A tale of two indians

Posted on February 12, 2012 by murali
In the past month, I read two books with similar settings , but diametricaly oppposite story lines., “the White Tiger ‘ by Arvind Adiga and ‘a tale of two Indians ” by Maharshi Mehta. 
Both the stories are set in rural India and have protagonists struggling to break out of a vicious cycle of poverty, ignorance, casteism and feudalism .
That is where the similarity ends.The white Tiger, from rural Bihar  finds his way to Delhi through cunning and deceit and finally obtains a fortune by murdering his employer. He then goes on to use his ill-gotten wealth to bribe the powers that be and become what he calls an entrepreneur.  
The second story, set in rural Gujrat, follows a course diametrically opposite. Our hero, loses both parents early in life; and he is particularly upset that he could not save his mother as medical help could not reach her in time due to poor roads. Fired by his mission to participate in building good roads in rural areas, he struggles through his way , through sheer grit and handwork to become an engineer in Goverment service. Through out his life he faces more than his quota of  tragedies and yet finds ways to overcome his personal grief by serving his fellowmen. It is also significant that most of the characters in the novel are based on real people , as mentioned in the ‘acknowledgments’. 

The ‘white tiger ‘ won the Man Booker prize, while ‘the tale of two Indians’ is hardly known. Is it necessary to expose the dark underbelly of the country for an Indian work to win an Oscar or a Man Booker prize? 

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The Solitude of Emperors

Posted on December 22, 2011 by murali


Having read Davidar’s first book, it was only natural to pick up his second book, “ The Solitude of Emperors”; to read. It is so different from his first book, yet there are similarities. If caste and racial issues were intertwined in  the earlier plot, communal violence dominates this plot.

The narrator of the story, young Vijay is a budding journalist who , due to sheer boredom of life in a small town in South India, breaks out his cocoon to take up a job with a magazine in Mumbai. Mr Sorabji’s magazine, “The Secularist”,  has a small but dedicated readership of people who share his vision of a secular India.
Mr Sorabji becomes a  father figure for Vijay and he just soaks up the ideas and vision expounded by his mentor. But for Vijay, it is all just abstarct ideas till the time communal violence breaks out in mumbai, following the demolition of Babri masjid. He gets caught up in the violence on the streets and is a mute witness to riots and killings in all the gory details. His magazine runs a major story on the riots and riot victims as part of the campaign for a secular India.
The second part of the book covers Vijay’s experience at the Nilgiris where another disputed Shrine is under attack by the right wing activists. It is here that Sorabji’s manuscript is introduced, from which the title of the book is derived.  The artcle is addressed to the young people of the country for instilling of secular values through a study of the lives of Asoka, the emperor of renunciation, Akbar, the emperor of faith and Gandhi, the emperor of truth.
There are two imposing , well defined characters to cover the two main divergent view points, viz, Mr Sorabji, the editor of ‘The secularist’ and Rajan, the entrepreneur-politician. While Mr Sorabji, believes in convergence of religions for the good of the mankind, Rajan convincingly argues that a strong Hindu rashtra alone can bring in peace and prosperity for all including the minorities.
The most lovable character in the novel, is the  vagabond called Noah, who has seen it  all, done it all , in his ‘ripe’ age of 36 and is now content to live in the local cemetry with his dope, flowers, a dog called’ godless’ and his great collection of contemporary european poetry. While all other characters move on predictable lines, it is this loose canon that adds life to the narration in the second part of the book.
The first part of the novel covering Vijay’s escapades in mumbai is highlighted by a gripping narration with a meticulous eye for details. In the second part, the narration is more like a tourist guide book, with long interruptions by  sermons in history, ie Sorabji’s manuscript on the ’emperors’. Yet there is enough momentum to keep the readers’ interest in the ultimate fate of the shrine. Will it also go the Babri Masjid way and if so with what consequences ?
An immensely readable book, if only for the excellent characterization of Mr Sorabji and Noah.

