Newly Returned Indian

Readings in History Part 6 - Back to Indus (-Sarasvati) valley

2011-09-11T07:26:00.000-07:00

The Indus valley civilization has been a source of great intrigue for me. I had written about it in two previous posts. In my first post, which was summarizing John Keay's book on Indian History, I had mentioned the common (Western?) view of the Indus valley civilization that it was distinct from the Vedic Aryan civilization. This was backed partially by the fact that there seemed to be no link between the undeciphered Indus script and the Vedic Sanskrit.

Recently, I have been made aware of a completely different thread of thought wherein the Vedic civilization is nothing but a continuation of the Indus valley people & heritage. This thinking also happens to be contrary to the Aryan Invasion theory according to which the Vedic Aryans "invaded" India from somewhere in Central Europe or Asia.

An engrossing and scholarly work by Michel Danino titled Lost River: On the Trail of the Sarasvati lays a strong foundation for this line of thinking. The book starts as a hunt for the river Sarasvati that is the most mentioned and praised river in the Rig Veda. One of the Rig Vedic hymns lists a set of rivers in order : Ganga, Yamuna, Sarasvati, Shutudri (Sutlej)...., Sindhu (Indus),.... This order happens to correspond to the modern rivers in the region from east to west (with Sarasvati missing today of course). The rishis of the Rig Veda praise Sarasvati as a gushing river 'breaking through the ridges of the mountains with her strong waves'.

Danino makes a convincing case for Sarasvati to be the antecedent of the current Ghagra-Hakkar river system in Haryana and Punjab which is now a seasonal river that dries up much before it reaches the sea in the Thar desert. This location is in between the Yamuna on the east and the Sutlej on the west and aligns with the east-to-west order mentioned in the Rig Veda. If this was indeed a gushing river with huge flows in Vedic times, how did it get reduced to this seasonal stream? Danino cites various studies that point to a seismic event in the foothills of the Himalayas (close to where the Sutlej and Yamuna rivers originate) that might have happened sometime in the 3rd Millennium BCE. The realignment of the terrain caused by this earthquake caused these two rivers that were then tributaries of Sarasvati to change course radically. The Sutlej got diverted to the west and got captured by the Indus system. The Yamuna, which was then a westward flowing river into the Sarasvati was diverted eastward where it joined the Ganges. The diversion of two of its primary water sources was the primary cause of the Sarasvati drying up.

Now, how is all of this connected to the Harappan civilization? (the reason I start referring to the Indus valley civilization as the Harappan civilization will become clear soon). It turns out that a full cataloging of all the Indus valley sites reveal a close association of the Harappan civilization with the Sarasvati river and its tributaries. Even though the most well known sites of the Indus valley civilization (Harappa and Mohenjadaro) are located along the Indus river, there are hundreds of sites that have since been discovered along the course of what would have been the Sarasvati river and its tributaries at that time.

Further, a classification of Harappan sites as early, mature and late happens to align well with the history of when the river was flowing and when it started shifting course as established by the geological evidence. Mature sites are found along the original course and as it starts drying up, late sites show up further east closer to the Yamuna. Given the association of the Harappan sites with the Sarasvati river's course, Danino (and many other archeologists) argue that if the civilization should be named after any river(s), it should be called the Indus-Sarasvati civilization. Or more neutrally, the Harappan civilization after the first discovered site.

So, we have the Vedic Aryans living close to the Sarasvati witnessing its robust flows and Harappan sites have been found in exactly those locations. If the Vedic Aryans arrived in India 500 years after the decline of the Harappan civilization in the 2nd millennium BCE as per the prior belief, then they could not have seen the Sarasvati in full flow since the geological evidence suggests that it had dried up by then. This is actually the starting point for Danino's elaborate argument that the Vedic society and latter day Indian civilization is nothing but a continuation of the Harappan civilization. The Harappans did not vanish. They just moved eastward as the rivers shifted courses and settled eventually in the Gangetic plain. This makes the Indian civilization the longest running continuous civilization in history as per Danino and others who share this thinking (this may just explain the 1.2 billion).

If the Harappans are closely associated with the Vedic Aryans, that seemingly contradicts the theory put forth by I. Mahadevan and Asko Parpola that the Harappan script might be a written form of a proto-Dravidian language. Or does it? Only if you equate languages with civilizations. May be there were proto-Dravidian speakers living among the Harappans (Vedic Aryans). There is a lot of other evidence that suggests the Harappans themselves were a very diverse loosely federated society with no central control.

The book continues with an elaborate discussion of the Harappan civilization, and how, many of their traditions show up in modern day cities along the Gangetic plain. More on that later.

- Balaji

Mamallapuram - part I

2011-06-26T06:31:00.000-07:00

It was the last week of my 2-month sabbatical and I made a 3 day trip to Chennai. One of those days was spent in Mamallapuram (or Mahabalipuram), 50km from Chennai on the East Coast Road. Mamallapuram is the site of the world famous sculpural complex constructed by the Pallava Dynasty in the 7th/8th centuries CE.
This was no ordinary trip. I was accompanied by my friend RG who has learnt about Mamallapuram from the likes of noted cultural enthusiast Prof. S. Swaminathan and Prof. Balusamy of Madras Christian College, who have researched Mamallapuram extensively and written about it. My friend had been on the ultimate guided tour of Mamallapuram with Profs. Swaminathan, Balusamy and others; he was kind enough to pass the knowledge on to me. The knowledge RG has will easily surpass the government certified tour guides you will find in Mamallapuram. I was in good hands.

Who built Mamallapuram?
There is some debate about which of the great Pallava rulers had them sculpted. The more prevalent theory is that Narasimha I (son of Mahendravarma Pallava) constructed most of the complex except the shore temple which is attributed to his grandson Rajasimha or (Narasimha II). There is another theory that says the whole thing was constructed by Rajasimha.
It is hard to believe that sculptures of this variety, sophistication and scale could have been done in one ruler's reign. In fact it is quite possible that Mahendravarma Pallava (Narasimha Pallava's father) may have conceived and started the whole venture and it was finished by his descendants.

Why is Mamallapuram a big deal?
It is the only place in the world where you can find four different sculptural ideas executed -

Giant monolithic shrines carved out of entire hillocks (e.g. the Pandava rathas)

Cave temples dug into a rock face with a mandapa, pillars, one or more shineswith no upper vimana or gopuram (e.g. the Varaha Manadapam)

Open-air bas-relief scultptures Elaborate sculptural panels on a rock face depicting a certain theme or an event from the Hindu epics or puranas. e.g. Arjuna's Penance

Structural Temples Non-monolithic temples (i.e.) constructed the "regular" way; e.g. the Shore Temple

When you see the variety of techniques being attempted and not necessarily completed - many of the mandapas and rathas are unfinished - you wonder if Mamallapuram was a sculptural laboratory of sorts.

Of course, India has a rich sculptural heritage and there are plenty of places where you might see grander temples (at Tanjore, Konark for instance) and arguably more intricate sculptures (at Belur, Halebid for instance). However keep in mind that Mamallapuram pre-dates almost all of them, often by many hundreds of years. In fact, there is a belief that Mamallapuram inspired a lot of South Indian temple architecture.

Objectively, I am amazed by the sheer ambition, scale, sophistication and the engineering. Examples of the engineering are the perfect curvilinear surfaces that roof the Draupadi Ratha and the 3-dimensional perspective vision in the Mahishasura mardhini and minor Elephant panel. See Mahisha below who looks bigger because he is closest to the observer while Durga is further back and looks smaller;

Subjectively, many believe that the sculptures have a grace that is not seen too often in latter day sculptural art in India. Gods and other figures are depicted in unique poses with subtle angles (look at Mahisha's indecisive pose) that hold a lot of intrigue. There is also the innovation, quirkiness (Mahisha seems to be the emphasis rather than Goddess Durga?) and audacity (e.g. of giant monoliths that get completed over decades across what must have been multiple sculptor's lifetimes).

