Fate, Destiny or Luck of Girish Wagh and Vasudev Deshpande

Indians tend to use the word "fate" very often. They seldom use "destiny" or simple "luck". Marathi author G A Kulkarni जी ए कुलकर्णी, deeply influenced by Greek culture preferred "destiny" नियती.

I am more comfortable with the word "luck", toss of coin.

In January 2008, media and the world at large hailed the launch of Tata's Nano. Ratan Tata very generously gave large credit of this success to Girish Wagh.

I am sure Wagh deserves all his success but does he know that he also is very lucky?

41 years ago in 1967, in the middle of what Surjit Bhalla calls India's "rotten age period (1960 to 1980) of declining growth and increasing poverty", a young man Vasudev Deshpande helped design "Meera Mini Car" for now defunct "Meera Automobile & Engineering Industries Pvt Ltd" based in small town of Ichalkaranji in Kolhapur district. See few relevant pictures below.

India's automobile industry history has almost forgot Deshpande.

History is replete with such examples. When we hail new heroes and their achievements, it also is time to reflect on who all went before them.

Nicholas Taleb:

“Heroes won and lost battles in a manner that was totally independent of their own valor; their fate depended upon totally external forces, generally the explicit agency of scheming gods (not devoid of nepotism). Heroes are heroes because they are heroic in behavior, not because they won or lost.”

Vasudev Deshpande will remain a hero to me.



Please note Numberplate




Vasudev Deshpande explaining features to a minister

Phantom महाबली वेताळ in My Classroom. Speaking Marathi.

NYT editorial of January 3, 2008- “Comic Books in the Classroom”- said:

“Generations of children grew up reading comic books on the sly, hiding out from parents and teachers who saw them as a waste of time and a hazard to young minds. Comics are now gaining a new respectability at school. That is thanks to an increasingly popular and creative program, often aimed at struggling readers, that encourages children to plot, write and draw comic books, in many cases using themes from their own lives…

…Teachers are finding it easier to teach writing, grammar and punctuation with material that students are fully invested in. And it turns out that comic books have other built-in advantages. The pairing of visual and written plotlines that they rely on appear to be especially helpful to struggling readers. No one is suggesting that comic books should substitute for traditional books or for standard reading and composition lessons. Teachers who would once have dismissed comics out of hand are learning to exploit a genre that clearly has a powerful hold on young minds. They are using what works.”

I know the power of comic books.

When I grew up, no one (yes, including Shivaji) captivated me more than Phantom, Mahabali Vetal महाबली वेताळ in Marathi. I read and re-read exploits of Phantom and Mandrake, published as part of Indrajal Comics series by Bennett, Coleman & Co

Those heroes’ families became mine.

Bheem of Mahabharat was strong as Lothar, Mandrake as clever as Shivaji. When Princess Diana died I felt sad because she had the same name of Phantom’s wife!

Kolhapur had many attractions for me. One of them was my cousin’s collection of Phantom and Mandrake books. I knew by heart all those books. They were translated in Marathi with some chutzpah.

I have never understood why Phantom comics books were not published in Marathi later.

I wish I had the help of Phantom to learn Newton’s laws and Diana’s help to understand working of the United Nations!

Marathi newspaper Sakal सकाळ on January 18, 2007 reported: “अल्लाद्दिन, टारझन, मोगली आता मराठीतून 'बोलणार'!” (“Aladdin, Tarzan, Moguli now to ‘speak’ in Marathi”)

Poor Sakal. It doesn’t even mention the rich world of Phantom in Marathi that came to pass.

Anil Kumble’s Team is Largely Brahmin. So was Shivaji’s Ministry..

त्र्यंबक शंकर शेजवलकर, 'रामदासांचा उपदेश व उद्योग महाराष्ट्रराज्याला विघातक ठरला काय?', १९४३, 'निवडक लेखसंग्रह', पृष्ठ ३१-३२, १९७७:

"... प्रो. (व्ही. व्ही) जोशांचे 'शेतकरी-राज्य' महाराष्ट्रात स्थापन करणारा शिवाजी सेनापतीखेरीज बाकीचे सात प्रधान ब्राह्मणच का नेमतो?... खरी स्थिती अशी की, शिवाजी जातधर्म , आपपर, उच्चनीच, काहीही न मानता 'अधिकार' पाहून प्रत्येकाकडून काम घेत होता... "

Indian media is angry because Australian media have raked up caste.  

