Melapati Chakravarthy - Learning from a melting pot of cultures

Learning from a melting pot of cultures 

Melapati Chakravarthy 

It was a humid, sunny afternoon of June 1974, and a crowd of youngsters unfamiliar to each other were assembled lecture hall of IHMCT Taramani waiting to be interviewed, a part of the admission process.         

The bonding that took place between the youngsters has developed to friendship still going strong even after a century. One by one, we were ushered into the interview room and quizzed by the board. The interview board was presided over by Director of Technical education Mr.Vayapuri, Principal  of IHMCT, A.V.Kuppuswamy, Director of Dasaprakash Hotels, Anand Rao who was also a renowned cricket  commentator on All India Radio. Later, knowing the qualities of we had nicknamed our Principal as ‘Always Very Kind’ based on his initials and which he was.  

A fortnight later the names of selected students were displayed on the notice board and were advised to meet Mr Rajan, the administrative officer of the institute, to complete the admission process. Rajan along with his team consisting of Mr Madavan, Mr Ramanujam and Mrs. Gitalaksmi were helpful and made it extremely easy to complete the process. 

On the first day of college, we began our memorable journey and experience of campus life. We were met by Mr. Aron Victor then assistant cookery instructor and himself a ex-student of the institute who became our lifelong friend, who is no more and whom we miss.

Shortly after the new batch assembled in the lecture hall, our Principal entered with a big smile on his face and introduced himself. To our surprise, he was a chemical engineer who was well versed in the catering field and education. He was the founding father of IHMCT along with Mr.Bellfield Smith. Later on, one by one other faculty members were introduced and vice-versa. The faculty briefed us about the subjects they were going to impart to us.

From day one, I was a hosteller, and my roommates were Tamilarasu and Pratap Reddy with whom i still maintain close bonds. Hostel life was also a very thrilling experience and i was nominated as a member of the hostel management committee, which stood in good stead and helped me during my career, in managing people of vast diversity and taste.  

The first fortnight we were introduced to rudiments of catering as a profession. We were taken around the campus and briefed about the different kitchens and bakery, the equipment, it’s usage and upkeep. 

Meanwhile, we were asked to procure our kitchen uniform for our practical classes.  As always, during our three years at college, we used to have theory and practical classes. A day before the practical class, we were given the recipes and nutritive value of each dish and we had to work out the costings of each dish, by obtaining the rates from our college store. Mr Jayaseelan who was the stores incharge used to always update us on the cost of all raw materials.

Our first year cookery instructor was Mrs.Uma Natraj and assistant instructor Mr.Victor. We had two demonstrators, Mr.Subramanian whom  we used tease as Mr. Cut Put Boil, and who was excellent in teaching us continental  dishes. Mr.Iyer our other demonstrator, was a pure vegetarian, but by mere smelling the non-vegetarian  dishes,  he used to tell what to add and enhance the taste. During the first year we were not allowed to attend cookery classes if we sported long hair, were unshaved or had untrimmed nails. This was the first lessons of hygiene and a beginning of a disciplined career. 

During cookery theory, we cherish how Mr.Victor used to dictate notes. His way of dictating Cut the carrots, chop the onions, slice the tomatoes, will always be remembered.

Mrs Uma Natraj along with her cookery practicals used to teach us commodities and selection of raw materials.

During our first-year, an outing was planned and my batch mates entrusted me with the responsibility. We had come back the same day, so I worked out the logistics to travel to the Kone Waterfalls in Andhra Pradesh. We had our breakfast and lunch we carried along in two chartered buses. Bottled water was a rare item available only in five-star hotels under the brand name of Mohan, which meant that it was not accessible to us, so we had to carry water from our hostel. 

At that time, Tamil Nadu was a dry state whereas liquor was permitted in Andhra Pradesh. The minute our bus entered Andhra Pradesh my friends wanted the bus to stop in front of a liquor store. 

During our course, we used to have our inauguration day, which was a grand event with an important personality in our field who used to be invited as chief guest.  We used to have cultural programmes which used to run late into the night. Each year, students were assigned the task of preparing food and we used to also get help of our faculty.

 

During my second year, a similar trip was planned to Pondicherry and my batch mates wanted to organize it. We toured Distilleries, the Beach, Aurobindo Ashram and before we returned, I had to go searching for my many of batch mates from adjoining bars and load them in the bus, as they had soaked up.

During the final year, all subjects were same, and Mrs.Amleta Mullens was our cookery instructor again no nonsense person. She used to dictate cookery not a day prior to practicals and we were expected to study and be thorough with the ingredients, weight and method of preparation. Anyone who was not prepared, was not allowed for practical. She used at random pick the students to check. This made us study and be prepared, something which we did not encounter during our first two years.