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Book Review : House of Blue mangoes

Posted on December 8, 2011 by murali

What drew me to the book was that it was set in rural Tamilnadu and that the author was my class-fellow at school. Firstly, about the author, I shall restrict myself to some trivia, which is not in the public domain, since a simple googling of the name can give you more inputs than you can read.
Roll No 605, Bharathi feeder house in 1968, Chera house and finally passed out from Valluvar house in 1975.  In all likelihood, his writing career started with “Nonsense Rhymes” , published in the school magazine, Amarsainik 1968, If my memory serves me right, it went something like this;
there was Mr cork,
who killed a huge hawk,
with a piece of chalk,
………….
In School, David was a voracious reader and he won prizes for recitation, essay writing and short story writing. 
Coming to the book, the story covers three generations of the Dorai family, set in rural Tamilnadu, in the period from 1899 to 1946. These were very turbulent and eventful years that saw more churning, in the political, economical and social life in India , as compared to any period over 2000 years of history.
The main characters are Solomon Dorai, Daniel Dorai and Kannan Dorai, who respond to the challenges of their own generations in the ‘Dorai’ spirit. If the first generation was mired in caste wars, the second was affected by nationalist movement. The third, had to tackle the social churning and the uneasy equations between, Indians, white-men and the Anglo-Indians. There is a portrayal of two strong women , Charity and Lily, who free the Dorai men to pursue their eccentric ways and to nurture their inflated egos, while they themselves toil to keep the family together as much as possible.
Narration is simple and easily flowing, particular when Tamil words are easily interposed, with no annotation, brackets or italics.
…..spinster chithis and decrepit thathas were singing along….
The rural beliefs and way of thinking is conveyed through the characters, without any commentary or moderation.
………Every villager knew that a man didn’t find soil that suited his nature would not prosper. Brahmins thrived on sweet soil, like that found in the delta at the mouth of the river, which is why Subramania Sastrigal and his ambitious young son would never thrive on the astringent soil of Chevathar. They might squeak and flail away at the Dorais but one roar from Solomon would send them scurrying for cover. But surely the kunam of the Vedhars matched the soil of the Chevathar, which was neither sweet nor sour, salty or pungent but fairly bitter-the soil of people of the earth, farmers and artisans……………
Right through the book, the blue mangoes are loved, missed, venerated, glorified; well, the blue mango is more than a fruit; it represents love for one’s native place, மண் வாசனை , family, clan honour, clan spirit and what not.
There is detailed descriptions of well jumping in rural tamilnadu, shikar and life in a tea estate. There is a vivid description of tadpole catching by a little boy, which took me back to our own tadpole catching sprees in the puddles among the rocks between Chera house and the water tank. David was very sharp and I could never catch a single one.
There are many historical events interpolated in the story, and at time it is difficult to separate facts from fiction. 1899 caste riot at Sivakasi, ‘upper-cloth’ wars of Travancore, assassination of Ashe Dorai (the collector of Thirunelvali) are the major events described in the novel. DD mentions in the Author’s note , that he had to invent three new castes so that he did not add to the caste controversies, in Tamilnadu, Kerala and the country at large. The author also says that these castes share some similarities with some of the non-brahmin casstes in the south. I must say , there is more than just some similarities.  I think, in the land of ‘Satyakam’ , we should not be shy of speaking a bitter truth.  David’s ‘Andavar’ is so much like nadars and one of the fictitious castes ,’ vedhar’ sounds so much like ‘dhevar‘  



The acknowledgement section is exhaustive, which goes to show the kind of background research which had gone into writing of the book.
It is definitely a readable book,
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The Lieutenant by Kate Grenville

Posted on September 22, 2011 by murali
On Board the First Fleet that bought convicts to Australia in 1788 was a young lieutenant of marines, William Dawes. Although nominally a soldier, he was a considerable scholar in Austronamy, mathematics and languages. The records left of the language of the indigenous people of Sydney area (Cadigal tribe) is by far the most extensive we have. It contains not only word lists and speculations about the grammatical structure of the language, but conversations between him and the indigenous people, particular a young girl, Patyegarang. 
These are the basic facts , on which the extraordinary life of Lieutenant Daniel Rooke is based, in the book ‘The Lieutenant ‘ by Kate Grenville. Most of the characters are based on the accounts of the first settlers in New South Wales (NSW) .   It is interesting to note that, all cadigal words and conversations quoted in the book have been taken verbatim from Dawes’ language notebooks.
The story describes the clash of civilizations, when the white man meets the natives of Sydney, NSW.  For the white man, be it the marines or the convicts (declared unfit to live in the civilized world of Europeans), the natives were simply savages, though for Lieutenant Rooke, it was difficult to say who was more civilized. The author compares the two peoples, through the eyes of Lieutenant Rooke, not based on the advancement in science and technology and standard of living , but based on quality of life and from a linguistic point of view.

