Three Hundred Ramayanas and a Discussion

From a discussion in Facebook with a friend.

Anup Pandey

Why all SICkular and ***hole born in Hindu community only ? Here is anothttp://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gifher one ..

http://www.thehindu.com/news/cities/Delhi/article2550965.ece?homepage=true

The Hindu : Cities / Delhi : Ramayana row: DU Council ignored opinion of three experts
www.thehindu.com
Delhi University's Academic Council seems to have relied on the opinion of one expert, conveniently ignoring the collective opinion of the remaining three, in its controversial decision to drop A. K. Ramanujan's celebrated essay on the Ramayana from its history syllabus.
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Anup Pandey http://anilbali49.sulekha.com/blog/post/2009/03/three-hundred-ramayanas-legal-notice-to-oxford-university.htm


Vidyasakaran Dhanapathi
Just a sample...

From your second link by anilbali49... (nothing edited/removed/read in between lines)
//It gave an example of Dog’s Urine to comment on Holy Ramayana. It say’s “a dog came that way and pissed into his mouth” and on return from Ram Lila he tells his wife about Ramayana that it was “Terrible. It was so salty”. The article published by Oxford clarifies that “what happens when you really listen to a story, especially to Ramayana”. In another place the writer has compared Holy Ramayan with ‘Aristotle’s Jack Knife’ of a carpenter. //

Trust me. I have listened to this story in 1991-92 in my school days. Nothing detrimental about Ramayana here. It's about someone who sleeps in the Ramayana recital.

Anilbali has edited and pasted from the original, which is 'Ever since, he has been respected in the village as a wise elder, and he has also behaved like one. That's what happens when you really listen to a story, especially to the Ramayana'. Now, read again the edited part from Anilbali. He doesn't want you to know the whole passage. Why? He wants to turn you against the passage.

Jack Knife... During my childhood itself, I have heard the above story and the story of 'Sita as Ravanan's daughter' and few more as well. I have even read that Krishna of Brindavan and Krishna of Dwaraka and Krishna of Gita 'might' all be different people. We even have more than one researchers concluding that the Lanka mentioned in Ramayana is not today's Srilanka but it is a place near Vindhyan Hills. Now, what to say of the hundred small hills in south india said to be the stones fallen from Hanuman's hand, and the other 'tourist' places in sri lanka?
Now, what's wrong in bringing up 'Jack knife' as in 'is it like Aristotle's jack knife'? If one doesn't ask that question, what kind of researcher he is? If one doesn't ponder over that question, what kind of 'student' he is?

These Hindutvavadi's are trying to terrorize the so called Hindus into a phobia by overreacting and propagandizing. I wish not many fall prey to that.
People in DU Academic Council don't deserve the power they have. They are just the incapable psyches afraid of facing any question or argument. Let them rest in peace with their peanut brains!
16 minutes ago • Like

WHEN NOT DEFINED

The following is a poem one of my friends wrote. Title was 'When not defined.....'

When I see the truth I say what I feel,
but I found that to others I couldn't appeal.
I tried to tell them, but words couldnt explain
what I felt inside, be it love or joy or pain.

The more I tried to make myself clear,
I found that the truth had become dirtier.
The truth of the heart is corrupted by the mind;
Some things are clearer when not defined......

My reply is what you see below!

Nice! I remember we discussing something on these lines, back in 2006.

Now....

I have bigger worries.
Bigger or different, or whatever. Oh!


What is this life, full of care; No time to stand and stare;
stare, at the truth; and indulge in it.
Dirty it with words;
reclaim its purity with silence
filled with more words, just expressed in limit.

Stare! To stare at the truth and indulge in it!
I might soon become incapable of seeing anything;
Running, running along with closed eyes.
With pain and joy limited to the physical realm.
When it is anything other than physical,
it is something I would otherwise have laughed at. Trivial.
And the other thing... love.
Is there a smiley that is self-geering, Hello hello Tahoma!?
Aureliano! Are you me!?
Thank goodness, there are some kids around.
Spreading some cheer and dreams.
And, more thanks to goodness,
I dont have to take these kids to my home.

My home, where I can,
sit aone and stare at the truth;
indulge in its dirtiness;
silently swear, jibe at its pretentious clarity.

A PROUD FREEMAN

When one of my colleagues was appreciating my reading habit, I replied 'It is not such a good thing as you say. All that reading does to me is to make me be available for more pains. It just makes me so sensitive and aware for everything that can cause pain'. I was trying to tell that one doesnt have to regret not having the habit of reading. Even as I was saying the abovementioned, I realized how true what I was saying was.

When I read my last post two days after writing it, I wondered why it should be so negative. Was it really negative? Why I sound a bad egotist to myself, when no one around me would want to believe it? I wondered why I make things difficult for myself?

Few more days later, I was reading Utilitarianism by John Stuart Mill. Below text reminded me of my previous post. I wasn't sure how well related these are. Let's see.