 The Sydney Morning Herald article says: “…The Brahmin caste, which forms only a tiny fraction of India's population, has always dominated the national cricket side. Even today, with the game reaching further and further into the countryside, and the so-called lower orders, the Indian team has a decided flavour with Anil Kumble, Rahul Dravid, VVS Laxman, Sachin Tendulkar, Sourav Ganguly, R.P. Singh and Ishant Sharma all Brahmins. Wasim Jaffer is a Muslim, Harbhajan Singh a Sikh, while, of the Hindu players, only Mahendra Dhoni and Yuvraj Singh come from "lower" castes…” 

The other day I read T S Shejwalkar’s article on the importance of work of Saint Ramdas who was a Brahmin. He says:”…seven out of eight members of Shivaji’s 17th century administration were Brahmins…only chief of army was non-Brahmin...” 

Most Hindu Indians are sensitive about caste. Most of them like me marry into their own caste.  Why can’t foreign media talk about it?

 

Y D Phadke य दि फडके No More

Yesterday afternoon I spoke to Vasant Sarwate. I thanked him for sending me two of his books. I read his obit of Ramesh Mantri रमेश मंत्री and felt sad.

Little did I know by evening I would be sadder.

I have created five entries pf prominent Marathi speaking personalities in English Wiki- Vasant Sarwate, D G Godse, M V Dhond, Y D Phadke, T S Shejwalkar.

Four of them are now dead.

I couldn't have imagined that it would happen so soon after M V Dhond.

19th/20th century Maharashtra produced some great historians.

V K Rajwade, Riyasatkar Sardesai, Vasudevshastri Khare, T S Shejwalkar...

Y D Phadke easily fitted in that tradition.

Unlike Shejwalkar, he was not great original thinker but focused on hard data and facts.

When Ramachandra Guha wrote "A Corner of a Foreign Field", I suggested him to check his fundamental thesis with Phadke.

I like all of his books but particularly like Nathuramayan नथुरामायण. He is not much known outside Marathi reading world because most of his work is not translated in English.

Non-Marathi reading world is poorer for it!

Now, Here's My Plan...For 2008

The Dalai Lama (August 1999): "For me, it is nothing. New millennium, or new century, or new year. For me is another day and night. The sun, the moon, the stars remain the same."

I need no alcohol to get drunk but I have never understood all the hoopla about a new year. I get very excited on the morning of Indian new year day. This year like almost every previous year, I won't be awake when new years arrives. Neighbourhood noise of course will wake me up.

31st December is a busy day for Indian TV channels. Their anchors are very excited, people watching them- like a couple below- probably aren’t.



“With sensing of New Year you must be thrilled- heart must be beating faster, let us dance, let us sing!”

(double click on the picture to get a much larger view)

Artist: Abhimanyu Kulkarni, Lokprabha अभिमन्यु कुलकर्णी , लोकप्रभा

I have no resolutions but plan for 2008...



Artist: Shel Silverstein for Playboy (easily one of the best pictures I ever saw)

...a plan to escape.

But isn't this blog an effort to escape? Escape from one's own personality?

Well then I have a plan to escape from "escape".

I will be off for few days and will meet you some time in January 2008.

Happy New Year 2008. Thanks for all your encouragement and comments.

Faking Friends for Fame

Times of India November 25, 2007:

“…Competition for friends can be so fierce that some have even resorted to faking friend lists. Sixteen-year-old Mohit Kapoor, for example, has put up 20 benami profiles and keeps scrapping himself daily. "This not only pads the number of scraps I receive, but I can also brag about things indirectly," grins Mohit.

This kind of obsessing before the computer about unreal friends who don't really give a fig about you has unhealthy consequences, especially for introverts who don't have a life in the real world. "There are a lot of people who go online looking for friends because they don't have them elsewhere," says Dr Harish Shetty, a Mumbai-based psychiatrist. "So, the online friends become their universe, and even a slight rejection or snub becomes a big issue."
“
This brought back memories of Devyani Chaubal (1942-1995), a film gossip journalist. She reportedly faked friends, stars of Hindi film industry, from Raj Kapoor to Rajesh Khanna.

Subhash Bhende सुभाष भेंडे drew a delightful Marathi word-caricature of her- "Sharmishtha Godambe शर्मिष्ठा गोडांबे"

We may or mayn't know clandestine Mohit Kapoors but we get to know many Sharmishtha Godambes in our life.

I have lost their count.


