Lifestyle
Ancestors from Tamil Nadu and born & brought up in Kerala - from this cultural backgcultural background arose, the modern day Kerala Iyer. He considers that cleanliness is more important than Godliness. He is able to live a very religious life side by side with adapting himself to modern life. This modern man spends a part of his earnings in repair and upkeep of the temples and institutions in his village knowing really well that it is only a matter of years when there may not be any more iyers in his village. He makes it a point to go to his village every year during temple festivals in his village. He is also trying to build guesthouses in his native villages. Even in the places where he lives, he builds temples reminiscent of his village. He speaks Malayalam to his friends and talks the peculiar Palakkad Lingua in his house.
He is no more a landlord or a businessman but a white-collar worker in metropolises of India and in almost all the major industrial towns across the world. Traditionally, a Kerala Iyer is a strict vegetarian and a tea-totaller. But nowadays, he smokes and on occasions does even consume liquor along with his friends. Some even take Non vegetarian dishes, occasionally. He is very liberal outside but once he reaches his hearth, the religious beliefs of his forefathers descend on him. He brings up his children, telling them that the only property that he can leave to them is education. Because of this, generation to generation there is progress in his family status. Widow remarriages has become common in Kerala Iyer houses. Dowry is a thing of past. Unfortunately, even Divorces are becoming common.
It would be difficult to imagine how they live with these contradictions. But this is a fact and this has produced the very pleasant individual who is at peace within him and makes great contributions to his society and its culture.
Life & times of Mami - the Iyer woman
The Iyer women who migrated along with their men to Kerala from Tamil Nadu were the todu were the torchbearers of the tradition of the caste. But life in Kerala in the earlier years for them was very different from what they were used to in Tamil Nadu. The initial years were that of struggle. Whatever they used to get in plenty in TN were either costly or unavailable in the new homeland. It is presumed that they had initiated changes in food habits. For example, they started using coconut in their cooking and also substituted coconut oil for groundnut oil, which they were very much used to.
The public of Kerala called the Kerala Iyer women as Ammiyars or Mami.
The dress code of Pattar women was very simple. During the early childhood, possibly most of the children irrespective of a girl or boy, used to wear a towel while going out. On festive occasions they used to wear coloured and printed skirts called pavadais and blouses. Rich people bought silk skirts or pattu pavadais for their daughters. But once they are married they have to compulsorily wear the nine-yard Sari as worn by their mothers. This like all ancient dresses is an unstitched cloth. It was compulsory for all of them to wear glass bangles. It was compulsory to adorn their forehead with red kumkum and apply turmeric powder while taking bath. Gold ornaments were also worn. Most of them preferred to get it made in Tamil Nadu where 22 carat gold was used in contrast to Kerala where 18 carats were used. The trademark of an Iyer girl is the nose ring she wears. In the earlier days both the sides of the nose were pierced and golden rings were put. If the nose rings are not there at the time of the marriage it was compulsory that her nose is to be pierced and the ring should be put before the marriage. Gradually the number of the rings was reduced to one and today it has become rare. One could identify an Iyer girl in the schools by her nose rings and she is called a PATTATHTHI PENNU. Rich Tamil family daughters were given diamond earrings (vaira thodu) at the time of the marriage. In some families it is compulsory that the ladies should wear vaira thodu whereas an ordinary Kerala Iyer girl had to do without that. Another gold ornament that was prevalent during those days is a golden waist belt known as oddiyanam. Every lady used to have a kasu malai - a necklace made of gold coins. These items were considered as status symbols of a rich family.
The women had to take bath early in the morning before entering the kitchen. Taking into account the fact that bathing was always done in ponds, streams, and rivers, they used to go out very early in the morning. Early morning women clean the front part of the house with a cow dung solution that is supposed keep away all the insects. Then they religiously draw a kolam, which is known as rangoli in modern days. This is normally done with rice powder or rice paste. The idea behind this is that the ants, which come in search of food, would eat this so that they will not enter the house in search of food. Drawing kolam is really an art. This is done joining different dots and lines. During festivals and weddings large size kolams adorn the front entrance of the houses. Now as people live in high-rise apartments there is hardly any place to draw kolams.