Next to selfishness, the principal cause which makes life unsatisfactory, is want of mental cultivation. A cultivated mind-I do not mean that of a philosopher, but any mind to which the fountains of knowledge have been opened, and which has been taught, in any tolerable degree, to exercise its faculties-finds sources of inexhaustible interest in all that surrounds it; in the objects of nature, the achievements of art, the imaginations of poetry, the incidenets of history, the ways of mankind past and present, and their prospects in the future.

I felt like someone approving of my varied, at times contradictory, interests. By no means, I want to proclaim that I am that so called 'cultivated mind'. At least, it is something I want to be, it looks like. To hold back on most of those interests, just to be able to pass the remaining days in peace (!?) is just unthinkable.

I am reminded of Darwin's words 'My God, it is intolerable to think of spending ones whole life, like a neuter bee, working, working, & nothing after all.' This he wrote, when he was pondering on the question, To marry or Not!?

Now, it is probably not (just) a so-called normal(!) life that can sway me away from being a real cultivated mind. There are thousand other things. Or, probably nine hunderd and ninety nine.

John Stuart Mill says

'Many who begin with youthful enthusiasm for everything noble, as they advance in years sink into indolence and selfishness. But I do not believe that those who undergo this very common change, voluntarily choose the lower description of pleasures in preference to the higher. I believe that before they devote themselves exclusively to the one, they have already become incapable of the other.'

So, I wonder which point I am at, in this common change. I am almost certain I am in it. I wake up late every morning, I don't exercise regularly, I don't read regularly, most of the times I read, it is all junk. Am I becoming incapable of the enthusiasm for everything noble?

As I always say, it's probably this realization, this alone, that can help me recover. Every night, when I retire to bed, I chide myself for having wasted so much of time. Hope there is a turnaround, soon!

Utilitarianism says elsewhere

'Genuine private affections, and a sincere interest in the public good, are possible, though in unequal degrees, to every rightly brought-up human being. In a world in which there is so much to interest, so much to enjoy, and so much also to correct and improve, everyone who has this moderate amount of moral and intellectual requisites is capable of an existence which may be called enviable; and unless such a person, through bad laws, or subjection to the will of others, is denied the liberty to use the sources of happiness within his reach, he will not fail to find thi enviable existence'.

This enviable existence sounds almost like a compromise to my ears. And, I have to hope for it. The reality is, I am not going anywhere. Start was good, I guess. The past few months have been a regresing time period. Lot of work at office, and the standard of my other activities have gone down steadily. I need to pull up my socks before I lose the self respect. Come on, I can! I am, after all, a proud freeman!

WHAT DO I WANT?

Ok, seriously, I don't know what is that one thing(if there is one), by doing which I will be happy. But I'm sure it's not what I am doing right now. I don't want to be in this corpo-rat(e) race. I don't want to spend all my time reading, doing and thinking of datacom and networking. I don't want to burn my days, competing with my colleagues for that extra money and a safe job. I don't want to become a superman, who can help some company earn few more dollars.
I want to read political science, economics and sociology. I want to understand the history of the human race, history of its history, science, politics and life. And find out, if it could be better.

Some times I doubt, if I am a pessimist, always rejecting all the good that is around. I doubt, if I am just incapable of doing well in the current setup, and if that's why I am working around it. Just being a spectator, taking up the role of a researcher or reporter, who has interest but is not part of the thing that he is reporting/analysing; At the same time, anxious of his place in it, realising his stake in it secretly.

I want to keep my body fit so that it can do anything my mind wants it to do. Nevertheless I indulge in excessive/rich food that is not good for my health, and very soon regret it.

I call myself a slave, a slave of the idea called freedom. I can't rely on anyone for my goodness. I want to live and die on my own hands. Not because I don't trust fellow human beings. I trust them to be human beings, nothing more. I am aware fully that their lives are their business, and mine is mine. When I say life, mine or someone else's, I am aware that everyone's unerstanding of it is different, and the limits are different. Mine is bound by that too. Meaning, my life may not be limited to the singular body and emotions of mine alone.
It will be great to live a nice evening, leaving oneself fully to a loved one. But, very soon, the urge to break free will become unbearable.

One thing I dread is ordinariness, though I want to look very ordinary (especially when everyone around me try their best to look extraordinary). Basically, we are all trying to do the same thing. It is just that I am not comfortable with the common definitions. I just don't want to play by the rules set by people who didn't think what I am thinking. Why should I?

I want to learn. Almost everything. I want to be able to create the best drawings, I want to be able to sing a song that is good enough to sound good to my ears. I want to be able to dance, very well (I'm a pauper of adverbs, I am running out of them). I want to understand how things work. I am not too worried about the minutest technical things, but I want to understand the logic that stands behind each one of the things that I see. After understanding a few, most of the times, i lose my interest, and the feeling of not 'doing' anything overcomes me. I wouldn't want to sell my drawings or writings to earn my meal. Because I know these are not good enough. I want to really 'do' something. Like doing agriculture, growing rice and making my meal.