RG could go into each panel or structure for about 20 minutes, describing the scene, the figures depicted and the various subtleties. Clearly, I cannot do justice in blog posts like these, but I will try and go into some detail on some of the masterpieces in subsequent posts.

- Balaji

Hampi Trip

2011-04-01T23:40:00.000-07:00

Our first long distance drive after returning to India was to Hampi, Karnataka, the capital of the Vijayanagara Kingdom (1337- 1550s). On the way, we took the shorter route that is mostly on state highways after an initial 75km stretch on the nice NH7 (now a 4-lane divided freeway).This route stumbles through myriad towns and villages on mediocre roads until the last 50km where it resembled the lunar landscape. On the way back, we decided to take the longer (440km) route which took us through a longer (300km) stretch on NH7. I would recommend the longer but faster NH7 route anyday.

Of course, the purpose of this entry is not to analyze road conditions in modern day Karnataka, but to talk about a World Unesco Heritage site that represents the "last great Hindu" kingdom in the south. Legend has it that Harihara and Bukka were inspired by their guru Vidyaranya to establish the kingdom on a spot where during a hunting trip, they found a hare turning back and confronting the hounds that were giving it chase. There were also more pragmatic reasons such as the water from the nearby Tungabadra and the surrounding rocky hillocks which formed a natural fortress from the north. In the North was the Bahmani Sultanate (1347-1518) which after 1518 broke into five sultanates of Ahmednagar, Berar, Bidar, Bijapur and Golconda (Hyderabad).

As per Sastri (author of History of South India), the kingdom had a tumultous relationship with the Bahmanis with whom they waged wars at times and at other times forged alliances with one or two of them - the Sultanates of course were fighting among each other all the time. Finally in 1564-65, the Bahamanis decided to set aside their differences and united against their common enemy and waged the decisive battle of Talikota against Rama Raya (the last noteworthy Vijayanagara ruler) on the banks of the Krishna. The battle was going in favor of Rama Raya, until supposedly two of his Muslim commanders deserted him and joined the enemies with thousands of soldiers. Rama Raya himself was killed and the Bahmani army pillaged and burnt Hampi for months leaving it in its current ruined state.

So what you see in Hampi today is mostly in ruins but enough evidence of its one-time greatness is there to be seen. The only intact temple is the Vrupaksha (Lord Siva) temple. In most of the other temples, the super-structure is all gone and you only see the mandapam level (ground floor). The vimanas (tower above the main shrine) and gopurams are all gone. The Vittala (Lord Vishnu) temple must have been a glorious temple, which consists of the famous stone chariot and mandapas with "musical pillars" - three pronged pillars where mildly tapping on one of them reverberates musically through the rest of the pillar. You see long colonnaded bazars in front of each temple which were once bustling marketplaces for everything from precious gems to Arabian horses.

There are three stunning monolithic statues - two of Ganesha including the Kadalekalu (peanut-bellied) Ganesha and Narasimha (reconstructed partially by the Architectural Survey of India). You now only see the arm of Lakshmi who was sitting on Narasimha's left lap. The yoga band around his knees has been reworked by ASI.The Zenana or the Royal enclosure houses the king and queen's palaces, (what is left of them) a gigantic "parking garage" for the royal elephants (which interestingly is mostly intact) and a beautiful bathing pool. We saw some lighting work in progress for a project called "Hampi by Night" which if done right could offer another way to experience Hampi.

The coracle (தெப்பம்) ride on the Tungabadra is a must-do and is a good way to get to the Vittala temple from downtown Hampi or from the quaint Mango Tree outdoor restaurant which is further upstream. Hampi is best visited during the winter months as the heat in central Deccan seems to be only amplified by the rock faces that are in abundance in the area. We decided to stay in an upmarket hotel outside Hampi which was fine if boring; if you're feeling a bit more adventurous you could go for the charming little guest houses (Indian equivalent "B&B"s) right in Hampi.

For more pictures, see the public album in Picasa.

- Balaji

Getting my car registered - Part two

2011-01-03T08:00:00.000-08:00

I got to the window at around 1:40pm bracing myself for a harried and rude official. Instead I was pleasantly surprised to find a person who had an air of brisk efficiency and was not unfriendly. He gave crisp responses to my questions and moved my papers along with scribblings on what seemed like random pages in the forms. He asked me to rush for inspection as it was getting to be closing time.

Inspection involves driving up your car on a 2nd line to a waiting police officer. This line was not that long and I reached the head of the queue within a few minutes. The police officer pointed out that I am supposed to get an imprint of the chassis number on the form using a pencil. The friendly instruction sheet surely didn't mention that. I hastily moved the car to unblock the line and my driver - who had joined me by then for moral and logistical support - ran to the nearby டப்பாக்கடை for a pencil. As I learnt that day, the chassis number can be found somewhere below the driver seat and can be reached conveniently by twisting your upper body into a sciatic pain inducing position. The police officer signed me off and sent me for the next stop which was in an air-conditioned cabin where some higher official (the RTO himself?) needed to give final blessing for my form.

In the air-conditioned room, there was a guy ahead of me waiting to see this officer. The officer gave a quick dismissal saying it was past closing time. The guy ahead of me mumbled something apologetically and the official grimaced and looked at the form and said something about him really not needing to see it. In any case, he quickly scribbled a signature on his and my forms and sent us to the last stop where our signatures were to be captured electronically to be printed on the registration card.

There was another line for this (of course) which was getting multiplexed with the original slow moving line processed by the same efficient official. Mercifully, by this time, they were draining the pipeline for the day and this was a short and fast moving line. As I signed, I was told that my license plate number will be assigned in the next few hours and I could look it up at the RTA web site. And the registration itself will arrive by courier within 2 weeks.

Hooray! I was out around 2:15PM. It had taken 2 1/2 hours on the 3rd attempt in which 2 hours was spent waiting in the first queue. While there were enough plot twists and tense moments, I suppose it was not too bad considering it was the peak hour.

Morals of the story when it comes to dealing with License Raj:
- Be prepared to make multiple visits in case you missed something in the documentation - double check the documents in advance to reduce the chances of this happening.
- Avoid Saturdays if at all possible (don't bother coming if it is the 2nd Saturday); if you have to come on a Saturday, come early in the day.
- Be prepared to defend the queue - this is true anywhere in India. We desis have the line-cutting gene.
- I don't think an agent could have helped in the process. You have to be there anyway to sign electronically and I think you have be present for the inspection also. There were people who looked like agents in the line; they had multiple stacks of forms and hogged time in the queue and were also more prone to line-cutting. If we avoided the middle-men, I think this process will be a lot saner.
- And finally, don't forget those no. 2 pencils.

- Balaji

P.S. I am planning to drive this car until its last breath.

Getting my car registered - Part one

2010-12-24T23:07:00.000-08:00

For newly returned Indians, dealing with the Indian bureaucracy can be a traumatic experience after having been spoilt by the relatively smoother dealings with Uncle Sam. These days however, many government services are being made available online, so encounters with License Raj are far and few in between. It is however unavoidable if you buy yourself a new set of wheels.

When I got a 2-wheeler 2 years ago, I dealt with my fears through the tried and tested technique of procrastination. I registered it finally almost a year after I got the thing after multiple nudges from FIL. I could get away with it because it gets driven only for a kilometre from the house for early-morning dropoffs of my kids to the school bus stop or for emergency groceries close by.