Artist: Barney Tobey The New Yorker 23 October 1978

Tilak-Agarkar Dogfight...Still Goes On

This blog already commented on the abusive language used by Andhra Pradesh chief minister against his predecessor:

“Why are you feeling so restless. I will thoroughly expose you today…(so much so that)…you will feel ashamed that you were born to your mother, you will feel that you should not have born at all. This is just a preamble.” (Times of India July 24, 2007).

Sonia Gandhi recently called Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi- “Maut Ka Saudagar” (merchant of death). (Wonder what Congress leaders should be called for carnage of Sikhs in Delhi in 1984. "Maut Ke Dalal" Brokers of Death?)

Using extreme profanity in public is not new to India and prominent Indian leaders.

It probably started with Bal Gangadhar Tilak बाळ गंगाधर टिळक (1856-1920) and Gopal Ganesh Agarkar गोपाळ गणेश आगरकर (1856-1895), truly giants of 19th century India. In 1893, they fought mother of all wordy duels.

They used terms like leper, dog afflicted with rabies, murderous, rotten brain, arrogant, mean to describe each other.

Agarkar started it.

(Source- “व्यक्ती आणि विचार” य दि फडके; “Person and Thoughts” Y D Phadke, 1979)

In January 1882, Wikipedia says, telephony was introduced in India but Tilak and Agarkar never spoke to each other on phone.

If they were to...


Artist: Whitney Darrow,Jr. The New Yorker 8 February 1947

Where is Suttee in the Barchart?

This post is in memory of graceful Ms. Benazir Bhutto.

I hope her death will marginalise extremists in Pakistan the way Mahatma Gandhi's death marginalised Hindu extremists in India for 40 years.

Cherie Blair has brought up the subject of widows and “suttee — a widow burning herself alive on her husband’s funeral pyre” in The Mourning After : NYT December 18, 2007.

“…The centuries-old practice of suttee — a widow burning herself alive on her husband’s funeral pyre — has all but vanished. But the few cases of self-immolation that do occur are a reminder of how bleak the future is for many widows…

…In rural areas of Nepal and India, widows may still be expected to shave their heads, sleep on the floor and hide from men for the rest of their lives.

In Afghanistan, where two million women have lost their husbands in decades of fighting, widows are prevented from working and have no way to provide for their children. In Tanzania, among other countries, the legal system makes it difficult for widows to inherit their husband’s property...

…In India alone, there are estimated to be some 30 million widows struggling to bring up children. Across the developing world, there may be as many as 100 million in a perilous state. Conflict, ethnic cleansing and AIDS are increasing these numbers by the day and creating younger widows. In countries where disease or conflict are most rife, half of all women can be impoverished widows…”

Suttee in New York Times in 2007?

Not surprising.

This year Times of India published two reports on the subject of suttee in July 2007:

“The entire community will be held accountable for any incidence of sati under new amendments being brought into the Commission of Sati (Prevention) Act, 1987, which were cleared by a Group of Ministers on Friday.

The proposed changes seek to make the law act as a strong deterrent to the crime while protecting unwilling women who are forced into the funeral pyre. Under the amendments, proposed by the ministry for women and child development (WCD), the act of coercing a woman to commit sati has been made a non-bailable offence. Imprisonment under the law has been increased to a minimum of three years, going up to 10 years, and the fine has been enhanced from Rs 10,000 to Rs 50,000…”

And

“Devils among us- The latest amendment to the commission of Sati Prevention Act proves, yet again, that social evils are very difficult to eradicate.”

Frontline January 4, 2008 said: "There has been an escalation of all forms of violence against women in India in the past two decades...The violence against women takes many forms. They are killed in the womb; they are traded for sex and labour...Domestic and marital abuse is made more possible when women have fewer options for escape out of such oppressive relationships because of lack of assets or economic security in the form of gainful occupations... " (See barchart at the end of this post)

Suttee is just another form of violence against women. Indeed, it was.

“…particularly in Bengal, suttee was sordid and cruel…in nine cases out of ten, the woman in Bengal went to the flames in fear and horror…she was usually tied to the corpse, often already putrid; men stood by with poles to push her back in case the bonds should burn through and victim, scorched and maimed, should struggle free…”

(Source- The Men Who Ruled India by Philip Mason, 1953)

Have you read anything more barbaric than the above in entire human history?

But it was glorified in our culture quite a lot.

Vinayak Janardan Kirtane विनायक जनार्दन कीर्तने wrote a book “Elder Madhavrao’s Death थोरले माधवराव यांचा मृत्यु “ in 1861. It was staged in 1862. It was the first independent, literary and published Marathi play.

