My Allahabad Story

By Himendra Nath Varma

My Allahabad Story recollects the author's privileged childhood in a prominent family of the city he is obsessed with. He traces his growing years in the large middle class Kayastha family bringing out in amusing detail, some quaint social customs and traditions that existed half a century ago.

The author wonderfully describes the changed complexion of the city with a tinge of despair. Life and times and what happened to Allahabad has been graphically described with nostalgia. An interesting account of an Irish resident brings out the social life that prevailed in Allahabad hundred years ago, interlaced beautifully between the English, Anglo-Indians and Indians.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
• Release date: Feb 4, 2019
• ISBN: 9789388038027

Himendra Nath Varma

Born on 24th July 1943, in a distinguished family of Allahabad, Himendra Nath Varma is an alumnus of the Allahabad University. He joined the State Bank of India as a Probationary Officer and retired thirty seven years later as a General Manager. He has served on the Board of IDBI Capital Markets Ltd. and is currently on the Board of SBICAPS Securities Ltd. He lives in New Delhi & Allahabad, and loves reading biographies and listening to Hindustani classical music.

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Introduction

My Allahabad Story was never intended to be a book. A few years ago, on a late wintry evening at my New Delhi home, I was gripped by a sudden pang of nostalgia, and upon switching on my laptop, I randomly started writing about the days when my father was alive, and the wonderful childhood I had lived through in Allahabad. Thus, the chapter in this book that appears as Evenings at Home, was the first to be written, for they were special and unusually interesting. It remained at this juncture for some time, till I happened to visit Allahabad on one of the periodical trips that I take in order to recharge my batteries, and showed this piece to my brother Satyendra. He was not only thrilled, as he read about all those moments that sent him cascading back to the past, but also quite surprised at some of the details that I remembered even after nearly sixty years. He was the one to suggest that I write more. I had quite enjoyed writing that piece, and thought why not go as far back in life as I can remember. Memories can be such powerful, precious possessions, and should be preserved for posterity. After all, histories are moulded from them. And that’s what I have done in these memoirs. Family members are astonished by how well I remember people, incidents from that time, and the life that was. That life is well over half a century old, spent in good old Allahabad, and the members of my family vouch for every bit of it as true, authentic, and accurate. As I said, it was never meant to be a book and what I wrote was for my family’s eyes only. However, as I went along, I kept wondering whether my accounts could be adapted to provide, even to a lay reader, especially if he had ever lived in Allahabad, with a slice of the life that prevailed in a typical middle class joint-family household of the Kayasthas of Uttar Pradesh, half a century ago. I am convinced much of it, especially the customs and traditions from that time, will read like artifacts in a museum from a distant past and capable of fascinating the present generation by offering a glimpse of how their grandmothers lived.

