The biographical work ‘Viriah’ tells the story of a young Kapu boy from Korlapadu in Krishna district who leaves home after a domestic quarrel and by a quirk of fate, takes a ship to Durban, imagining it to be the Promised Land. He joins thousands of others like him from India, who slogged endlessly on the sugarcane plantations of the fertile African soil in the harshest conditions.
In the course of narrating this rivetting story, he also brings out the pains and pleasures, the lows and the highs that the coolies pass through in an alien land, even as they outgrow their misery, find little pleasures of life and gradually settle down with a family.
The well-written book is worth a read for all those interested in the history of Telugu immigration, much before the US became the most sought after destination.
Ramesh Kandula