B.K.S. Iyer wakes up at 5 am to the strains of suprabatham by M.S. Subbulakshmi. The next on his playlist is Bhaja Govindam, as he paces his balcony for the newspaper to land. He has heard Rajaji’s introduction to the song in his impeccably Tamil accent a million times and yet he gets goosebumps when the great man intones: “Knowledge, when it becomes fully mature, is bhakti. If it does not get transformed into bhakti, such knowledge is useless tinsel. To believe that jnana and bhakti, knowledge and devotion, are different from each other, is ignorance.” Mrs Iyer has served up steaming idlis, virginal white coconut chutney and a wee bit of the more vile molagapudi. His tiffin is packed and Mr Iyer, of slight build and quiet demeanour, is off to work, clad in his bush shirt and pant. Depending on the city, his boss is a Punjabi or a Marwari or a Gujarati, always a man, who employs him for, as Mr Iyer is meek and honest, he means no trouble.