It had a scene of Madhavrao’s wife Ramabai रमाबाई going suttee on his funeral pyre.

A woman going suttee was considered almost a goddess. To create publicity stunt, theatre company who was staging the play started bringing few ladies from the audience on to the stage to worship Ramabai.

Soon the scene became so popular that it alone would last for a couple of hours! People forgot that the actor who was playing Ramabai was a male – Vishnu Vatave विष्णु वाटवे! They took home suttee’s prashad (like flowers, wheat/rice grains, vermillion/ turmeric etc.) from the stage!

(btw- This may sound familiar to those who know Hindi film "Jai Santoshi Maa" (1975) which used to convert cinema halls into temples.)

(Source- D G Godse द ग गोडसे, “नांगी असलेले फुलपाखरू Stinger Possessing Butterfly” 1989)

I wonder what Lord William Bentinck (1774-1839), who was responsible for banning the practice of suttee सती in 1829, would have made of this? After all he was the first Governor-General who was prepared to take the risk of provoking a general cry of religion in danger.

Even sensible and rational writer Vasudev Krishna Bhave वासुदेव कृष्ण भावे seemingly justified suttee in his classic "Maharashtra During Peshwa-times पेशवेकालीन महाराष्ट्र"(1936).

Not all widows landed up on funeral pyre.

They fought all odds to play significant roles in India's recent history upto 1829:

Jijabai (Shivaji's mother), Radhabai Bhat (wife/mother of Peshwa), Gopikabai Bhat (wife/mother of Peshwa), Ahilyabai Holkar, Kittur Rani Chennamma ...

Artist: James Thurber The New Yorker 12 February 1949


Causes of Death among rural women aged 15-44 in Maharashtra, 1996

Inflation Hurts Literature too! तानी मावशीचे दोन आणे.

Christian Lorentzen,

‘Fictitious Values/ Boom and bust in twenty-first-century lit’, Bookforum, June/July/August 2012:

"The banality of money may be a reason writers shy away from quoting dollar amounts. If we can’t escape prices in our daily lives, can’t we at least escape them in novels? Besides the risks of committing an embarrassing inaccuracy and alienating the reader, who may have completely different notions about what constitutes a living wage or a reasonable price for a sandwich, quoting actual numbers dates the work in a way that it didn’t in the relatively inflation-free bullion-backed nineteenth century."

Although it continues to be legal tender, 25-paisa coin (Hindi चवन्नी , Marathi पावली) is no longer accepted at Pune.

I have used 1-paisa, 2-paisa, 3-paisa, 5-paisa, 10-paisa and 20-paisa coins in the past. They all gave me tremendous pleasure because all of them once could buy me some favourite food- candy, peppermint, peanuts, puffed rice, biscuits etc.

Thanks to inflation, they are now dead as dodoes.

The Economist, December 8th 2007 confirmed: "The Economist's food-price index is higher today than at any time since it was created in 1845." (see chart at the bottom of this post).

Inflation kills poor and those who don't own assets.

SWAMINATHAN S ANKLESARIA AIYAR said in his essay ”Independence & the Bengal famine” of August 20, 2003:

“…(during the world war II) Massive inflation was the inevitable outcome, something that did not happen in Britain itself. The food price index (1937=100) shot up to 311 by 1949 in India...The data reflect the rationed price of food in India: the black market price was even higher.

Now, inflation is very good for producers and asset owners. All property owners saw property values skyrocket. Rising agricultural prices benefited all landowners, and even small ones got out of debt and bought fresh land. Many new salaried jobs were created by the war, and the problem of the educated unemployed disappeared. Above all, the business class flourished…

… The real wages of factory workers declined 30% between 1939 and 1943…

…The rural landless in India were the worst hit. They had neither access to the new urban jobs or rationed urban supplies. Ranging from a quarter of the rural population in Bengal to over half in Madras, they bore the brunt of spiralling prices..."

Inflation affects even literature.

Marathi literature, cinema contain many references to monetary aspects of everyday life- salary, loan, food, education, marriage, illness, land price- expressed in rupees and paise. Understanding them is very vital to appreciate the art.

Inflation makes us numb to them.

Here is an example.

तानी मावशी: “…अणि हे घे दोन आणे तुला, वाटेत फारच भूक लागली तर काहीतरी विकत घे …”

(Tanee Maternal-aunt: “..and take this two annas for you, if you feel very hungry during the journey, buy something…”)

[जी ए कुलकर्णी “कैरी” पिंगळावेळ G A Kulkarni “Raw Mango” Owl Time 1977]

Two annas meant 12 paise.

