When I first met Aravindan in 2014, he was working for The Hindu Tamil. I was meeting journalists from various publications in Chennai and he was one of the people who wanted to speak to me. When he was informed that the interview would be a short one, he politely refused to engage and asked if we could meet later for a long-form interview. This was quintessential Aravindan.

He was never interested in superficial conversations that did not go below the surface. A person of depth and nuance, his every question was layered and allowed for passages in various directions. He made you pause, think and, at times, forced you to add subtlety to your opinions and positions. Aravindan was a thinker who could not tolerate flatness in intellectual activity and would convey this to you with a probing question that would be accompanied by a smile or a chuckle.

Within a few months of our first meeting, Aravindan reviewed a music film titled One in which I had sung. The film was about listening to Karnatik music in its barest form when the musician was in the wilderness. Today, with the advent of mobile cameras and other technological advancements, such videos are often seen on Instagram. But, at that time it was a pathbreaking effort.

What Aravindan saw in the film was something........

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