At one point of time, The linguist in Rooke is so excited , when he discovers that the cadigals had different words for “You and me’, ‘all of us’ or “me and these others but not you’, all embedded in the pronoun !While English makes only the crudest of distinctions, the natives were a race of people using a language as supple as that of Sophocles and Homer”

The xenophobic and culturally blind Europeans have caused  untold miseries to natives of america, and Australia. When you think of the word ‘holocaust’ what comes to mind is the history of Jews. But there has been a holocaust on much larger scale, perpetrated by the then civilized world. It has been estimated that by the seventeenth century, more than 50 million native Americans perished as a result of war, disease, enslavement, and deliberate brutalities of Europeans.

Who is a savage, what is savagery ? A savage is considered “A brutal and vicious person”. But don’t seemingly civilized people act more cruelly to their own fellowmen ?  A scene in the novel, illustrates the point. The entire British marine forces form up in their ceremonial  best, for a punishment parade. A man who had stolen potatoes from the garden was being flogged methodically, mercilessly, till his back is reduced to a bloody pulp, all in the name of impartial justice and iron discipline. There is only one person on the scene who sees just ‘cruelty’  and nothing else. He is the only one  dares to protest and he is a native whom they call a savage.

Nothing tells more about a civilization than its untranslatable words.  I quote from the book ;
————–
“She went over to the fireplace and held out her hands to the coal…Then she pressed his fingers with her own….He felt her skin warm and smooth….. Their hands were of the same temperature now.
“Putuwa”, she said.
From her gestures and actions he deduced that word ‘putuwa’ to mean warming one’s hands by the fire and then squeezing gently the fingers of another person. In English it required a long rigmarole of words….. Tagaran was teaching him a word and by it she was showing him a world”
—————

A very interesting book indeed !

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Women, Work and Identity

Posted on August 11, 2011 by murali
–>

     I have always wondered how the gen-next is going to handle the issues of family , work and gender-equality. About 25 years back, women still had an honorable, socially acceptable designation as ‘housewife’ or home maker’.  Today, even if they call it ‘CEO , Home Inc”, there would be no takers for the title. 
       Women do need an identity, outside their home, just as men have always needed. Even in my 32nd year of service, I can’t say enough is enough. I keep hearing  “What do you plan to do for a second career. ?”
        Read a book, ‘When Work Doesn’t Work Anymore’ by Elizabeth Perle Mckenna. This book was written in 1997, but is just right for the social scenario in India today. It is about a successful career woman, who after 20 years of relentless pursuit of success on ‘man’s terms’ realizes there was  something missing in her life despite achieving everyone of  the goals she set for herself in personal and professional sphere. She still liked her work alright, had what she calls ‘rock solid marriage’; yet this was not what she had thought her life would be like.

Just as the title is, there are a number of interesting oneliners  to describe the situation of women today.  


Some examples:

“ women soon realized, going to work involved having to work” 

“without the privileges or good financial rewards, work was just that – work.”

“ and worse, women are faulting themselves for not being enough of what they don’t even want to be”

“she has arrived at what she calls her ‘something gotta give period’ which means either her career or her personal life is going to get smaller for the good of the other”

     The author narrates the stories of women with similar predicaments, to illustrate each point she makes. Then there is a liberal dose of Gloria Steinem (GS) Quotes to add weight to her case.

        Today, women have entered every field, well, almost every field, and have tasted success in every field they have ventured into. But after, working for 20-30 years, in a man’s world , playing by the rules set by men, there is a kind of emptiness. There is a  perceived sense of failure, which is best expressed in the words of  GS, ” If you meet a woman who’s doing wonderfully well professionally, doing great creative things and is completely happy with her work, but does not have the personal life she thinks she should have, she may think she is a failure. Men are the reverse. They can have great personal lives, and think they are failures if they don’t have the job success they think they are supposed to have.”

