About two decades back, Anaikatti was a hilly hamlet with a rustic flavor. There used to be just a handful of houses, majority of them with tiled roofing and a typical backyard adorned with washing stones, cement water tanks, and aluminum mugs. While all these used to be a common sight those days, what was special about these houses was the sight behind their backyard.
The backyard would open up to a valley of sorts, with a rivulet flowing downstream. Uneven passages, behind each house, slightly more than a foot wide, would take one down the slope, to the waters. During the summer months, the rivulet used to bear the sight of small isolated ponds with thin streams of water connecting them, whereas, during monsoonal rains, a copious amount of water used to gush through.
Farming once used to be the prime source of livelihood, especially, further uphill from Anaikatti, where plantation estates thrived in areas like Sholayur and Kathalakandi. Brick kilns eventually became a lucrative business in around Anaikatti.
The main road in Anaikatti, which reaches up to the Kerala border about a mile away, had a small check post office with a manually operated barricade and a Tahsildhar to monitor the movement of trucks that used to ply to and fro from Kerala. Often timber, firewood, agricultural products, and later on, also bricks used to get transported through trucks. A limited number of state buses and 'Kerala Jeeps' stationed at the border used to ferry people to other destinations in Kerala and the western ghats. The number of vehicles, in all, passing Anaikatti used to be relatively very less.
The village used to have a sober look during the day and the nightfall used to bring the hamlet to silence and sounds of nature, other than the occasional movement of trucks. Hillocks used to have neatly laid plots of farm lands. Cattle rearing over terrain slopes used to be a common sight, yet the fear of wild dogs used to keep herders from not venturing too far away. Apart from the regular festivals celebrated in the Coimbatore region, people in Annaikatti used to take an annual pilgrimage trek to Ramarpadam (a hilltop across Mangarai) and visit Chemmannur Malleswaran temple to get a glimpse of the Malleswaran peak, during Shivratri festivals celebrated by tribals of the region with much pomp.
Anaikatti has always served as a corridor for economic activity in the region, connecting a number of tribal hamlets in the region, located on the borders of Kerala and Tamilnadu. It still continues to be. Anaikatti is also a home to The Nilgiri Biosphere Nature Park, Salim Ali Center for Ornithology and Natural History, Arsha Vidya Gurukulam founded by Swami Dayananda Saraswati, and Karl Kubel Foundation for Child and Family. The once silent hamlet today bustles with frequent movement of vehicles. It also functions as a transit route to tourist destinations in the western ghats. Located at a distance of 26 Km, Anaikatti remains the closest hill getaway within Coimbatore.
While the natural beauty of the western ghats is a sight to cherish, it is also important that it is preserved and animals corridors not violated upon. The growing number of resorts in and around Anaikatti, with some flouting Environmental norms, still remains a concern that needs to be addressed.
The backyard would open up to a valley of sorts, with a rivulet flowing downstream. Uneven passages, behind each house, slightly more than a foot wide, would take one down the slope, to the waters. During the summer months, the rivulet used to bear the sight of small isolated ponds with thin streams of water connecting them, whereas, during monsoonal rains, a copious amount of water used to gush through.
Farming once used to be the prime source of livelihood, especially, further uphill from Anaikatti, where plantation estates thrived in areas like Sholayur and Kathalakandi. Brick kilns eventually became a lucrative business in around Anaikatti.
The main road in Anaikatti, which reaches up to the Kerala border about a mile away, had a small check post office with a manually operated barricade and a Tahsildhar to monitor the movement of trucks that used to ply to and fro from Kerala. Often timber, firewood, agricultural products, and later on, also bricks used to get transported through trucks. A limited number of state buses and 'Kerala Jeeps' stationed at the border used to ferry people to other destinations in Kerala and the western ghats. The number of vehicles, in all, passing Anaikatti used to be relatively very less.
The village used to have a sober look during the day and the nightfall used to bring the hamlet to silence and sounds of nature, other than the occasional movement of trucks. Hillocks used to have neatly laid plots of farm lands. Cattle rearing over terrain slopes used to be a common sight, yet the fear of wild dogs used to keep herders from not venturing too far away. Apart from the regular festivals celebrated in the Coimbatore region, people in Annaikatti used to take an annual pilgrimage trek to Ramarpadam (a hilltop across Mangarai) and visit Chemmannur Malleswaran temple to get a glimpse of the Malleswaran peak, during Shivratri festivals celebrated by tribals of the region with much pomp.
Anaikatti has always served as a corridor for economic activity in the region, connecting a number of tribal hamlets in the region, located on the borders of Kerala and Tamilnadu. It still continues to be. Anaikatti is also a home to The Nilgiri Biosphere Nature Park, Salim Ali Center for Ornithology and Natural History, Arsha Vidya Gurukulam founded by Swami Dayananda Saraswati, and Karl Kubel Foundation for Child and Family. The once silent hamlet today bustles with frequent movement of vehicles. It also functions as a transit route to tourist destinations in the western ghats. Located at a distance of 26 Km, Anaikatti remains the closest hill getaway within Coimbatore.
While the natural beauty of the western ghats is a sight to cherish, it is also important that it is preserved and animals corridors not violated upon. The growing number of resorts in and around Anaikatti, with some flouting Environmental norms, still remains a concern that needs to be addressed.