Who's that serious-faced little girl?

She is now the Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu. Again

Who Would Have Guessed?:Tamil Nadu Chief Minister J. Jayalalithaa (extreme right, front row) as a fourth grade student of Bishop Cotton Girls' High School in 1957.—

As All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK) Chief J. Jayalalithaa was being sworn in again as Tamil Nadu Chief Minister, a small circle of people in this city, who once knew her as a wide-eyed little girl with pigtails, excitedly recalled those days.One of them, Stella Samuel told this reporter: “I can help you find a group photograph with her in it, shot in 1957. She was in her fourth grade then.”

Dr. Samuel is a former Principal of the 140-year-old Bishop Cotton Girls' High School in the city, where Ms. Jayalalithaa studied from nursery to grade four.

The photograph

Dr. Samuel then directed this reporter to another century-old institution — EGK and Son Photo Studio on Church Street. Several phone calls later, E.G. Chandan, the studio's 71-year-old, third-generation proprietor, located what we were looking for.

There she was in her school uniform, seemingly detached from the excitement surrounding the photo session. The little girl, last one on the right seated at the front row, is looking away from the camera lens even as most of the remaining 35 are focussing intently at it.

The caption names her as Jayalalitha Jayaram. Numerological considerations behind the extra ‘a' came decades later.