This book explains a lot, almost
everything that is Kerala’s politics and society today. All the roots are here.
There is brilliant and ever resourceful Raja Ravi Varma. There is also a bit of
history of Tea and Coffee in India. Still, it is a story of the House of
Travancore and its’ matrilineal system the knowledge of which can surprise most
of the Indians. Manu S. Pillai does a wonderful job as in each chapter he
starts from the history and context of an event in not so particular a manner
until he makes the reader look at something very particular. In this journey
one learns about the system of regency, whims of British Viceroys and Indian
Royal houses. Like any ruling family there is jealousy in the house of
Travancore, there is opulence, ambition, tyranny, decorum, even black magic and
ultimately there is the struggle to survive against democracy. Hero in this
book is the Senior Maharani or Maharaja Sethu Lakshmi Bayi. One has to read the
book to know why a queen would be called the King. It is strange that from the
era of freedom struggle wherein social reformers have been celebrated all over
India, Sethu Lakshmi Bayi’s name is almost forgotten. Availability of telephone
to public, electricity, agrarian reforms, women’s education and employment,
mid-day meals at schools, cooperative societies movement, a public health
division; when most of the Indians had not heard of these terms, they were all being
implemented by Sethu Lakshmi Bayi in Travancore. In 1930 under her rule the
British Regent noted, Travancore had the highest budget for education among all
the states and provinces of India. Kerala’s literacy rate comes with no
surprise now. One appreciates the industry of British people a bit more; one
understands the caste struggle in India a little more after reading this book. Then
there is antihero Sethu Parvathi Bayi, the relentless. Her presence at times
takes this book close to being a thriller. From the Portuguese brutality to the
divine grace of Swamy Padmanabh, this history is unlike that of any other
Indian state.