Therefore, I continued chronicling, giving the text some kind of order, lest nothing of note, or interest, or some relevance to contemporary times, from my point of view, was omitted. While this effort is not meant to be a historical record, it is definitely an attempt towards articulating what life was like in the charming city of Allahabad of yore, where I spent my early years, and the profound transformation that it has undergone. I have tried, to the best of my abilities, to trace those changes in the chapter, What Happened to My Allahabad, especially its lost charm. I have had a privileged childhood and upbringing, deeply influenced by my mother, father and eleven older siblings, and through them, the people who came home regularly. Even at a very young age, I could perceive that what I was experiencing something different. My father, who had started his practice as a young lawyer in Allahabad in the year 1919, like many of his peers in the same profession, was also drawn into public life. But he had a distinct edge over others, thanks to his father-in-law, Major Dr Ranjit Singh, OBE, whose very close associates were men of the stature of Motilal Nehru, Madan Mohan Malviya, Dr Sachidanand Sinha, Sir Sundar Lal, Sir Tej Bahadur Sapru, Sir C Y Chintamani, and Krishna Ram Mehta, to name some, apart from Governors of the State (Allahabad was the capital of Uttar Pradesh at that time), High Court Judges, and a host of senior civil and military officers. However, the most significant turn took place when father came to occupy 7, Elgin Road, initially as a tenant of Dr Sachidanand Sinha, an eminent lawyer and statesman with a strong connection with Bihar, who divided his time between Allahabad and Patna. Therefore, a chapter has been devoted to 7, Elgin Road. As the eleven of us were growing up, father’s sessions with us at the dining table, and in the drawing room, where we were sometimes allowed to join his friends, became a rare and invaluable source of intellectual stimuli, to acquire knowledge of the world. A great storyteller, father also had a sense of humour, and some of the characters and incidents featured in this book owe their presence to his accounts of them. That was the privileged upbringing I was referring to. Inspiration for my memoir also came from the title of Mr Fali Nariman’s brilliant autobiography Before Memory Fades, and I have rushed through some parts of my writing before that happened to me too. A rather detailed account of one Mrs Thompson, a close acquaintance of my maternal grandfather, is featured here for two reasons: First, because I discovered the account of her romantic interludes buried among my maternal grandfather’s diaries that he had meticulously maintained from 1901 to 1935, which I found to be hilarious; and second, the whole affair brings out so much about the character of the social life that had prevailed in Allahabad a hundred years ago, a beautiful mélange of people, English, Anglo-Indians and Indians.

Allahabad has lately been receiving attention in some excellent books by Arvind Krishna Mehrotra and the inexhaustible Neelam Saran Gaur, all beautiful literary works that will be cherished for posterity. Nevertheless, I thought that when it comes to the forties, fifties and sixties, certain interesting aspects of those times needed sketching in, and my effort will, hopefully, not appear superfluous, but go on to supplement these efforts in capturing and preserving memories of the once charming city and the people who made it so.

ONE

Early Memories

12th March 1946 is the date from which I can recall the earliest memories of my life. One may ask how I can be so precise, and the answer is quite simple. It was the day my eldest sister, Prabha, got married. Some blurred images of this occasion are etched in my mind, though people find it difficult to believe. I was born on the 24th of July 1943, therefore, not even three years old at that time, but the elders in the family have corroborated whatever I claim to remember. In this attempt towards recollecting my life and times as I grew up in Allahabad, I will try to provide as faithful an account as my memory serves me. While much of it is remembered from first-hand experience, quite a bit of the incidents in this book are based on the detailed accounts narrated by my father and elder brothers at the dining table or during drawing room conversations. Truly speaking, I was spurred into writing my story rather late in life, steered into action by the rather startling metamorphosis that this once glorious city is undergoing. Every time I visit the city, it pains me to see this relentless transformation. I sometimes wonder whether any other medium-sized city in the country has undergone such a dramatic decline from glory to rot, as Allahabad has. The tragedy of this situation is that the time is fast approaching when a whole generation who rue this decline will have passed away, taking with them all the fond memories of those bygone days. There will be no one left to make agonising comparisons, as the past is entombed in its own silence.

Coming back to the story I had started, it might appear to be wondrous as I recollect the time when my sister was getting married, especially considering that I wasn’t even three years old. Yes, it sounds odd, but not so much when it turns out that I was the youngest of twelve siblings: Eight brothers and four sisters! The eldest in the family, my late brother Lt Col Brijendra Nath Varma, was born when the First World War had ended, and I was born when the Second World War was at its peak. That made us twenty-six years apart in age. Trivial as they may appear, but for the record I remember that there was a very large tent pitched under the two huge neem trees situated on the right side of the entrance to our house from the Lyall Road gate. My maternal uncle, my mother’s only brother, had been stationed in that tent and I remember playing on his huge tummy as he lay on a charpoy. I distinctly remember hearing the term ‘at home’ for the first time, and this grand function was the wedding reception which was held on the front lawn. There were clusters of tables with white tablecloths, and chairs positioned around them all over the lawn, and snacks were being served. While this was happening, there was a small, low platform neatly covered in white sheets, set up at an angle at the front left corner of the lawn on which Bismillah Khan and Party were performing on the shehnai. Much later, I would learn from father that Bismillah Khan had charged a princely sum of Rs 100 for the evening. His party had been put up in tents, pitched in one part of the compound. The one other verifiable fact I remember was a row of two or three wooden tables set up at one end of the lawn, just in front of the portico, on which was a display of an array of multi-coloured soft drink bottles. Smartly attired waiters in starched white uniforms would carry the drinks to the tables from here. That’s it. This is what I remember of this first wedding in the family.

