Jackson Thumbakkaran, a fisherman hailing from Thumba, Thiruvananthapuram, was an active presence in the rescue operations at Chengannur during the floods that ravaged Kerala in August 2018.
Jackson ventured out with his fishing boat in challenging areas like Puliyoor and Pandanadu and rescued hundreds marooned in their houses.
He was carrying out a daring rescue bid to save an ailing septuagenarian called Ayyappan at Pandanad when he received a phone call from his house informing his father's sudden demise.
As the eldest son and sole breadwinner, Jackson was to rush back home. But Jackson was made of sterner stuff.
Instead of dropping the rescue midway, he saved Ayyappan and his family in his fishing boat, dropped them at a secure place and got back to more work.
Two weeks after the floods, when Jackson got back home after the post-funeral prayer meeting of his father, there was Ayyappan awaiting him at his gate. “You saved my life suppressing immense grief. I shall never forget you, my son.
I have two sons and two families now,” the old man told Jackson. Jackson's heart filled with joy when he saw his five children playing around with Ayyappan's grandchildren in his courtyard.
When Kerala witnessed the worst calamity in its history and thousands fled to relief camps, leaving behind their possessions, people from all sections of society ventured out to help those affected. Help poured in regardless of social, geographic, financial and academic factors. New bonds were forged between the rescuers and the rescued - many cherished even today.
A month after the August 15 deluge, Onmanorama presents some exceptional instances of empathy and self-less action which helped create such bonds between state capital Thiruvananthapuram and Chengannur in the backdrop of Kerala floods 2018.
Sociologist P Gopinathan Pillai, former faculty at the Department of Sociology, University of Kerala, looks at this bond between people of the two towns as testimony to the Comptian theory in sociology. The theory basically defies the necessity of biological ties to identify a group as one's family.'
For no returns
Several fishermen plunged into the floodwaters with their fishing boats to rescue those marooned. There were hardly any safety equipment to protect them – other than the confidence in their own skills in water.
A week after the floods, the Kerala government organised a meeting in honour of their effforts. Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan also announced Rs 3,000 to each fisherman who had participated in the rescue operations.
Robin Puthiyathura, a Thiruvananthapuram fisherman who was an active presence in the rescue operations at Chengannur, turned up at the meeting at Nishagandhi auditorium, Museum campus, Thiruvananthapuram on August 20.
He carried a newspaper-wrapped kit. As the chied minister was about to give out the aid, he refused politely and presented his kit to a government official there. “Here is Rs 30,000.
We, 16 fishermen who were disheartened by the sight of dilapidated houses and estranged families in Chengannur, mobilised this money from our earnings in three consecutive days after floods.
We don't want the Rs 3000 each. Please use that money to rebuild Chengannur. Here's our donation to the chief minister's disaster relief fund,” Robin said, handing over the bundle of currencies to the authorities.
Malayala Manorama had published the photos of Akhila and her two-months-old-son Aarav, natives of Thiruvanvandoor in Chengannur, who were rescued by Robin and his friends.
A house for Aadi
Jackson Thumbakkaran was moved by the picture of little Aadi and his family, the Chengannur natives who lost their house and all the belongings to the floods. Malayala Manorama published the image of a newborn boy and his parents who spend their days in relief camps even a month after the floods.
“I remember having rescued Aadi and his mother. They were just discharged from the hospital when the floodwater marooned them.
When I reached their house at Puliyoor, Alappuzha, little Aadi was screaming in pain and fear. I received the baby sitting in my boat and held him close to my chest, as if I received my own child outside the labor room.
The baby stopped crying and stared at my face for a while before slipping into a peaceful nap. I held him in my hands until we reached the nearest dry patch,” Jackson remembers.
After he saw Aadi's face again in the newspapers, Jackson organized his friends and started a campaign to constitute a fund so that they could build a secure house for little Aadi.
“We need at least Rs 2 lakh to start off the project. The little one's homelessness and the despair on the face of his parents haunt me. I have already started to spread the word,” Jackson says.
Jackson's brother Baby John, who works at a private hospital in Australia, collected Rs 4 lakh from his friends, colleagues and neighbors in that country to help rebuild Chengannur's lost glory.
“I know of the distress in Chengannur from what my elder brother. I delivered a talk in one of our prayer meetings in the local church and the community instantly came up with generous contributions to help rebuild the town,” Baby John says.
Jackson and his friends arranged numerous flood-relief kits containing basic utensils, kitchen accessories, spices and foodgrains for the flood victims of Chengannur.
Reunion of 'new families'
On September 11, Tuesday, Nishagandhi auditorium became the venue of an emotional reunion of fishermen who led the flood-rescue operations and the natives of Chengannur who were rescued by them.
Coastal Watch, a non governmental organization working for the welfare of fisherfolk in Thiruvananthapuram, organized the meeting.
“We didn't expect more than 40 people to turn up when we invited over 25 families from Chengannur and about 45 fishermen from Thiruvananthapuram," says Jerome Antony, president of Coastal Watch.
“We were overwhelmed to see a hundreds of them, men, women and children. They enthusiastically searched for familiar faces and interacted like long-lost siblings. To our astonishment, most of the rescuers and the rescued families are still in touch,” he said,
Natives of Chengannur expressed their gratitude for their rescuers in the gathering. Some broke into tears when they narrated their tales of estrangement, loss and agony.
