Puthuppally: Biju has a collection of 2,215 badges at his home in Puthuppally in Kottayam district. All these were worn by former Kerala Chief Minister Oommen Chandy for various events.
Biju first got a badge from Oommen Chandy, worn by him for an inauguration event during his first tenure as Chief Minister in 2004. Biju brought it home and pinned it on the calendar. This then became a hobby. Biju started collecting all the badges worn by Chandy at various functions.
Thus, Biju now has hundreds of badges worn by the former CM. These are safely kept in three big bags at his home.
Oommen Chandy was first amused when Biju came up with his unique request - that all badges be given to him. Then he agreed to the request and put his gunman up to the task.
Whenever Oommen Chandy takes part in a function anywhere in Kerala, his gunman would keep the badge for Biju. And he would hand over the collection of badges to Biju when Chandy returned to Puthuppally every Sunday.
This became a routine, and all of Chandy’s gunmen from Pradeep, Ashokan, Ravi to the current Sreekumar remembered to save the badges for Biju.
This has been the practise since 2004.