After this, it used to be a very busy schedule of backbreaking work of the house. Once the day's food is cooked one ladle of rice was given to the crow in a specific place of the house. It is believed that the forefathers of the family come in the form of crows and eat the rice. This was done to ensure that the crow did arrive on the most important day- sraddha day (death anniversary of ancestors). Non-arrival of the crow on this day caused mental anguish from a belief that the departed one was not happy and hence did not turn up.
Till a century back, the caste had an iron clad rule that they should be married off before they attain puberty. The rich families, which were few in number, were able to marry off their girls in style. But most of the girls suffered a lot. The formal education got discontinued after they became seven or eight years old. There was backbreaking dowry to be given along with the girl in contrast to a system of no dowry during the days of initial migration. There are several recorded instances of girls being sold in marriage in Madras to very old men who came from Andhra Pradesh. Other evils brought about by this system were, being married off to very old and poor men, being married but not living with husband, etc. These lead to further problems like early pregnancies and very high mortality of mothers & their offspring.
When the 'Sarada Act', piloted by Mr. Balvilas Sarada was moved in the legislature raising the age of marriage for girls, the whole of Palakkad protested. It is said that, the expensive Vedic sacrifice of Athi Rudram was performed so that the act should not become a rule. Due to the fact girls were married off at a young age and also their husbands were much elder than them, each village had lots of widows, many of them of very young age.
Kerala Iyers followed the Mitakshara Nyaya, which controlled the inheritance of wealth. According to this, women can never own property unless they had got it from their father during marriage. This property was called Manja Kani and was inherited by the daughters of the family from their mother. During the division of property of the joint family, widows without children got only maintenance money from other living brothers.
A lot of positive changes started happening in early 1900s. Girls started going to local schools. Many of them of those times completed high school education. Some girls belonging to cities entered the colleges also. Many girls belonging to poor families started working initially as schoolteachers. Rarely they also learned Shorthand and Typewriting and after marriage were employed as Stenographers. Girls from rich families did become Lecturers in colleges and took up similar jobs. But the age of marriage of girls was around 16. The parents used to get terribly worried, if they were not able to find suitable grooms for them before this age. Slowly this age of consent was raised by the society. But in the early days, males dictated even this. Since boys who were left to fend for themselves by the families, could not settle down before the age of 25, they started preferring girls of 18 or so initially and later this was raised to 20. In villages, where there were no educational facilities, these girls studied music or Hindi till they got married. The death during first delivery was a rare phenomenon and with medical facilities even the men started living up to 60-70 years. The population of widows in villages has terribly reduced.
The life of the present day Kerala Iyer girl has changed a lot. Most of them get educated and then get employed. The grooms consider an employed girl as a prize catch. Dowry is almost a thing of the past in this community nowadays. There are many cases of divorce and remarriages. There are several instances of widow remarriages also. Though the general populace is still against love marriages, they do take place in large numbers. The families initially quarrel but are reunited. The girls were permitted to wear any clothes they liked including Churidars and night dresses. Though the difference in lives between a boy and girl has not completely disappeared, it is on the way out. Most of the girls get married only after they complete their education and possibly after getting employed. The status of a Kerala Iyer woman/girl in her society is much better than the status enjoyed by an Iyer woman/girl in Tamil Nadu. There is a lot of change and the progress is fast but it needs to change more rapidly. Though many girls were very talented in the field of music, dance and other fine arts performing the same on the stage was considered below their status and such ladies are generally considered as immoral. So we can find very few Kerala Iyer ladies in these fields. But the times are changing... we can see many ladies coming up in different fields. Given a chance they will not lag behind anybody in the world.