Fishermen, on the other hand, described the challenges they encountered in the rescue mission and shared some unforgettable instances. Several fishermen hosted the people they rescued at their home on the night before the gathering.
They paid frequent visits to Chengannur on the days following the floods and kept track of the rehabilitation and welfare of the people they rescued, like loving siblings.
“A couple of days after we returned home from relief camps, two people from Thiruvananthapuram turned up at our door-step.
We were busy cleaning our mud-covered house. I found the faces very familiar. With sheer disbelief, I recognized them as the fishermen who rescued us. We welcomed them and offered them tea.
They just wanted to know if wer were back home, safe. When we visited Thiruvananthapuram for the post-flood gathering, I stayed at one of their houses like it were the house of a close relative.
We've found new families in the capital city now. Thiruvananthapuram shall not struggle for anying as long as Chengannur is here,” Baiju, a flood-victim said.
Thiruvananthapuram district collector K Vasuki, IAS, also participated in the gathering.
Undeclared coastal holiday
Rough seas give the best harvest to fishermen. Lesser known is the fact that the shores of Thiruvananthapuram experienced a massive mud-bank occurence (chaakara) full of prawns and pink perches during the four days of Kerala floods 2018.
“We would have got a profit of at least Rs 10 lakh had we gone fishing those days. But we didn't think twice before rushing to Chengannur.
A big sqaud of regular fishers mass-bunked the coasts. Naturally, the ones who stayed back at the coast could easily go fishing and utilize the opportunity.
But to our surprise, when we were back at our coast on August 19, none of our fellow-fishermen had gone fishing.
They wasted an entire season just to declare solidarity with the rescuers,” Baby, a fisherman from Poonthura, Thiruvananthapuram.
The fishing villages of Thiruvananthapuram observed an undeclared holiday to offer moral support to their neighbors and family members who went on flood-rescue mission.
However, the sea gave her beloved children a second chance and a mud-bank reappeared on August 19 and 20.
The fishermen, who went together to the seas on those days, dedicated a portion of their profit to the chief minister's fund.
A livelihood in return of many lives
Shaiju, a native of Thiruvananthapuram, ventured out for flood-rescue operations in Chengannur taking along his brand new fishing boat which he purchased just two days before the floods.
On August 16, Shaiju's fishing boat rammed a compound wall and got irreparably damaged.
“Many people, including my family members, asked me not to use the new boat for flood-rescue operations. I bought it on a loan which I am yet to start repaying,” Shaiju recalls.
Disheartened, Shaiju returned home with no means to continue his vocation. His friends captured a video clip of Shaiju's damaged boat, and the image went viral on social media.
A group of non-resident Indians purchased a fiber fishing boat for Rs 2 lakh and gifted it to Shaiju as a token of gratitude and appreciation.
“I asked them not to spend such a huge sum to help a layman like me. We are fishermen.
Our lives are like air-filled balloons.A simple prick of a pin is enough for it to burst,” Shaiju told the NRIs, reluctant to receive the present. However, the youth finally yielded to the love of Abu Dhabi – based Malayali friends circle.
Shaiju carried out a two-and-a-half-day long flood-rescue operation on his new boat at the challenging areas of flood-hit Chengannur.
The boat, which is supposed to be used in unobstructed waters, was easily damaged in rough use.
“It was the first time that boat saw water. I thought I would inaugurate it by rescuing lives. I was deeply hurt by its damage.
I am extremely grateful to the kind-hearted people who bought me a new, better boat,” Shaiju said.
A memorial for rescue
The Central Tourism Department is all set to install a memorial for the flood-rescue operations in Chengannur.
A sculpture christened 'Statue of Humanity' will be erected in one of the flood-ravaged sites of Chengannur, to mark the legendary flood-rescue operations in history.
'Coastal Warriors,' a group of Thiruvananthapuram fishermen, engaged in the rescue operations, came up with the idea to lease out one of their fishing boats and donate the money to the relief fund.
Later, in an attempt to 'immortalise' their effort, they prepared a proposal for the Statue of Humanity and submitted it to Union Minister of State for Tourism Alphons Kannanthanam.
Kannanthanam accepted the proposal and promised to include it in the special tourism package for Kerala.
“I suggest setting up a museum to record and exhibit the pictures, videos and newspaper reports of Kerala floods 2018,” Alphons Kannanthanam said. He also sought a detailed project report for such an inclusive historic monument and museum complex.
Expert's take
Dr Pillai calls these emotional ties 'phenomenal' and 'a case deserving detailed academic study.'
“I would suggest some of my doctoral students to take this up as a topic of their research. Human beings are distinguished by their feelings of fraternity and prudence. In crisis situations, they forget ascribed social identities and form instant groups to aid mass survival.
You can see this behaviour in many other social mammals like apes and felines. But what distinguishes Homo sapiens is the maintenance of those groups through constant communication,." he said.
"Saving one's life makes that person identify the rescuer as his/her family member. The kind of relationship that forms might be brotherly, fatherly, friendly or romantic.
They tend to cherish the bond and form single families with them. All what we should look forward to is the sustainability of this relationship.
If they cherish this fraternity all their life, Kerala floods will contribute a new theory to world Sociological literature,” he said.