G A Kulkarni-sir, two annas won’t buy me anything today and worse, my son doesn’t even understand this currency.

I wonder if we need to print consumer price index of the year against each such reference!


‘A shilling? How long have you been drunk?’

The Spectator 2007

Why Ketkar-pedia (महाराष्ट्रीय ज्ञानकोश) Flopped but Wikipedia Booms?

Brad DeLong said on December 24, 2007:

"blogging evangelist Dave Winer made a long bet with New York Times executive Martin Nisenholtz: "In a Google search of five keywords or phrases representing the top five news stories of 2007, weblogs will rank higher than the New York Times' Web site."...

...In the five years since the bet was made, a clear winner did emerge, but it was neither blogs nor the Times.

Wikipedia, which was only one year old in 2002, ranks higher today on four of the five [top] news stories [of 2007]: 12th for Chinese exports, fifth for oil prices, first for the Iraq war, fourth for the mortgage crisis and first for the Virginia Tech killings..."

The Economist on April 20, 2006 said:

”… Wikipedia's promise is nothing less than the liberation of human knowledge—both by incorporating all of it through the collaborative process, and by freely sharing it with everybody who has access to the internet. This is a radically popular idea.

Wikipedia's English-language version doubled in size last year and now has over 1m articles. By this measure, it is almost 12 times larger than the print version of the Encyclopaedia Britannica. Taking in the other 200-odd languages in which it is published, Wikipedia has more than 3m articles. Over 100,000 people all over the world have contributed, with a total of almost 4m “edits” between them.

Wikipedia already has more “visitors” than the online New York Times, CNN and other mainstream sites. It has become a vital research tool for huge numbers of people. And Wikipedia is only five years old.

This success has made Wikipedia the most famous example of a wider wiki phenomenon. Wikis are web pages that allow anybody who is allowed to log into them to change them. In Wikipedia's case, that happens to be anybody at all. The word “wiki” comes from the Hawaiian word for “quick”, but also stands for “what I know is...”. Wikis are thus the purest form of participatory creativity and intellectual sharing, and represent “a socialisation of expertise”, as David Weinberger, who is currently writing a book on collaborative intelligence, puts it…”

Dr. Shridhar Venkatesh Ketkar श्रीधर व्यंकटेश केतकर (1884-1937) is a formidable name in the pre-independence history of India.

His reputation is based on his unique creation - a 23-volume encyclopedia in Marathi, called Maharashtreeya Dnyankosh महाराष्ट्रीय ज्ञानकोश. His work received no government funding and took 12 years of his life eventually killing his diabetic body.

He reminds me of great Don Quixote. We may all laugh at Don but we envy him deep down, for his capacity to dream and incessant efforts he puts in to pursue those dreams, against impossible odds.

T S Shejwakar त्र्यंबक शंकर शेजवलकर, Durga Bhagwat दुर्गा भागवत, Y D Phadke य दि फडके and many others have written very sensitively and perceptively on the life and work of Dr. Ketkar.

Phadke’s article informed me most. Shejwalkar's brought tears to my eyes.

Phadke argued that Ketkar shouldn’t have undertaken this project. He thought Ketkar was a very promising sociologist and should have stuck to his core skill. By doing so, he would have contributed more to India’s intellectual progress.

As Phadke demonstrated in his article, Ketkar was a highly opinionated person. He wasn’t ready to listen to any expert, let alone revising his work based on their views.

(“व्यक्ती आणि विचार” य दि फडके; “Persons and Thoughts” Y D Phadke, 1979

"निवडक लेखसंग्रह" त्र्यंबक शंकर शेजवलकर; "Selected Articles-collection" by Tryambak Shankar Shejwalkar 1977)

You can’t compile encyclopedia with this attitude.

The Economist on April 20, 2006 said:

“…Among the new media, wikis are the perfect complement to blogs. Whereas blogs contain the unedited, opinionated voice of one person, wikis explicitly and literally allow groups of people to get on the proverbial “same page”…”

Ketkar wasn’t ready to get on the same page with anyone who didn’t agree with him, he didn’t believe in collaborative intelligence!

For that reason, sadly, Maharashtreeya Dnyankosh महाराष्ट्रीय ज्ञानकोश is just a relic today.

Ketkar says to all of us:


‘I thought I had an encyclopedia inside me but it was just a blog.’

variation on The Spectator cartoon