A Market That Refuses to Fade
Had it stood, it would have completed 125 years in November this year. Moore Market however still remains, forty years after a disastrous fire engulfed it, as an evergreen memory. It is just that I find with some digging, that there were clearly two views about it – the roseate nostalgic one, and the other, more based on reality, of an urban facility that was a byword for chaos and many malpractices. These contrasting perceptions together define Moore Market’s place in Madras history and explain why memories of it remain so sharply divided even today.
From Popham’s to Loane’s Square
Planned as the central market for the city after Popham’s in Broadway was condemned as unsanitary, work on it began in 1898 and was completed in November 1900, when Governor Sir Arthur Havelock threw it open. The earlier market, named after the man who planned out Broadway, was demolished and a park, the acme of Victorian ideals in planning, was laid out in its place. It was named Loane’s Square, after SJ Loane, the then Corporation engineer, and is today known as Sriramulu Park.
Architecture and Ambition
The new facility, built alongside Central Station, was named after Lt. Col. Sir George Moore, President of the Madras Corporation in 1898. Built at a cost of 26,000 Pounds, Moore Market had 291 stalls and occupied a vast site measuring 350 feet by 240 feet. Designed as a rectangle around an open central courtyard, it allowed free circulation of air and light. The Indo-Saracenic structure had an outer verandah with arches leading inside, and sections for vegetables, meat, fish, poultry, provisions and other goods.
When Reality Took Over
That may have been the plan, but what emerged was a haven for second-hand, spurious and often stolen goods. A benign or negligent administration watched but never acted. Official reports confined themselves to statistics on stall occupancy, rent collection and upkeep expenses. To understand how badly Moore Market functioned, one has to turn to popular writing. An article by Sa Viswananathan in Ananda Vikatan in 1962 vividly describes the chaos, the grey population of itinerant vendors and the frightening experience that awaited the unwary shopper.
A Shopper’s Nightmare
If you touched something, it was considered sold. If you argued, a group would form around you and force the sale. The market was notorious for products that did not work or were branded only in name. Kothamangalam Subbu’s Thillana Mohanambal contains a brilliant passage on Moore Market at its worst, though it did not make it into the film. Since the novel is set in the 1920s and 1930s, it suggests that degeneration had already set in by then, with rural visitors cheated the most.
Symbol of Urban Decay
By 1962, when Anubhavi Raja Anubhavi was made, Moore Market had become, in Kavignar Kannadasan’s eyes, a symbol of all that was wrong with the city. In the song Madras, Nalla Madras, he included the line “Ooru Kettu Ponadukku Mooru Market Adaiyalam.” The vendors rose in protest and demanded an apology. Kannadasan refused to budge, standing by his portrayal of Moore Market as a byword for decay and disorder.
Fire, Clearance and Aftermath
Administrative negligence, lawlessness typical of vending zones and public apathy together sealed Moore Market’s fate. With the railways needing land to expand and hawkers refusing to move, the great fire — the first of many that would consume Madras heritage buildings — proved convenient. Vendors were shifted to the poorly planned Lily Pond Complex, built on a filled-up lake. Perhaps only book lovers and gramophone record collectors truly mourned Moore Market’s passing, even as the building itself paid the ultimate price.
A Hard-Learned Lesson
Surviving photographs show Moore Market could have been repurposed beautifully as a suburban railway terminus, with additional structures behind it. But years of mismanagement had taken it to a point where only catastrophe enabled change. One silver lining remains. Moore Market, and other lost heritage buildings, forced a shift in thinking. Today, heritage structures in the city are no longer demolished with such impunity, and their loss has made Madras at least somewhat more careful with what remains.
This article appeared in The Hindu- https://www.thehindu.com/news/cities/chennai/the-two-faces-of-chennais-moore-market/article70404074.ece
My book, Chennai, A Biography can be ordered-http://- https://sriramv.com/2021/12/27/how-to-buy-autographed-copies-of-chennai-a-biography-from-outstation/