We recently acquired a Ford Figo, a compact diesel hatchback that gives 15kmpl in the city and promises to reduce my fuel bill almost by half (Petrol prices in tax-hungry AP reached a whopping Rs. 62 recently). Unlike the US, where you renew your rights to emit carbon every year, in India you pay an one-time (hefty) road-tax when you buy the car and you're done. The dealer collects the payment from you when you buy the car, but does not get it registered. Instead he gives you a stack of forms and a nice instruction sheet as to how to do it. The instruction sheet looked quite encouraging. It assured that I don't need an agent, I just need to show up in the local RTA office with the aforementioned stack of forms and "enjoy the warmth of their hospitality".

My first attempt on a Saturday morning got quickly aborted as it happened to be a second Saturday and the office was closed. My second attempt was on one of the week days. I reached the office early enough (around 9:30AM) feeling quite smug to be there before the rest of Hyderabad wakes up (usually around 11AM). The queue was short and I reached the window in no time. A guy who looked like an agent was helpfully snatching the forms from the folks to verify if things were in order and he did the same with me. He found that the forms were missing a signature and a stamp from the financing bank. Darn it.

The dealer and the bank's loan guy were supposed to work together and the bank's explanation as to the missing signature was typically vague. It seemed like the missing signature was by design and I was supposed to have contacted the loan guy after getting the vehicle to get the requisite signature.

Anyway, the loan guy picked up the form from me at work. We arranged to meet at the RTA office the next Saturday where he would come with the signed form.

So I reached the RTA office for my 3rd attempt on Saturday morning a bit later than I would have liked - 11:45AM. There were multiple long lines, with no signs as to which line was for what; word on the line was that one was for new driving licenses and the other was for registrations. I joined the line for registrations just getting beaten by two people who squeezed ahead of me.

The anxious wait started with less than two hours left before the office closed early on Saturday. People in the line had to be constantly on the vigil fighting back line-cutters, but were not always succeeding. One guy tried to get ahead of me saying he had just gone to park his car; I had been in the line for 15 minutes and had not seen him earlier, so I said nothing doing. He sulked and moved back and promptly cut into the line three spaces behind. The queue was getting increasingly restless and was pushing up forward as if that will make it move faster. The guy behind me was violating my air space big time and when I glared at him, he just pointed to the guy behind.

I was getting philosophical at this point and was fully prepared to find out at the counter after a couple of hours that some other thing was missing. "No registration for you!"

(to be continued).

- Balaji

CWG Part Deux

2010-11-25T08:41:00.000-08:00

Although it is old news now, I feel like I should write one after the CWG. The games themselves went largely without incident. There was some whining from the media about how they were treated by the organizers. Apparently the games website was mostly down and information was poor to non-existent on event schedules. Some of the Indian players complained about not being able to get tickets for their next of kin. There was some noise about how the women ushers during the medal ceremonies were dressed inappropriately in bridal costume.
Still, considering the state of affairs before the start of the games, things had trended up significantly. Not a peep about about the athletes village once the games started, other than the exceptional food.

For TV junkies like me, the CWG was another landmark - the first broadcast of HD in India. Consumers in India have been conned into buying HD TVs for a few years now with no HD programming in sight. Finally, the programming is here, a bit like how it happened in the US when it started. Discovery and National Geographic have HD channels and they have started showing major sports events on HD as well. I have a Tata Sky HD set top box that cost Rs. 2500 with first year's HD programming thrown in at no additional cost.

The CWG opening ceremony looked rather nice on HD. So did the stadia - they stood up to the scrutiny of the higher resolution camera quite well.

As for India's performance in the games, it was its best ever - which was broadly expected given the host country boost factor. India finished 2nd in the gold-medal tally behind powerhouse Australia, just one medal ahead of England and 3rd in the overall tally. Curiously, England, Scotland and Wales compete as separate countries while they combine as the UK in the Olympics.

Going into the last day, India trailed England by 1 medal, equalized and then took the lead in dramatic fashion behind Saina Nehwal's come-from-behind victory in the Badminton singles finals. The one thing that marred the proceedings on the last day for India was its thrashing at the hands of Australia 8-0 in the men's hockey finals.

There were many firsts for India, a handful of track and field medals including a gold in women's 10000m and an 1-2-3 finish in women's discus.

So that was the good part; once the games ended, we started hearing about how much money the organizers looted and we are back to reality again.

- Balaji

Returning to the country holding the CWG

2010-09-25T19:01:00.000-07:00

I returned yesterday from a 2-week long business trip to the US where I was reading and hearing media reports about the CWG debacle in Delhi; must say I had my head down in shame a bit. The Indian media perspective (more like "The Hindu's" perspective) is decidedly more mixed. Clearly it was top of mind for The Hindu with 7 stories on its Saturday's edition.

"Get your act together, Manmohan tells Ministers" - Where was he all these years?

"Sigh of relief for Games officials" - The said relief comes after a guardedly positive statement from the president of the CWG foundation, Mike Fennell. IOC president Jacques Rogge threw in his support as well. They both seem to believe things can still be salvaged in the next 8 days. Apparently a lot of progress has been made in the last 3 days.

"A letdown for a proud nation" writes Peter Roebuck the sometimes controversial British cricket writer. This article and another report I heard on the NPR reinforced the notion that there is at least some sentiment in the West that is rooting for India and these people are saddened by this setback to India's standing in the world. Among other things, Peter Roebuck cites some study about India that says in around 15 years, 291 million will move from poverty to a sustainable lifestyle and the size of the middle class will grow to 538 million. I wish I could believe that.

"Mixed reactions to facilities at the Village"
"Athletes village comes in for praise"
An Indian table tennis player actually liked the accommodations. Another Indian athlete opines anonymously that the facilities are 95 percent ready but the lack of finishing touch is making it look bad. A Kiwi player says they were promised world-class accommodations and was disappointed. The Kiwis however really liked the setup for table-tennis.

The final verdict will have to wait until after the games, but it is likely only to decide how black an eye India is going to get.
- Balaji

Readings in history (part 5) - lecture by Dr. Parpola

2010-07-14T11:16:00.000-07:00

During my last visit to Chennai, I attended a lecture by Prof. Asko Parpola, a well-known researcher on the Indus Valley Civilization (IVC) and the yet to be deciphered Indus script (see my earlier post on Harappans and Aryans). Prof. Parpola along with Dr. Iravaddam Mahadevan (another well-known researcher in this area) have hypothesized that the Indus script is a script used to write a proto-Dravidian language. Proto-Dravidian is the hypothetical language that Tamil and other Dravidian languages descended from.

In this specific talk, Prof. Parpola focused on a couple of possible connections between the Indus script and Dravidian languages. One was the preponderance of the "fish" symbol in the Indus script, some of which he claims to indicate a "star". Refering to a star as a fish is of course reminiscent of referring to a star as "Vin meen" in Tamil, where "meen" is Tamil for fish.

The more elaborate discussion was on the occurrence of a symbol that is taken to be the hind-leg of the wild-ass, an inhabitant of the salt-deserts of north-west India (the same area where the Indus valley civilization had spread).

Prof. Parpola hypothesizes that the Tamil word for donkey "kaZhuthai" referred originally to the wild-ass as it can be parsed as "kazh" (salt-desert) + "uthai" (kick), i.e. kicker of salt-desert. He also conjectures that the old Tamil word "taal" (தாள்) which has multiple meanings including leg and star is another possible link.

Okay, if you're like me, you are probably thinking this is a big stretch. However, if there are multiple such tenuous links, I suppose they could add up to a "preponderance of evidence" claim.

In any case, the deciphering is very much incomplete as Profs. Parpola and Mahadevan readily admit and Prof. Parpola says other interpretations of these symbols are possible.

One unfortunate aspect of research like this is that it gets politicians and other people with vested interests and foregone conclusions all excited. The "Dravidians are great" gang understandably grasps at such research feverishly. (Prof. Parpola was an invited speaker at the recently concluded World Tamil Conference at Coimbatore where he was bestowed the 2009 Classical Tamil Award by Chief Minister M. Karunanidhi).

