Tushar Bhatt
He sits on the ground,atop an ochre-coloured clothpiece,the back supported by a board.The lean bespectacled ascetic,Swami Chindanada,head of the Divine Life Society,who turns 80 on Sun-day,looks completely at ease,as if he has been there all his life.Around him are some books and booklets,his constant com-panions in his ceaseless wandering throughout the world.
The serene face is no stranger to Ahmedabad,but this time his three-day visit coincided with his birthday,a day being observed as no different from other days.But,he is a monk with a difference, somebody who is in the world,but not of the world, a man totally without ego.His huge following would do almost anything that he might care to ask;and he never asks for anything.
He treats even a sceptic with great affection,as if the visitor is a dear disciple,launching into a discussion with a gusto,neither age nor fraility standing in the way.
What is the necessity and relevance of spiritual life,the sceptic asks,echoing a sentiment often heard in the modern,technological world,where space has shrunk,distances spanned.The Swami's eyes lit up,a smile flickers on his lips.He ticks off what man has achieved through centuries of scientific development: "Jungles have been converted into cities,and night has been converted into day.We have conquered time,distance and air.We go under the water faster than the fastest sabmarine animal created by God; we are able to fly in the faster than any bird created by the Creator.We have outdistanced the fleetest animal upon the surface of the earn and vast knowledge has been accumulated.There are thousands of libraries with millions of books, universities agalore,and education has spread."
He pauses for a flickering moment,silence underlining the extent of progress mankind has made."And, in spit of all this ,is it not ironical that today human society lives in a fear psycho-sis.Sedatives and tranquilisers are needed by many.Why? The modern man is an anxiety-laden creature.The world is fulled with problems, complexities and there is a great state of worry,fear and uncertainty."
Some may even be tempted to ask: Has man a future? Is he on the brink of a global destruction?
Swami Chindananda says: "The problem that faced our pre-historic,stone-age ancestors-- the problem of survival -- has now come back to confront the modern man,after so much of progress and accumulation of knowledge."
What is the reason for this,why is not man better off than those bygone days. "Yes, we are better off in certain ways.We have more comforts.We can live life with great ease,less exertion,and if that is taken as a better state of life then we are vastly better off than our ancestors."
But is it globally so,is everyone,in that state ? Why are there dis-trust,hostility,hatred,cut-throat competition,conflict,restlessness,all around,whether in the developed West or,the less developed coun-tries ?
The Swami reasons:"We cannot say that the scientific knowl-edge,technology,advancement,discoveries by themselves have brought mankind to the situation that prevails today.We cannot say so because knowledge is only accumulation of information and facts,The forces that man has learnt to harness are amoral,neither good nor bad.They are just there and they are neutral since by themselves,they do not possess the ability to cause any experi-ence to man.They cannot destroy because they are inert and so we cannot say that by themselves they constitute the present prob-lem of mankind.It is the way in which these forces are applied,the way in which they are used that decides whether they are a men-ace to mankind or a boon."
Swami Chindanand continues to speak in an even tenor,his words are almost like a whisper, a secret being shared with a close friend. "If man has been civilised,he has progressed,should be-come better and better ? Should he not create a world where there is peace,happiness,where man lives without fear,there is amity,co-operation,harmony,a feeling of unity and brotherhood? Should not this characterise real civil civilisation, the true progress ?"
The evening shadows are lenghthening in the garden outside. The Swami says:"This has not happened because man has totally ignored the nature of the human being,neglected the spiritual di-mension of a human being's personality,and ignored the cultivation of the spiritual aspect of life."
He becomes a bit descriptive,as if to put it across in a more ru-dimentary fashion." Man has brought about a wonderful transfor-mation in his outer environment,but never paid much attention to his own cultivation.So many fields of knowledge were brought about,cultivated and evolved,but human culture was totally ne-glected."
Swami Chindanad comes to the moot point: "The great blunder which man committed was to take a purely materialistic view of the human being.They looked upon a human being as a physical and psychological creature, a bilogical being endowed with a faculty of thinking,feeling and reasoning,and they said if you cater to the needs of the body and mind of man, that is all there is to it. You have done your duty."
He goes on:"This materialistic view of the human being led peo-ple to evolve social theories and political philosophies which were oriented towards bringing about a state of well-being of the physi-cal man and the psychological man."
In India,says Swami Chindananda,it has been known that man is endowed with a third,and higher factor that ,in fact, is his true iden-tity.The physical and psychological aspects of the human beings are to be provided for,but not at the neglect of man's true Self." Spiritualism is needed to help man cultivate the third level of his being.He says that the power of thought,feeling and reasoning make the human beings different from animals,but not necessarily superior."Unless man cultivates his true self,the very intellect may cause his downfall,may become a curse."
The Swami says:Man should become aware of his inner divin-ity.Divinity withim himself each human being is potentially divine.". He once wrote:" Man is part of God.There is, as the Quakers say in the West,that of God in man.This concept is one of the basic and fundamental concepts in all religions.The essence of education is to try to bring about in the psychological man nobility.The essence of living true life is the awakening of the sleeping and slumbering divinity."
What is it that distinguishes man,asks Swami Chidan-anda,himself providing the answer. "It is the ability to be compas-sionate, the ability to feel for the joys and sufferings of others, the ability to wish to ameliorate the sorrows and troubles of others.Man is the only unique creature in the entire creation who can think of others,who can try to live for others."
The clock is ticking by.A young disciple,mindful of the time as also the stress continuous talking is imposing on Swami Chidan-anda,silently pushes an alarm clock in fron him.But the monk ig-nores his imploring glances.Later,Swami Adhyatmanand recalls:" Swami Chindanand would never shrink from making his point ,no matter how much pain it might cause to his body."
Born on September 24,1916,as Sridhar in an orthodox family at Mangalore,Swami Chidananda graduated from the Loyola College in Madras in 1938,and joined the Himalayan Ashram of Swami Sivananda in 1943.He was later put in charge of the dispensary and served patients,some afflicted by leprosy with great compas-sion.He took sanyas in 1949,and a decade later,went to the West for two years on a lecture trip.He succeeded Swami Sivananda as president of the Divine Life Society in 1963 and has been on the move ,giving discourses and lectures throughout the world.
The neglect of spiritual aspect of life because of the focussing of attention of the materialistic view of the human personality has been a costly error,he says.The only solution to the present crisis gripping the world is to rectify this error.Identify yourself with oth-ers,feel their sufferings, try to alleviate their sufferings." That, of course,would only be a beginning to awakening the spiritual nature of the human beings.Service of man is worship of God."
A shining example of this near at home in Gujarat;the 80-plus-year old Dr Shivanand Adhvaryoo of Virnagar.For nearly four dec-ades he has been working for combating eye ailments and blind-ness from that small village in Saurashtra.One Dr Adhvaryoo has made so much difference. It is an unspoken thought: What a cu-mulative change would there is if there were many more such peo-ple in different walks of life.
Swami Chidanand attained freedom from the burdens of this world in 2009.
Sunday, January 17, 2010
A melodious life, a soothing voice: Rasbihari Desai
Even if he were to keep utterly silent the man sitting in a chair in the third floor flat at Chandra Ratna in Ellisbridge area of Ahmeda-bad appears to have an unmistakable presence --not that of an in-timidating personality who dazzles his surrounding but that of someone like the full moon in a night sky, soothing and allowing other stars also to shine.
The man, Rasbihari R. Desai, noted Gujarati singer,composer and music-maker, nevertheless, also gives an impression of being detached from even his own self; he often refers to himself as Rasbhai,as if he were talking about a third person. The gaze from behind the black-framed spectacles is so piercing that for a mo-ment or two you feel the man is not looking at but looking through you.The biggish glasses rest on a rather large nose and seem to separate the rest of his face from the large forehead topped by wavy hair.Unconsciously,he tries to pat down the waves from rising into a mesh antenna at the top of the head.
The visual image could be dismissed as an effect created by the first impression were it to undergo a change in subsequently. In Rasbihari's case,even those who have known him for years would easily vouchsafe that the air of curious detachment around his be-ing is indeed a permanent feature.
That also perhaps explains the low profile he projects in Guja-rat's cultural life,in spite of having a rich voice,considerable musical talent that he has nursed through rigorous self-training over four to five decades and the yeoman's service that he has done in helping others to make a name in the sugam sangeet,light music.
He insists on continuing as an amateur artist instead of becom-ing a commercial or professional artiste; for he sincerely believes that he is neither of the showbiz nor in it.He has been in the lime-light,but would not move a little finger to keep the spotlight on him-self.
Says Kshemoo Divetia, a noted Gujarati music composer: "Rasbhai has a first rate voice, a superb kharaj, and sings with all his heart and being." Madhav Ramanuj, a noted poet,says: "Rasbhai is a unique music-maker in more ways than one.For one, he does not pursue music either as a career or hobby; he does it as a kind of sadhna ,spiritual activity. For another, besides being a music-maker par excellence, he is also a human being of the same grade."
Rasbhai,as Rasbihari is generally known,approaches music with a sense of reverence,combined with a scientific attitude of a life-long professor of physics. He says: " To me,music is not something that comes from your vocal chords,or hands or any instrument that you have.It mainly comes from the heart,is channelised through your body kept in trim through arduous 'riyaz'. I always treat myself as a perpetual student of music."
Born on June 23, 1935, at Patan in north Gujarat,Rasbhai lost his mother,Durgaba,when he was hardly 4 years old.His fa-ther,Ramanlal,who died in 1983,had a melodious voice.He used to sing patriotic songs with great fervour and sweetness at the meet-ings and processions during the fight for the country's free-dom,earning the nickname of being Meghani of Patan.(The late Mr Zaverchand Meghani,poet who also had a rich voice, has long be-ing hailed as Gujarat's poet-laureate of the Independence move-ment.) Rasbhai's grandmother, Mahalaxmiben,too had a very sweet voice and had a vast repertoire of bhajans,kathas and folk songs. She could recite the entire Ramcharitmanas from mem-ory.Thus, although Rasbihari had no formal exposure or training in music,the talent ran in his blood.
Even as he grew up as an average boy,Rasbihari,thanks to his aunt,Nirmalaben V.Desai,developed a spiritual bend of mind.In a commemorative volume,brought out after her death,Rasbihari re-calls how the foundations for his future life were laid during the eight years he spent at her aunt's place till he reached the age of 12.Her influence was to exert a great deal in his life,shaping his dreams,tempering his ambitions,providing him courage and sol-ace,and always there as a guiding star.It was she who in addition to the love for music inculcated in Rasbihari a great respect for lit-erature,taught him spiritualself-effacement and introspection.She herself was a good singer,wrote a lot and worked ceaselessly as a social reformer and teacher.
