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ROAD LESS TRAVELLED

Photo: S. Ananthan

Picture-postcard scene At Ezhuthugal Pudur

We have driven some 60-odd km from Coimbatore. A drive that gets progressively better as we leave the Babel of Thadagam road behind. Already, everything seems calmer, more languid and oh! so green. In fact, the only other colour around is a screaming red hibiscus on the dashboard of the car. All too soon we are there. Vaidyar Kadai is the name of the bus stop (if you are travelling by bus). From there it is on foot to Ezhuthugal Pudur.

Trampling through tall grass and other undergrowth, the first stirring of unease. I remember someone mentioning how Mulli, a village not too far off, has a hospital where tribals treat cobra bites. I share the information with my companions. Just in case, especially since I have come in sandals instead of shoes. But, all is well.

It couldn’t be better. In between the trees you catch sight of a rushing stream. That is where we get on to the boat. Ravindran, the forester, just hollers across for the boatman and there is immediate response saying he is on the way. Instead of waiting, we are invited by the headman to his village Sundapatti — a cluster of huts, a picturesque meadow and, a disused ropeway. We clamber down to the riverside again. Huge trees slouch against the bank of the river. Surreptitious movements reveal monkeys, behind a purdah of leaves and twigs, unlike their brazen cousins on the Ooty road.

And so we walk on, with Bhavani for company. She hurries past, slows down waiting impatiently for us to catch up and then rushes off again. A spindly lad with a big woven basket on his back waves at us from the other side. I am horrified to learn he is our boatman, and worse, it is our transportation that he is carrying on his back — a coracle, not a charming basket as I had thought.

Some goats, a dog and sundry villagers gather to watch the fun. Our entry into the coracle is best described as ungainly. The friendly river from where I sat on its banks, is suddenly a surly green. The coracle seems to rotate 360 degrees as it moves forward and I can’t help remembering the final moments in the movie Milan in which Sunil Dutt and Nutan in a similar vessel, meet a wet end. Thankfully, the crossing is short and uneventful. We leave the coracle as inelegantly as we entered it.

A picture-postcard scene. Grazing and farmlands stretch to the foothills of the Western Ghats on the horizon. It is silent with only bird twitters and a stray bleat or moo. But that is not all. In a copse, almost smothered in undergrowth, are two stone slabs. In one, a hunter is spearing a tiger, in the other, a king (going by his crown) is confronting a crouching tiger with an axe. No one knows how long they have been around. But why here, in the middle of nowhere? Why not? There are jungles around, there is a river nearby, the tiger must have come there for a drink when the king hunted him down right at this spot. And, the act of valour was frozen in stone.

Then we go back to the real and grimy world of power cuts and potholes, leaving our friends from Ezhuthugal Pudur discussing tigers, elephants and ragi crops. And, after only a little less unnerving coracle ride, we head back.

From Coimbatore to Anaikatti check post it is 31 km. Follow the Kottathara-Mulli road for 25 kilometers. At Vaidyar Kadai, turn right for Ezhuthugal Pudur.

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