On the other side, the "Aryan supremacists" frown upon anything that gives the Dravidians any kind of legitimacy. For some of them, contesting this hypothesis is not just about denying the Dravidian connection to the IVC, but to appropriate an Aryan one (although there seems to be no archeological backing for the Aryan connection - there is plenty of evidence against it as John Keay talks about in his book).

There is however another school of thought (this by published scientists) that says that the Indus inscriptions were really not a script (of any language, Dravidian or otherwise), instead just a bunch of random signs (like a set of traffic signs).

The tension between the two sides (or is it three?) was apparent during the Q&A session after the talk.
Dr. Mahadevan alluded to this by asking the audience to limit themselves to "clarifying questions" on the paper. At a different point, Dr. Mahadevan (a Tamilian) also said that Dr. Parpola enjoyed some benefits as an IVC researcher that he himself did not have, because Dr. Parpola could not be labelled a "Tamil Chauvinist".

So, I was all prepared to witness some serious war of words, but it ended up fairly lame but for a couple of skeptical questions which Dr. Parpola answered rather diplomatically. I heard from my friend that an earlier talk by Dr. Parpola engendered a lot more debate.

Anyway, let us hope that this research is conducted solely by objective scientists with as minimal external influence as realistically possible. And I do hope they crack the script. Whether you consider yourself Aryan or Dravidian, the mystery of the IVC carries enough intrigue that you want to know the answers whichever way they point.

- R. Balaji

Related links:
An article in The Hindu on this topic
This blog post follows a robust debate on the merits of Parpola's ideas.

Historic visits - Kakatiya sites

2010-06-26T01:59:00.000-07:00

We travelled to Warangal (140km from Hyderabad) and environs over the weekend to visit sites from the Kakatiya dynasty (13-14th century AD). Kakatiyas controlled northern Andhra Pradesh around that time and were feudatories of the Hoysalas of southern Karnataka. Their art definitely seems to have been influenced by their suzerains. Hoysalas of course built the famous temples of Belur and Halebid, arguably among the most beautiful sculptural temples of South India. I have visited Belur/Halebid as a kid but still remember some of the sculptural marvels.

Of the three places we visited

(I) the Kakatiya Fort complex in Warangal,

(II) the Ramappa temple in Palampet and
(III) the temple complex (mostly in ruins) at Ghanpur,

I liked the Warangal site the most, probably because it was the most well maintained. There must have been a stunning temple here once. What you see now are various pieces of that temple that have been arranged into some kind of order by the Archeological Society of India (ASI). One of the prominent features were the perfectly circular inserts in the pillars that look as if they were lathed. Except they didn't have lathes in the 13th century.

The scultptures show signs of systematic mutilation (right) suggesting that the temple was destroyed by an invading enemy. It is tempting to think of the Muslim invaders as the culprits - Malik Kafur, Ala-ud-din Khilji's general conquered these parts around that time. However my friend RG who accompanied me pointed out that vandalizing temples and monuments of a conquered kingdom was fairly common practice by kings of all religions throughout history. Wendy Doniger, noted Indologist whose "Hindus - An Alternative History" I am reading now, echoes similar sentiments.

It was fun to have my friend who is an "amateur enthusiast" of sculptural art in South India play unofficial guide; we looked for various clues to identify the deities and other mythological characters portrayed there. For instance, two sculptures standing on either side of a small shrine turned out not to be Dwarapalakas as their position might suggest, but Lord Shiva himself, considering that he had 4 hands, wore an Angavastram that didn't go below the knee and the serpent earrings; clearly the re-arrangement of ASI still needs some work.

The Ramappa temple was very curious in that it had a super-structure that was very much intact, while the base looked like it had been disturbed violently by an earthquake (picture to the right); or more likely because the temple settled into the ground that couldn't bear the weight of all that granite and basalt. The Ramappa temple had inscriptions that looked fairly close to modern-day Telugu script (I have picked up a little bit of the Telugu script in the last year, though I don't understand what I read).

The temple complex at Ghanpur was in the worst shape. The highlights there were the leaning temples and the temples with fractal patterns in their vimanas (vimanas unlike gopurams are the towers over the main shrine; gopurams are at the gateway of the temple).

For more pictures from the trip, see this Picasa album.

Life as a sports fan in India - Cricket, tennis and F1

2010-06-05T02:19:00.000-07:00

For someone who was following the NBA, NFL, tennis and a bit of golf in the US, I needed replacements in addition to cricket and tennis in India. I love cricket, but there is just too much of it and you get saturated. I withdraw myself every few months, and come back to it refreshed.

I am on one such break now and I have discovered the joy of Formula 1. F1 features the most advanced and sexiest looking cars in the planet, super-talented egotistic young drivers with the maturity level of teenagers, challenging tracks (not the boring curved rectangles of NASCAR) and plenty of on-track strategy (pit stop, tyre and fuel strategy).

On top of this, the intra-team dynamics between the engineers and the two drivers creates lot of intrigue. Clearly it doesn't matter to the team which of their drivers wins as the total points from both contribute to the team's points for the Constructor's championship. However, the drivers are also after their individual glory of winning races and the annual driver's championship.

So what's not to love? There was one little problem. There was not much overtaking. Too often, it seemed like the car with pole position ran away for a coast-to-coast victory.

This season, they have tinkered with the rules and there is lots of overtaking - I don't yet understand which changes caused it. One significant change is the no-refuelling rule which means that there is no need for a "fuel strategy" . Fuel tanks have been enlarged to fill enough fuel to last the whole race. This implies that the cars get progressively faster as they consume fuel and get lighter through the race. The pit stops are now only for tyre changes (or to fix any number of issues that can crop up in the car) since tyres don't last the entire race. Fewer variables and simpler racing.

This year there are two teams (Red Bull Racing and McLaren Mercedes) that have the fastest cars and probably the four best drivers - Mark Webber and Sebastian Vettel for Red Bull; Lewis Hamilton and Jenson Button for McLaren. The Red Bull cars are faster in the corners, while the McLarens have better straight line speed. Any one of these 4 drivers can win on any given week. When one of these cars somehow falls behind in pole position or ends up behind because of a slower pit stop, they are certain to overtake everyone and come up front. Further there is a weekly battle within these four that makes for some seriously competitive racing.

Take for instance last week's Turkish Grand Prix. Webber and Vettel (the Red Bull drivers) were #1 and #2 going into lap no. 41 (it was a 58 lap race), when Vettel overtook Webber on the inside but inexplicably moved to the right, making contact. Vettel's car spun out of control and he retired from the race. Webber managed to rejoin the race as #3 behind Hamilton and Button (the McLaren drivers) who by now had taken the #1 and #2 spots. Vettel made a "mental" gesture as he walked out of his car, clearly blaming Webber for the incident even though the near-unanimous verdict from the pundits was that his move to the right (into Webber's way) caused the contact.

Then in lap 49, it was the McLaren drivers' turn for a duel. The McLaren crew radio-ed instructions to both drivers to "conserve fuel", so Hamilton slows down a notch; Button disregards the instructions, speeds up and overtakes a surprised Hamilton; Hamilton now furious, battles back and retakes the lead soon after. The McLaren crew is now in a panic as they don't want a repeat of what happened to the Red Bulls and repeat the instruction for conserving fuel, effectively asking them to stop dueling. The race ends with those track positions with Hamilton's first victory of the season.

As you can see from these videos, a lot of the action is now telecast with on-board cameras which is probably the best way to experience the race. I can't wait to watch this in HD when it does eventually come to India.

Talking of HD, Indian consumers have been getting conned into buying HD TVs for the last few years while there is no HD programming; finally Sun started HD service on some select channels (including coverage of this year's IPL) a couple of months ago. Tata Sky (which is what I have) promises to have it by end of year in time for the Commonwealth Games.

