Chapter Twenty
As Life Settled
With my marriage, we had had two ‘exchange marriages’ in the Kottathala Warriem. The first of these was when Vallyettan and Chechi married siblings. Unnikrishnan or Vallyettan had married Saradamani. Anandavalli, or Chechi had married Shankara Warrier, Saradamani’s brother, more popularly known as Makkuashan. This time it was Ramachandran marrying Ammini and Appukuttan marrying me. Both Ammini chettathi and I realised we were pregnant at almost the same time. I delivered Vineeta on the 25th of July 1964 and Kochettan had a baby boy on the 18th of August 1964. He was named Rajshekar. Soon after this, in October 1964, Appukuttan’s youngest sister Shreedevi got married and his parents came to Bombay for the marriage. They arrived in Bombay in September and visited us as well.
After the wedding, my mother-in-law stayed back to help us with Vineeta as Appukuttan and I were both working full-time. Sathidevi, Appukuttan’s unmarried sister also lived with us at that time. Her marriage was fixed for 7th February of the coming year. In the meantime, my mother-in-law developed a fever and the injection that she was given caused an allergic reaction and she developed a rash. She died in Bombay as a result of this on the 1st of February 1965 and naturally, Sathi’s marriage was postponed. Appukuttan and I went to Kerala with the ashes to perform his mother’s last rites. We had to leave Vineeta with Appukuttan’s sisters in Kerala for a short time because we now had no one to look after the baby in Bombay. After Vineeta turned one, Kochu Madhavi chechi or Kochai chechi, as she was better known, brought her back to us. Later that year, Sathi and Balan got married and the newly married couple moved to our home in Chembur and Appukuttan and I returned in 1965 to O1 in New colony, since the house was still in my name.
Soon after this, Ammuchitta left and went back to Malad. Appukuttan’s house in Chembur belonged to the Housing Board of the Bombay Government and had been allotted to us as Appukuttan was an employee. There were frequent inspections and soon it became important for us to return there to show that we were bonafide tenants. Since the house was only large enough for one family, Sathi and her husband went to our place in New Colony to stay with Amma, Subhadra and Achu. Kochai chechi stayed with us for a while to look after Vineeta. Appukuttan’s youngest sister Shreedevi got pregnant by then and went back to Trichur for her delivery and Kochai chechi accompanied her. Once again, we moved back to New Colony to be with Amma, since we needed help with looking after Vineeta, and Sathi and Balan moved to a new place. In the meantime, Radha and Subhadra had both gotten jobs in the Indian Railways. While this was good news, it also meant that Amma had to go to Santacruz to look after Jayshree and so she took Vineeta with her. Soon Radha was expecting again, so we moved Vineeta to Sathi’s house where Sathi’s mother-in-law helped bring up both Vineeta and Sathi’s first-born Sujata. Finally, we realised that we could not just keep moving our baby from one place to another. Recognizing the need to have a stable environment for a baby to grow up in, we employed a young girl from the village to come and stay with us to look after Vineeta while we went to work. For almost three years before that, my little baby had been shunted across different environments, with different caregivers. We, her working parents had had little means to engage additional support.
In 1967, Subhadra received a marriage proposal from Bhaskaran, a young suitor who lived in Bassein Road and had a job in Phoenix mills. Her marriage was also solemnised at the Guruvayoor temple in Kerala and Appukuttan’s family lent us a big hand in hosting the guests who had come for the wedding. Subhadra left for her new home and moved to Bassein Road. We continued to live in New Colony and Amma returned to live with us. Achu was still unmarried and Amma was now available to look after Vineeta.
Before the year was past, Bhaskaran brought us a marriage proposal for Achu. Achu had been adamant in the past, saying that he would not have an exchange marriage. Now with Bhaskaran suggesting a girl in his extended family for Achu, it sort of became like an exchange marriage anyway. Bhaskaran, Achu and I, travelled to Bangalore to see Sarala. It was important for a woman to be there with them and Subhadra was pregnant at that time, so Achu asked me to go along. Sarala had just finished college. She was a happy, smiling, energetic and an extremely pretty girl and I was awe-struck by her radiance. Her parents welcomed us warmly and we were all very happy with the match. They wed on April 25th, in 1968, again at Gurvayoor. With this marriage, Devaki Devi’s brood was all happily married and settled.