Exploring colonial Chennai

Monuments still stand to mark the location of the British’s first intrusive foray into India

The British left India in 1947, but their legacies are still a powerful drawcard for tourists in Raj-strong cities like Kolkata and Chennai; the latter is even marked by some historians as the birthplace of the colony in the sub-continent. During my recent visit to this metropolis, formerly known as Madras, it was intriguing to wander around the Fort St George precinct and discover how the British crept in as a trading company and ultimately laid claim to the territory.

Dotted on Coromandel Coast of Bay of Bengal, this fourth largest cosmopolitan city of modern India was nothing but a tiny fishing village called Madraspattnam 500 years ago, occasionally touched by Armenian and Portuguese traders, before arrival of the British in 1639.

Francis Day, then an employee of the East India Company bought a strip of seafront land from the local chieftain to establish a factory and warehouse, to undertake trading activities. He built extensive fortifications around the property that was supposedly completed on St Georges Day, thus giving the walled area its name: Fort St George. It was from this location that the British rolled out their momentous empire that ruled India for the next 350 years. Fort St George remained throughout, as a silent witness of the evolution of a cosmopolitan settlement that is presently home to 4.5 million people.

When visiting Fort St George, don’t expect see a typical citadel with walls and ramparts. They are all gone, and the short and squat remains are hidden behind shrubbery grown from the dry moat which surrounded the bastion to keep away invaders. The quarter is now replaced with huge government office buildings and the first thing that drew my sight was a soaring flagpole with India’s tricolour flying proudly at its top. My local guide Srinivasan, told me that the mast was erected in the 1600s by Elihu Yale, the then governor of Madras, to hoist England’s Cross of St George, marking the advent of their occupation of the land.

In case you are wondering if this Yale has any connection with the world famous university in America, the answer is yes. He was part of the company and after becoming governor in 1684, played a lead role in developing the Fort St George quarter. The story goes that while doing so, he also amassed a huge pile of personal wealth. Later, on returning to England, he donated some of his precious belongings to a small Collegiate School in Connecticut. Those were later auctioned and the proceeds aided the realisation of the university, named after its generous donor. Other than reminiscing about history in the air, the attractions that draw visitors to the Fort quarter are the Fort St George Museum and the St Mary’s Church.

The two-storey building in which the museum is located is very important in history. Built in 1795, it was named as ‘The Exchange’ because of its use by English merchants and traders to do business. A room on the ground floor served as the office of Madras Bank, which later became part of the Imperial Bank of India, which in 1955 ended up as the State Bank of India, a financial pillar in the country. So according to Srinivasan, the fort can claim to be the birthplace of the nation’s modern banking system.

While wandering along its lonely corridors engulfed in silence, I could imagine myself hearing raised voices of buyers, sellers and agents haggling over prices or the quality of the merchandise, occasionally interrupted by the shrill sound of sirens from ships crowding the harbour.

The two floors of the museum house an ensemble of artefacts – portraits, busts, documents, porcelains, coins, aquatints, arms and textile pieces that present to the interested, an informative panorama of the British in India, particularly in Madras. A large marble statue of Governor

General Lord Cornwallis welcomes visitors. British history celebrates him as the man who contained the powers of Tipu Sultan, though earlier he suffered a humiliating defeat at the hands of George Washington. The views from the roof are now obstructed, but in earlier times, a clear view of the sea was possible, so the first lighthouse of Madras was built there to navigate the Company’s ships safely to shore.

A large oil portrait of Robert Clive, whom many regard as the key founder of the Empire in India, immersed me into the interesting history of British-India around the mid-18th century.

Clive came to Madras as a petty clerk, but burst into prominence when the settlement was invaded by the French. He was the rescue man, and that success built him a reputation. He was sent to Bengal in 1756 to fight against Siraj-Ud-