- Balaji

Trip to Mahabaleshwar

2010-05-01T22:27:00.000-07:00

We went to Mahabaleshwar on a team outing - by over-night train from Hyderabad to Pune and then a bus ride to Mahabaleshwar. It is a "hill station" in the Western Ghats 100km from Pune. Hill station in quotes because at an altitude of 1400m, it is not as chilly as what you might expect like Ooty (2200m) or Kodaikanal (2100m).

However it rivals if not exceeds the other two in terms of scenic beauty. It is situated on a plateau with stunning views of five river valleys all of which originate from near Mahabaleshwar. |Four of these are now dry, the fifth one being the still-wet Krishna. The Castle Rock and Arthur's Seat viewpoints offer views of canyons lined with stratified walls that are reminiscent of the great canyons of the US. Interestingly, the guide books (Frommer's, Lonely Planet) don't make a big deal of this. Goes to show how these places in India can be under-marketed also revealing attitudes towards tourism in India. The guides mention the temple adjoining the origin of the 5 rivers and the strawberry farms, but none the canyons.

- R. Balaji

Golt movies ain't half bad

2010-04-09T23:23:00.000-07:00

Okay, if "Golt" offends my Telugu brethren, I will invoke the Chetan Bhagat excuse - you only make fun of people who you care for.

It is now almost three years in Andhra Pradesh and what better way to get to know a people than to watch their movies? My wife and I have started watching Telugu movies on DVD borrowed from our neighbors. Going to the theater does not work because of the language problem, which is conveniently resolved with subtitles in the DVD form. And yes, my conclusion of this post's title was reached by a sample size of two - Magadheera and Arya 2.

When I was growing up, Chiranjeevi movies (dubbed in Tamil) used to be shown in the 10:30 morning show in my home town; I remember seeing trailers of these and feeling all superior about Tamil movies - the Chiranjeevi movies seemed like cheesy masalas even at that age. The only good Telugu movies seemed to be from K. Viswanath (Sankarabaranam, Sagara Sangamam, Swathi Muthyam etc.) at that time.

Fast forward 25 years (sheesh, I feel old writing that), and now Chiranjeevi's son Ramcharan is acting in masala movies, arguably much better ones. Magadheera was a super-hit last year and we could see why. It is a love-story that spans 400 years - a warrior and a princess from a pseudo-historical Deccan kingdom whose unfulfilled love gets another chance when they are reborn in modern-day Andhra (or is it Telengana?). Ramcharan is swashbuckling in the warrior role and passable in his modern day incarnation while Kajal Agarwal pulls off both roles with aplomb (aside from looking cute beyond belief); of course my wife's assessment of the two actors might be the reverse.

It amazes me how little the Indian film industry dips into our vast and rich history for its stories these days. I can't remember a single recent movie set in pre-colonial India other than Jodha Akbar and Ashoka (both laudable efforts). Movies like Magadheera show the possibilities even though this one is actually not based on historical events.

Indian movies have made enormous progress in photography, art direction and other technical areas. I think it is about time big-budget producers and directors made some blockbusters set in our history.

Anyway, coming back to Magadheera, it should show Tamil masala directors a trick or two. I now see why a lot of recent masala hits (the Vijay ones especially) are being imported from Telugu to Tamil.

A lot of the movie is shot in Hyderabad and it was fun to see some places that we know. I have been to the Golkonda fort many times; it is a great place especially when you see it with a guide who can put it in the right historical context. But it never looked as beautiful as it looked in Senthil Kumar's camera in the song "Panchdhara Bomma". The song alone is worth the price of admission. It is arguable whether India produces world-class movies, but we sure make the world's best music videos.

The other movie Arya 2 was more of a guilty pleasure. The movie is outrageously campy but it was also very funny. Boy, this guy Allu Arjun can dance (and I thought Vijay could dance).

- R. Balaji

He did it!

2010-03-13T23:53:00.001-08:00

One of the issues I have continued to follow after I returned from the US is health care. I have also been following how Obama is doing as president. It was a no-brainer to vote for him being on the center-left myself, especially after the Bush years. While I knew expectations on him were wildly unrealistic, I was still hoping for say just a couple of miracles.

However, in the first year he had managed to disillusion everyone who voted for him and enraged everyone who did not. The health care debate was going badly for the Democrats with Republicans managing to vilify it quite effectively. So when I went to the US for my quarterly business trip in February, I was in a morose mood. I was especially disgusted by how the loss of one senate seat could make Obama and the Dems so timid (filibuster, schmilibuster).

However there were signs of a turnaround in those two weeks I was there. When the history is written about how Obama pulled off a legislative achievement that could very well rank among FDR's New Deal, the Reagan tax cuts and LBJ's civil rights bill, the healthcare summit should be judged as a turning point. It was political theater at its best, seemingly orchestrated only for the O man's benefit. He seemed like the only adult in the room, and just couldn't help coming across as the most intelligent and knowledgeable on the issues. He also came off as gracious in accepting a couple of Republican ideas and in a hilarious moment acknowledged the feisty John McCain's criticism about some pork barrel in the bill.

Since then, the Democrats (led by the formidable Nanci Pelosi) seemed to have new energy infused into them and for once have acted with the courage of their convictions. The Dems in the House are passing a bill that is supposedly unpopular (depending on what polls you believe) and might even cost some of them their seats in November. Why? Because they believe it is the right thing. Where were they all these years? Looks like there is some hope for them after all.

So why do I think this bill is a good thing ? There is a part of the bill that spends money to cover un-insured and under-insured people*. I support this part for the same reasons why most bleeding heart liberals do. Don't get me wrong - capitalism is the greatest thing since steamed idlis, but there are a couple of things for which we should make an exception. Health care is one of them.

Then there is the part that prohibits insurance companies from doing plain old shady things - like stopping coverage once you get sick and deny coverage for pre-existing conditions ( the latter is arguably less shady). The fact that profit-minded companies will do things like these (can't even blame them), is exactly why we need to exempt health care from capitalism and free markets. And why it is reasonable for a social justice minded government to get into this business.

There is a supposed third goal of this bill that reduces the upward spiral of health care costs. The problem is real enough (US spends the most per capita on health care in the world, while it is not in the top 15 nations in terms of health indicators). But this part seems so complicated that we will never know until we see some results.

- R. Balaji

We're World No. 1!

2010-02-19T10:16:00.000-08:00

India reached the no. 1 ranking in ICC Test Rankings after beating Sri Lanka at home 2-0 in December. The real test came this February when they played No. 2 South Africa at home. They promptly lost the first Test by an innings and more at Nagpur, crumbling against a speedy and swinging Dale Steyn. Reverse swing used to be the domain of bowlers from the subcontinent and Dale Steyn seems to be the first white bowler to have cracked the code. We sorely missed Dravid and Laxman, both out with injuries.

India needed to square the series (don't ask me about the logic of a 2-match series) at the lovely Eden Gardens to retain their No. 1 ranking. And that is exactly what they did. The win was made possible by a mammoth 643-6, thanks to 100s by Sehwag, Tendulkar (his 47th!) , Laxman and Dhoni.

India's ascent to the top has been built on a batting order "designed by God himself" as someone said. With Sehwag, Gambhir, Dravid, Tendulkar, Laxman and Dhoni you can probably create two international teams of great batting caliber. The so-called seniors (Dravid, Tendulkar and Laxman) don't seem to be in any hurry to retire. All 6 of them have been in form recently and that is a bit too much to handle for any attack in the world. With the wise Zaheer Khan's reverse swing and the wily and fighting Harbhajan Singh's off spin, we have a reasonable bowling attack to boot.

The South Africans are a sporting bunch - they actually walk when they're out without looking at the umpire; a welcome change from the lows in sportsmanship inhabited by the Aussies. It was nice to see that these things still happen in cricket. Most of the Indian players still walk (may be except the naughty Harbhajan).