Says Rasbihari: "Music,simply put,is the language of emo-tion,language of the heart.Every human has some music in his or her being.There really can be no true enemy of music-- not even Aurangzeb,the moghul emperor." But why some people can sing or play music and why others could ,perhaps,enjoy it all only is some-thing that defies explanation. "Our ignorance about such things is limitless. There are machines that can synthesize and produce something very akin to a human voice. But, no, you cannot repli-cate a Lata Mangeshkar through such a machine." This was be-cause music was not only a product of vocal chords or hands play-ing tunes and rhythms; it also was a product of the heart,of the in-volvement of the self of the person doing it.
Rasbihari firmly believes that when he sings, " it is not I -- the ego of I in a capital letter - but some unknown,divine element that sings." This was so everywhere,but some recognised it and others did not. In truth, every public performance of Rasbihari and his singer wife, Vibha,begins with a prayer to that element in a be-ing.Since he sings with all his heart,his lack of formal training in music never posed a big impediment to him.He has a natural gift of a rich,resonating voice; he enhanced this gift by a systematic self-training that included even pranayam. His enchanting kharaj (lower octave) is the result of his regular pranayam that needs deep breathing. Lower octave, say music critics, is a sound produced from the depth of the navel (nabhi) and deeper and more pro-longed the breath is richer it would be.How enchanting it all could be can be sampled from a duet the couple has sung: Maadi tarun kanku kharyun ne suraj ugyo (written by Avinash Vyas) or Ame komal komal (written by Madhav Ramanuj).The couple has sung poems and ghazals written by many noted Gujarati poets such as Anil Joshi,Sheikhadam Abuwala,Harindra Dave,Bhagwatikumar Sharma and Ramesh Parekh.
Rasbhai began singing quite early in his life,but the real turning point in his life came when in 1964 he got married to Vibha Vaishnav,herself a top-notch singer.Says Rasbihari: " She has been a source of constance inspiration and encouragement.She is the first critical listener of anything that I sing or compose." The husband frankly says about his wife, who is an assistant income tax commissioner, that she is a superior artist as compared to him as far as self-confidence and consistency are concerned.They have given musical performances at hundreds of places in Guja-rat,India and abroad,and bagged honours. Rasbihari and Vibha have also some long play rcords and cassettes to their credit.
But,Rasbihari's most significant contribution has been to go be-yond self-development. On the Dushera day in 1961,he was in-strumental in the formation of a voluntary grouo,called Shruti,devoted to music. "Some friends met at my house on that day and we decided to sing together,experimenting with different styles and innovations in light music." The group, which had initially 22 members,has helped put on the high road of music a number of budding young people.Today there are 28 members in Shruti,but ,says Rasbhai, times have changed. "The pace of life all around us has quickened.Thirty years ago,it was not difficult to find three hours twice a week for the group activity.Today,it has become a tough thing to do. Yet, whenever programmes are to be organised, we do get together."
Rasbhai had taken to music as a mission only.Quite early in his youth,he decided to become a teacher,resisting family pressure to go for engineering which was the in thing then. He took up teaching of physics in a government college in Ahmedabad,later shifting to the Bhavan's college,and in his spare time at the Bhavan's started twice a week classes in light music,another activity that has given philip to young aspirants.Even today the class is conducted.He has also been at a number of youth camps ,run by the state govern-ment for ten days in the summer vacation,for moulding talents in music. Recalls Mr Kshemoo Divetia: " I would go for two or three days. But Rasbhai has a knack for these things.He is very comfort-able with students and can devise ways to keep them occupied throughout the day even as they learnt a lot about music." In 1980, Rasbihar got the best playback singer's award in Gujarati for his song,Maari Ankhen Kankuna Suraj (written by the late Ravji Patel) for the path-breaking film, Kashino Dikro.He and Vibha have also toured the U.S.A. extensively,and recalls fondly how very well-responsive the crowds there were. In Cleveland,says the singer,the audience gave them a standing ovation for as long a period as a song would last. At another place,they gifted them more money impromptu than the amount they were to get as honorarium.All through these years, Rasbhai has resisted playing to the gallery.He says that his amateur status,backed by his ability to eke out a living as a teacher,enabled him to stand up against making "compro-mises" that would have meant playing second fiddle to commercial interests.Essentially,the Desais sing for themselves, for their own artistic fulfilment and believe that if do it with hearty involvement,it makes an impact on the audiences too.
Rasbhai has no regrets;he has got no ambitions either. He is content that he remained a teacher for more than three dec-ades,which enabled him to remain an amateur in music as he de-sired.Then,he took premature retirement ,giving up teaching some five years sooner than the age bar would require to devote more time to music. Vibha continues working.He does some writing on music as well as on physics since " I like writing ".He puts much store by the yoga in music and feels that music is a kind of yoga only.He calls his devotion to music a process of mind purification (chittashudhdhikaran),and he keeps harbouring a restiveness that he should be able to be more and more creative in music-- "till this body lasts".He thinks that as his pursuit -- or devotion,as he would put it-- intensifies,he would be able to bring out more music from his being.All around him,Rasbhai does not find reason for despair on the music front in Gujarat."There are a lot of talented young people who will shine soon."
He stands aloof,singing mainly for what is called nijan-and,unimpressed by the rat race around him to hit the top of the chart. He is popular,but he is not a populist.The spiritual balance of mind that he has achieved enables him to follow his own motto: Surilo kanth,surilun jeevan ( melodious voice,melodious life).That he has entered the sixtieth year of his life is a little known fact.And,Rasbhai is not bothered about it.
A Wounded Soul of Gujarati Ghazals: Amrut Ghayal
He not only brought the ghazal form as authentic poetry into Gujarati, insisting on using the words of his mother tongue, but also elevated its status to a spiritual level, to a level reflecting the trials and tribulations of the masses, rather than remaining a vehicle of the love-lorn.
Ghayal - a wounded soul - was his pen-name, but even the poet himself had given up using his surname, Bhatt, and signed as Amrut Ghayal.Why did he take this particular pen-name? With a toothless, hearty laughter, he said: “It is not a pen-name taken in the aftermath of a broken love-affair. In a way, all human beings are wounded souls. I sing their songs."
There was not a trace of bitterness in Ghayal,although he yearned to be thought of a martyr;. in truth, he came across as a man who had lived a full life, had no complaints ,and more importantly,who,unlike so many of his age, was never tired of life. There was a peculiar zest for life, which made Ghayal an unusual ghazalkar, who had seen many ups and downs in his long innings. Teeth had taken leave rather early, and so had hair on his head, deep lines furrowed his largish forehead and veins stood out prominently on his shrivelled hands. But the mind was alert, registering as truthfully as ever. Though his throat parched easily, he spoke fluently, and coherently, never lost for either words or thought. The memory served the master efficiently, and Ghayal wrote incessantly. "You see, I cannot sleep much, and am much too restless to give up living."
The old world courtesy, long association with royalty and a modesty of soul, all made the man, bent with age. He would get up when visitors came, and see them off at the gate of the house when they depart, even though he had to walk with a stick.
Modest he was, but Ghayal was no servile a soul. He had seen a lot of ups and downs in life, but had not allowed them either to dent his spirit or to be cowed down by the worldly-wise, powerful. His modesty went hand in hand with an outspokenness that had struck many as unabashed arrogance.Yet; he was full of self-deprecating wit, a caring parent and affectionate individual, who would not overlook the ways of the world. In the middle of making a profound remark on ghazals, he would suddenly stop, switch gears and would call out:"Listen, bring some tea or coffee for our guests", and then pick up the thread of what he was saying effortlessly.
His literary journey of life had a journey of a single-minded devotion to the word .He had written nearly 1000 ghazals,brought out seven volumes of poetry, taken part in hundreds of mushairas.Still,he was as joyfully into it all as he was in his younger days. "I get involved in writing, once the imagination is triggered, often by a single word, a single phrase or sentence, uttered in utterly normal affairs of the day to day life. Words have such an effect on me that my thinking process gets started by them suddenly and I go into a trance like situation.Then,I would not get any sleep, would not remember the time of the day, or even to eat.” Some call it ras samadhi.
He went on: “I have an inner voice, ordering me about. It just does not get drowned by any external noise, distraction or difficulties." But, that did not mean he was an escapist, a romantic living in a make-believe world. Another poet, Makarand Dave, has noted that his spiritual bend of mind, made Ghayal a poet in this world, but not of this world. He did not run away from pain, but digested the pain so well that it led to a rare sensitivity and high-grade poetry. He took life at a high flood, unafraid of the intensity of the turbulence, and neither having the slightest doubt that he shall overcome.
Ghayal himself summed it up all in one of the ghazals:
Valan hun eak sarkhun rakhun chhun asha-nirashaman,
Barabar bhag laun chhun zindagina sau tamashaman
Sada jitun chhun evun kain nathi,harun chhun bahudha pan -
Nathi hun harne palatva deto hatashaman.
(I maintain the same frame of mind in hope and in despair,
I partake fully in the drama of life without allowing it to impair,
Not that I always win ; many a time I do get trounced,
But,not allowing it to drown me, I get back into it bounced)
Past eight decades into life,this man could still talk as if he was a mere 20-year-old, so full of ideas,joys,setbacks,life itself.He had a life-long habit of keeping a pencil and paper,handy,whether he was at dinner table or in prayer.But, that does not mean that Ghayal depended on the Muse to transmit him a signal and do all the work. He had mastered both Sanskrit and Urdu,although he wrote in Gujarati. He had studied the classics in ghazals,learnt techniques of word-play,meter,and to care of every word that he may care to use. "I do not depend on certificates from others; I must get a certificate from myself before I finish writing, re-writing and re-writing." That often meant the writing stretched over many days for a single composition.He,of course, was not in a hurry,nor was he bent upon mass-production,partly because he did not write to order, -- that is, any external order.
For all this, Ghayal was a simple person,not given to any showmanship or snobbery, two hallmarks of creative writers these days.
Born on August 19,1916, at Sardhar in Rajkot taluka,he remembered the prediction his father, Laljibhai ,had made about his son. Laljibhai was a chef in the royal household of Lakhajiraj of Rajkot, and since Amrut was born on the day of Randhan Chhath (which fell on August 19 that year),when people cook delicacies,he forecast:"The boy will spend a life getting heat, getting boiled." Like noted painter Vasudeo Smart,young Amurt's early days were also spent watching the colourful rites at the Vaishnav Haveli in the village.He would play the role of Krishna in the Krishna Lila stage in the haveli,go to a Sanskfit pathshala in the morning, and to the village primary school in the afternoon."On way back from school, I would go to the fields,catch-hold of the family mare,and bring her home,picking up vegetables for the kitchen.I would occasionally go to the tiny village library, read books and poems by Kalapi and Jhaverchand Meghani.Under the spell of Kalapi's poetry in Kekarav,I had imagined to pen poems,sitting on the bank of the village pond.But nothing got written. Upto the seventh standard,this more or less was my childhood."
