A roundabout at a crossroad in PTP Nagar is the venue. The island has a flagpost in the middle. It’s five in the evening and K. Balakrishnan Nair arrives right on the dot. He heads for a house nearby, carries out a plastic chair and sets it in the circle. “Although he does not use a watch, Balakrishnan sir is always punctual. The rest of us, however, look at our watches and mobile phones for the time,” grins A. Gopinathan as he joins Balakrishnan. Soon there is a group of men seated on the island.
Gopinathan, the leader of the group, introduces me to the members. He first starts with himself. “I am a retired IPS office, while Balakrishnan sir is a retired director from the Economics and Statistics Department. Balakrishnan sir is the oldest in our group. He is 83 years old. See that man there? Don’t be misled by his mop of white hair. He is the youngest of the group; he is 67. His name is P.A.K. Neelakandan and he used to work at the finance department at the Secretariat. The one holding the umbrella is K.V. Balachandran Menon. He worked at the Kerala State Animal Husbandry Department. G. Prabhakaran Pillai over there is a retired officer from the State Bank of India, while SMC Pillai is the founder chairman of Amrita Channel. C.P. Thankappan Nair retired from the Airport Authority of India. As you can see, we are all senior citizens.”
The men meet daily in the evening, be it rain or shine. “There are a few more members but they could not make it today. Those who can’t make it usually call or text to say so,” says Gopinathan.
The gathering of men in the neighbourhood meeting up in the evenings began way back in the early 90s, recalls Balakrishnan. There were 14 members in the group then. “We used to meet near the first PTP Nagar bus stop after work. There was a bench where we could sit and catch up on the day’s news. Sadly, I am the only one remaining of that group,” he says.
The present group started gathering around the island in 2000. “It began with two people meeting regularly at the spot and soon more people started joining in. On a good day, there will be 10 to 12 of us. The group is open to everyone from the neighbourhood. Although PTP Nagar has quite a large number of senior citizens, only a handful like us meet up every day. I guess the rest either have problems with mobility or are tied up with household activities and other events. And no, we don’t have a name for our group,” says Thankappan.
The men say the daily meets are something they look forward to. “Apart from perhaps S.M.C, all of us here lead retired lives. S.M.C travels to Delhi often to supervise a project he is working on. The rest of us usually spend our time in front of the television, thus catching up in the evenings does wonders for our soul. Not only does walking to the meeting spot make it a nice evening walk but we also get our daily dose of fresh air as there’s a nice steady breeze out here,” says Balachandran.
As Gopinathan’s house is the closest to the island, everyone stores their chair at his residence. The topic of discussion for the day is often based on the headlines of the day. “All of us are avid news lovers. Our day starts with the newspaper and we are often glued to news channels throughout the day. Our conversation ranges right from politics to sports. Sometimes, Gopinathan, who is a poet, recites his poetry. There is also a lot of teasing, jokes, laughs.... The meet-ups help us stay active, and healthy,” says Neelakandan.
And while there may be the occasional disagreements everyone cools down as quickly. “We are all living on borrowed time. Life is too short to waste on such petty arguments. We never leave the circle discontented,” says SMC. And with that we leave the men to carry on.