      Another GS Quote from the book ‘ The working world remains a place built for men with full time wives to take care of the rest of the life’. In the present times men are also equally handicapped to succeed in such a working world. Talking of full time wives, the Indian scene is indeed quite confusing. There are housewives/home makers, ladies and  working women who may be categorized as full time wives, part-time wives or of any shade in a broad spectrum.

      Years ago, I saw a hand bill  inviting ‘housewives, working women, and ladies ‘ to join a computer training course. After some deliberation, I translated ‘housewives, working women and ladies’ to mean ‘women who work only at home, women who could work also at home and women who wouldn’t work even at home’

         The last category is possible in India , thanks to affordable domestic help. That is where the ‘CEO, Home Inc.’ steps in.


Recently I read an indian version of similar ideas in HT http://www.hindustantimes.com/Kamla-comes-home/Article1-719214.aspx

        The book is a good read for any woman looking to balance work life and personal life. Another quote from GS ” I still get young women in audiences, asking,’How can I combine career and family?’ I always tell them, ‘you can’t until men are asking that question too ‘.” Well, men  will start asking such questions , if only they are allowed to go easy on their work life, by the society, family and themselves.

     For whatever reason, men haven’t made much progress in work-family balance. At best you have the cooperative husband who is prepared to put up with cold dinners or even no dinner, cheerfully. Don’t expect him to cook or wash for the whole family. On the other side is the prickly type (no pun intended) who simply cannot accept any situation where the woman is not at home.
         Let’s say, one has decided on how much to give to one’s career, still there is a need to decide the time line. There are two schools of thought; one is to first establish yourself in your work place and then raise a family. The other is to take a break, complete your family and then get back to the rat race .

           Unfortunately, a woman’s most productive years coincide with her reproductive years as well. Oh God ! isn’t there any easy decisions at all in life?

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Denial of the Soul

Posted on July 26, 2011 by murali

       A disclosure to begin with; Dr Peck has been one of my favourite authors, (a psychologist /philosopher /motivator ), I tend to agree with most of his ideas (not a good thing for independent thinking). Moreover, having been through “Road less travelled”, “Further along Road less travelled” and Road less travelled and beyond”, most of the anecdotes and case histories are so familiar.

           The title reminds you of of CG Jung’s “Modern man in search of a soul” It is always exciting when Physics, Metaphysic, Psychology and Parapsychology meet, like in “Tao of Physics”
            The book covers the medical and spiritual aspects of Euthanasia and mortality. During our lifetime, we inevitably have to endure physical suffering such as pain, sickness, injury, tiredness, old age, and eventually death; and we have to endure psychological suffering like sadness, fear, frustration, disappointment, and depression.
           It starts with an analysis of physical pain. There is good pain and bad pain , short term pain and chronic pain and there are gradations in severity of pain. After all the first step to relieve pain is to study pain. Here, we are introduced to the concept of palliative care and hospice, which focus on pain management rather than cure.  While physical pain is more talked about, it is the emotional pain that Dr Peck considers more relevant to the issue of Euthanasia.

            There are many ideas which wouldn’t go well with the scientific fraternity; I quote,

           “The question is not merely “what is the name of the disease ? but whether the disorder is purely biological or purely psychological or a mixture of the two. If it is a mixture, which is the case as often as not, what are its proportions ? 50-50, 90-10 , or 10-90 ?Social and spiritual factors must be considered. I could argue that almost all diseases are bio-psycho-socio-spiritual disorders”

(Doctors are obsessed with disease and disorders… A corollary to the above statement implies that well being means ‘physical, mental, social and spiritual well being)

      After Physical and Emotional pain , the author goes on to Social and Spiritual aspects of Euthanasia. There is a chapter on Secularism. While Indian secularism implies going to every place of worship, the American secularism, stays away from all religions.
        Some of the terms discussed are ‘pulling the plug’, ‘double effect’, (relieving pain by increasing the dosage of painkiller, while risking speedy progression of the disease) , ‘Physician assisted suicide’, ‘passive euthanasia’, and ‘right to death on demand’.
      The author is not against Euthanasia,but against playing ‘God’. He is just apprehensive about two things in particular; firstly, the inconsistent nature of medical cover in US and secondly, the rampant secularism. Specifically he is concerned about a number of things like not debating enough about euthanasia, leaving out the spiritual aspects in the discussions, and finally letting the economic aspects decide framing of laws, since it is the Insurance companies which are most affected by any law on Euthanasia.
       He concludes that, in the absence of widespread debate on the issue, the nation might be mislead. It is likely that legal experts, medical experts and insurance companies who are averse to take into consideration any spiritual and emotional aspects, decide the fate of patients who, by and large believe in some kind of God.

