Petchi Thangavel

Forty-one years ago, in October 1979, Veera Chinnammal was on her deathbed. She told her daughter-in-law, “Pappa, a year from now, you will deliver a girl. Name her Petchi, after our family goddess, Petchiamman.”

A year later, on Diwali day, Pappa had a normal delivery, although a C-section had been planned. Her husband, Thangavel, was thrilled; his smile stretched beyond his mustache! The neighbors wondered why he was so happy at the birth of a girl.

They named the daughter Petchi.

Says Petchi, now 40, “the prediction of my birth, and my being born on Diwali day are indications that I am not only lucky; but also blessed.”

Thangavel starts his day at 5 a.m. With gunny bags full of saleable stock on his back, he hunches forward. Physically thin, he walks alongside his rented tricycle from the wholesale to the retail market, covering four kilometers every day. Pappa accompanies her husband, unloading the bags and segregating the vegetables into small saleable pieces.

“I remember those tough times during the Pongal. We never celebrated the festival because my parents were busy selling sugarcane. And my parents would get infected by the sheath and blade of the cane.”

Petchi was the seventh child; her parents lost five earlier. Thangavel was 45, and Pappa 35 when Petchi was born. Her elder brother, Thangaiyya, the couple’s second kid and the only other survivor discontinued his studies to help Thangavel at work.

“I still recall we did not lock our homes until my brother got married. There was nothing there of value except used utensils and old books.”

Poverty did not stop Pappa and Thangavel from showing love and care for their children. Working 14 hours a day, the couple would return by 7 p.m. “Many times, we would go asleep hungry before my parents came. Then, the next morning, we would come to know that Amma had fed us when we had slept.”