For shelterless and deserted souls, The marina is home

Janarthanan, 58, Kadiri, Andhra Pradesh

Janarthanan found refuge on the Marina beach eight years ago after his family ill-treated him and today he is known as ‘Naidu’ among the shopkeepers near Labour statue. "Come to the Labour statue and ask for Naidu, and they will tell where I can be found," he said.

Whenever he feels like it, he works at a fruit shop for a wage of Rs 300 per day and on days when he does not feel like working, he drinks alcohol and lies under the trees on Kamarajar Salai promenade, watching the visitors and the leaves overhead. On some of the days that Janarthanan does feel like working, he also transports from different goods that arrive in vehicles to shops lining the beach. He gets Rs 10 to carry one carton to the shops and Rs 6 for each water can.

Janarthanan, however, works hard only to buy liquor and beedis since he does not have to worry about his food and accommodation. After sleeping on the beach, Janarthanan's typical day begins with a walk up to a tea shop in Chepauk. "I regularly read the newspapers, so I buy an Eednadu," he says. Then, he takes a shower at a private pump in the beach itself, which is open only to the known people, he claimed.

At 10 am, he gets his breakfast at Sai Baba temple in Mylapore or another from mutt in Chepauk around noon. After the day-long work, he heads straight to a Tasmac shop with his earning to buy a 180 ml brandy for himself, which is also his dinner. On the sweltering afternoon that we met him, he was free as he had fought with a fruit shop owner the previous night for delaying paying him his wage after 9.30 pm because of which he could not buy alcohol for himself. Sometimes, Janarthanan also gets offers to earn Rs 200 to stand in the queue at MA Chidambaram stadium for tickets for the whenever there is a cricket match, but he does not like the idea.

In the last eight years, he has hardly ventured out of Marina. Once, he once tried to find some work at Koyambedu, but he did not like it and returned to his favourite place at the Marina. When asked where he and others like him go during the monsoon, he pointed at the parking shed of Commissionerate of Municipal Administration on the other side of the Kamarajar Salai. Also, at times when he feels unwell, Saibaba temple in Mylapore, where doctors treat him, give medicine and, if required, even injections for Rs 10.

Although Janarthanan has been living at the beach for eight years, he has not formed attachments with anybody. When we asked him to recount some of the interesting incidents he witnessed at the beach, all he spoke about seeing Prime Minister Narendra Modi from close quarters, when his convoy made a brief pause on Kamarajar Salai for Modi to wave at people gathered on either side during his latest visit to Chennai. He also remembered the final processions of former chief ministers J Jayalalithaa and M Karunandhi and wonders why so much space has been occupied for their memorials.

Speaking about his life prior to 2010, Janardhanan says that he had graduated from school and had even worked as an isometric fabricator in Dubai for 11 years and as a timekeeper in Saudi Arabia for 8 years. When he quit his job and returned to home, he was earning around Rs 40,000 per month. But, he met his downfall in the form of alcohol. He says he got addicted to liquor because of his "immoral" behaviour, which made their children— two daughters and two sons—hate him. "I started a grocery shop, but my wife took over the entire collection, transferred my properties into their names, and treated me like a canine," he said. One day, he decided to leave them forever and went to Tirupati. From there, he came to Chennai with his friend Raja. A few days later, however, Raja also left him.

Apart from his mother tongue Telugu, having worked with Tamils and Keralites and shared rooms with them in Arab countries, Janardhanan says he can speak Tamil and Malayalam. He also learnt to write in English (his handwriting indeed is good) and Hindi. He also claimed to be know how to work on MS Word.

On asking him why doesn’t he lead a better life using the skills he has, he retorts: "What is the point?"

Janardhanan said that the moment he realised that he would not be able to enjoy the fruit of his labour that he earned after working abroad for 18 years, he stopped worrying about the future. Now, he says he takes one day a time and all that matters to him now is to be able to pay for the alcohol that he needs during the day.

