Can We See As Far As Sampati?

Mark Cocker , The Guardian, January 19 2013:

"... Indians have learned the hard way about the generosity of vultures, because in the 1990s they started unwittingly to kill off 40 million of them with a veterinarian's painkiller called diclofenac (given to working animals to reduce joint pain so as to make them work longer). Juniper details the chain of unforeseen consequences. Not only did the loss of the birds' sanitary service give rise to a mountain of cattle carcasses, it also triggered a vast increase in the dog population which, in turn, caused 40 million more dog bites and 47,000 additional deaths from rabies. The total bill for losing the nation's spiralling flock of avian scavengers has been calculated at $34 billion..."

I have never been able to forget one sight from the period 1988-1989.

My work-colleague and I were walking down the then considerably leafy Gangapur Road (गंगापूर रस्ता) in Nashik (नाशिक)  towards Someshwar (सोमेश्वर) around 7 am.

There in the middle of the road we saw a big wake (a group of vultures) feasting on an animal carcass. We both were taken aback, a bit scared. We stood and watched the scene for a while and moved on reluctantly.

Later we reached our destination and took in the pristine beauty of river Godavari (गोदावरी) but I couldn't take my mind off the earlier awesome sight for many weeks after that.

Vultures while feasting look like humans.

It's a great testimony to rootedness of our epics that Ramayana has two distinguished vultures- Jatayu and Sampati but  NO eagle or peacock! Why isn't vulture India's national bird?

It's claimed in Wikipedia that "the spot where a wounded Jatayu was found by Lord Rama is on the outskirts of the Taaked village in Nashik District."

I have no doubt about the claim because I met his descendants as narrated above in Nashik city only!

'Ravana Mortally Wounds Jatayu' 

Artist: Bhavanrao Shrinivas alias Balasaheb Pandit Pant Pratinidhi (भवानराव श्रीनिवास उर्फ बाळासाहेब पंडित पंत प्रतिनिधी), ruler of Aundh

(for more such pictures visit 'Kamat's Potpourri' here.)

After Jatayu dies, as Rama cremates him ritually, he mourns Jatayu's death in very moving terms:

"या गतिः यज्ञ शीलानाम् आहित अग्नेः च या गतिः |
अ पर आवर्तिनाम् या च या च भूमि प्रदायिनाम् || ३-६८-२९
मया त्वम् समनुज्ञातो गच्छ लोकान् अनुत्तमान् |
गृध्र राज महा सत्त्व संस्कृतः च मया व्रज || ३-६८-३०
एवम् उक्त्वा चिताम् दीप्ताम् आरोप्य पतगेश्वरम् |ददाह रामो धर्मात्मा स्व बन्धुम् इव दुःखितः || ३-६८-३१"

("Oh, greatly mighty king of eagles, by me cremated ritually and by me aptly consented to, you depart to the unexcelled heavenly worlds... you depart to those worlds that are destined for the virtuosos of Vedic-rituals, and to those worlds that are destined for the practisers of ascesis amid Five-Ritual-fires, and to those that are destined for un-retreating combatants, and to those worlds that destined for the donors of lands..." So said Rama to the departed Jataayu. [3-68-29, 30]
On saying that way, that ethical-souled Rama mounted that lord of birds onto the pyre and he sorrowfully incinerated that eagle in a flaring fire of pyre, as he would do in respect of his own deceased relative.  [3-68-31]

from Valmiki Ramayana)


In Pune urban, I haven't cited a single vulture since 1999.

The word vulture (गिधाडे) creates strong negative vibes in Marathi. They became even stronger for me after Vijay Tendulkar's (विजय तेंडुलकर) popular play 'Gidhade' came out.

If Tendulkar had known what Mr. Cocker has said in the quote at the top, he would have thought twice before naming his controversial play.




 'Sampati Points Towards Lanka'

 Artist: Bhavanrao Shrinivas alias Balasaheb Pandit Pant Pratinidhi (भवानराव श्रीनिवास उर्फ बाळासाहेब पंडित पंत प्रतिनिधी), ruler of Aundh

I have always been intrigued by this picture since my childhood.

In the gathering shown,  there are stalwarts like Hanuman, Jambavant, Angada and others but Sampati is shown sitting at the head of the conference table!

Sampati tells the gathering where Sita is. He informs them, sitting there, he can see Sita who is 100 Yojans away from there.