The wedding of my eldest brother, Lt Col Brijendra Nath Varma (fondly called Bhaiya) took place in March 1948 and I remember bits and pieces of this wedding as well. I have a faint memory of my would-be Bhabhi visiting us some months before the wedding, along with one Mrs Kaul who was a close friend of her mother. They had come in the evening in a tonga (horse carriage) that had remained waiting in the portico to take them back. I did not go into the drawing room because no one had called me in. Due to my shyness, I could not bring myself to go in on my own, either. But I hung around in the verandah outside to get a glimpse of my future Bhabhi. And I got a good look because she had come out ahead of the others from the drawing room, and gone and sat in the rear seat of the waiting tonga. She was slender, fair and good-looking, and I liked her. I went on to see the marriage celebrations of all my other siblings, and will at some point later record some of the interesting incidents. However, if I were to write about all of them, it might become a boring, endless procession of weddings for the readers. Bhaiya had joined the Army before I was born and I recall him being a Captain, posted in Lahore. World War II was on, but Lahore was not affected in any way. I remember, however, much talk and clouds of concern at home when news came that Bhaiya was to be posted to a place called Pandu on the Burma front, where the Japanese were close by. I did have an idea then that the Japanese were considered to be our enemies. My brother’s visits on home leave were few and far in between, but always filled with excitement, largely because he would bring toys for us. These were mostly guns, pistols, railway engines, aeroplanes and jeeps. I also remember that Bhaiya had a friend called Captain Kamiana who had visited us quite a few times, even without my brother’s presence, bringing us news of him. I think he was posted in Allahabad in those days. Father’s office table had a dark green rexine cover on it and on this cover was a tiny crescent-shaped burn mark, just a centimetre by a millimetre, which I would continue to notice for years. Capt Kamiana had been responsible for it; he had left a burning cigarette on the table.

Ramji (Ravindra Nath Varma), my second elder brother and the third eldest child in the family, had started life as an apprentice with Sir C Y Chintamani who was the Editor of The Leader, an English daily from Allahabad, somewhere in 1943, and the remaining six of us brothers and three sisters were at that time, students in school, college and the university.

My father, late Surendra Nath Varma was an advocate, who practised in the High Court. He had shifted to Allahabad in 1919 from Ghazipur, where he had originally started his career in the District Courts, following in the footsteps of his father Shyama Prasad, who had been the Government Pleader of Ghazipur and Balia. Interestingly, my grandfather’s father, that is my great-grandfather, Aditya Prasad, had also been a leader of the District Court Bar at Ghazipur, and my great-great-grandfather, Munshi Jawahar Lal, had also been a lawyer in Ghazipur, making my father a fourth generation lawyer. Father has had a deep influence on each one of us in the family, and in our own lives, we have practised his principles, values and ideals to the fullest. We learnt from him the invaluable skill to discern between good, bad and evil. He was a strict disciplinarian, but a doting father, who gave us the right amount of freedom to develop ourselves. He was highly respected in the High Court, equally by the Bar and the Bench, the city of Allahabad, and the entire community around him. A strict Arya Samaji, he practised reforms in matters of rites and rituals, ugly social customs particularly relating to dowry in marriages and other lowly traditions like the deemed right to harass the bride’s parents by bringing an unduly large marriage party, and so on. He was fully conscious of and abhorred the exploitative practices involved in marrying off girls, which very often brought ruin to her family. He had eight sons, and in their marriages, four of which were performed after his death, the question of dowry never came up. The baraats (marriage parties) for all my brothers never comprised more than seven or eight members of the immediate family, including the groom and a servant. This was something unheard of, possibly even today, in the states of UP and Bihar, where the numbers could average a hundred persons. I was part of only one brother’s baraat as a result. Sometimes, his dogged adherence to his principles would annoy our close relatives who would feel neglected. They would look upon such principles scornfully and brand them as silly idiosyncracies, but father firmly held on to his convictions. He was courageous about his convictions and never gave in. He never lost respect and admiration because he himself practised what he preached.

