Kochi: The 2024 Tamil film ‘Meiyazhagan’ reminds us that an old bicycle can become far more than a machine. Treasured by Karthi's character with near-religious devotion, it becomes a symbol of gratitude, memory, a sacred inheritance and a lifetime of love.

MB Prakashan, 80, of Kochi’s Kalamassery never needed to watch ‘Meiyazhagan’ to feel that gamut of emotions.

For nearly 70 years, the 1957 model Raleigh Humber bicycle his father gifted him was the first thing he looked at every morning and the last thing he wiped down every night before sleeping. Prakashan had received the cycle from his father with a simple instruction: “Do not ruin it, and do not sell it”.

Prakashan honoured that promise for three decades until a thief wheeled it away on the eve of his father’s 23rd death anniversary.

“People ask me why I’m grieving over an old bicycle,” Prakashan says softly. “It may be scrap to them, but to me, it isn’t a bicycle. It is my father. And I lost him a second time when the bicycle was stolen,” he told Onmanorama. The gravity of his loss has made people feel as if they lost something of their own.

In his school days, Prakashan, who lived in Mattancherry, walked more than 7 km each day to St Sebastian’s School in Thoppumpady. Those were years of severe financial hardship for the family. Then fortune smiled unexpectedly.

His father, MR Balakrishnan, won a prize in the ‘DB Charities’ lottery from Calcutta in 1957. After clearing pressing debts, he made one purchase that would outlive him – a brand-new Raleigh Humber bicycle from Kavitha Cycle Emporium near Kavitha Theatre on MG Road in Ernakulam.

The Humber soon became Balakrishnan’s constant companion through every chapter of his working life. An ex-serviceman, he worked as a Jetty Master at Ernakulam Boat Jetty, a KSRTC conductor, a tally clerk at Cochin Port and, from 1962 onwards, in the security department of Premier Tyres in Kalamassery. He cycled the long stretch between Mattancherry and Kalamassery daily.

“After buying this cycle, I believe my father never even boarded a bus. He would only go by cycle and return by cycle. Even if it rained, he would wear a raincoat. Back then, it was a mud road all the way to Mattancherry. He would pedal all the way home, wash the cycle a second time, wipe it down, store it, and only then go to sleep. I grew up watching all of this.”

Without realising it, Prakashan was also inheriting his father’s ritual. Years later, illness confined Balakrishnan to bed. Before he passed away in 2003, he entrusted the bicycle to his eldest son.

Working as an insurance agent and as a bumper lottery distributor, Prakashan could comfortably afford motor vehicles. He even bought his son a Royal Enfield Bullet. But he himself refused to abandon the Humber.

“Not a single day passed where anyone saw me without that cycle. I was that much deeply attached to it. I won’t give the cycle to anyone even to pedal. Even if someone says, ‘I’ll go drink a tea and come,’ I won’t give it. Father was like that too. He had never given it to anyone else,” he said.

The bicycle itself became something of a local legend. Its rare double-piped front fork – two separate tubes descending from the handlebars before merging into one near the wheel hub – made it instantly recognisable across Ernakulam as no other bicycles had that type of fork. Years ago, when a scooter accident bent both its rims, friends advised him to discard it. Instead, he painstakingly restored the wheels.

He had already decided to pass the legacy to his 11-year-old grandson, Samanyu Maloth, who loved helping his grandfather wipe the bicycle clean every evening.

That dream was shattered on Wednesday, July 22. Around 6.30 pm, Prakashan stopped near his shop along VP Marakkar Road near Edappally Toll Junction to issue an urgent insurance policy for a customer. Feeling unwell and eager to return home, he parked the bicycle along the road, locked it, but accidentally left the key in the lock.

When he stepped outside around 7.15 pm, as rain clouds gathered overhead, the bicycle had vanished. The timing made the loss almost unbearable. The next day, July 23, marked the 23rd death anniversary of his father.

“The cycle was my father’s memory. When it was lost on the eve of his anniversary, I felt as though he had passed away all over again right at that moment,” he said.

A town searches for more than a bicycle
News of the theft spread rapidly across Kochi. A complaint was filed with the Kalamassery Police, while relatives and friends fanned out across nearby areas searching for the bicycle. Investigators examined CCTV footage from ATMs and neighbouring establishments, though the exact parking spot unfortunately fell outside camera coverage.

The story soon touched thousands. Businessman Boby Chemmanur announced a reward of ₹5 lakh if the bicycle was safely returned, even offering to help the thief rebuild his life with a job.

Meanwhile, the response from ordinary people moved Prakashan even more. Schoolchildren travelling on buses began watching for old green bicycles. Strangers photographed vintage cycles they spotted near migrant worker settlements and WhatsApped the images to him, hoping one might be his. Friends and neighbours made vows at temples and offered prayers for the bicycle’s safe return. Even local politicians and policemen assured him they would find it.

Every year, Prakashan performs the annual Bali rituals in his father's memory at Aluva Shiva Temple along Periyar. “This time people who got to know about the theft asked me whether I could find it and assured me they would also help me find it,” he said.

For Prakashan, those gestures mattered more than the reward. “There are prayers from so many people. When people call to ask, ‘Did you get it back?’, it comes from a genuine prayer in their hearts,” he said.

Despite losing what he considers his most precious possession, Prakashan harbours no hatred towards the person who took it. He says he has no interest in pursuing a police case or causing him trouble. “ If he returns the cycle, I will withdraw the complaint,” Prakashan said.