"इह स्थः अहम् प्रपश्यामि रावणम् जानकीम् तथा |
अस्माकम् अपि सौपर्णम् दिव्यम् चक्षुर् बलम् तथा || ४-५८-३१
तस्मात् आहार वीर्येण निसर्गेण च वानराः |आयोजन शतात् साग्रात् वयम् पश्याम नित्यशः || ४-५८-३२"

(Staying here I am clearly seeing Ravana and like that Janaki... even for us eagles, our sight and power will be excellent like that of Garuda, the Divine Eagle... [4-58-31]
Thereby, oh, vanara-s, dietetically and congenitally we eagles can always see till the end of hundred yojana-s, comprehensively... [4-58-32]

from Valmiki Ramayana)


(Although they are classified in the same family Accipitridae,  vultures are NOT descendants of eagles. That is like giving all the credit for the existence of vultures to the eagles!)

What kind of vision have we humans got? How far can we see?


While writing this post I re-read Arun Kolatkar's (अरुण कोलटकर) long poem 'Dron' (द्रोण), 2002. It describes an imaginary victory feast given by Rama in Lanka after his conquest.

The poem is brilliant and funny. ( I especially like the part where monkeys wonder why human females' breasts- unlike their own females'- are so large!)

Page 16 has following:

"...त्या पार्टीला
सगळ्या वानरांना तर आमंत्रण
म्हणजे होतंच अर्थात,

अगदी आवर्जून,
कारण रामाच्या विजयात सिंहाचा वाटा
त्यांचाच तर होता..."

( ...To that party
all monkeys had invitation
of course they had,

it was made sure
because lion's share in Rama's victory
was their only...")

I wonder why vultures, bears and squirrels were not invited. Didn't they too contribute to the successful military campaign?

Remember that Rama above- at least in death-  has treated Jatayu like his own relative. Have they already forgotten Jatayu's elder brother Sampati?

Mr. Cocker, Indians forgot the generosity of vultures long time ago. As you say, we are now learning it the hard way.

TᴚUTH about Saul Steinberg's UID!

Bob Mankoff:

"When Steinberg did the cartoon of the two men duelling in the mouth of a giant alligator, and the one with the assortment of question marks, in the early sixties, his cartoons became equal parts philosophy and art, and no part mirth.

And, truthfully, if this evolution in Steinberg’s style hadn’t happened, there wouldn’t be a five-hundred-and-ninety-one-page tome about him.

But I must admit that I’m a big fan of his early cartoons..."

Vasant Sarwate's (वसंत सरवटे) is very fond of the late Saul Steinberg's cartoons, particularly his later ones. 

In his book 'Vyangkala- Chitrakala', 2005 ('व्यंगकला - चित्रकला'), he says this about Saul Steinberg's  cartoon above:

"चित्र पाहताक्षणीच आपल्याला यातली गफलत ध्यानात येवून गंमत वाटते. मागाहून अधिक विचार केल्यावर त्यातला खोल अर्थ कळायला लागतो. जगात निर्भेळ सत्याचा आग्रह धरण्यात अर्थ नाही; तसे संपूर्णपणे सत्य कुठेही मिळणे अशक्य आहे व परिस्थिती आपण स्वीकारल्याखेरीज इलाज नाही. असा काहीसा विचार हे चित्र सुचवते."

(The moment we see the picture we are amused by realizing error in it. Later when one thinks one starts to get the deeper meaning to it. There is no point demanding the absolute truth in this world; that kind of truth is impossible to attain anywhere and there is no remedy other than accepting the reality. The picture suggests such kind of thoughts.)

So what was the truth (or TᴚUTH?) about the life of the cartoonist himself? His unique identification  UID?

Deirdre Bair tries to answer it in 'Saul Steinberg: A Biography'.

What do some of the reviews say?

JANET MASLIN, The New York Times, December 13 2012:

"The overly protective Saul Steinberg Foundation did Steinberg a huge disservice by forcing Ms. Bair to paraphrase documents and denying her the right to reprint more than a smattering of his art.

Those obstacles might not have been wholly insurmountable, but Ms. Bair does a flat job of paraphrasing, and she displays scant critical insight into the many tics, motifs and obsessions that run throughout Steinberg’s work. She also fails to convey any sense of the vaunted Steinberg charisma — although, as she says in an afterword, interviewees would typically smile at his memory and say something like, “What a wonderful man he was, and oh, how I miss him!” The wonderful man is absent from “Saul Steinberg.” In his place is a cranky, abrasive misanthrope who somehow made himself popular with many big droppable names."