Father was extremely well-read in subjects such as English literature, history and political science, with highly developed intellectual capabilities. Apart from achieving success in his profession, he took a keen interest in public life, which was something not uncommon among lawyers in those days. This brought him into contact with a number of eminent political leaders of his time. His political affiliations were with the Liberal Federation, the breakaway faction of the Congress Party, and he was one of its General Secretaries. He was closely associated with the Servants of India Society, founded by Pt Hriday Nath Kunzru. He followed the work of the Harijan Ashram, an organisation put up by Munshi Ishwar Saran. Although a staunch Arya Samaji, he was broadminded enough to observe catholicity of purpose in his approach to life and respected all faiths and beliefs. He was an active member of the Athenaeum Club, sponsored by the YMCA Allahabad, and our house would regularly host meetings where talks and discussions of topical interest were held, followed by High Tea. Paul Shiromani, Secretary of the YMCA, was a regular caller at our place for a number of years. An annual feature during Christmas, I used to look forward to the carol-singing at our house. On Christmas Eve or a few days earlier, some prominent Christians of Allahabad, members and nonmembers of the Athenaeum Club, ladies and gentlemen very properly dressed, would arrive in three or four cars in the late evening and hurriedly assemble in our drawing room and sing carols for father. It would last for about half an hour and then coffee and biscuits would be served. I presume father also gave a small donation for the church. Two of the couples I remember were Mr and Mrs Philips, and Mr and Mrs Pillai, prominent members of the Christian community in Allahabad.

The person that my father was, he made it a point to preside over the dining table at tea and all meal times when all of us would be present. Our places at the table were fixed according to seniority, beginning with the oldest child and ending with me, the youngest in the family. Father would regale us with stories from the High Court, anecdotes of the public life of the times, and enrich our general knowledge by sharing his variety and depth of interests and experiences. He would also inquire into what had happened in school that day. He always encouraged conversation, inculcating in us the art of dinner table conversations.

Ramji (Ravindra Nath Varma) would bring in news from his newspaper office, The Leader, and discuss it at the table. Due to the remarkable depth of his knowledge from his readings, particularly of British parliamentary history and Indian political developments, he too would enrich us with such priceless material like no classroom could ever provide. He chose not to attend the university and insisted on starting life as a journalist with The Leader, as an apprentice to Sir C Y Chintamani, the famed editor and statesman. He started with a measly stipend of forty rupees, all of which he used up for buying books and journals. He would subscribe to Punch, John O’London’s Weekly and Time, delivered efficiently by the Universal Book Company. As a kid, I loved browsing through his bookshelf, and for some strange reason, my eyes would come to rest on two orange-coloured hardbound volumes, titled Money in the Bank and Joy in the Morning, kept side by side. PG Wodehouse readings came much later, and by a quirk of fate, I became a banker. Without any knowledge of its contents, I was quite aware that Ravindra’s prized possessions were an eight-volume set of The History of The Times and another six-volume set of The Second World War by Winston Churchill. Some of the bookshelves in the house were quite ornate and positioned all around the house, and since then, I have had a fascination for books and bookshelves. The first book I got was a beautiful hardbound edition of Aesop’s Fables, gifted to me by Ravindra on a birthday. He had followed it up with Gulliver’s Travels and Rin Tin Tin’s Rinty. However, I had already started delving into The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes and Jim Corbett quite early in life, and these were to remain lifelong favourites. When I was in the sixth or seventh standard, Ravindra suggested that I ought to read My Early Life by Winston Churchill, and even gifted me my own paperback edition.

