assets to the farmers at the insistence of Congress activists. At the time of Quit India Movement, he whole-heartedly participated in the protests. Unfortunately, he was incarcerated in Poona (now Pune) and then died a tragic death.

The Kurukh Adivasi family of Argora

Here my aunt stands straight and bold, with her hands crossed, next to her elder sister (standing middle), Ramkrishna, whom she lovingly called Chamguru, as it was the name of the village she was married into. In the middle, seated is her eldest sister Seeban with her two daughters, Peetal and Dol. The little boy is their youngest brother Vimal. The awkward gentleman standing right most was their next door neighbour. Badi-mumma cannot recollect his name but says that Vimal had invited him to be photographed and he acceded. The photograph was taken outside their home by their bhatu (brother-in-law) Naru Toppo, Seeban’s husband. Naru was a local professional cameraman and a studio-master. His studio was located in one of the sectors set up by an Industrial corporation, HECL (Heavy Engineering Corporation Limited), not far from their hom

A proud mustache

My Father, Amin Chand. Delhi. 1958

My Father, Amin Chand. Delhi. 1958 Image and Narrative contributed by Arun Kumar Nangla, UK This picture was taken in a studio in Sarojini Nagar, Delhi in 1958 for official employee records of the Union Public Service Commission (UPSC). Their office used to be at India Gate. My grandfathers and great-grandfathers were all farmers and land owners from an area near the Bhakra-Nangal Dam, Hoshiarpur in Punjab. (hence my last name). In 1956, my father became the first person to dare leave his village & family profession. He travelled to Delhi in search of change and a respectable government job. He was 21 years old then and 12th Pass. He was abreast in reading and writing in Urdu, as Urdu was in those days the official state language of Punjab, and Punjabi per-say was only spoken at home. Much later into his life in Delhi, he learnt how to speak, read and write in Hindi and a bit of English. People often ask me the reason for 'Kumar' in my name. As far as I know, People including my parents in those times were very influenced by successful film Stars like Dilip Kumar and Manoj Kumar, and therefore a 'Kumar' was added to my name too. It offered a semblance of success and its use was highly popular and trendy. Many of the people you may know with the middle or last name "Kumar", were named so because of the very same reason.

All translations are machine generated, hence they are not 100% accurate.