 'cranky, abrasive misanthrope'? So did he  look like this?

courtesy: The Saul Steinberg Foundation/Artists Rights Society (ARS), New York

 A Saul Steinberg drawing that was published in The New Yorker in 1954

 DEBORAH SOLOMON says about the book:

"...Who was Saul Steinberg? His acquaintances thought of him as an elegant dandy who seemed catlike in his refinement. In his prime, he lived on the Upper East Side of Manhattan, dined out most every night and held forth at dinner parties with piquant erudition and wit. But behind the thick glasses and mandarin mask lay a haunted figure, a fearful man who visited indignities upon himself and those around him. As Bair reveals, his love life was a string of infidelities, and crabbiness was his default mood...

...By then he had met Hedda Sterne, an abstract painter and fellow Romanian émigré who valued books and reading as much as he did. Together, they practiced speaking English and declared a moratorium on their native Romanian, “a language of beggars and policemen,” as Steinberg scoffed. They married in 1944, at City Hall in Manhattan. Just a few weeks later, they were entertaining a pregnant friend when Sterne looked out from the kitchen into an adjoining room and was startled to see her husband passionately kissing their guest. “In a way, sex was his life,” Sterne later said. “He deprived himself of true union because he was not ever in love.”..."

(The New York Times, November 21 2012)


JONATHAN LOPEZ says in WSJ, November 30 2012:

" He pursued affairs and even propositioned the teenage daughters of acquaintances, for which he was reprimanded by outraged parents. On one occasion, according to Ms. Bair, he invited a friend's 19-year-old daughter—a girl he had known since she was in diapers—to spend a weekend in the Hamptons in order, he said, to enjoy some time in the country. Drawing upon her interview with the girl—now an adult—Ms. Bair informs us that "in the middle of the night, she woke up, 'petrified with fear,' to find him in her bed. He embraced her, but she 'froze and wouldn't budge,' until he eventually 'just sort of gave up and went to his own bed.'"

In the quote at the top of this post, I quote Mr. Mankoff. Here is an example of  "his early cartoons...the early funny ones"

I call it UID - Aadhaar cartoon.

If George Orwell Were To Be Down and Out Today...

Ralph Steadman:

"I was re-reading Down and Out in Paris and London recently. I think if he were to be down and out today he could survive on the bins behind the superstores … there's so much free stuff that they throw away – perfectly good food."

 "Down and Out in Paris and London" has already appeared on this blog here. There, I compared the book to my favorite Arun Kolatkar poem, I call it "Down and Out in Mumbai":

"मुंबईनं भिकेस लावलं
कल्याणला गुळ खाल्ला
ज्या गावाला नाव नव्हतं
पण एक धबधबा होता
तिथं एक ब्लँकेट विकलं
अन पोटभर पाणी प्यालो

पिंपळाची पानं चघळत
नाशकापर्यंत आलो
तिथं तुकाराम विकला
अन वर खिमापाव खाल्ला
..."
['Arun Kolatkarchya Kavita' (अरुण कोलटकरच्या कविता), 1977/2003, Page:92]

Translated into English by Kolatkar himself

("Bombay made me a beggar.
 Kalyan gave me a lump of jaggery to suck.
In a small village that had a waterfall
but no name
my blanket found a buyer
and I feasted on plain ordinary water.

I arrived in Nasik with
peepul leaves between my teeth.
There I sold my Tukaram
to buy some bread and mince
...")


Recently it was widely reported that "Almost half of the world's food thrown away, report finds".

Orwell day was observed on January 21 2013.

Now, who could have connected these two news items?

Only a good cartoonist and illustrator like Ralph Steadman as quoted at the top! 

"...if Orwell were to be down and out today he could survive..."

I wish!

Artist:  Ralph Steadman, 'George Orwell and a pig',  1996 illustrated edition of  'Animal Farm'

Using Racist Distance as a Tactic of Rule in Battlefields and Tea Esates

Jo Johnson:

"The ascendancy of evangelical Christianity, the demise of the practice of inter-marriage or cohabitation with Indian wives, and the onset of undisguised imperial arrogance (once the British had defeated all their military rivals on the subcontinent) all contributed to the painful termination of the easy relationship between Indian and Briton that had, by and large, prevailed during the 18th century."

Maya Jasanoff:

"John Darwin has provided an ambitious, monumental and convincing reminder that empires are the rule, not the exception, in world history. What their passage has meant - and will continue to mean - for the people who live within them remains for others to explore."

