Burning bright

Unique hobbies

Ever seen an oil lamp designed to be mounted on or fastened to the front of a bicycle? All one needs to do is light the wick in the lamp before hitting the road. Widely used by cyclists on city roads four to five decades ago, this oil head lamp is in Svan Krishna Murthy’s prized collection of oil lamps.

   Krishna’s collection includes a variety of lamps regularly used in houses and shops, on choppy seas, by the roadside and in the fields on the countryside. While most of Krishna’s 80 odd lamps are carefully preserved in his hometown in Chitradurga, he has many of them adorning his home and office space here.

  Krishna says that he has carefully picked up every lamp in his collection. “I am drawn to anything that is antique. As a child, I used to collect stamps and matchboxes during my stay in Chitradurga. When I moved to Bengaluru, I saw these oil lamps. Many of them were discarded as scrap. I would pick them up from people who didn’t want them while sometimes my friends would hand over those they didn’t want,” he recollects.

   Krishna explains that he has bought some of the lamps from Sunday bazaars and from the narrow lanes of Chennai, Mumbai, Hyderabad and Delhi. “You find the rarest of lamps in Sunday markets. It is an expensive hobby but I don’t mind paying a little extra to pick up something rare,” he says. 

   Krishna’s collection is indeed an impressive one with a few lamps as old as 100 years. The lamp that needs special mention is a mud one that can hold more than four to five litres of oil and burn continuously for three days. There are also lanterns that were specifically used in horse-drawn carriages, bullock carts and lit in front of houses. “I bought a red, green and white lamp which was manufactured in 1920 and shipped from London. This lamp was used on ships as a sign of their arrival or departure. I brought this from Hyderabad. There’s another lamp which, when lit, will glow in different colours,” shares Krishna.

  He has lamps made from silver, bronze, stainless steel and glass. “These lamps are regularly maintained by my mother Shobha and wife Ashwini. They polish them, dust them regularly and help maintain them in good shape,” he adds.  

  Krishna hastens to talk about a special lamp that can store upto 100 litres of oil. “This was extensively used in villages, in households with large families. It still works perfectly,” he says.

 This is not just a hobby for Krishna. He also spends quality time reading about these lamps and documenting their history. “I am just as curious as anyone else, to know the origin of these lamps and read about them. I would like to hold an exhibition of these lamps someday,” he says in an excited tone. 

   Krishna says the advent of the modern and electric lamps has indeed relegated these beautiful oil lamps to history. “My hobby is also an attempt to revive these oil lamps and keep the flame burning bright,” shares Krishna.


(Krishna can be reached on [e-mail])