George N. Netto

Twists and turns

He was the epitome of physical fitness: tall, lean and ramrod straight.

Jeeves, albeit Indian

It was Somerset Maugham who observed that American women expect to find in their husbands a perfection that English women only look for in their butle

A true conservationist

Few are aware that the path snaking into the heart of Munnar’s Eravikulam National Park is known as the “Gouldsbury Track”...

Tea times

Growing up in Munnar in the ’50s, we loved nothing more than a visit to the nearby tea factory.

Hollow words

En route to Munnar, Kerala’s premier hill-resort, one comes across several signboards with pious exhortations...

Bright sparks

As children growing up in Munnar, nothing enchanted us more than watching Ahmed, the knife-grinder, at work.The moment we espied his stooped figure...

Counterfeit Brit

Invitably, the Raj threw up a crop of brown sahibs in Munnar. The BS, or desi version of the British tea planter, epitomised all that was British and

Hunter’s bond

During the Raj few bonds were stronger than those forged between Munnar’s shikar-loving British tea planters and the local Muduvans, their tribal trac

Birds of a feather

The serenade starts at dawn — usually led by the soulful warbling of a thrush or the cooing of a dove.

A pioneering feat

It’s a feat unmatched in the annals of Indian wildlife history. Records show that in 1892 the Scottish pioneers who opened up Munnar’s tea estates suc

Trophies from the Raj

On a May evening in 1970, a planter in Munnar crouched in a ‘machan’ over the half-eaten carcass of a cow, expecting a panther to return to its ‘kill’

Beware of wild dogs

The other day on my evening walk outside Munnar, I rounded a bend to find two wild dogs loping towards me...