Indivar Kamtekar:

"...Check this for yourself.  Almost no student, despite high marks in Indian history at school and university, will be able to tell you, even very approximately, how many Britishers were actually to be found in India in the colonial period.  He or she would have devoted a considerable amount of time to the study of British rule, would possess a store of other factual information, and may well be able to debate, quite intelligently, the character of colonial conquest.  But ask this particular question, and you are likely to draw a blank...

Officials numbered about 12,000 only.  These included all the British members of the Indian Civil Service, the Indian Police, the railways, and the irrigation and engineering services.  The most important group was thus numerically the smallest.  On the basis of these figures, there were more than two thousand Indians to each Britisher in India.

These figures are seldom, if ever, mentioned in nationalist historiography.  They are probably kept out of sight with good reason, for the numbers are embarrassingly small.  The remarkable thing about the British in India was that there were so few of them.  Even the Indian Civil Service, of which so much was heard, had only a thousand officers in all, half of whom were Indian.  An analysis based on such figures can make imperialism look more like a midget than a monster.  But in the nationalist view, the forces of justice and of good triumphed in India, despite the superior might of the foreign forces of evil.  An Indian David killed a British Goliath.  A fearsome adversary was overcome.  Conveying this impression requires exaggerating the might of the foreign forces of evil.  The story of 1947 has, in the last half century in India, moved towards precisely this exaggeration..."

As I have mentioned here earlier, I lived on  a tea estate in Assam from July 1989 continuously for about a year and then intermittently until 1992.

One of the weirdest things that was practised universally in the tea gardens of Assam was social segregation of three classes of employees- managers/ executives (few in numbers), babus/ clerks (quite a few) and labourers (large).

We were told not to socialise with the clerks, let alone labourers. That meant, we were neither supposed to invite them home nor go to their homes. Only 'executives' were given the membership to the plantation club.

Four-five labourers were assigned to our modest bungalow as helpers - mali, bearer, aaya, chowkidar. We did not know how to use bearer and aaya. So they liked to be posted to our place! As ordained, neither we  went to their homes nor got to know them properly.  It was as if they were Neanderthal while we were Homo sapiens! When we were away on vacation in Maharashtra, our chowkidar was murdered while returning home from the night duty.    

I got along well with a couple of clerks- so well that we occasionally exchanged dirty jokes. One of them used to tell me a lot about sex lives of rather large looking ducks of Assam as well infidelities of some of tea estate men including current and past executives. In the streets of the town around our estates, one came across a few very fair skinned men with light (even blue) eyes. Apparently, they were offsprings of the past British sahibs!

I would have liked to invite those friendly clerks home for a meal. But I never did.

We were brown sahibs, continuing the practices started by the British sahibs. Why did the Brits follow such practices? 

'From the Cape to Cairo', Puck, 1902

Britannia leads civilising soldiers and colonists against Africans as Civilisation conquers Barbarism. 

courtesy : Library of Congress and HisoryToday.com

John Darwin's two books 'After Tamerlane: The Global History of Empire', 2007 and 'The Empire Project/ The Rise and Fall of the British World-System, 1830–1970', 2009 are masterly studies of the empires and also provide antidote to the writings of the likes of Niall Ferguson.

David Cannadine says : 

"Darwin makes a good point in 'The Empire Project' that some people do suggest that the Empire is a story of scandal and exploitation that we should feel guilty about. Other historians of a more right-wing persuasion think the British Empire is a great story that we should be proud of. Darwin says it is not really very helpful to keep fighting about whether it was good or bad because there will never be agreement. Instead the way to move forward is to try to understand how it worked and why it fell apart. "

Mr. Darwin  has a new book out "Unfinished Empire: The Global Expansion of Britain".

Linda Colley writes in its review:

" Even when Britain's own troops were sparse – in India before 1770, or in the Caribbean because of disease levels – it often coped by hiring indigenous troops and slave soldiers to do the dirty work. The extreme smallness of British numbers in many overseas locations also tended to reinforce the use of racist distance as a tactic of rule. Keeping the "natives" (and women) out of certain clubs in imperial settlements was not just prejudice, but also an attempt to shore up the charisma of the local dominant white males."  

When I read it,  I realised how this 'tactic' was deployed in the tea estates of Assam as late as in 1980's! Clerks= indigenous troops, slave soldiers= labourers...?

I have known what it was to be a Gora Sahib in India. And I did not enjoy it at all.