He recalled: "I came to Rajkot for the eighth standard, and began learning English.Prabhudas,our teacher ,would patiently explain everything,but I just would not understand anything,would get fed up and jump classes.Most of my evenings were spent playing cricket,volley ball and wrestling.I was the school cricket team's opening batsman as well as bowler and had played against a Jamnagar team in which famous cricketer,Vinoo Mankad, was one of the players.Because of him, we got beaten. Another famous cricketer of the old time, Amarsinh, was also known to me,and thanks to him I played for a year in the Morvi team,after three years in Alfred high school in Rajkot.In 1936,after Mankad left the Jamnagar team,we managed to wrest the shield from his home team."
But all this,plus reading of literature and poetry,took a toll on his routine studies. He failed four times in his matriculation,and in 1938,wrote to the ruler of Pajod princely state, Pajod Darbar,Khan Imamuddinkhan, who later assumed the pen name of Ruswa Mazlumi,for a job,becoming his confidential secretary,in 1939. He held that job till 1948, during which he systematically learnt Urdu,getting his first ghazal published in Beghadi Mauj journal.Ghayal also happened to meet a lot of leading Urdu writers,such as Jigar Moradabadi,Josh Malihabadi,Bharat Vyas,Krishan Chander and Shoonya Palanpuri in those years.
Ghayal spoke with great warmth of his association with Pajod Darbar.He was the first person to recognise the potential in Ghayal's pen.An athlete and a player,Ghayal had been hobnobbing with writing.A sports contact with the grandson of Kalapi,Prahladsinhji,invited him in 1938 to go to the Kalapi festival at Lathi.Kalapi's son,Joravarsinhji too was there and so was the noted poet, Lalit. Joravarsinhji was a great fan of Kalapi and would recite poems of sorrow from Kekarav,Kalapi's collection of poems,every night with deep passion and anguish,tears rolling down his cheeks even as he sang."This made a deep impact on me",said Ghayal. In the mornings there would a visit to the samadhi of Kalapi.
Said Ghayal:"One day, while at the samadhi, I started feeling an unbearable,unrecognisable pang of mental anguish.Pajod Darbar had asked me to bring something for myself from Lathi. I started thinking about what I should receive from the precincts so poetic.I could not fathom my unease,nor could I decide what was it that was bothering me.I started crying and Joravarsinhji, who was known as Kakasaheb, consoled me."
Ghayal recalled:" I told Kakasaheb that I felt I had found what I was looking for. I was looking for the ghazal,and the ghazal itself has apparently found me. I do not think I will have peace with myself till I devoted my life to the ghazal.But how to do that was beyond me."
In the drawing room of the palace, Prahladsinhji asked the same question as was posed by Kakasaheb."I repeated the answer,but then suddenly my eyes caught the fish whirling in the aquarium in the room.I wrote a few lines comparing the slave Indians with the fish in the glass vessel. In the evening,Lalitji blessed me.He wrote the blessings in a poem,which unfortunately I later lost."
On return to Pajod from Lathi,Ghayal was as if in another world.The uneasiness lasted for sometime during which he went on inquiring about ghazal with every literary figure who visited the state.He had noted that the ghazal writers of those years used a lot of Persian and Urdu words and determined to write ghazals in Sorathi dialect in Gujarati.The editor of a journal, Karavan,from Rander,Vahesi,recommended to Ghayal a study of a two-part volume ,Shayari. He also asked Asar Saleri,to take him as a disciple.Asar told him to send him his ghazals.When Ghayal sent one,Asar wrote an advice that Ghayal followed all his life. "You do not have to show any ghazals of yours to anyone." He started depending on his own judgement,his own conscience.All his life,Ghayal never permitted any of his works to go into print till he had satisfied himself. "It requires writing and re-writing, but I am not a poet in haste and would not make compromise about my inner satisfaction.If conscience certified it,then only a ghazal of mine would be worthy of being called ghazal." He had implacably followed this golden rule,and maintained a total self-honesty.
In 1947,Ghayal's first wife, Taramati,died, but in the same year he managed to pass his matriculation.For a brief while,he went to college in Rajkot but gave it up. Soon thereafter when princely states were merged into Indian union, left Pajod too,to become a clerk in the public works department in Rajkot,and rose to senior clerk's position. In 1950,he married for the second time. He gave a lot of credit for his literary work to the wife, Bhanumati. In 1951,he got promoted as an accountant.His first collection of ghazals,Shul Ane Shamna,was published in 1954,when he got transferred to Junagadh.After serving the government iin Sunrendranagar,Bhuj and Nakhtrana,he settled for good in Rajkot in 1973,upon retirement. In 1978,Ghayal went to the Soviet Union and by 1982 four more publications were to his credit. In 1984, he got affected by TB,but recovered.Since 1985,he had been devoting time to writing only.A thousand-page compendium of his collected works was published as part of the celebrations of his 80 years of life.
He never stopped,however. "I write every day",Ghayal said, patting a black colour briefcase,lying next to him on the bed on which he was sitting when I went to see him once,never realising it was our last meeting.He planned to complete at least 1,001 ghazals in his life time; some 900 had already been written. "I plan to bring out one more book ,my ninth,coinciding with the philosophy of nine rasas",he said without any boasting.Modest he always was,but he was also proud to be an original poet.Once he was asked if he could be called Gujarat's Ghalib.With humility,he submitted: I do not believe in copying,and I would only say this much:
Anadi chhun matlab adal man adal chhun,
Nathi nakal hun dar asal hun asal chhun.
Nathi samrat athva rushi hun;
Kharun jo kahun to shaheed-e-ghazal chhun.
(Am with neither a root nor a top. I am I am,
Am not a copy. Originally I am an original.
I am not an emperor ,nor am I a saint,
I am just a martyr to the ghazal,if must it be said.)
His ghazals talk a lot about life and death."I want to tell you I have not been a soft,cry-baby type. I would rather say this:
Tane kone kahi didhun maranni baad mukti chhe?
Rahe chhe ked eani ea fakt diwal badale chhe.
(Who told you there is salvation after death?
Prison remains the same,only the walls change.)
Once,when he was down with hepatitis-B,there was dim hope of his survival. But Ghayal was not one of those pessimists."I told my children I am not going to die . I am going to live for 89 years.Even thereafter,it would be like changing clothes. I will come back.There is nothing like death; it is only a change of clothes."
His advice to the young writers was equally frank,and fearless."Study the ghazal first. Read everything you can. Respect the word,its finer nuances,exact meaning,proper usage.The word is a very pious thing. Use it with devotion.Do not soil it. Only such a devotion to the word will bring in the real element of poetry into your writing."
People still remember how Ghayal recited a Gujarati composition to Jawaharlal Nehru when the first prime minister of India was on a visit to Rajkot during the days of the erstwhile Saurashtra state,some five decades ago. Another tall poet,Shaikh Adam Abuwala,recorded the encounter evocatively.
Ghayal told Nehru that he would present something in Gujarati only,seeking the prime minister's indulgence if he could not follow it. A game Nehru said : "Go on. I have been with Bapu for many years and can understand Gujarati, and if need be can even speak a smattering of it too."
Then, Ghayal sang out something that must have left Nehru, who wore a red rose in the lapel of his coat, red also in face, especially the part where the poet talks of giving the people at least a stale rose,:
Melun ghelu makan to aapo,
Dhul jevun ye dhan to aapo.
Saav juthun shun kam bolo chho ?
Kok saachi jaban to aapo.
Bagman chhe bhag amaro pan,
Eak vasi Gulab to aapo.
Sukhna be char shwas to aapo|
Zindganino bhas to aapo|
Mukt vatavaran na swamio,
Kain hawa kain ujas to aapo|
Muktinu ene saaj to aapo.
Adamino avaj to aapo|
Mai na put manvine pratham,
Manvino mijaj to aapo"
(Give us,the people, at least a dirty,squalid hovel,
Give at least grains like dust.
Should not someone tell the truth?
Is telling lies always a must?
Give us an account,
Maybe wrong, but some count.
Forget not we too partly own this flower bed,
If not much,give us at least a stale rose.
Give us a few fresh breaths of life,
Or, at least give us an illusion of life.
O you Gods of freedom,
Let us have some air,some light in all this darkness.
Give us an instrument of freedom,
Give our vocal chords some rhythm.
O you,darlings of the mother India,
Give Man first of all the temper of a free man.)
A stunned Nehru asked Ghayal when he completed,why was he saying those things? “Give us time.”
Ghayal replied:"A poet is a mouthpiece of the people and the mouthpiece should pass on the pains of the people." The prime minister said: "Certainly. But do you feel the country has not made any progress at all?" Ghayal riposted:"Nearly two decades of Independence would be over soon.The underground drainage is still to come into my street."
Today,after six decades of Independence,an underground drainage is still to come in many streets of many cities.
There,however, was a paradox. If Ghayal could be brutally frank,he could be charming also. A freeze frame from the past has remained itched in memory. When this writer first went to meet Ghayal, he was in his pooja of the deity. As the visitors sat quietly for nearly half-an-hour,he went on unhurriedly, but not unmindful of our respectful waiting. Prior to getting up, he opened his eyes and softly called me and my wife Hansa and made us offer homage to the deity.He began reciting in Sanskrit. I believe in God but not in the rituals. But I did not utter a word.When the chanting ended I looked quizzically at Ghayal. He read my mind and said” I was praying to Goddess Saraswati to make home in your inner being to give power to your words.” I kept mum for want of words.
Nearly three free-wheelling hours of talking passed in which everybody present joined. Brushing aside the pleadings not to bother,he got up,picked up a stick and walked,firmly,chattering away in a firm voice,wheedling out a promise to come back soon.A spiritually erect man,bent with age; a rebelliously young mind,refusing to grow senile, stood as we left..
Ghayal is gone now. I have no idea if the goddess of letters has paid heed to his commendation. I do not think that she has but hope one day she will. What a daydream!