Call me old fashioned, but I believe Test Cricket is the only pure form of cricket bcause it is a true test of bat against ball. I detest 20-20 and I eagerly await the day it will go away. Limited overs cricket makes sense when the need to slog is balanced by the need to keep the wicket to last the entire overs. With 20 overs, there is little risk of getting bowled out, so batsmen can slog with impunity. This tilts the equation too much in favor of the bat.

As for tests, yes, it is impossible to sit and watch all 5 days, but you catch pieces of the action when your favorite batsman or bowler is operating and the extended highlights in the evening are rather convenient. To be No. 1 for the first time in this form of cricket is just plain awesome.

- R. Balaji

Reading and watching Chetan Bhagat (part 2)

2010-01-30T22:04:00.000-08:00

We went and watched 3 Idiots. It is a honest-to-goodness feel-good melodrama that leaves no emotion in the human mindscape un-visited. It was also hilarious at times. Indian movies are like chaat; evey movie (dish) will contain every emotion (taste).

I also don't get why the hero has to have superhuman physical prowess, Einstein's smarts and Gandhian nobility all in the same movie; among others, it also has the problem of seriously lengthening the movie since each quality takes about an hour to demonstrate. I am fairly certain the book (Five Point Someone) doesn't do this, now I have to go and confirm. Anyway, dinging it for the bad habits of the genre is not being fair to it. Adjusted for the genre, it is certainly one of the better movies I have seen recently. Every Indian who went to an Engineering college (either willingly or forced by some circumstance) will connect with it in many many ways.

- R. Balaji

Readings in history (part 4 - Harappans and Aryans)

2010-01-25T23:09:00.000-08:00

One of the things that has drawn me to history recently, is really the curiosity about who we (Indians) are as a people and where we came from. Yes, it sounds like a cliched middle-age crisis driven thing, but it is real enough.

I went back to reading John Keay's book, especially the first few chapters that deal with Indian pre-history. Turns out, we only have two major sources to understand our history in the 3000-5000 years before Christ. One is the Sanskrit literary and religious compendium in the form of the Vedas, Upanishads, Puranas, Brahmanas and the two great epics . The other is the Indus Valley civilization which is one of the three great civilizations from that era (the Egyptian and Sumerian being the other two).

First the Harappans - as Keay calls the folks from the Indus valley civilization. Harappans did not build towering monuments like the Egyptian pyramids. They however built arguably more egalitarian structures (i.e. not monuments for kings' after-life built by slave-laborers) of bricks so advanced that when they were excavated in the 1920's, the presiding archaeologist thought they were merely 200 years old. They also may have invented the proverbial wheel and spread their civilization over an area that spreads more than 600 km.

The thing is, even though these two societies (Harappans and Aryans) lived roughly in the same geographical area there is no link between the two. It is clear that the Harappans did not write the Vedas. The Aryans' arrival in India post-dates the last of the Harappans by at least a few hundred years. Further the Harappan writings look like anything but Sanskrit.

You might have heard that the Harappans' script has been defying proper deciphering by epigraphists. There are two theories on it - the initial hypothesis of links to Aramaic and Iravadam Mahadevan's more recent theory that it is indeed linked to the Tamil-Brahmi script.

As for the Aryans, it is remarkable that we know about a society primarily from their literary and spiritual work and not traditional sources of historians such as inscriptions recording actual events. Unless of course you believe that the events in the epics like Ramayana and Mahabharatha actually happened in some form. Interestingly enough, John Keay seems to suggest exactly that. He even dates the Great Bharatha war at around 1000 BC. Looking at these epics from a purely historical view, Keay however seems to oversimplify them. For instance he condenses all of Ramayana into a single statement that its goal was to institutionalize dynasty based monarchical system in North India (as opposed to the clan-based societies that existed around that time). I was disappointed that he did not delve into the content of the stories to reason about the people who wrote them. Whether the events in Mahabharatha and Ramayana happened or not, the stories at the least give hints to the kind of values that must have existed around that time. The great sacrifice of Bheeshma, and the sense of filial duty and nobility of Rama and Bharatha to just mention a couple of examples. Not to mention the complex interplay of characters and their motivations in the Mahabharatha. May be it is not aligned with the historian's method to do this kind of reasoning.

Keay writes amazingly well and I have yet to see another book that so concisely, dispassionately and readably narrates Indian history, albeit in a cold-blooded western way.

- R. Balaji

Reading and watching Chetan Bhagat

2010-01-18T06:51:00.001-08:00

My head was beginning to hurt reading too many improving books - as P. G. Wodehouse would have called them - and it was time for some lighter fare. A neighbor of mine recommended Chetan Bhagat; apparently he is what twenty-somethings are reading these days. So I decided to reconnect with my younger self and read his latest book, the hugely entertaining Two States.

Within 5 pages I was transported to my college years; Bhagat's simple no-nonsense style and acerbic bluntness fit the gen X (or is it Y?) narrator's sensibilities like a glove. Well it better, since it is semi-autobiographical. It is the love story of a boy and a girl whose families in a certain way represent opposing ends of the Indian cultural spectrum; a live-life-to-the-full Punjabi family on one side and a serious geeky Tamil Brahmin family on the other. Cross-cultural weddings are ripe with humorous possibilities and Bhagat takes full advantage. The book works equally well as a satire (of the corporate world, north and south Indian stereotypes) and as a family relationship drama. It is also probably the best service to national integration since Bharathiyar's "Sindhu nadhiyin ..". If these two families can get along, surely anyone in India can with anyone else (like for e.g. Andhraites with Telengana-ites; sigh) .

It is a screenplay ready to be made into a movie and I can't wait to see how the movie will do in Tamilnadu. Bhagat holds nothing back in his digs on all-things Tamil (or more loosely South Indian). He needs every word of the apology he makes in advance in the preface: "you only take digs at people you care for"; he is married to a South Indian and I suppose he has a certain right.

Apparently this is not even Chetan Bhagat's best book. I hear good things about his earlier book - Five Point Someone, a film version of which (3 Idiots) has recently released and is a big hit. I have not seen it yet. Another one is One Night at a Call Centre (film version "Hello").

- Balaji

Readings in history (part 3 - a couple more books)

2010-01-13T09:21:00.000-08:00

Thought I will briefly mention a couple of other books on history.

A few years ago, when I was in the US, I read India - A history by John Keay. If you're looking for a comprehensive & readable account albeit from a western eye, you could try this. I remember being vaguely irritated by his dispassionate treatment at times; a plundering Mahmud Ghazni would receive the same level of respect as Raja Raja Chola or Akbar from his very academic view of history.

A remarkable part of the book is the chart in the Introduction that shows the percentage of territory controlled by various dynasties in the last 2000 years. A pretty neat way to summarize and picture Indian history.

Another book I read in 2007 is No God but God by Reza Aslan which is a history of Islam. Events in the last decade had piqued my curiosity on Islam (to put it mildly) like I am sure many around the world. It was quite educational and an easy read. The chapter on Sufi Islam struck me as interesting and surprising - Sufiism is a mystic tradition of Islam whose practitioners talk about almost a romantic love of God - not unlike Hinduism's own Andal and Meera. Modern day Islam however seems to look at Sufiism with a disapproving eye. You might have heard of Rumi, a well-known Sufi poet who has attracted a lot of attention in the west. I sampled some of his writings a couple of which reminded me of The Gita's central motto ("Karmanye..."). It is always interesting to see common ground between religions. The books also takes great pains to depict how Islam has been this multi-faceted religion through history while it may not appear that way in modern times.

- R. Balaji

Readings in history (part 2 - languages)

2010-01-10T10:47:00.001-08:00

Thanks for all the comments - inspires me to keep going.

More highlights follow from Sastri's book and some from other sources including a friend of mine I will call RG (who is well versed in these matters and has been educating me a little).

