The Cooum River and the Historical Geography of Old Madras

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The two maps from two different centuries, the one above from the eighteenth century and the one below from the nineteenth century illustrates the phenomenal trasformation in the form, character and morphology of the City of Madras from a Port town serving essentially the needs of the East India Company to an Imperial city, a visible symbol of the British Empire. And between the two lies an important 

historical fact: the city had changed to such an extent that we can hardly recognise the contours of change today. We attempt herein, to study the cartographic representions of Madras to uncover the Historical Geography of the City. We are particularly interested in seeing how the River Cooum has fared in all these momentous changes. Our focus therefore is on the River Cooum, today a dreary sewer trudging placidly through the city. The Map below shows that even in the late nineteenth century there were water bodies like the LOng Tank in Nungambakkam which were drained to fulfill the growing demand for space and the consquences were borne by the people of the city in 2015.

The Cooum is one of the shortest rivers in the region, a mere 75 kms from its source in Tiruvalluvar District and a recent Cultural Heritage study has mapped out nearly 100 temples all along its banks. Three important Saivite Temples are located near the source of the River: Tiruvikolam, IlambaiyanKottur and Tiruverkadu. All these temple are sung in the Tevaram and are therefore Padal Petrra Stalam. The water from the Kosatalaiyar River flowed into the Cooum assuring it a steady inflow. In 1868 the Tamaraipakkam check dam was built which restricted the flow from the Kosatalaiyar River to the Cooum and an open channel was cut to gring, by gravity surplus water to the Red Hills Reservoir located in the outskirts of Madras. Human intervention has played a major role in changing the flow and direction of the river. 

Early Map of Madras

A part of an early Map of Madras

The River as we know from the description left behind by John Lockyer flowed right into Fort Saint George, almost dividing the trapezium shaped settlement into two sections. From the very start of the English settlement, the East India Company sought to change the course of the River and they Company brought with it the onsiderable experience in draining swamps and building dams and canals which had started in England during the reign of the Stuarts. For nearly half a century the East India Company could do little as idt did not have full control over the  northern and western parts of the Plains. Only after the acquisition of the three villages of Pususuvakkam, Egmore and Ningambakkam was it possible to diver the course of the river from the Fort and make the Triplicane River and the Egmore River join so as to create an island. This island can still be recognized as Statue of Sir Thomas Munroe stands on the Island and in the toponyms of Madras Island Ground is sometimes mentioned.

A feature of Company life, and it is unfortunate that this is being destroyed, is the existence of Country Houses built by the important members of the company, the writers, the factors, the military officers etc. It is difficult to believe butthe River Cooum was considered attractive enough for them to builsd huge Bunglows. The large eighteenth century mansion in Nugmbakkam built by Dr Anderson, the successor of William Roxburgh, still exists and I hope I am permitted to visit it some day. His house was known as Pycroft Garden. There was until thirty years back, a Country House just below the Nugambakkam overbridge that connected Spur Tank Road with Poonamalli High Road. A early visitor to Madras in the eighteenth century wrote: "It is a surprise to find a handsome stream winding through the town and suburbs, and presenting broad stretches of silvery water at various points". The Adyar River, also a tributary of the Cooum was separated from the original river due to the interventions made by the Company in the early eightenth century when for reason of security they evicted the Indian settlers from the Fort and settled them in what is called in the Records as (a) Mutialpetai and (b) Peddanaikkenpetai. We have already described these Indian settlements wearlier.

The River was the life line of Madras and it provided a means for communication and transport We still have photographs of the River providing the route through which firewood and rice as delivered from the suburbs to residential areas inSouth Madras. The Buckingham Canal which was the Cochrane Canal of 1806 was the starting point of the decline of a once gentle and clean river.

A Boat on the Cooum in the early Twentieth Century

We can look for the traces of the river by follwing the Old Maps of Madras. The River no longer flows close to the Fort and even the Adyar River has lost its discharge into the Ocean as the sand bar stops the river from entering the By of Bengal. The construction of the Harbour at Madras in the first decade of the twentietn century, as the military and naval rivalry between Britain and Imperial Germany was building up was the last straw. The Cooum was redued to an urban slush pipe. 

We can infer from the records left behind by visitors tht as late as the eighteenth century, that boats plied on the Cooum near the Thomas Gate. The establishment of the settlement of Chidadripettai was amde possible by changing the course of the River and reclaiming land. The area where the General Hospital and the Medical College stands today extending up to the Southern Railway Headquarters and Central Station were part of the land drained by the River.After the French were forced to leave Madras in 1749, this area was levelled and all the Country Houses shifted to Nugambakkam or further up to Saint Thomas Mount. The bridge over the river is still called Garden Bridge and this harkens back to the days when the river provided nourishment to Garden Houses in that area,

The Buckingham Canal whose construction began in 1806 and ended in 1867 stretched from Markanam near Pondicherry to Kakinada in Andhra Pradesh. Begun as a famine relief project this Canal disrupted the inflow of water into the River ans the river was diverted into a temporary basin in order to facilitate the construction. The Canal was 750 kilometers long and was an excellt, indeed marvellous feat of engineering/

The Chennai Floods, Water Management and the wisdom of the Madras Presidency Administrators: The Buckingham Canal

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The recent devastation caused by the phenomenal floods in the city of Madras caused large scale loss of life and property. The entire city was almost submerged by the surging waters and parts of the city, particularly along the watercourses were significantly inundated. To make matters worse nearly 34,000 cu secs of water was released from the Chennambbakam Tank without prior warning as the storage capacity of the tank was reaching the high-water mark. There was a fear of the tank breaching and so water was released and the nearby Puzhal Tank breached leading to flooding in Madipakkam and Pallikaranai. Only people living in high rise buildings were comparatively safe as the ground floor was completely submerged in large swathes of the city. Out of the nearly 3000 water bodies documented in the City of Chennai, more than half have been encroached by builders and the rapid unplanned urbanization of Chennai has led to the decline of the environment and the recent floods had demonstrated that Chennai was living on borrowed time. It must be clear to everyone that had the Buckingham Canal been allowed to function the large scale floods could have been avoided. The rulers of Independent India deliberately neglected the Buckingham Canal because they were enamored of dams which were considered the "temples of modern India". The blind rush toawrds industrialization resulted in the Buckingham canal being neglected and the 786 km canal has all but disappeared. Even in the 2001 Tsunami the vestige of the one kilometer wide canal which stretched from Markanam to Kakinada in the East Godavari District absorbed the shock of the waves and thereby protected part of the coastline. The worst damage was in the areas south of the canal.The history of the canal began in 1817 when a 11 kilomwter canal was constructed from Madras to Ennore. Gradually the canal was extended to Pulicat and during the devastating famine of 1877-79 the canal was constructed as famine relief work. Historical documents show that in the late 19th century rice was sent from Godavari region to Madras along the canal. As the cost of transportation by water was always cheaper, Madras as Chennai was then known, received its grain due to the canal. The canal was a life line for the people of the region. Independence meant that the administrative jurisdiction of the canal was fragmented and the whole project was allowed to decay. The canal was joined to the Adyar River and thereby a natural system of drainage came into existence. Had the Adyar River been dredged and the flow of water kept without major impediment, the damage in the recent floods could have been avoided. The Buckingham Canal took nearly a century of effort and Independent India as a nation run by corrupt people without wisdom allowed this great feat of engineering to decay.