(END) ----
Saturday, January 16, 2010
Rohit Mehta, A Gujarati philosopher Ahead of His Time
Tushar Bhatt
Rohit Mehta, who died at the age of 86 at Varanasi on March 20, 1995, is remembered differently by different people. Some recall his cogently thought and delivered lectures on philosophy. Some talk of him as a man with legendary memory who could quote flawlessly from Sri Aurobindo,Upanishad,Gita as also Marx, a teacher with a vast repertoire and a subtle sense of humour and a prolific writer,and a man of unfailing kindliness.
Still some others think of him as a charismatic personality, donned most of the time in spotlessly white dhoti and yellowish khadi-silk kurta,slightly stocky in build,and wearing a black-framed pair of spectacles over deep penetrating eyes.He was brilliant, but never flamboyant, solid but never seeking recognition, an original thinker who could easily and without showing any burden mix with the most ordinary.
An unusual man who was extra-ordinary in many respects, and yet strove to conceal all this under modesty and nonchalance
Remembered Late Prof.P G Mavalankar, former M.P. and a well-read man himself: “Rohitbhai was a five-in-one personality - a thinker,philosopher,interpreter, writer and speaker, clear in thought and precise in language and eloquent in delivery. All these took him to the top.” He was all this, and much more.
A many spleandoured man,Rohitbhai as he was universally known was not just a run-of-the-mill freedom-fighter,a socialist-turned-spiritualist. He was in the world class, a thing about which he never had to seek certificates or to boast. Yet, he was so self-effacing that one would have to hunt for a photograph of his.
How tall was he could be measured from the fact that he was one of the pioneers of the Socialist Forum within the Congress in the early 1930s .He went to prison repeatedly, starting from student days and would have gone far had he stuck to politics. It was Rohitbhai who introduced a then young Morarji Desai to the youths during the freedom struggle.
He quit it in 1935,and was never to regret it.
He penned more than 25 books on philosophy, delivered thousands of lectures all over the world and sought to interpret the coming world far ahead of his time to his contemporaries. He was an able interpreter of his friend and philosopher,J.Krishnamurti,of Gita,of Upnishads and Yoga.
Yet, he was no parochial a preacher. His vision could embrace technology and spell out its impact on society and mankind far ahead of his fellow human beings.
What he diagnosed in 1950 in one of his early volumes, The Intuitive Philophy,rings so prophetic after 59 years today,as if it has been foreseen in minute detail by him.He said: “Ever since the industrial revolution of the early 19th century, there have appeared such factors in our society as have led to rapid and revolutionary changes in the socio-economic structure of the world. This tendency towards rapid changes has been considerably intensified by the scientific advance in the course of the last 100 years and more. Large-scale economic production and the breaking down of the barriers of space have been the two most outstanding features of the social and economic revolution which began in the 19th century and which still continues its onward march.”
“The new means of transport and communications, moving at terrifically increasing speeds, have eliminated distances between countries and have thus brought the peoples of all nations suddenly together. Along with this advance there has been an enormous increase in the scientific and mechanical skill as applied to economic production. This scientific technique is becoming more and more perfect so that there is today production of economic goods on a colossal scale. These goods must be sold and one country is too small an economic unit for the absorption of commodities produced on a mass basis. This factor of large-scale economic production, coupled with the elimination of distances, has tended to break down national barriers. Economic life has become international, for economic trends during the last years have moved in the direction of world unity.”
He perceptively observed: “But this economic currents have been obstructed in their progress by political forces. While the world is becoming one on the economic plane, it is kept divided on the political level. The idea of complete national sovereignty does not leave its hold on the minds of the people.”
He said:” One of the major contradictions of our age is this: the trend towards unity in the economic sphere and the maintenance of national sovereignty on the political plane. ... This is one of the paradoxes of our civilisation that while we desire for peace, we work for war !”
“Man’s psychological inability or refusal to adjust himself to the requirements of technological revolution has created an immense problem for our human civilisation...We cannot stop the advance of science producing continual changes in the material conditions of life, nor can we stop the activity of the mind which makes every change in the objective conditions too dangerous for the very existence of human civilisation. It may sound strange to say our generation is mentally tired while it has reached new heights of mental development through scientific advance.”
He thought specialisation and over-specialisation was the craze of the modern age, which had enabled us to create a wall between the real problem of life and us, the real problem being the increasing mental tension in the life of the individual. The problem of the individual, according to Rohitbhai, was to discover the fundamental value of life. Today the subjective life of man has been rendered extremely poor while the objective conditions are changing at a terrific pace. Man is trying to cover up his inner poverty by erecting huge mansions for social, political and economic activities. But these activities, instead of providing relief, gradually create greater and greater psychological tension in the life of the individual. Probably at no time in human history was the gulf between the subjective and objective factors as great as it is today. Unless harmony is established anew between these two factors, the human crisis is likely to move towards a deepening horror, the result of which will be complete destruction of our civilisation. We must discover a philosophical approach that would enrich the subjective life of man.” Prophetic words, coming from a man then in his early forties, and that was ages before Alvin Toffler had dreamt of his Future Shock.
Rohitbhai was born on August 3,1908 at Surat in the family of Hasmanram,who used to be a professor in physics at the Elphinstone college,Bombay.The bright child was destined to do unusual things from the early age. At the age of 18,he led a student strike in the Gujarat college in Ahmedabad against the dictatorial behaviour of its principal F.Shiraz.His two other associates were Jayanti Dalal, writer and Nirubhai Desai,who later became a famous journalist and author.Shiraz had ordered that no student shall participate in any political activity.The strike continued for three months at the end of which the young Rohitbhai was rusticated from the college and the Bombay university, according to Dr Bhaskar Vyas of Baroda.
Between 1926 and 1934,the young man was sent to jail five times for his activities in the freedom struggle, making him a blue-eyed boy of Mahatma Gandhi. He had already been an avid socialist by then, a core member of the group believing in socialism within the Congress in those days. During the floods in 1927-28,Rohitbhai did a lot of work for the poor.
He went to jail during the salt satyagraha too and in 1934,Rohitbhai was handed a two-year term of hard labour, and sent to Ahmednagar.The heat and hard work in breaking stones there led to a terrible illness. He suffered a sun-stroke and then was partly paralysed. The alarmed authorities rushed him to the KEM Hospital in Bombay under the care of Dr Jivraj Mehta, who was to later become the first chief minister of Gujarat.
Rohitbhai had refused even to go on parole but the Mahatma intervened. According to Prof Bababhai Patel, a Congress worker,Jamnadas Dwarkadas took J.Krishnamurti to see the ailing Rohitbhai. Krishnamurti kept his hand on the parts of the sick man’s body wherever it was paining. The therapeutic touch is said to have cured Rohitbhai completely. He walked next day, and was discharged from the hospital soon.
Rohitbhai who was in the freedom struggle along with Jaya Prakash Narayan ,was a sort of maverick. He invited Subhaschandra Bose to Gujarat,ignoring Vallabhbhai Patel’s orders.
But the spiritual bend of his mind had already started asserting over his rebellious political mind. He had begun to realise the “soullessness” of politics and plunged into studying the works of theosophy and Krishnamurti.
Leaving “the dunghill of politics”, he took to spiritualism and philosophy for life. He explained in 1937 his transformation in a volume called, A new world of theosophical socialsim,predicting the eventual downfall of the Soviet Union.
In 1941,Rohitbhai went to Adyar in Tamil Nadu to act as recording secretary of the theosophical society,and soon became the international secretary. He explored the ideas propounded by many and yet did not subscribe to any one idea completely. This however was not out of an intellectual arrogance but out of modesty. He was to be later given a doctorate in philosophy by the Swiss University at Lugeno.Among the books he wrote were many notable ones such as Yoga-the Art of Integration, The Nameless Experience, From Mind to Super-Mind,The Call of the Upanishads,the Intuitive Philosophy,the Play of the Infinite, the Dialogue with Death,the Being and the becoming, the Eternal Light,the Creative silence,Seek Out the Way,the Search for Freedom, the New World of Socialism, the Science of Meditation, and the Journey with Death.
in 1936,Rohitbhai was married to Shrideviben,a decade younger to him. She used to sing very melodiously. At his lectures, recalled Prof P.G.Mavalankar, Shrideviben would sing bhajans and hymns appropriate to the theme of his talk.” People would appreciate these after listening to Rohitbhai since the talk would make them understand the bhajans and hymns and their meaning all the better”, Mavalankar said. Prof.Mavalankar and his wife used to know the Mehta couple well and fondly remember Rohitbhai’s request at his talks (he would call them talks, rather than lectures): “You cannot leave while Shridevi is singing the bhajan. However,you can leave when I am talking.” Hardly anybody would go.
He used to live in Varanasi,when not travelling or lecturing around the world and the country.He used to come to Ahmedabad at least once a year for a series of lectures,which would start at 6.30 p m in the lawns of the late Rambhai Amin’s house in Gulbai Tekra,on the Labh Pancham day .Prof.Mavalankar remembered having seen around 2,000 people listening to Rohitbhai in rapt attention.When his health started giving in, he used to come every alternate year.
Remembered Mavalankar:” Rohitbhai had good diction,and he would speak neither fast nor slow,quoting with ease from a variety of works.His sense of humour would peep through in subtle manner every now and then.He was an optimist and knew the future lay in re-discovering India.This could be done by reviving its great culture which has been showing strands of decadence.”
Rohitbhai was a widely travelled man,having lectured at various places in Europe,the U.S.,Africa and Asia.He could talk fluently in English, Hindi and Gujarati.”
Dr Bhaskar Vyas of Baroda, who knew him for more than two decades remembered of an attempt by himself and Dr D V Nene at doing a biography of Rohitbhai. He read some chapters Vyas had written and recommended: “Tear them up”. Apparently, to Rohitbhai ideas were more important and lasting than the man who thought them, even if it was Rohit Mehta.
Despite his tall stature in the world of philosophy,Rohitbhai always preferred to remain the shadows, shunning the limelight. In 1993,a greeting card he sent to his friends said:” The mind that is constantly renewing itself never grows old. It is constantly on a voyage of discovery. It never arrives. It moves on towards an endless journey. And the secret of life is found not by one who has arrived, but by one whose journey never ends.”
In January,1994,he came for the last time to Ahmedabad.Shrideviben’s younger brother, Late Devendra Oza, a veteran journalist and humour writer in Gujarati,under the pen-name of Vanmali Vanko had lined up an interview for this writer. Hours before the meeting,Rohitbhai developed fever and the meeting was put off to a future date. That date would now never come. He has moved on to an endless journey of no return.
(THE END)
Rohit Mehta, who died at the age of 86 at Varanasi on March 20, 1995, is remembered differently by different people. Some recall his cogently thought and delivered lectures on philosophy. Some talk of him as a man with legendary memory who could quote flawlessly from Sri Aurobindo,Upanishad,Gita as also Marx, a teacher with a vast repertoire and a subtle sense of humour and a prolific writer,and a man of unfailing kindliness.
