Dhanushkodi – The Ghostly Seatown With Outlandish Charm
The loco pilot could see absolutely nothing. The only sounds that could be heard were the fierce growling of the winds and the intimidating roar of the seas. The lights and the signal had gone out in the middle of that ominous, chilly night in December 1964. The destination, Dhanushkodi Railway Station, was only a few hundred yards away. With no signal to guide him and no ray of hope to hearten him, the driver of Pamaban-Dhanushkodi Passenger drove the train ahead with 110 passengers and five railway staff including him.
A huge oceanic swish out of the blue! In the glimmering light of the crescent moon, he saw a gigantic tidal wave rising above them like a sea monster…
In a few seconds, the Passenger train submerged into the freshly formed deluge with its 115 passengers! The midnight of 1964 December 22 became a nightmare in history, turning a onetime flourishing township into a ghost town. On that deadly night, when a colossal super cyclone performed a monstrous death dance over the confluence point of the Indian Ocean and the Bay of Bengal at the southeast end of the Indian peninsula, around 1800 people lost their lives.
What culminated on that deadly night was the tragic conclusion of a depression that originated in the South Andaman Sea on 17 December 1964. The depression augmented and eventually turned into a devastating cyclone storm on 19 December. When it hit the seashore town of Dhanushkodi, it had an estimated velocity of 280 kilometers per hour! As it passed through the neighboring town, Rameshwaram, the cyclone triggered tidal waves of 8 yards in height.
Standing in the winds on the seashore of Dhanushkodi approximately six decades after the dreadful super cyclone washed across the ancient township, which once shone with a fairytale beauty, my heart was laden with an undefinable sorrow. Around me on that December evening was a ghostly scenic charm that resembled the netherworld, with the ruins trying to mumble out their old tales of lost glory.
Even while lying silent and subdued in memories of the past, the historic shoreland has an ethereal charm that no words can translate. The ruins of the Christian church, from where sacred chants once rose like the scent of incense, lay dilapidated and roofless like hands outstretched in a forlorn prayer. The altar of the church resembled a primeval cave where unseen doves fluttered their wings. I sharpened my ears: Does a strain of Gregorian chant rise from that mournful silence?
The water caught up in the two-foot diameter pit in front of the church tasted great! How could this strip of shoreline, sandwiched by two salty oceans, have sweet-tasting water? One thing was sure. The life in Dhanushkodi sixty years ago was indeed glorious. What astonished me was the information that Dhanushkodi had a functional higher secondary school in those days! It had a railway station, a post office, port offices, customs, textile shops, hotels, and more. Indeed, it was a well-developed and happening township.
Ferry services connected the ports for Dhanushkodi with Talaimannar village of Sri Lanka (in those days Sri Lanka was known as Ceylon). People and goods were transported across the sea on boats. A train service also existed between Dhanushkodi and Chennai Egmore.
For a recollected traveler, Dhanushkodi offers a peaceful retreat. The pure white shoreline of this ghostly township is always caressed by a serene breeze, which seems like performing reparation for its one-time atrocities that pummeled the shoreland. An ablution in either of the seas, the Indian Ocean, or the Bay of Bengal is a rejuvenating experience. I found the Bay of Bengal comparatively more serene and friendlier than the slightly belligerent Indian Ocean. So, along with the co-tourists, I took an ablution in the turquoise waters of the Bay of Bengal.
Dhanushkodi has a sacred myth behind its name. The word literally means ‘the tip of the bow.’ According to one legend, Lord Rama pointed the tip of his bow toward Lanka, where his spouse Sita was abducted by the Demon King Ravana of Lanka. A bridge was built to the direction over the Indian Ocean by the army of monkeys led by Lord Hanuman. This bridge, which is believed to still exist beneath the sea, is called Rama Setu (Rama’s Bridge).
Another legend is also parallelly prevalent, which argues that this underwater bridge was crossed by Adam, the first human, from Sri Lanka when he was expelled from Paradise. Hence, this bridge is also known as Adam’s Bridge. Sri Lanka is separated from Dhanushkodi shoreland only by a sparse distance of 31 kilometers.
As I was crossing the celebrated Pamban Bridge, one of India’s finest engineering splendors, which connects the Indian Mainland with Rameshwaram town, located on Pamban Island, I was thinking about the fierce courage of those two railway employees, who were hanging on the ruins of Pamban Bridge for about 12 hours while the devastating cyclone was raging across. What must have been that night in their memories and what tales must have they narrated to their grandchildren?
Meanwhile, four radio operators risked their lives to continue live broadcasting from Dhanushkodi and informing the world about the catastrophe. These bravehearts, who survived the night of doom, were later honored by the Government of India for their unparalleled dedication and courage. Dhanushkodi was later declared uninhabitable and earned the sobriquet, ‘Ghostly Town.’
Today, the white sandy expanse of the shoreland is speckled with the shacks of fishermen, earning their livelihood from the catches from the encircling seas. On that solitary night, I stood before one of the shacks, where a fisherman named Arumukhan fried sea fish on a queer stove made out of an old iron drum. The fish tasted satisfying on my tastebuds which were struggling to digest the sad truth of the ruined paradise at that splendid seashore where the moonlight, the seas, and the breeze met in an ethereal charm.
A melancholic, but poetic silence engulfed me as I boarded my car from Dhanushkodi. A chant rising from the Church, a lesson from Shakespeare’s plays rising from the classroom, a letterbox being opened with someone’s heartbeats recorded, a railway siren howling… from the distant past, beyond six decades, when the town was alive and brimming with life.
I turned around and looked back for one last time. The vast expanse of untranslatable outlandish charm lay half submerged in the darkness with untold tales.
Goodbye, Dhanushkodi! Rest in Serenity!
Article by
Abhilash Fraizer
About the Author
Abhilash Fraizer is an Indian author, poet, novelist, journalist, translator and advertising copy writer hailing from Kerala. A Post Graduate in English Language and Literature, Abhilash has authored 14 books and has written numerous poems, stories and articles for various international and Indian journals. His latest work is ‘Father, a collection of poems’, published globally by Wipf & Stock Publishers, Oregon, USA. His other renowned works in English include ‘The End of Wars’, a novel and ‘Everlasting Things are Incomplete’, a collection of poems. Dalamarmaram (The Rustle of Leaves), Paravakalude Vazhi (The Way of Birds), Raamazhayude Theerathu (On the banks of Night Rain), Sajalam (Aqueous) and Prapancha gaatha (The Ballad of the Universe) are some of his noted works in Malayalam, the official language of Kerala.
‘Prapancha gaadha’ won Kreatiff Silver Award for the second-best Novel in 2020. A recipient of multiple accolades, Abhilash has been awarded with KCBC (Kerala Catholic Bishops’ Council) Media Commission’s ‘Yuva Prathibha Award’ in 2014. His poem ‘Between the Islands’ was voted and enlisted among the best 100 poems in a global contest held by Poemhunter.com. A screen writer as well, Abhilash has written scripts for noted Sight and Sound Shows including ‘I Believe’ and ‘Ammamaram’, staged in a major venue in Kochi and were watched by over 50,000 people. He has also written scripts for various television programs and lyrics for about 50 songs, which have been recorded for various albums. He lives in Ernakulam, Kerala with his wife Sunitha and two sons Ezek and Izan.