Simply by being present at those ‘sessions’ at the dining table, we were able to absorb a wealth of knowledge and information at that young age, and only later in life would we come to realise what a privileged childhood we had. We were a lucky lot, and the way each one of us have led our lives, is entirely due to our upbringing. Father invested heavily in educating us, in the broadest sense, and making us good citizens. However, when he died rather early in 1962, the estate he had left behind amounted to practically nothing. When father died on 10th August 1962, I had just entered the university for my BA, but all my seven older brothers were already well settled in life. Two were in the army, and two practising at the Allahabad High Court. Satyendra, the elder of the two lawyer brothers practising at the Allahabad High Court, had boldly turned down judgeship in July 1973, primarily for his principles, ‘on account of certain developments in the field of judiciary’, as he wrote to the Chief Justice, a day before he was to take the oath. He was apparently referring to the then controversial supercession in the appointment of the Chief Justice of India. Some years later, Amarendra went up to the Bench and upon retirement, became Chairman of the Monopolies and Restrictive Trade Practices Commision. Ravindra was now a journalist with the Hindustan Times, New Delhi. Two of my other brothers were senior executives with Brooke Bond India Ltd and Caltex India Ltd. And all the four sisters were happily married to equally well-placed husbands working with the Tatas, in Lucknow University, Oxford University, and the UP Civil Service.

I must hasten to add that it was not just us twelve siblings living in that house. There was always a cousin or an uncle residing with us for their graduate studies at the famous Allahabad University. I have memories of Bhaiya Chacha (Akhilendra Nath Varma), a cousin of my father from Ghazipur, who was staying with us as he pursued his studies at the University. His father, that is my grandfather’s brother, was an agent for the Standard Vacuum Oil Co. in Ghazipur. He used to send handsome amounts as pocket money for my uncle, to enable him to lead an indulgent lifestyle as a student, a far more comfortable one than any of my brothers got. My brother Gulalji (Retd Justice A N Varma) tells us stories about how he would con this uncle of ours into taking him to Lucky Sweet Mart in Civil Lines. He would make him pay for both of them on the plea that he would settle his share once they were outside the shop, since it was embarrassing to do so in the presence of the owner, who knew the family well, and then once outside, he would scoot.

I had only heard stories about Bachwa Chacha (N N Varma), father’s own younger brother, who had also stayed with us earlier on and finished his intermediate studies from K P College, pursuing his BA and MA from the University. My earliest memories of him are as a working person. In spite of his post-graduate studies, he would always land up as an Inspector in some department or the other in the State Government. He had held positions as an Excise Inspector, Inspector of Factories, Inspector of Weights and Measures and so on. He was about the same age as my eldest brother and some of our cousins, so they would treat him lightly. They had nicknamed him the Inspector. Apparently, these jobs that he would land up with, were courtesy his dear friend C B Rao, ICS, son of Sir C Y Chintamani. He sported a Charlie Chaplin moustache and resembled him a little bit too. He spent much of his income on buying good clothes, and except in summer, he was uniformly clad in a tie and jacket. He was fond of the bottle, but surprisingly preferred country liquor to anything else. Even in later years, whenever he came to Allahabad for short stays with us, the first thing he would do was get hold of our old faithful Sitaram to fetch him a bottle of country liquor from the city. A host of very interesting stories about this uncle of ours can be recounted, but I will confine myself to some of the gems. He had once won a bet of five rupees from his university friends by courageously walking over to Amrita Sher-Gil, who was holding an exhibition of her paintings at the University, and engaging her in small talk for a couple of minutes! Amrita Sher-Gil came from a wealthy family and had already acquired fame as an artist of international stature. She was looked upon, at least by students, as an impressive personality, not easily approachable. With his stupid boldness, my uncle managed to walk over to her and talk to her for a few minutes, enquiring about the prices of some of her paintings on display. He had been able to do this without any mishap, Ms Sher-Gil also taking him seriously, possibly mistaking him to be a student from one of the Princely States, many of whom came to Allahabad for their studies. The other instance concerning this uncle came about much later when I was in college and he would visit us sporadically from Ghazipur, where he was posted as an Inspector of Weights and Measures. He showed us a verse he had written on the death of President Kennedy, titled ‘Kennedy Not Dead, Yet Sprouting’ and posted it to Jackie Kennedy. Only he could have written this hilarious piece. However, after an anxious wait lasting weeks, he was rewarded with a typed acknowledgement bearing a facsimile of Mrs Kennedy’s signature, which he promptly had framed and hung in the drawing room of his Ghazipur house. He had learnt to play the violin and the israj, another stringed instrument, in his schooldays and was quite adept at playing both.