Still some others think of him as a charismatic personality, donned most of the time in spotlessly white dhoti and yellowish khadi-silk kurta,slightly stocky in build,and wearing a black-framed pair of spectacles over deep penetrating eyes.He was brilliant, but never flamboyant, solid but never seeking recognition, an original thinker who could easily and without showing any burden mix with the most ordinary.
An unusual man who was extra-ordinary in many respects, and yet strove to conceal all this under modesty and nonchalance
Remembered Late Prof.P G Mavalankar, former M.P. and a well-read man himself: “Rohitbhai was a five-in-one personality - a thinker,philosopher,interpreter, writer and speaker, clear in thought and precise in language and eloquent in delivery. All these took him to the top.” He was all this, and much more.
A many spleandoured man,Rohitbhai as he was universally known was not just a run-of-the-mill freedom-fighter,a socialist-turned-spiritualist. He was in the world class, a thing about which he never had to seek certificates or to boast. Yet, he was so self-effacing that one would have to hunt for a photograph of his.
How tall was he could be measured from the fact that he was one of the pioneers of the Socialist Forum within the Congress in the early 1930s .He went to prison repeatedly, starting from student days and would have gone far had he stuck to politics. It was Rohitbhai who introduced a then young Morarji Desai to the youths during the freedom struggle.
He quit it in 1935,and was never to regret it.
He penned more than 25 books on philosophy, delivered thousands of lectures all over the world and sought to interpret the coming world far ahead of his time to his contemporaries. He was an able interpreter of his friend and philosopher,J.Krishnamurti,of Gita,of Upnishads and Yoga.
Yet, he was no parochial a preacher. His vision could embrace technology and spell out its impact on society and mankind far ahead of his fellow human beings.
What he diagnosed in 1950 in one of his early volumes, The Intuitive Philophy,rings so prophetic after 59 years today,as if it has been foreseen in minute detail by him.He said: “Ever since the industrial revolution of the early 19th century, there have appeared such factors in our society as have led to rapid and revolutionary changes in the socio-economic structure of the world. This tendency towards rapid changes has been considerably intensified by the scientific advance in the course of the last 100 years and more. Large-scale economic production and the breaking down of the barriers of space have been the two most outstanding features of the social and economic revolution which began in the 19th century and which still continues its onward march.”
“The new means of transport and communications, moving at terrifically increasing speeds, have eliminated distances between countries and have thus brought the peoples of all nations suddenly together. Along with this advance there has been an enormous increase in the scientific and mechanical skill as applied to economic production. This scientific technique is becoming more and more perfect so that there is today production of economic goods on a colossal scale. These goods must be sold and one country is too small an economic unit for the absorption of commodities produced on a mass basis. This factor of large-scale economic production, coupled with the elimination of distances, has tended to break down national barriers. Economic life has become international, for economic trends during the last years have moved in the direction of world unity.”
He perceptively observed: “But this economic currents have been obstructed in their progress by political forces. While the world is becoming one on the economic plane, it is kept divided on the political level. The idea of complete national sovereignty does not leave its hold on the minds of the people.”
He said:” One of the major contradictions of our age is this: the trend towards unity in the economic sphere and the maintenance of national sovereignty on the political plane. ... This is one of the paradoxes of our civilisation that while we desire for peace, we work for war !”
“Man’s psychological inability or refusal to adjust himself to the requirements of technological revolution has created an immense problem for our human civilisation...We cannot stop the advance of science producing continual changes in the material conditions of life, nor can we stop the activity of the mind which makes every change in the objective conditions too dangerous for the very existence of human civilisation. It may sound strange to say our generation is mentally tired while it has reached new heights of mental development through scientific advance.”
He thought specialisation and over-specialisation was the craze of the modern age, which had enabled us to create a wall between the real problem of life and us, the real problem being the increasing mental tension in the life of the individual. The problem of the individual, according to Rohitbhai, was to discover the fundamental value of life. Today the subjective life of man has been rendered extremely poor while the objective conditions are changing at a terrific pace. Man is trying to cover up his inner poverty by erecting huge mansions for social, political and economic activities. But these activities, instead of providing relief, gradually create greater and greater psychological tension in the life of the individual. Probably at no time in human history was the gulf between the subjective and objective factors as great as it is today. Unless harmony is established anew between these two factors, the human crisis is likely to move towards a deepening horror, the result of which will be complete destruction of our civilisation. We must discover a philosophical approach that would enrich the subjective life of man.” Prophetic words, coming from a man then in his early forties, and that was ages before Alvin Toffler had dreamt of his Future Shock.
Rohitbhai was born on August 3,1908 at Surat in the family of Hasmanram,who used to be a professor in physics at the Elphinstone college,Bombay.The bright child was destined to do unusual things from the early age. At the age of 18,he led a student strike in the Gujarat college in Ahmedabad against the dictatorial behaviour of its principal F.Shiraz.His two other associates were Jayanti Dalal, writer and Nirubhai Desai,who later became a famous journalist and author.Shiraz had ordered that no student shall participate in any political activity.The strike continued for three months at the end of which the young Rohitbhai was rusticated from the college and the Bombay university, according to Dr Bhaskar Vyas of Baroda.
Between 1926 and 1934,the young man was sent to jail five times for his activities in the freedom struggle, making him a blue-eyed boy of Mahatma Gandhi. He had already been an avid socialist by then, a core member of the group believing in socialism within the Congress in those days. During the floods in 1927-28,Rohitbhai did a lot of work for the poor.
He went to jail during the salt satyagraha too and in 1934,Rohitbhai was handed a two-year term of hard labour, and sent to Ahmednagar.The heat and hard work in breaking stones there led to a terrible illness. He suffered a sun-stroke and then was partly paralysed. The alarmed authorities rushed him to the KEM Hospital in Bombay under the care of Dr Jivraj Mehta, who was to later become the first chief minister of Gujarat.
Rohitbhai had refused even to go on parole but the Mahatma intervened. According to Prof Bababhai Patel, a Congress worker,Jamnadas Dwarkadas took J.Krishnamurti to see the ailing Rohitbhai. Krishnamurti kept his hand on the parts of the sick man’s body wherever it was paining. The therapeutic touch is said to have cured Rohitbhai completely. He walked next day, and was discharged from the hospital soon.
Rohitbhai who was in the freedom struggle along with Jaya Prakash Narayan ,was a sort of maverick. He invited Subhaschandra Bose to Gujarat,ignoring Vallabhbhai Patel’s orders.
But the spiritual bend of his mind had already started asserting over his rebellious political mind. He had begun to realise the “soullessness” of politics and plunged into studying the works of theosophy and Krishnamurti.
Leaving “the dunghill of politics”, he took to spiritualism and philosophy for life. He explained in 1937 his transformation in a volume called, A new world of theosophical socialsim,predicting the eventual downfall of the Soviet Union.
In 1941,Rohitbhai went to Adyar in Tamil Nadu to act as recording secretary of the theosophical society,and soon became the international secretary. He explored the ideas propounded by many and yet did not subscribe to any one idea completely. This however was not out of an intellectual arrogance but out of modesty. He was to be later given a doctorate in philosophy by the Swiss University at Lugeno.Among the books he wrote were many notable ones such as Yoga-the Art of Integration, The Nameless Experience, From Mind to Super-Mind,The Call of the Upanishads,the Intuitive Philosophy,the Play of the Infinite, the Dialogue with Death,the Being and the becoming, the Eternal Light,the Creative silence,Seek Out the Way,the Search for Freedom, the New World of Socialism, the Science of Meditation, and the Journey with Death.
in 1936,Rohitbhai was married to Shrideviben,a decade younger to him. She used to sing very melodiously. At his lectures, recalled Prof P.G.Mavalankar, Shrideviben would sing bhajans and hymns appropriate to the theme of his talk.” People would appreciate these after listening to Rohitbhai since the talk would make them understand the bhajans and hymns and their meaning all the better”, Mavalankar said. Prof.Mavalankar and his wife used to know the Mehta couple well and fondly remember Rohitbhai’s request at his talks (he would call them talks, rather than lectures): “You cannot leave while Shridevi is singing the bhajan. However,you can leave when I am talking.” Hardly anybody would go.
He used to live in Varanasi,when not travelling or lecturing around the world and the country.He used to come to Ahmedabad at least once a year for a series of lectures,which would start at 6.30 p m in the lawns of the late Rambhai Amin’s house in Gulbai Tekra,on the Labh Pancham day .Prof.Mavalankar remembered having seen around 2,000 people listening to Rohitbhai in rapt attention.When his health started giving in, he used to come every alternate year.
Remembered Mavalankar:” Rohitbhai had good diction,and he would speak neither fast nor slow,quoting with ease from a variety of works.His sense of humour would peep through in subtle manner every now and then.He was an optimist and knew the future lay in re-discovering India.This could be done by reviving its great culture which has been showing strands of decadence.”
Rohitbhai was a widely travelled man,having lectured at various places in Europe,the U.S.,Africa and Asia.He could talk fluently in English, Hindi and Gujarati.”
Dr Bhaskar Vyas of Baroda, who knew him for more than two decades remembered of an attempt by himself and Dr D V Nene at doing a biography of Rohitbhai. He read some chapters Vyas had written and recommended: “Tear them up”. Apparently, to Rohitbhai ideas were more important and lasting than the man who thought them, even if it was Rohit Mehta.
Despite his tall stature in the world of philosophy,Rohitbhai always preferred to remain the shadows, shunning the limelight. In 1993,a greeting card he sent to his friends said:” The mind that is constantly renewing itself never grows old. It is constantly on a voyage of discovery. It never arrives. It moves on towards an endless journey. And the secret of life is found not by one who has arrived, but by one whose journey never ends.”
In January,1994,he came for the last time to Ahmedabad.Shrideviben’s younger brother, Late Devendra Oza, a veteran journalist and humour writer in Gujarati,under the pen-name of Vanmali Vanko had lined up an interview for this writer. Hours before the meeting,Rohitbhai developed fever and the meeting was put off to a future date. That date would now never come. He has moved on to an endless journey of no return.
(THE END)
A Kannad Professor and "Manvi Ni Bhavai" :V Y Kantak
Tushar Bhatt
BARODA:
BARODA:
May can be mercilessly hot in Baroda.Although it is already past 4.30 in the afternoon,the city as if lay under a heat haze,with traffic thinning to bare minimum.A man of medium height,in long-sleeved white shirt and trousers comes into the cool environ of the air-conditioned office,mopping sweat from his head of receding hairline.