I want to be good to everyone, for only then, I can think good of me. I look like, speak like someone, who is too concerned about society. But, in actuality, I am worried about only myself. Society figures in my life, only because I am in it.

I want to remain very simple, in every way. I watch in dismay, the lives, mine and others' becomeing complex slowly; mine, by my own doing. Making myself simple, removing everything that is not necessary, will probably help me find the 'essential me'. That might make it easy to satisfy myself. But, I understand that it is probably against the nature, which has seen to it that an amoeba becomes a human, so complex that my words can't describe. How can learning things can make myself simple? Doesn't it add ideas, making myself complex? Here is the twist. I think I learn things, so that I can reject them. Unknowingly (not any more!) I have rejected all those already. I just want to be sure, so I learn. I remember reading all the religious text I could get just a few years back, and now I am an atheist. Why is it necessary for me to find out the 'essential me'? Because, 'essential me' is not going to be different from 'essential anyone'. That will probably be the smallest unit of a being that can think. I guess that will help. Will it, really?

I crave appreciation. On receiving it, I get disappointed, I feel I have grown small upon receiving it. I feel I don't deserve it, purely because I had craved it.

How self centred, I am! That's another thing I am dreadful about. Can I ever be in a relationship, where I am responsible for another life? I have been a responsible son, brother at home; a very responsible worker, mentor, colleague at office. So, the chances are that I can be. But I am anxious about it. When I am not sure what I am doing with my life, how can I join it with someone else's, or how can I bring a new one into existence?

I remember Nagarjunan telling, during a discussion, how he had moved on from existentialism to structuralism. I am not sure if he meant that the essential-being becomes kind of inessential when faced with the groups of beings, which are not worried about the essential or non-essential beings, which are concerned about everything that an essential-being seeker would abandon as inessential, at the same time infringing upon every individual being.
I dont know if I would abandon all this and become something else. I have no opinion about that right now.

Now I have more questions. What the hell is this 'essential me'? That was a word I stumbled across a few minutes back, while wondering what I am looking for. Do I mean err... God by any chance? Hell.. no! This search probably is same as the one the atomic scientists have been doing. Please don't call me spiritual. I hate that word.

RESERVATION - Anti-Constitutional?

I was going through the study material of 'Indian Economy - Problems and Policies', a first year paper of Madras University's Distance education B.A Economics.
(It has spelling mistakes and grammatical errors in almost every page.)

I happened to come across this part, which discusses the impact of caste on Indian economy and its development.

Following are the points mentioned there. I have copied the statements as given in the material.

Section 1.5 - Page 9

The close and rigidities between caste and occupation prevent occupational mobility vital to economic transformation.

Another defect of the caste system is the existence of a class of untouchables who can never move up the social ladder. This has resulted in waste of human talents and potentialities.

(Probably they meant 'close relationship and rigidities')

Section 2.6.2 - Page 23

Rigid rise between caste and occupation restricts occupational mobility and supply of efforts

(rise? They must have meant relationship, I guess)

After discussing few other points on the similar lines, here comes the concluding paragraph.

Though our Indian constitution prevents discrimination by caste, the recent policy of reservation has lead to the strengthening of this institution. Even if its influence has reduced due to selection of individuals by competitive exams, it is still a very much living institution, according to Epstein.

First it states that reservation is anti-constitution. Then it says, it is reservation that strengthens the institution. Then it goes on to say that the competitive exams are to reduce the influence of caste/reservation.

Caste is still a living institution, yes I agree. But I'm not sure if Scarlett Epstein identified reservation to be the cause of this. It would be interesting to know what solution, whoever it is, Epstein or Dr.K.K.Muruganantham (Course writer from DRBCC Hindu College), would suggest, to nullify the impacts of the caste system on the economy, if reservation is anti-constitutional and if it strengthens the institution.

SUCH A LOVELY PLACE

I was on the highway
And the FM was filling the car
Serving melodies and memories sweet.
Up ahead in the distance
Dark dark sky and a gold coin moon
An Indian's moon in Californian sky
Visible through the thin cloud layer
The dark thick clouds painting black everywhere.

Sudden storm of grief struck my heart
Farther I go and I Wouldn't see my moon...
I told myself
Stop in this moment
And just stay with the present...
Pity Pity!
Where will I stop?
Time or space?

What a nice surprise!
Moon followed my eyes,
Forty miles per hour,
shining through the clouds
Making them look thin and pale.

It wasn't a thin layer
That allowed the moon to shine.
It was the moon
that made the cloud look thin.

With my eyes on it,
I can go anywhere,
For wherever I go, My moon!
May the sky be dark and the clouds thick,
You brighten my way,
My eyes, my life.
World with you
Such a lovely place!
Only with you,
Such a lovely place!

(Yes, You got the song FM was playing right!)

Remembering S P Thamilchelvan