       Everything discussed in he book is morbid and it definitely jolts you, and yet it leaves you with a clearer and lighter frame of mind, in the end.

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Gates of Fire

Posted on July 2, 2011 by murali
Read a book Gates of Fire by Steven Pressfield, a historical novel based on the battle of Thermopylae. It is a nice mix of fact and fiction , the drama just enough to smoothen the rough edges and to add a little spice to a simple battle report.

Of course the victors write the history and it would be worth remembering the words of Mark Twain

“The very ink with which all history is written is merely fluid prejudice.”

Though over 2500 years have passed since, the Spartan culture , governed by the laws of Lycurgus continues to inspire and influence military minds, particularly the spartan way of training for war.

The story is narrated in the words of a low ranking person in the Spartan society helot / Squire. It reminds me of another great book on written by a German private , one of the best books I have read on World War – II, “A Forgotten Soldier” by Guy Sager .These books paint a broad brush on the macro events while concentrating on the innermost emotional experiences of soldiers during war and what soldiers call minor tactics or battle craft.

The language used is not scholarly but simple narrative style. Even a profound statement is reduced to simple words. During a lull in the battle a non Spartan tells the Spartans , “I now realize that all the drill and discipline you Spartans love to pound into each other’s skulls were really not to inculcate skill or art, but only to produce this glue that bind a unit together”

” Only to produce this glue”; The words ring true even today. In military academies they talk of camaraderie, team spirit and bonding which are nothing but the quantity and quality of ‘this glue’. At least in infantry battles it this ‘glue’ which decides the outcome, even in the 21st century.

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Fifth and the last part of ‘Books, Books and books..’.

Posted on May 29, 2011 by murali

Regimental soldiers’ always looked down upon ‘book worms’, yet the Schools of Instructions in the Services like to project an image of Scholar-Warriors. There is a nice promotional video clip on the subject and it is even available on the you tube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=muY3TF1lcmk
But God knows that you cannot do much profound thinking with a 2 kg steel helmet on your head and as an infantry soldier soldier you are more concerned about the well being of your knees than your head.

Be that as it may, Schools of Instruction like National Defence Academy, Army War College, National Defence College , and College of Defence Management boast of great libraries. These institutions get massive budgetary allotments for library and the funds are well utilized to build up quality collections on Political Science, Geopolitics , Defence Startegy, Counter-Insurgency and Counter-Terrorism. And of course , there would be an equally good collection on Psychology, Philosophy, Sociology and Self improvement.

At Armoured Corps Centere and School, I literally feasted on the history of Tank battles, by Liddel hart, Guderian, and Manstein. The effect of this reading on my grades was adverse if any; after all wide reading and army grades don’t go together.


To sum up I have always been impressed with army libraries and my stay in a cantonment has always been enriched by regular visits to these libraries. It is not just the books, but the ambiance, as well. They are clean, well maintained and are surrounded by vast open spaces and plenty of greenery.
Here is a picture of St Peter’s Anglican Church, at Fort William , Kolkata, built in 1784 in the Gothic style. It is presently the Eastern Command Command Library . The biblical saga narrated in the medium of stained glass is one of the finest in the country.

Today, I am glad that I chose to settle down at Mhow, with three good libraries in a radius of 2 km .






http://mi59.blogspot.com/2011/01/books-books-and-books-iii.html

http://mi59.blogspot.com/2011/05/books-books-and-books-iv-regimental.html

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Books Books and Books – IV : Regimental officers don’t read, they are soldiers first !