Under the thick eyebrows,his sparkling eyes are sunken in the sockets,the only signs of age that Prof.V.Y.Kantak shows.
Many others at 85, when I first met him in early 1990s, would have remained indoors.But not Kantak.His quest for divining the inner meaning of life is driving him even now to look at the world around with alacrity,rarely found in men half his age.
A sprightly man,with a firm voice, a lively interest in the world around, a life-long experience of teaching,reading and writing in English,combined with a mental agility that is able to transcend mere words,format and story element,were as if waiting in the wings all these years.They have come in to play a role in Kantak in adding to the list of world class novels a gem of Gujarati literature rendered into English.
Manavini Bhavai,the celebrated novel by the Late Pannalal Patel,has at last become available for the non-Gujarati reading to sample the richness of the regional literature,its cultural ethos.
It has been waiting for nearly half-a-century for Manavini Bhavai first came out in Gujarti wayback in 1947.By now,it has gone into as many as 13 print-runs.Late Pannalal Patel,its author,was given the Jnanpith award for 1985 for it.
But,the much-acclaimed piece of literature,rated as the most powerful portrayal of Gujarat's rural life,had to wait till 1995,to come out in English.It would,perhaps,have taken a bit longer had it not been a chance suggestion some four years ago that triggered the literary interest of Prof Kantak, a retired don of the Maharaja Sayajirao University here.
A low-profile,self-effacing teacher of great eminence,Prof.Kantak gave the translation to the Sahitya Akademi in Delhi to publish,and did not think much of a follow-up to let the larger world know about it.Mr Arvind Patel, son of late Pannalal,took the translation,published under the tital Endurance,brought it to this reporter along with new editions of several of the late author's other works in Gujarati.
The blurb on the flap of the English version of Manavini Bhavai is rather miserly,about the translator.It makes for a terse reading of four sentences:"V Y Kantak(1912),eminent academic and critic,retired from the M.S.University,Baroda,as Professor of English.He has been working there almost since its inception.He has also taught at the Utah University,in the U.S.A.and was for some time Professor of English Literature at CIEFL,Hyderababd.He has written extensively for various literary journals in India and elsewhere."
Even a brief meeting with Prof Kantak would underline the inadequacy of the introduction,for the professor not only possesses extra-ordinary depths of knowledge about literature of the world,but also has a sound backing form a powerful insight into philosophy,erudition in half a dozen languages and profound understanding of both the western and the oriental thoughts,the first emphasising the reality as perceived in the world outside an individual and the other stressing the world within an individual.
Pannalal Patel,one of the leading figures of Gujarati literature,who died on April 6,1989 at the age of 77,himself got a belated recognition in the country when Manavini Bhavai bagged the 1985 Jnanpith award for him.Many have likened Pannalal and literature of early days to Maxim Gorky.
Like Gorky,Pannalal had also graduated from the university of life and had excelled t portraying in words powerfully life around him.He wrote graphically,and yet with a simple beauty and directness of prose.Man was at the centre of the best that was ever written by Patel and yet it was no fanciful flight of imagination in individualism totally divorced from the contemporary society around the author.Pannalal never cme out as an escapist in the struggles of ordinary people he wrote about. "Man", he once said," is not evil as such. Hunger is.And worse evil than hunger and poverty is begging."
Pannalal's characters,such as Kalu and Raju in Manavini Bhavai,were intensely human,drawn from the rural world of north Gujarat,speaking their own language,reflecting their own hopes,fears and frustrations,but never despairing of being alive.
Yet, Pannalal's reputation as a wordsmith largely remained confined to Gujarat,even after he came into limelight natioanlly after the Jnanpith award.That there was little awareness in the rest of the country about it underlined the tragedy of contemporary Indian literary scene as well.A man who was not well-versed in English and the art of advertisemet for the self,Pannalal in his lifetime never managed to bridge the gap; not that he cared either.
Kantak's translation of Manavini Bhavai at long last mercifully tries to fill the gap.Were Pannalal alive today,he would have perhaps called it a divnine co-incidence.Recalls Kantak: "Some four to five years ago, the son of a professor colleague,now living in the U.S.A. suggested to him a translation into English of Manavini Bhavai. I had not read it till then,although I have been in Gujarat for years.I read it,liked it and Endurance is the end-result."
Kantak came to Gujarat wayback in 1947,the year Pannalal's book was first published in Gujarati. He had been,by then teaching English for 11 years at Wilson College in Bombay.Some friends goaded him into joining a vast educational complex that was being set up at Vallabh Vidyanagar by late Bhailalbhai Patel,popularly known as Bhaikaka,and his colleague. "I and an old-time colleague,Dr.Aloo Dastur,came to Vidyanagar,setting up a college there. In the initial days,I rememebr we even used to take part in the voluntary labour at the construction site.Such was the enthusiasm Bhaikaka could generate."
After three years,in 1950,when the M.S.University was set up,Kantak moved to Baroda and rose to become the first Dean of the Arts faculty and retired in 1972.He then went to the USA and taught at Utah University before going on to Hyderabad,to call it a day for teaching sometime in 1977.He has been in Baroda eversince,occasionally writing here and there,delving deeper into philosophy,his yearning to unravel the mystery of reality as compelling a motivating force as ever.The translation of Manavini Bhavai into English also formed part of that quest only.
Pannalal's novel has been hailed widely as a modern classic,modern in the sense that it was a major achievement in a fictional mode that Pannalal himself started with in his 1941 work,Malela Jeev.Set in village life of north Gujarat,it is a fictionalised account of the great famine of 1900,remembered as the most ravaging calamity of Chhapaniya after the Vikram Samvat 1956 in which it occurred.Pannalal was a self-made writer and wrote it in a simple,direct style,devoid of any literary artifices or sophistication,and yet he was never "crude" or"raw"The story of a love affair between Kalu, a rustic village youth and Raj,a woman with immense mental power,the novel progresses on parallel tracks;it talks of the tragic lives of the two lovers,their endurance in the face of all adversities and the will to survive it all,as also of a people who were were devastated by the great famine,enduring similarly.It created waves in Gujarati literature,impressing readers as well as the pundits.Noted film actor and director,Upendra Trivedi,made a film based on the novel,and it won a Silver Lotus in the regional film category at the 41st national film festival a couple of years ago.
It moved Trivedi as it did Kantak.Said Upendra Trivedi; "Time is the hero,nature its leading lady and the famine the villain.Man's battle against the famine,the shortage of food fodder and water,the miserries all around,are enough to crusrh his spirit.Yet,man fights on,often hanging on to the the fragile threats of non-existent hope.The saga of Kalu and Raju too was equally moving."
Says Kantak: "Pannalal achieved a break-through in writing this powerful work.It was not only set in rural background,used the idiom familiar to the rustic folks,and still it was neither crude nor raw,neither did lack in intellectual content.With a complete artisic control,Pannalal made powerful probes into the basics of the human condition.Apart from imaging a peasant culture with ancient roots in its effort to cope with nature's callousness and human perversities,the novel has the distiction of fictionalising a historic catastrophe,the great famine known as Chhappaniyo.It is the tale of a man wedded to the soil in a raging tempestuous sort of conjunction from which a few chancy drops of 'nectar' can still be salvaged."
For all this,it was no easy a job to render the novel into English. Kantak says: "One addresses the task of translating into English the idiom and speech-tones of the well-grounded dialect of this novel of the Indian peasantry's life-style,with considerable trepidation." He has tried to retain,as far as possible, something of the naive simplicity and force of the direct immediacy of utterance implicit in it. Still,Kantak,the life-long university don and critic,is not making any claims. I am aware that howsoever one may try,the brevity,the compactness,the brilliant staccato effect, are inevitably lost."
He says "I have tried to avoid anything like a special stylstic feature that might call attention to itself in the English that is used. I hope the 'Englishing' conforms to the norms of the ordinary English that is current in India, without obscuring altogether the down-to-earth quality of Pannalal's art." One thing that gave Kantak a lot of troubles was the rendering into English of the songs and lyrical strains used for group-singing at marriage ceremony and other occasions.He rendered these in unrhymed iambic verse or less in keeping with the singing quality of the original pieces.
How did Prof.Kantak go about translating it? "I read it very carefully twice as a whole novel ,and then again read it meculously chapter by chapter as I went on rendering it into English. There were revisions too, especially in songs and lyrics.It took me some two years to do all this."
About the ethos of the novel Manavini Bhavai,Kantak says he is deeply impressed. "It is obvious that the Kalu of the famine sequences,towards the close,strikes one as a different Kalu from the puny,sentimentalism-prone, schoolboyish young man that the earlier Kalu was.What transformed him ? It is no doubt the natural process of maturity in the first instance. But the peculiar toughening of mental fibre and inner growth come from his respnse to two things -- the impact of Raju, and late, of the Chappaniya.Of these,Raju over-shadows everything in the novel.She is the heart of the story.She makes her young man. You almost hear the potter slapping and patting the maleable mass,and see her at the wheel,nudging,pressing, coaxing,as she spins the mass giddily into a shape.And, all done as though unconsciously,without any sort on design."
He continues: "Raju on the one hand, and the Chhappaniya on the other,bring Kalu to the boil, to maturing. Raju's role, in subtle ways,is that of a "mother" too,in addition to being a beloved. It is this vista,this simutaneous perception of the dream girl-- the soul mate (italics) mater (italics over),mother earth,prakriti,the one manifest in the other.Perhaps this, more than anything else spells the Indian experience.The secret of the endurance she instils in Kalu is the kind that is implcit in prakriti,nature, itself."
For Kantak,an image of the Indian reality comes to life between the two intensities,represented by Raju and the Chhapaniya,as if acquiring name form-- Namrup. "It is possible the perceptive might catch a glimpse of that elusive entity in the blundering innocence of a Kalu," says Kantak " More likely,they will see it all the more clearly in the eloquent silences of a Raju.And in the process, the 'drollness' of the tale,too,will have taken on a certain subtle singificance."
The reference to the drollness is to the original title's word Bhavai,literally speaking bhavai would mean a droll story,implying superfluousness.When he gave the original title,Pannalal himself was aware of the ordinary,literal meaning.In the foreword to the Manavini Bhavai,dated April 25,1947,the late author said that in addition to the literal meaning,bhavai would also imply in certain situation a reference to the worldly affairs or property,as was depicted in the Gujarati saying,Be Dhoran Ne Be Chhoran,A Aapni Bhavai (Two cattle head and two children,that is all what is our property in this world). Or,in another saying, Kheti A To Bhai,Zazan Manavini Bhavai (Farming,my brother, is a droll story of many people together).