Some time later, Sudhir, the son of another of my father’s brothers, who was a practising doctor in Ghazipur, also came and stayed with us for four years in order to pursue his BA and MA from the University. He would smoke on the sly in his room, and was very scared of my father, who he felt was unduly strict and curtailed his freedom to some extent. Nevertheless, he knew that if he was to stay at 7, Elgin Road, he had to conform to the prevailing conditions, which father enforced on his own children. Sudhir did observe the discipline of our house, although a little reluctantly. He had been a student of ancient history and in later years, he became the Curator of the famous Salar Jung Museum in Hyderabad.

Uncles, aunts and cousins mainly from Fatehpur and Ghazipur, which were my mother’s and father’s ancestral places, respectively, would often arrive unannounced and stay with us for days, a practice that was welcome in our house. It was customary. The household was in a constant state of hustle and bustle, full of people, both young and old, and a number of servants, making for a very interesting childhood in which I remember myself as a spoilt and precocious little kid. When I was a little older, I learnt that during the hour of my birth, quite early in the morning, I was delivered at home, as was the practice in those days, with no nursing homes, and father was still working in the office surrounded by clients. Also, I came to know that father’s fortunes had taken an upward swing in his profession from just about this time. This was 24th July 1943. My arrival was considered auspicious. There is a lot more to my story, which will unfold in due time, as I keep recollecting vignettes from that beautiful past.

SCHOOLING

St Mary’s Convent, Thornhill Road, Allahabad

I was privileged to have been sent to the best school in Allahabad, meant for little boys and girls. I think it must have been the January of 1948 when I began my school life at St Mary’s Convent. The youngest of my older brothers, Shailoo (Shailendra Nath Varma, who retired as a Brigadier), was already there. Memories of this period, nearly 62 years ago, are like an old necklace with some beads missing here and there, leaving visible gaps, but they continue to be a prized possession. The school building was a grand colonial structure in red brick with borders and archways painted in light yellowish brown. It had a large porch, and a broad verandah running along the front on one side. The verandah had a parapet with balustrades running all along the magnificently arched steps, opening up here and there on to green patches of grass and small flower beds, with potted crotons and palms on either side. At one end of the verandah, there was a little chapel improvised in a large room near the office. We were occasionally marched in there for prayers, and as we trooped out, after the prayers, we were given a few drops of holy water in our little palms, which we swallowed. The holy water came out of a bowl that was kept on a wooden shelf on the wall near the door. A nun would dip a spoon into this bowl and sprinkle it into our hands. We must have been tiny because we could not really see the bowl properly, and were always a little curious about its contents.

The school premises were remarkably clean, with a beautiful garden in one part of the compound facing the office, which boasted of the best of roses and seasonal flowers. A large tract of green grass had luscious beds of phlox, verbena, antirrhinums, dahlias, poppies, larkspurs, and trimmed borders of candytufts, a riotous profusion of colours. On two of the sides grew luxuriant walls of the finest sweetpeas and hollyhocks. I have very vivid memories of nasturtiums bordering the short road leading from the side gate of the school opening in front of St Joseph’s Cathedral. The gardener would intersperse the nasturtium bed with five-to-six-inch chunks of burnt coal procured from the railway yards. The plants would