THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Government Central High School, Attakkulangara, is older than the oldest tree at its campus. As the trees and the school’s oldest building are about to be razed by Thiruvananthapuram Development Authority (TRIDA) for a bus bay-cum-shopping complex project, several associations including Heritage Walk, Tree Walk, Indus Cycling Embassy and School Samrakshana Samithi met at the campus on Sunday to reminiscence the former glory of the school.
A wooden panel displayed on the oldest school building shows that the school should have started at least in 1889. However, its history can be traced back to 1880 according to Achuthshankar S Nair, Director, Centre for Bioinformatics, University of Kerala. Armed with a yellowed ‘Government Central High School Centenary Souvenir’, he said that T Marthandan Thampy, known by the name Pulaya Thampy, established the institution as a primary school. In 1889, it became a high school. However the name was changed to Central High School only in the 1950s.”
Six portraits of the school’s illustrious teachers were found inside the 1889 building, he shared. These included poet Ulloor S Parameswara Iyer, former Chief Minister Pattom Thanu Pillai and reformer Sahodaran Aiyappan.
Among the school documents which Kerala Council for Historic Research classified a year ago, a register signed by Ulloor was also present, according to Anitha Sharma, coordinator, Tree Walk. To preserve the schools history, these documents would have to be digitised, and shifted, she said.
The oldest building is now lying unused. According to members of the School Samrakshana Samithi, the headmistress’s office had to be shifted a couple of years ago, as the building had started to wither. They say that Corporation had stopped providing maintenance funds since 2004. Even before TRIDA project, there have been attempts to use school land for non-educational purposes, according to Saji Kumar, member of School Samrakshana Samithi.
“ In the eighties, the school students had staged protests, when KSRTC wanted a portion of the school land. In 1985, I was part of another strike, demanding that buses should not block the school gate. The school had a strength of 2,000 students then and KSRTC had to accept our demand,” he said.
The vast, green space of the school, is of great value, said Elizabeth Tharakan, Heritage Walk founder. This is right in the middle of the city, and houses a different world, she said. Tree species like Sage-leaved Alangium and Clammy Cherry, which are not otherwise found in city areas, is growing on the campus. Barn Owl or ‘Vellimoonga’, and a few migratory birds which normally keep away from the city, were some of the 25 species of birds, which a birding group called Warblers and Waders found during a survey here.
In Pune, a two-decade old movement to save a green lung had yielded good results, according to Susheel Kumar, who was associated with Tree Watch, a Pune-based NGO. “ Human activities had resulted in the loss of a lot of trees at Vetal Tekdi, a hill within Pune municipal corporation. To ensure green cover, the people around the place helped with afforestation. Walkers while crossing the hill would water the plants on the way. Later when a road was to be widened, the citizens’ groups protested and the High Court issued a stay order,” he said.
Anitha Sharma said that the government should review the project with alternate long-term plans and withdraw the order transferring land to TRIDA.