The unarticulated question is: Could this, as Kantak puts it,"what appears merely droll in the eyes of modern humanism -- be hiding a profounder insight underneath?" It does,making the apparent droll saga assume contrary meaning.
To Kantak, it was part of a personal journey of the innr landscape, an"experience". He says,without much ado:"I think I am satisfied with what I have done." He is not bothered if the translation attracts much notice,or not,wins acclaim or is ignored. He had done his job and was happy with the resultant volume.Alas, he is no more and a hunt to locate his family did not yield.Maybe,they have moved away, maybe our memory is too weak to
remember.
Upendra Trivedi : Lone Shining Star of the Gujarati Cinema
t
Tushar Bhatt
His face averted from the rest of the workers, an old man was digging earth at the drought relief work. The general deportment indicated he must have been a man from a well-placed rural family that had fallen on bad days because of the failure of the monsoon, but that did not prevent him from working like a fury. As his pick hit the land with gusto, he sang in Gujarati: "Khandaniya Ma Mathan Ram, Zinko Ram Zinko Ram, Dukale Pidhan Lohida Ram" ( We are like the grains being pounded in the mortar's God, go on pounding us with as much force as you like in this famine which is sucking our blood.) A visitor who was at the site to distribute buttermilk among the workers was overhearing it, as if petrified by the sorrow and pain the old man, as also thousands and thousands like him, were suffering, uncomplaining and yet with dignity facing miseries inflicted by the vagaries of the rain God. "It sort of sent a flashlight through my head", said Upendra Trivedi, noted Gujarati thespian, whose depiction on the celluloid of the terrible famine in Gujarat nearly a hundred years ago, done on paper with great mastery by the late author Pannalal Patel, Manvini Bhavai, had bagged a silver lotus award for a regional film at the 41st national film festival. Basically, Upendra is a showman in the genre of Raj Kapoor and Dilip Kumar. After a lifetime in films, he had a stint in politics and found out that the real life is far more complicated than the reel life. For some time now he has been in wilderness and was almost in the oblivion. Politicians, cricketers and denizens of the filmdom cannot afford to remain out of public limelight. Perhaps, Upendra Trivedi had perceived it to be a clear danger. His friends and well-wishers rallied round with a volume containing the actor’s own life statement and writings by others and released it on July 9, 2009 at Gandhinagar. Among those who were present was Morari Bapu, a noted Ramayan preacher. An exhibition of cartoons and caricatures on Upendra by Nirmish Thaker, whose cartoons appear in a number of publications, including Opinion was another highlight of the programme. Nirmish said later his was the first solo exhibition of cartoons on a single actor. Rahul Gandhi notwithstanding, aged people rule the political arena, but perpetual youth is expected of sport persons and show people. So it is difficult to make whether Upendra’s political career blooms once more or his screen life, his real life or his reel life! Whichever it is, it remains true that had he not done anything else but the film on Pannalal’s novel, Upendra Trivedi’s name would always deserve respect. The novel, on which the film is based, itself had won laurels for Pannalal, ever since he wrote it in 1947, capping it with a Jnanpith award for 1985, given in 1986.The late poet Umashankar Joshi had hailed Pannalal as a writer no less than Shakespeare. Upendra Trivedi would compare him with Chekhov; others have drawn parallel between Pannalal and Maxim Gorky. Like Gorky, Pannalal had graduated from the university of life, portraying life around him powerfully, graphically and beautifully. Man was at the centre of the best produced by Pannalal, and yet it was no fanciful flight of imagination in individualism totally delinked from the society around him. In the struggles of ordinary people he portrayed, Pannnalal never came out as an escapist." Man, " he once said, " is not evil as such. Hunger is. And a worse evil than poverty is begging." Upendra Trivedi, who has been a leading light of the Gujarati silver screen and stage for years, had acquired film rights of Manvini Bhavai even before it got the Jnanpith award to Pannalal.The story, its social relevance, its pathos, its immediacy all appealed to him as something that would lend for a powerful movie. But, said Upendra Trivedi later, " I could not clarify in my own mind as to what I wanted to do with the story. That day when I saw the old man on the drought relief work, heard his song, and later spoke to him to find out details of his life, it all clarified in an instant-- as if like a flash." He said that almost every Gujarati who can read has either heard of or read Pannalal's Manvini Bhavai. What kind of treatment should be given to it in pasteurising it was the million-rupee question that had been exercising his thought-process. "When I saw the old man and his dignified struggle, learnt of the fact that although he had a rich son in law, he was loathe asking for help, that during lunch time, he would go running home to look up his cattle, all touched my heart, and gave me a cinema idiom, so to say." He could as if fathom the suffering of the old man at the relief work, and strove to transform that suffering in filming Manvini Bhavai. "It was not a story of Kalu and Raju, or of any of the characters portrayed in the novel only. It was during a famine that most of the established demarcations of behaviour disappear. Family ties became strenuous; man and animal both would be compelled to drink dirty water from the same source. It was a timeless tale of the rural folks pitted against hard times, the story of a drought, a famine, whether it is in Bhiloda, my constituency, north Gujarat, Saurashtra or Kutch, or entire Gujarat. It transcended boundaries; it could be the tale of farmers in Somalia or Ethiopia." "Time is the hero, the nature its leading lady, and the famine the villain. Man's battle against the drought, the shortage of food and water, the miseries all around are enough to defeat him, crush his spirit. But man, fights on, often on the strength of fragile threads of non-existent hope. I made the film on this concept", Upendra Trivedi said." I realised how magnificent this epic struggle of human beings against the vagaries of nature has been. I have tried to celebrate it, eulogise his fighting spirit, and pay tribute to his ingenuity. Look at Kalu, one shower of rain and he revives as if Shiv has returned with the Ganga in his hairlock." He also felt that a paucity of water -- for drinking, for farming, for animals-- was at the root of most of his miseries. "Water is life." In filming the novel, Upendra made a few changes; " I have dropped a few characters, added some, added some descriptive scenes to make it all the more focused. For instance, to drive home the real face of the famine of the 1890, which Pannalal wrote about in the book, I have added a pre-drought scene of charming rural scenery. But I have remained faithful to the basic purpose of Manvini Bhavai." In a way, this is the graduation of Upendra Trivedi, successful actor, from the days he used to play varied roles such as Veer Mangdawalo, Malavpati Munj, to Kalu, the famine-ravaged rustic from rural Gujarat. If he began with Veer Mangdawalo, a beautiful story of history, in which a newly married man goes out from the marriage pandal to save cows. He remembered, with visible signs of pain, how the literati in Gujarat used to scoff at his such roles in historical movies made on low budget in Gujarati in the 1970s and early 80s.They made him a household name in the villages, but did not earn him respect among the elite. "The literati", he recalled as if to comfort himself, " had found fault even with Zaverchand Meghani half a century ago, when the poet and writer had roamed all over Saurashtra, collecting folk tales and songs. These had been the rich heritage of our people but the elite pooh-poohed it all. The same happened to me too." But, this has been an education for Upendra Trivedi and has helped him in transformation from a popular screen figure into a producer it some social insight and politician with some commitment. Born at Indore, Madhya Pradesh, on July 14, 1937, Upendra has seen many ups and downs. "For some time, we used to live at Ujjain and I did not even know much of Gujarati", he recalled. Then, he went to college in Mumbai, got a diploma in dramatics, studied Hindi, even as he pursued a career of acting on the stage. The exposure to the theatre gave him an abundant love for literature, an ability to put his finger on the popular pulse and courage to strive on and on. He remembered he had done an earlier picture in Gujarati just for a fat fee of Rs.500. Those were the days when one could be happy earning as little as Rs.125 a month. He got a break when he got a job as a producer on the All India Radio, but his first love, acting, made him gave it up." I was told I could not act at will if I was in the service. I chose not to be in service." His search for the self had begun. One of Upendra's early works was a highly successful play called Abhinay Samrat, a title that was soometimes applied to him in sniggering and derogatory reference. He played seven roles in the play, and yet the real identity of the hero was a mystery till the end; he was Radheshyam Maharaj, Haiderali Habib, Captain Rajesh Thakur, Rev.Johnny Walker, a tobacco trader from Talod, Pashabhai Patel. The story was that of a conman par excellence who could assume a different identity every time he needed to cheat someone, and get away by pleading that "Hun te nathi (he was not that person)." From "Hun te nathi", Upendra progressed to the silver screen, becoming the archetypal of Mangdawalo. But, he has also made films like Zer To Pidhan Jani Jani, based on the literary work of the same name by Manubhai Pancholi, Darshak. He has some 125 films, and many plays, to his credit by now. He speaks almost regretfully of the stunted growth of the Gujarati film industry; "It was beginning to blossom into its own after the inception of Gujarat as a separate state in 1960 and the formulation of a film policy later. But the video invasion, quickly followed by the satellite TV, aggression, dashed its hopes." He said that despite this, it was his ambition to make a film version of Manvni Bhavai. He has directed the film, in addition to playing the main role, written the script, the dialogue and chosen the locations himself. While Upendra plays the role of Kalu, whose struggle against the drought and pining for his lost love for Raju are at the centre of the theme, Anuradha Patel plays the female lead role. Among others in the supporting cast are Chandrakant Pandya, Bhairavi Vyas, Anang Desai, Kalpana Deewan and Ramesh Mehta. The only fault some people have found in the film is a reference to the Narmada project at the end of the movie. While it is true that water is very important, and so is the Narmada project, the mention of the Narmada super-imposed thus, lends a touch of propaganda to the effort. For a person who is a household name in countless village homes, Upendra is a very low profile person. He has an easy amiability, a presence and a good voice, but lacks the showbiz fizz. He had represented Bhiloda constituency in the backward Sabarkantha district for two terms, is very popular." I am not in politics for politicking", said Upendra, as if defending his place in it." I want to help the people; I am a people's artist and thought I could help them by working as their representative." He has an asset that may come handy in months ahead; he has a face that gets recognised by the crowds.