First, it would be good to clarify the linguistic hierarchy as widely agreed upon. Tamil, Telugu, Malayalam and Kannada are part of the same language family (Dravidian languages) rooted by the theoretical language proto-Dravidian. Tamil is the oldest as we all know. Telugu and Kannada branched off earlier and Malayalam was the last one to branch off from Tamil (around 9th century AD). i.e. it is the closest language to tamil. Telugu and Kannada countries were ruled by kings who patronized Sanskrit as the religious language and those languages have come to borrow heavily from Sanskrit. That is to say, while they are not Indo-European (like Sanskrit and its north Indian derivatives), Telugu and Kannada are much more influenced by Sanskrit . Clearly political history influences language history.

An interesting member of the Dravidian family, as some of you may have heard of is Brahui, a language spoken in what is now Baluchistan (parts of Pakistan and Afghanistan). A remote Dravidian language island in an ocean of Indo-European? There are a couple of theories on how this came about. One is that Dravidian speakers (and hence Dravidians?) occupied all of the subcontinent until the wave of Aryanization swept through all of north India somehow leaving a small island of Dravidian speakers. Another theory maintains the more prevalent view that Dravidians did not occupy north India; some of them just migrated to Baluchistan later. The Aryan/Dravidian debate as I mentioned earlier is a juicy one which I hope to return to at some point.

Anyway, coming back to the main thread, Sanskrit had been the language of high culture throughout South India while commoners spoke the regional languages. Tamil developed the "literary idiom" first. The earliest known Tamil literature is what we call the Sangam literature which is placed in 1st and 2nd centuries AD. The Sangam literature itself says that this was the 3rd Sangam and there were 2 other Sangams earlier which ran for a total of 9999 years. This is considered a big exaggeration. Surely Tamil literature is not 12,000 years old; but if Tamil evolved to a point where beautiful poetry following complex metres was written in 1st century AD, the language must have existed for a few hundred years before that in more rudimentary forms (this my own guess). But few hazard guessing a date.

Telugu and Kannada literature start showing up in the latter half of the 1st millennium AD with the bulk of it in the 2nd millennium. If we use the dates when the languages developed the literary muscle, then Telugu and Kannada are younger than Tamil by almost 1000 years. Malayalam is even younger*.

Other interesting titbits.
- Sanskrit was never written down for a long time and primarily stayed alive as an oral tradition as a way to carry the Vedas forward.
- Languages and scripts are "orthogonal'" . i.e. When we talk about a language's history, we talk about it independent of its scripts. There are often multiple scripts developed at various points for the same language. For e.g., Sanskrit was written in a script called Grantha in South India. Tamil had another script called Vattezhuthu. The current script for Sanskrit and many other north Indian languages is as you might know Devanagari.
- From a religious perspective, the source of Hinduism as we know lies in the Vedas and Upanishads (some consider the Upanishads as part of the Vedas) and the puranas most of which are dated in the BCs. However Buddhism and Jainism made a strong push that almost pushed Hinduism out of India. You might remember Amartya Sen's characterization of India as a Buddhist/Jain country until the 5th century AD. Then Hinduism makes a big revival after the 5th century AD. And as many of you might know, the saints who are credited for Hinduism's modern revival (if you can call 1500 years old as modern) are Sankara, Ramanuja and Madhva who were proponents of the Advaita, Vishishtadvaita and Dvaita Hindu philosophies respectively. All three of them notably hailed from South India; they published their findings, ahem I mean wrote their philosophies in Sanskrit.

That's all for now.

- R. Balaji

P.S.
* The discussion of the age of these South Indian languages reminded me of the debate going on right now in India where folks in Andhra have applied to the central government to give Telugu classical language status. There was some recent court finding that went against this. Apparently Tamil and Kannada have been given this status already. I forget what benefits this status provides.

Readings in history (part I - long)

2009-12-29T22:59:00.001-08:00

I am recently on a reading spree on history; some topics I am interested in are pre-history (way-back-when to around 1ooo BC), Indian especially South Indian history and history of languages.

If you share similar interests, here are some fascinating reads:
- The Third Chimpanzee by Jared Diamond follows his popular award winning Guns Germs and Steel. If you haven't read Guns, Germs and Steel, you can give it a miss and go straight to this one. That is because the entire thesis of the former book is condensed conveniently into one chapter of this book - a discussion of why human civilization advanced more rapidly in Europe than say in Africa. Diamond says the key to advancement lies in domestication of animals (cattle, horses) and plants (for agriculture and mass production) and Europe offered some geographical advantages in this regard - an east-west orientation with similar climate/geography over a wide land mass, availability of animals and crops for domestication . I am super-simplifying here, but that I think is the gist.

Diamond's analysis on where the Proto Indo-European (or PIE) language originated is especially interesting. PIE is the hypothetical root of all Indo-Aryan languages including Sanskrit and its Indian derivatives and most of the major European languages (also called Aryan languages). Diamond's conjecture is that PIE originated somewhere in Central/East Europe. Of particular interest is how he arrives at this, read the book for the analysis - some heady stuff.

The chapters talking about the microcultures of Papua New Guinea are another compelling part of the book. Due to the peculiar geography of New Guinea, it sustained many tribes that lived within 10s of miles of each other without ever coming in contact with each other nor with any other developed society until the mid 1900s when European explorers discovered them. These tribes apparently speak wildly different languages with some resembling Chinese while others resemble European languages. The island is a dream "laboratory" for sociologists and anthropologists.

- An Illustrated History of South India by K.A. Nilakanda Sastri (Oxford press): I am half-way through this book. Nilakanda Sastri's book is now more than 60 years old and is considered the definitive compilation of South Indian history. The latest edition is probably the most readable one - I had got an earlier edition which was more dense that I gave up after a couple of chapters. The new paperback is an abridged edition with pictures that is more accessible to mere mortals.

The first part of the book focuses on the political history, i.e. the empires, the kings, the wars they waged and the territories they controlled - the stuff we all learnt growing up in India in History class; those text books were probably based on this book. The later part (which I haven't read yet) is about social & religious history.

Some highlights from the book so far: the dynastic enmity between Pallavas and Chalukyas (6th to 9th centuries AD) is one of the juicier bits of South Indian history. The Tamilnadu State Board history textbooks portrayed the Chalukyas in a somewhat negative light as compared to the beloved Pallavas who were not just great warriors but also great stalvarts of art and architecture (I am pretty sure Kannadigas are taught a somewhat different version). Kalki fed on this in his Sivakamiyin Sabatham which is loosely based on historical events, where he shows Pulakesin II, the Chalukyan king to be an outright villain . The enmity has enough twists and turns complete with sons avenging father's defeats.

Well, the history according to Sastri is almost as dramatic. First, Pulakesin II invades the Pallava kingdom and comes close to Kanchi before he gets stopped 15 miles away. He still annexes a lot of North Pallava territory from Mahendra Pallava. Mahendra's son, Narasimha Pallava exacts revenge by defeating Pulakesin II (Pualakesin dies in this battle) and plundering his capital Vatapi (now called Badami). A couple of generations later, a Chalukyan king returns the favor on Kanchi. And so on.

Other than his mixed results with the Pallavas (which Tamilians and Kannadigas should probably agree on as a draw), Pulakhesin II was a great king in his own right. There is no historical basis for his villainy. He was just as territorially ambitious as the next guy, I mean emperor. Don't forget that he stopped the north Indian emperor Harsha Vardhana dead on his tracks at the banks of Narmada and hence perhaps stopped another round of "Aryanization" from ever happening (now that is a juicy topic for another post). You see, the whole of India has been united under an empire only a couple of times (by my count) in history before the British - Ashoka & Aurangazeb. If Harsha had beaten Pulakhesin, that could have led to one more instance.*

None of this is to take away from the greatness of the Pallavas - you just need to visit Mahabalipuram if you have any doubts.

