Chandy

80 years ago

I lived in the city, Thiruvanathapuram, the capital of erstwhile Travancore State, now a part of Kerala. We attended a girl’s school quite far from our residence. In the morning we used to go by jutka, a horse drawn carriage. In the evening we walked carrying our books. It was not like the present day,,when students have to carry a heavy load when they go to school. Travancore state was ruled by a Maharaja with the help of the dewan (prime minister). It was not directly under the British rule. There was a British resident posted to the state.

The money that was used then was called the sarkar rupee. 16 kaash made one chakram, 4 chakram, made 1 panam and 7 panams made a rupee.The rupee and panam were made of silver and chakram and kaassh of copper We also had British rupee. That was valued at 28 ½ chakram. We did a lot of Arithmetic sums changing sarkar rupee to British rupee and paisas and vice versa. As you can imagine, that was not easy,.It was tough!!!!Later the monetary system was changed to rupees, annas and paisas.

# posted by R C @ 7:47 pm