Tushar Bhatt
His face averted from the rest of the workers, an old man was digging earth at the drought relief work. The general deportment indicated he must have been a man from a well-placed rural family that had fallen on bad days because of the failure of the monsoon, but that did not prevent him from working like a fury. As his pick hit the land with gusto, he sang in Gujarati: "Khandaniya Ma Mathan Ram, Zinko Ram Zinko Ram, Dukale Pidhan Lohida Ram" ( We are like the grains being pounded in the mortar's God, go on pounding us with as much force as you like in this famine which is sucking our blood.) A visitor who was at the site to distribute buttermilk among the workers was overhearing it, as if petrified by the sorrow and pain the old man, as also thousands and thousands like him, were suffering, uncomplaining and yet with dignity facing miseries inflicted by the vagaries of the rain God. "It sort of sent a flashlight through my head", said Upendra Trivedi, noted Gujarati thespian, whose depiction on the celluloid of the terrible famine in Gujarat nearly a hundred years ago, done on paper with great mastery by the late author Pannalal Patel, Manvini Bhavai, had bagged a silver lotus award for a regional film at the 41st national film festival. Basically, Upendra is a showman in the genre of Raj Kapoor and Dilip Kumar. After a lifetime in films, he had a stint in politics and found out that the real life is far more complicated than the reel life. For some time now he has been in wilderness and was almost in the oblivion. Politicians, cricketers and denizens of the filmdom cannot afford to remain out of public limelight. Perhaps, Upendra Trivedi had perceived it to be a clear danger. His friends and well-wishers rallied round with a volume containing the actor’s own life statement and writings by others and released it on July 9, 2009 at Gandhinagar. Among those who were present was Morari Bapu, a noted Ramayan preacher. An exhibition of cartoons and caricatures on Upendra by Nirmish Thaker, whose cartoons appear in a number of publications, including Opinion was another highlight of the programme. Nirmish said later his was the first solo exhibition of cartoons on a single actor. Rahul Gandhi notwithstanding, aged people rule the political arena, but perpetual youth is expected of sport persons and show people. So it is difficult to make whether Upendra’s political career blooms once more or his screen life, his real life or his reel life! Whichever it is, it remains true that had he not done anything else but the film on Pannalal’s novel, Upendra Trivedi’s name would always deserve respect. The novel, on which the film is based, itself had won laurels for Pannalal, ever since he wrote it in 1947, capping it with a Jnanpith award for 1985, given in 1986.The late poet Umashankar Joshi had hailed Pannalal as a writer no less than Shakespeare. Upendra Trivedi would compare him with Chekhov; others have drawn parallel between Pannalal and Maxim Gorky. Like Gorky, Pannalal had graduated from the university of life, portraying life around him powerfully, graphically and beautifully. Man was at the centre of the best produced by Pannalal, and yet it was no fanciful flight of imagination in individualism totally delinked from the society around him. In the struggles of ordinary people he portrayed, Pannnalal never came out as an escapist." Man, " he once said, " is not evil as such. Hunger is. And a worse evil than poverty is begging." Upendra Trivedi, who has been a leading light of the Gujarati silver screen and stage for years, had acquired film rights of Manvini Bhavai even before it got the Jnanpith award to Pannalal.The story, its social relevance, its pathos, its immediacy all appealed to him as something that would lend for a powerful movie. But, said Upendra Trivedi later, " I could not clarify in my own mind as to what I wanted to do with the story. That day when I saw the old man on the drought relief work, heard his song, and later spoke to him to find out details of his life, it all clarified in an instant-- as if like a flash." He said that almost every Gujarati who can read has either heard of or read Pannalal's Manvini Bhavai. What kind of treatment should be given to it in pasteurising it was the million-rupee question that had been exercising his thought-process. "When I saw the old man and his dignified struggle, learnt of the fact that although he had a rich son in law, he was loathe asking for help, that during lunch time, he would go running home to look up his cattle, all touched my heart, and gave me a cinema idiom, so to say." He could as if fathom the suffering of the old man at the relief work, and strove to transform that suffering in filming Manvini Bhavai. "It was not a story of Kalu and Raju, or of any of the characters portrayed in the novel only. It was during a famine that most of the established demarcations of behaviour disappear. Family ties became strenuous; man and animal both would be compelled to drink dirty water from the same source. It was a timeless tale of the rural folks pitted against hard times, the story of a drought, a famine, whether it is in Bhiloda, my constituency, north Gujarat, Saurashtra or Kutch, or entire Gujarat. It transcended boundaries; it could be the tale of farmers in Somalia or Ethiopia." "Time is the hero, the nature its leading lady, and the famine the villain. Man's battle against the drought, the shortage of food and water, the miseries all around are enough to defeat him, crush his spirit. But man, fights on, often on the strength of fragile threads of non-existent hope. I made the film on this concept", Upendra Trivedi said." I realised how magnificent this epic struggle of human beings against the vagaries of nature has been. I have tried to celebrate it, eulogise his fighting spirit, and pay tribute to his ingenuity. Look at Kalu, one shower of rain and he revives as if Shiv has returned with the Ganga in his hairlock." He also felt that a paucity of water -- for drinking, for farming, for animals-- was at the root of most of his miseries. "Water is life." In filming the novel, Upendra made a few changes; " I have dropped a few characters, added some, added some descriptive scenes to make it all the more focused. For instance, to drive home the real face of the famine of the 1890, which Pannalal wrote about in the book, I have added a pre-drought scene of charming rural scenery. But I have remained faithful to the basic purpose of Manvini Bhavai." In a way, this is the graduation of Upendra Trivedi, successful actor, from the days he used to play varied roles such as Veer Mangdawalo, Malavpati Munj, to Kalu, the famine-ravaged rustic from rural Gujarat. If he began with Veer Mangdawalo, a beautiful story of history, in which a newly married man goes out from the marriage pandal to save cows. He remembered, with visible signs of pain, how the literati in Gujarat used to scoff at his such roles in historical movies made on low budget in Gujarati in the 1970s and early 80s.They made him a household name in the villages, but did not earn him respect among the elite. "The literati", he recalled as if to comfort himself, " had found fault even with Zaverchand Meghani half a century ago, when the poet and writer had roamed all over Saurashtra, collecting folk tales and songs. These had been the rich heritage of our people but the elite pooh-poohed it all. The same happened to me too." But, this has been an education for Upendra Trivedi and has helped him in transformation from a popular screen figure into a producer it some social insight and politician with some commitment. Born at Indore, Madhya Pradesh, on July 14, 1937, Upendra has seen many ups and downs. "For some time, we used to live at Ujjain and I did not even know much of Gujarati", he recalled. Then, he went to college in Mumbai, got a diploma in dramatics, studied Hindi, even as he pursued a career of acting on the stage. The exposure to the theatre gave him an abundant love for literature, an ability to put his finger on the popular pulse and courage to strive on and on. He remembered he had done an earlier picture in Gujarati just for a fat fee of Rs.500. Those were the days when one could be happy earning as little as Rs.125 a month. He got a break when he got a job as a producer on the All India Radio, but his first love, acting, made him gave it up." I was told I could not act at will if I was in the service. I chose not to be in service." His search for the self had begun. One of Upendra's early works was a highly successful play called Abhinay Samrat, a title that was soometimes applied to him in sniggering and derogatory reference. He played seven roles in the play, and yet the real identity of the hero was a mystery till the end; he was Radheshyam Maharaj, Haiderali Habib, Captain Rajesh Thakur, Rev.Johnny Walker, a tobacco trader from Talod, Pashabhai Patel. The story was that of a conman par excellence who could assume a different identity every time he needed to cheat someone, and get away by pleading that "Hun te nathi (he was not that person)." From "Hun te nathi", Upendra progressed to the silver screen, becoming the archetypal of Mangdawalo. But, he has also made films like Zer To Pidhan Jani Jani, based on the literary work of the same name by Manubhai Pancholi, Darshak. He has some 125 films, and many plays, to his credit by now. He speaks almost regretfully of the stunted growth of the Gujarati film industry; "It was beginning to blossom into its own after the inception of Gujarat as a separate state in 1960 and the formulation of a film policy later. But the video invasion, quickly followed by the satellite TV, aggression, dashed its hopes." He said that despite this, it was his ambition to make a film version of Manvni Bhavai. He has directed the film, in addition to playing the main role, written the script, the dialogue and chosen the locations himself. While Upendra plays the role of Kalu, whose struggle against the drought and pining for his lost love for Raju are at the centre of the theme, Anuradha Patel plays the female lead role. Among others in the supporting cast are Chandrakant Pandya, Bhairavi Vyas, Anang Desai, Kalpana Deewan and Ramesh Mehta. The only fault some people have found in the film is a reference to the Narmada project at the end of the movie. While it is true that water is very important, and so is the Narmada project, the mention of the Narmada super-imposed thus, lends a touch of propaganda to the effort. For a person who is a household name in countless village homes, Upendra is a very low profile person. He has an easy amiability, a presence and a good voice, but lacks the showbiz fizz. He had represented Bhiloda constituency in the backward Sabarkantha district for two terms, is very popular." I am not in politics for politicking", said Upendra, as if defending his place in it." I want to help the people; I am a people's artist and thought I could help them by working as their representative." He has an asset that may come handy in months ahead; he has a face that gets recognised by the crowds.
Friday, January 15, 2010
Resurrection ( translation of a famous Gujarati satire)
(A celebrated satire in Gujarati }
Originally written By VINOD BHATT
rendered into English by Tushar Bhatt
Resurrection
I could not trust my ears and stared with a dumb expression at my friend. He was emphatic: “You just try and find out if I am telling you the truth.”
He held up a small bottle containing sparking liquid. “Put only three drops
of this magic potion on any inanimate thing and it will spring to life.”
As if reading my thoughts, the friend drove home the point further. “I will tell you what you could do. Just go to any statue standing in a public place,put three drops of the potion into the statue’s left ear and see what happens.
He was so insistent I thought I had no option but to try. There being any number statues of any manner of people all over the country, it was easyenough. The question now was of choosing a proper candidate in an appropriate place.
It occurred to me why not try the potion on the Mahatma’s statue, standing at the Income Tax Circle on Ahmedabad’s Ashram Road? On his return from South Africa, Gandhiji had made home in Ahmedabad and founded the Ashram, the first
HQ of India’s non-violent freedom struggle.
Modelled on a famous woodcut of Nandlal Bose, the statue is beautifully done. With a walking staff in hand, the Mahatma seemed to be in a sombre mood and striding away from the Sabarmati Ashram.
Nevertheless I paused for a jiffy to ponder. Was it proper to carry out this seemingly innocuous experiment on the statue?
cause they were fighting for.
Perhaps, he also would not mind my putting in mere three drops of the potion in the statue’s ear. After all, unlike others I was only verifying the truth of my friend’s claim, a harmless experiment with truth, with no personal or group axe to grind.
I cautiously put the drops into the statue’s left ear. As soon as the drops went in, Bapu came alive.
There was some cramp in his sprightly demeanour, a result of standing in the same rigid position for years. He stretched and yawned. The walking staff in his hand dropped to the ground. Dutifully, I bent down and picked up the
staff to hand it back to Gandhiji.
Quick.”
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