Posted on May 28, 2011 by murali

My first place of posting was Mizoram. In field area, units usually stock up the kind of books best read when you are ‘soldiering’. We too had such a collection in our officers mess library and there were officers whose only favourite author was ‘anonymous’

We moved to Lucknow shortly where we had the Central Command Library. But it was meant for the oldies. Young officers , at least in those days were expected to be seen only in the sports fields or the training area. After all, unlike cadets, the officers did not even have an academic curriculum to worry about. Yes, the promotion exams were there, but they could be cleared through a combination of ‘kunji’ , smartness and timely support from helpful invigilators. Ostensibly to inculcate the habit of reading, the higher headquarters used to demand monthly submission of book reviews by every officer. As the report date neared, my stock value increased as I could pick up the nearest respectable looking book (can’t write about anonymous , you see) , flip through a few pages and produce an ‘ okay’ review. But, I must say, there were guys who could write a review even without a look at the book; mind you those were ‘netless’ days. When I was senior enough to groom young officers , I used to give them a long list of books to read, on their arrival in the unit and today I can say , everyone of them has benefited from that.
So by and large I read whatever was available in the regimental libraries. Sometimes when co-located with higher headquarters you had a wider choice of reading. Most of these libraries had a big chunk of collection on military science, then popular authors like, Arther Hailey, Sydney Shelden, John Gresham, Irving Wallace, Leon Uris, Robin Cook, Wilbur Smith, Robert Ludlum, Ken Follet, and Frederik Forsyth . There were certain books generally found in most regimental libraries ; biographies of military leaders, books by John Masters, Manohar Malgaonkar, and of course books on second world war. Barring the books on military science, it looks like a typical bookstore at a railway Station or Airport. Well life in Army is indeed like a palace on wheels; even the books we read conform to the idea.
http://mi59.blogspot.com/2011/01/books-books-and-books-iii.html
http://mi59.blogspot.com/2011/05/fifth-and-last-part-of-books-books-and.html
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Books, books and books-III

Posted on January 24, 2011 by murali
After leaving the School, I had a brief stint at Loyala College Chennai, for about four months before I joined the NDA. The college library was good but it did not have an open access system. You had to consult the catalog , fill out a slip giving your choice of books and at the end of the day, the books were issued, if available. You could also reserve a book if it was under issue. Well, it was difficult to pick up a book by just the title and the author, unless you had seen the book before. Moreover, one missed the pleasure of physical browsing of books. Its like ordering a pizza on telephone as compared to placing an order after leisurely taking in the sights and sounds and aroma in a restaurant.
And it was like a blind date. Once, I filled out a slip “Basic Theories by Freud” and after the classes, I was greeted by a real monster of a book, a hard bound edition , over 1000 pages weighing over a kilo. I had to lug it home , browse through for a few days before lugging it back.
It was a too short a stay at Loyola to settle down to any focused reading.
At NDA, again, there was a very good library, though it was hardly used by the cadets. Firstly cadets had little free time and more importantly, library was simply not considered a ‘hip’ place to be in. In fact during our time it was part of the punishments to spend the Sundays at Library. Defaulters (you did not have to do much to be labeled a defaulter; a button of slightly different shade, or a twisted lace in your boots can fetch you 7 or even 14 restrictions). Each day of ‘restriction’ included a run in the evening and 3-4 reportings and on Sundays , it included a library session. It goes without saying, I had my share of ‘restrictions’
It is at NDA that I read all the volumes of complete works of Swami Vivekananda, Biographies of Sri Ramakrishna and Swami Vivekananda by Nikilananda and Romain Rolland , Atmabodh and Kindle Life by Swami Chinmayananda. It is natural that philosophy and psychology are grouped together by librarians,. So my next stop was Psychology. I was particularly interested in Jung; a book I intend revisiting is “modern man in search of a soul”.
No Tamil books here and only fiction I read was ‘historical fiction’. I remember reading everything written by Alexander Solzhenitsyn including some prose poem; Gulag Archipelago, The First Circle, Cancer Ward, The Love-Girl and the Innocent, August 1914, One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich. To sum up, for whatever reason, it was all serious reading and just no fun reading. May be I equated serious stuff with English and it was much later that I read books like PG Wodehouse.




http://mi59.blogspot.com/2011/05/books-books-and-books-iv-regimental.html
http://mi59.blogspot.com/2011/05/fifth-and-last-part-of-books-books-and.html

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