A legal expert’s penchant for music
M.K.CHUBBY RAJ
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M.Anantanarayanan, a teacher at the Law College, Madras, also had a passion for Tyagaraja kritis. A tribute by his student in his birth centenary year.
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At a function: M. Anantanarayanan (extreme left) delivered the keynote address at a book release function in 1975. Others in the picture (from right) are C.V.Subramaniam, K.K.Shah and Dr. Raja Mannar. Mani Krishnaswamy rendered the prayer song.
I met M. Anantanarayanan for the first time on the day he took charge as the Director of Legal Studies, Madras. I was then doing my second year Law (B.L.) at the Madras Law College (1956). Along with secretary, Vaikunta Bhat and a few students, I met
him in his room. He had a brief chat with all of us on the syllabus, lectures, professors and so on. He expressed his willingness to take classes and enlightened us on the Law of Evidence, which he made interesting. His predecessors confined themselves to administrative work and did not take classes.
Shortly, Anantanarayanan was made a judge of the High Court of Madras and he rose to be the Chief Justice. My contacts with him were a few and far between when he was a judge. But after his retirement I was introduced to him by a common friend, a senior counsel. From then on, I used to meet him at least once a fortnight.
He and I had common interests. Both had a passion for Tyagaraja kritis. He could, without seeing a book, repeat the sahitya of all popular kritis. He could also give the meaning of every word and explain what the composer was conveying through the kriti to the listeners. He would also make cross-references to what poets like Shelley, Wordsworth and Keats have said in their poems.
Unique opportunity
The Music Club and Fifty-Fifty Club used to organise concerts at Ashoka Hotel, Pantheon Road, and SGS Sabha, T.Nagar respectively. As we were members of both, I had great pleasure in picking him up along with his wife, to these concerts. On the way back, he would explain the nuances worth noting in kritis and ragas. Thus I had the unique opportunity to learn many nuances in Tyagaraja kritis which could not have been learnt from books. In fact, he opened my eyes to the beauties in Carnatic music, particularly in Tyagaraja kritis, and in English literature. I am greatly indebted to him for the interest he took in making me understand and appreciate the subjects, so dear to my heart.
Once, he said, “To compose kritis is not difficult. Anyone with fairly good swara gnanam and proficiency in language can turn out compositions in Carnatic music. But mere words, raga and swaras do not necessarily make a good composition. In fact, the kritis recently composed cannot come anywhere near a single composition of Tyagaraja. The reason is that the kritis of Tyagaraja have not only words, raga and swaras, but there is also in them an ‘x’ factor, which I unfortunately inexplicable. It is this ‘x’factor that has made Tyagaraja kritis immortal.”
He once explained how “Nadopasana is the reverse of other upasanas. In the case of meditation (upasana), the meditator has to control his mind. But in the case of Tyagaraja’s nadopasana, melody had captured his mind and he could not think of any external object. So there was no need for him to control his mind.
It so happened that I was working with a bank in Bombay when his wife passed away in 1980. He had to shift to Bombay where his second son was living. It was a coincidence that his first son, who was in the Indian Foreign Service, visited his father in Bombay before leaving for Moscow as deputy to the Ambassador there, when I happened to call on his father. As I was saying goodbye to his son, Ananthanarayanan said, “Mr. Chubby Raj, we should meet again soon.” Least did I know that it was my last meeting with him. For, the next morning, I got a call from his second son, only to be told that his father passed away suddenly before going to bed the previous night.
I lost a great teacher who opened my eyes to the nuances in music and good things in literature. I miss him even now.
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