Mrs Varlakshmi taught us housekeeping and practicals.  Once, she asked us clean a large window and one of my classmates Shanmugam skipped it and was whiling away his time in the cafeteria. When Mrs Varlakshmi questioned him, he showed her a small glass panel and told her he could do that much only due his weak physique, much to our amusement, but Mrs Varlakshmi was angry and she walked away.

Mr Lazarus was the Lecturer of Restaurant & Counter Service. An elderly person with a serious demeanor, but his classes were fun. Betraying his steely resolve, he would suddenly ask if cockroach was a small or a large animal and the confused student would blabber a vague response. This would be immediately followed with the next salvo - if Bombay Duck flew or swam causing the student to be more confused and the whole class in splits.

Then we had one Mr.Sambandamurty who is used to teach us Front Office and Law. Soft spoken, he used to come up with allegories to keep the class lively. We all, by that time, pretty much knew that he instantly cooked up his stories, but enjoy we did. It used to be unadulterated fun.

 

Maintenance and repairs of kitchen equipment was a subject although we neither repaired nor maintained any of it. They were all done by technicians. One Mr Ali used to conduct those classes. Good friend Damodaran, a celebrated Chef today, well known to the Tamil diaspora, used to mimic Mr.Ali for his heavily Malayalam accented English. 

The Bakery practical was something that we always looked forward to as post the practical, we were given cakes pastries and other goodies, to taste. Our bakery instructor Mr Maria Joseph was an artist in icing and decoration of pastries. He used to take a lot of effort to teach us the icing techniques. Some of his students went on to become bakery chefs leading hotels, cruise lines and made a name for themselves.  He was assisted by Mr Roberts and Mr Srinivasan both of whom were his students in college. 

We had Mrs.Anandhi who taught us nutrition, a no nonsense person, strictly  professional but very kind hearted.

 

We had one Mr Jaichandran, an MBA from Berkeley University of USA who taught us Catering Management. He had published books on Management which were endorsed none less than by Miss Thangam Philips, the doyen of Catering Education. A year are so after we left college, Mr.Jaichandran became the Director of Training in hotel  division of ITC.

 So much for the first year, and when we moved to second year, the subjects were the same and only the syllabus was upgraded. Most of the faculty were the same except for cookery in which we advanced from Basic Training Kitchen to Quantity Training Kitchen. Our QTK instructor was one Mr.Ernest Joseph, a person who would not allow to waste even the trimmings and if he found anybody flouting his instructions,  he used jokingly reprimand them by calling Punack Buggur. In Tamil, Punack means Oil Cake.

 

Mr.Ernest was assisted by Mrs Greta Samuel a very  easy going  person and an ex-student  of my institute.  Then there was Mr.Antony, a demonstrator and he was famous for his quote to the students “Open the windows, let the air go out atmosphere come in.” 

Similarly for Restaurant and Counter services we had Mr.T.D.George who  had undergone training in  England under the guidance of Mr.Bellfield Smith. Mr George was a class by himself, and an authority on Wines, Cheeses Sauces and accompaniments. He was very strict and ensured that the highest standards was followed, when it came to table service. 

Dr Nagamani Madhusudhan Rao, HOD Nutrition was an adviser to WHO from India. In due course, she became our Principal on retirement of Mr.Kuppuswamy. Unfortunately we  lost her in an air crash that took  place  during our  final year. 

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The training and curriculum in the institute enabled us to establish ourselves in our professional career by catering to dignitaries, starting with then then Prime Minister’s Mr.Morarji Desai, Mrs Indra Gandhi, Mr Rajiv  Gandhi, Mr Atal Bihari Vajpayee and Dr.Manmohan  Singh. We also catered to Presidents and Prime ministers of other countries, like Sri Lanka, Mr Rajapakse and Mr Ranil Wickramasinghe and other dignitaries and corporate bigwigs. 

That was academics and there was a lot apart from it. 

We shared our hostel wall with IIT Madras and sometimes, we hostellers, used to jump over the compound wall to watch movies in their open-air theatre. This was one way of relaxing, in the sylvan expanse of IIT Madras.

We hostellers also often used to go to Adyar in the evenings, just to have a cup of tea with Irani Samosa either in Runs or Cornet Restaurant. Those were the days when life was unhurried and conversations had no time limit.   

During my first year was elected as vice Chairman (of?) by my entire batch unanimously and during the second and the final year I was the Chairman. 

Our Institute was a melting pot of cultures in as much as students poured in from all over the world. India, Sri Lanka, Singapore, Malaysia - you name them, we had them. Some of them figure in speed dials of cell phones to this date. 

For sure, IHM Taramani was, is and will always continue to be a part of lives.