British troops man a remote outpost during the Indian uprising of 1857. 

Photograph courtesy: Hulton Archive/Getty Images and Guardian,  December 28 2012

Padma Bhushan Mangesh Padgaonkar By Vasant Sarwate

Marathi news channels  reported on the afternoon of January 25 2013 that Mangesh Padgaonkar (मंगेश पाडगांवकर) was likely to be honoured with 'Padma Bhushan'.

This is the cover of Padgaonkar's book 'Udasbodh' (उदासबोध) by Vasant Sarwate (वसंत सरवटे). It features caricature of the author.

Sarwate talks about it in his latest book 'Samvad Reshalekhakashi' (संवाद रेषालेखकाशी), 2012:

"....Padgaonkar was little stunned seeing himself wearing a loincloth and  expressed it to the late S P Bhagwat , Bhagwat said 'lucky at least a loincloth is shown!'..."

("...आपल लंगोटीधारी व्यक्तिमत्व पाहून  पाडगांवकरांना जरा  धक्काच बसला व श्री पु भागवतांशी तसे ते बोलल्यावर भागवत म्हणाले होते 'नशीब लंगोटी तरी दाखवलीय!'...")

I was impressed with Bhagwat's sense of humour.


I wish Jaywant Dalvi (जयवंत दळवी) 'Thanthanpal' (ठणठणपाळ) were to be alive today. I wonder what he would have come up with on Mr. Padgoankar. Thanthanpal was very fond of Padgaonkar.

Finally, I too am glad that Sarwate showed the loincloth. You can't show a Padma awardee without one, can you?

Namdev Says Your Home Has Little Less Gold and Cash नामा म्हणे तुमचे घरी थोडे कमी सोनें दाम...

On January 22 /23 2013 Marathi newspapers and TV channels have reported about the government of Maharashtra's  audit report on missing jewellery of Lord Vitthal at Pandharpur (पंढरपूर) temple. The value of  'missing' jewellery reportedly runs into millions of rupees.

As has been often said on this blog, Marathi is such a rich language because of the literature created in it by the saint-poets centuries ago.

A part of B S Mardhekar's (बा. सी. मर्ढेकर) poem reads:

"काय गा म्यां पामराने
 खरडावी बाराखडी; 
आणि बोलावी उत्तरें
 टिनपट वा चोमडी."

(What poor me
scratching alphabets
and giving answers
tinpot or impudent)

Most of what I write on this blog is 'scratching alphabets' and saying something 'tinpot or impudent'. 

It sounds even more so after one reads someone like Namdev (नामदेव):


"केशव पुसे नामयासी । तुझी नांदणूक कैसी ।।
...
नामा म्हणे तुमचे घरी सोनें दाम। आमुचे घरीं तुमचे नाम।। " (1739)


When asked by the god how his life was, Namdev ends his answer to Lord Vitthal with these words:

("At your home there is gold and cash, at our home is your name.")

I have never read or heard simpler and more moving words than these.

I interpret it like this:

"Keshav, that is Lord Vitthal, asks Namdev how his life is. Namdev goes on explaining that it is not easy,  comparing in the process  many aspects of his life with that of the god.  In short,  as I read it, Namdev's physical  life is quite miserable. Therefore, does Namdev ask his god anything?

Nothing.

On the contrary, he tells his god "You are wealthy alright but I am wealthy too because I have your name on my lips. You own gold & cash and I 'own' you in my heart! I am as wealthy as you without any attendant hassles of lockers, security, alarms, audits etc.""

This is Bhakti at its best.  It trumps 'Mukti'  hands down. These masters ask : Who wants Moksha when we have devotion?

I have never read what Vithoba's (विठोबा) response was to Namdev's answer but I am sure Vithoba couldn't have been prouder! He would have just moved away...What devotees he has got...No other god is that lucky!


[You may read an excellent essay on Namdev by M V Dhond (म वा धोंड) here]

However, after the alleged scam, Namdev's words have to be slightly modified to :

"नामा म्हणे तुमचे घरी थोडे कमी सोनें दाम। आमुचे घरीं तुमचे नाम।"

 Namdev as imagined by renowned artist: Bhaskar Hande (भास्कर हांडे)

Courtesy: the artist and Marathi periodical 'Ringan', 2012 (रिंगण)

Visit here to read the full issue of Ringan

If you read Marathi,  I strongly recommend reading Mr. Hande's article there.   His explanation of the thought process that went into the making of the painting is an absolute delight.