"I became addicted to liquor because of my wife. My family insulted me because of my addiction. I could have taken up some other job if I could keep the liquor consumption under control, but I don't see the need for it. Now that's the only thing I live for. There are other addictive substances available as well, but I would rather let alcohol and beedi take my life away slowly," said Janardhanan. He once went to a relative's house to get his Aadhaar card made and get his voter ID card in the hopes of reconciling with his family, if they came to meet him, but in vain.

The only habit that he retains from his travails abroad is of shaving every day. And hence, among his meagre belongings is a razor. On being asked about his other possessions, he said, “It is difficult to keep things safe here. I have lost my earnings and liquor bottles to robbers who prey on people's belongings in the midnight. So, there is no point in stocking anything here.” As a parting question, we asked if he ever considered who would ensure his final rites when the time comes, Janardhanan said, "Do you have any sense of what happens around when you are asleep? No. If I die what is my problem of what happens to my body?”

G Raviprabhu, 54, Bengaluru

Chennai is Raviprabhu’s native town, but he moved to Bengaluru with family when he was seven after his father got a job there. But little did he know that he would return to Chennai at 54, alone and dejected.

Raviprabhu said he worked as a housekeeper in star hotels in Bengaluru, but now, he pulls joyrides at the Marina. He blamed his friends for his current situation for having misled and cheated him of all his savings. Raviprabhu is a widower who used to stay with his sister who is married into an Anglo-Indian family. But, after a quarrel with his sister, he moved to Chennai. “I went to Kodambakkam where my family used to live when I was seven and then came to the Marina. I was wandering here for two days and later this joyride owner, who lives in Nochikuppam quarters, offered me work,” said Raviprabhu.

He has been pulling joyrides for three weeks now and makes Rs 200 on a weekday and Rs 300 on weekends. He sleeps under the joyride in the night, takes bath in the common toilet, eats food at Amma Canteen. Raviprabhu has a soft corner for former CM J Jayalalithaa for her schemes like Amma Canteen and also because of the fact that she hailed from Bengaluru.

Having had enjoyed the Bengaluru weather, Raviprabhu said he does not like the weather in Chennai. Also, he has no friends in the city and is not interested in making any either as he had already been ruined by his previous friends.

Raviprabhu has a son who is in the first-year of pre-university course (PUC), but he has not decided about returning to Bengaluru yet. He wants to return and is hoping that her sister would soon come looking for him.

N Paramasivam

The Sunday morning that we met Paramasivam, we found him sitting on the service road with a cold drink in one hand, and a Tamil magazine on the other. He introduced himself as N Paramasivam and proudly added that his initial stands for both his mother and father’s names – Nallammal and Natarajan.

He did not want to reveal his age because it would him feel old. “I want to stay young forever, live beyond 100 years and do many things to reform the society,” he said. But, he does not want to reveal the details of his hometown as it may embarrass his family, especially because they are well off. “You can say I used to be farmer,” he told this newspaper.

Paramasivam said he left home after his children tried to poison him and travelled across the country. Whenever he comes to Chennai, he stays on the Marina. He refused to share whether he intends to stay there or move on to some other place.

Paramasivam said that being separated from his from his has given him the freedom to think. “I’m not interested in making money and going for a walk at the beach. People who work cannot think. They can excel in their respective fields, but they cannot excel as human beings. Everything needs to change, right from my village, Chennai, this Marina beach and then the national capital. People should start thinking freely and not be confined to the routine,” he said.

Poor eating habits has taken its toll on Paramasivam and he walks with the help of a crutch. He depends on Kapaleeshwarar temple in Mylapore and Parthasarathy temple in Triplicane for food. But on being asked why someone who thinks profoundly and wants to change everything lives at the beach, he said, “I think this way because I live here. To think about reforming poor, you should experience poverty. Had I been living in my hometown in my bungalow, these thoughts would never have occurred to me.”