Enough for now, more later.

- Balaji

* The bit about the significance of Harsha's defeat at Pulakesin's hands is my amateur point, not Sastri's.

Brush with corruption

2009-12-05T05:19:00.000-08:00

It has been 2 1/2 years in India and it is time that I had my first brush with corruption, if you ignore a minor funny traffic incident. I had to take two laptops with me to the US for a business trip. On my way out, the customs officer refused to record the fact that I was carrying two because I didn't have a letter from my company to that effect. After I reached the US, I arranged for such a letter to be sent to me and was armed with the said letter when I returned to Hyderabad.
When they scanned my carry-on bags at customs and found the 2 laptops, they duly sent me to a customs officer. I told him about why I couldn't get the export certificate on my way out and I produced the letter from my company. But that doesn't help now, the officer pointed out, I should have had the letter with me on my way out and got the export certificate then. After a few minutes of arguing I gave up and asked him what the duty was. He arrived at a depreciated value and assessed 30% duty on it and arrived at Rs. 7000. I didn't have that much cash on me and I asked him whether I could pay in some other way.
"How much do you have?"
"Rs. 3500"
"Okay, leave that here", pointing to the desk. Only then I realized what was happening, and I put the money on the desk. At that point, he became a little nervous and walked off the desk as if fleeing the crime scene. I was tired and sleepy and left in a huff, *&^?ed with the whole thing, wishing I had had the money and paid the whole sum to the govt instead of the guy. I also realized I didn't have a single rupee on me as I got into the cab to get home.

Kabini Trip

2009-11-23T07:46:00.000-08:00

On the Diwali weekend, we decided to give the festivities a miss and visited Kabini, a jungle resort nestled between Bandipur and Nagarhole National Parks in Southern Karnataka. It is reachable from Bangalore by road - 220km away.

It is an eco-friendly resort with food and wildlife safari included along with sleeping rooms at Rs. 4000 per head per day - not a bad deal especially considering the excellent safari. Kabini is home to 3 main predators - tiger, leopard and wild dogs. On our first evening safari we saw none of them, but saw lots of deer, a couple of elephants, langur monkeys and a gaur (Indian Bison). As for the early morning safari, my wife and I took turns with one of us watching the kids in the room. The second morning, my wife and my elder daughter struck pay dirt with a sighting of the elusive tiger (it was the first sighting in 3 weeks).

In the US, the only national park that I have been to that had a safari was Denali. Safaris are indeed a good way to experience a national park. Since the guided safari is often the only way to get inside the park, it reduces human impact on the park. Also, you're going with a group of people and you have more eyes on the lookout increasing the chances of sightings. The flip side is of course that you might come away empty, but then the lack of a guarantee is what makes an actual sighting all the more thrilling - I saw it in my daughter's eyes when she came back to narrate the trip.

In India, this is perhaps the only model that might work; it is not exactly democratic since the Rs. 4000 per day rate puts it beyond the reach of most people, but then narrows the visiting population to a manageable number. In any case, (non-religious) tourism in India is something a relatively small percentage of the population seems interested in. Many people gave me blank stares when I told them we had been to Kabini; and this is rated among wildlife enthusiasts as one of the top safaris in the world!

A standard refrain among Indians living in the US is that tourist destinations are not maintained and presented well - a belief I used to share. But Kabinis offer a counterpoint.

Anyway, the big cat continues to be on my list, while my wife and daughter have scratched it off theirs.

A jaunt down south - tree lined boulevards and freeways

2009-09-25T09:30:00.001-07:00

No posts for a week as I was in Bangalore for a business trip followed by a trip to Madurai and Kovilpatti to visit our folks. Bangalore was a welcome relief temperature-wise, as Hyderabad had started warming up again after a break in the monsoon early September. The tree lined streets with orderly - if heavy - traffic is a huge contrast from the chaotic roads of Hyderabad.

There are a lot more vehicles on narrower roads, but the roads actually have walkways for pedestrians leaving the entire breadth of the road to be available for motor vehicles. In the ubiquitous traffic lights, auto-drivers switch off the engine and wait patiently as opposed to feverishly jockeying for position to scream out of the gates. And the best part, they stop on red. Oh well, some day in Hyderabad..

From Bangalore to Madurai by air and then the customary 95 km drive to Kovilpatti to see my folks in my in-laws' Hyundai Santro. The big difference this time was that I drove on an (almost) uninterrupted 4-lane freeway that took an hour and 25 minutes instead of the usual 2 hours. They are finally finishing the 4-laning of roads connecting major cities in Tamilnadu. The last 2 years were painful as the roads were in even worse shape during the construction phase - but the end is in sight.
You barely notice Tirumangalam and Virudhunagar as you zoom past them on the bypass. Even if you go through the edge of a city, the neighbourhoods adjoining the now widened roads are virtually unrecognizable including the approach to my own home town. I completely overshot Kovilpatti and had to make a U-turn to get back. Hopefully they will install exit signs soon.

Otherwise, the drive was rather enjoyable and would have been more so only if the Santro had shown a bit more enthusiasm beyond 100kph. I need to work my way up the auto food chain and try this road with my FIL's Ford Fiesta next time.

- R. Balaji

Festival season in Hyderabad (part 1) - Ganesh Chathurthi

2009-09-11T22:34:00.000-07:00

It is the festival season in India and Hyderabad has its own unique way of celebrating it. You see, Hyderabad is a melting pot of South Indian, North Indian and Deccani Islamic cultures and it is very much apparent during this season. In the deep south, Vinayakar Chathurthi gets done in a day. In Hyderabad, like I suspect in many parts of the north, it is a fortnight long affair. Thousands of gigantic colorful Ganeshas get made and taken to water bodies in processions and get dunked cermeniously. As if we didn't have enough threats to our water resources already. At this rate, it is only a matter of time before Hussain Sagar will become Ganesh Sagar.

Anyway, this year I decided to set such pontifications aside and get into the spirit of it. The day of the Chathurthi, I went to my neighborhood Ganesha idol outlet and got a tiny beautiful white Ganesha with purple decorative powder for Rs. 50. The road-side "store" was manned (if you could use the word in this case) by a young man no more than 8 who was winding down his business and seemed a little impatient with me and wanted to get home if indeed he had one.

Then I went to the nearby market to get materials for the puja - a rare venture outside my humdrum routine. The flower cart guy insisted on giving me exact change back. I learnt that even a farmers market in India (Raithu bazaar) sells Washington apples at mind-boggling prices while the local produce was far cheaper. My daughter (who I firmly believe has a Pacific Northwest soul inside an Indian body) will have nothing less than Washington apples and thanks to her, Ganesha got Washington Red Delicious that day.

The nimarjan (immersion day) itself happens 10 days later and schools and many businesses close down since the city grinds to a halt in the evening with all the processions underway. This year, the nimarjan day unfortunately coincided with the day the news of YSR's tragic death broke out and I hear was a very muted affair. We stayed home as we were worried about repercussions from the event in the city. Last year, we had driven past Hussain Sagar as the immersions were happening - through truck-mounted cranes organized by the government itself.

So that is the Ganesh Chathurthi story; onto Ramzaan next.

An Arangetram

2009-09-04T22:59:00.000-07:00

Last week, we watched a Bharata Natyam Arangetram performance by Ms. Chelna Galada, student of Padmashri Ananda Shankar Jayant, one of India's top performing artists. My daughter has been taking dance lessons with her for the past year and my wife joined recently, thanks to which we got invitations to the event.

This was the 25th disciple of Ananda Shankar getting to do an Arangetram - a feat that requires meeting the "exacting standards" of Ananda - in her 26 year teaching career. The highlight of the event was the varnam that was based on a story from Jain mythology - the fourteen dreams that Queen Trishala had when she was pregnant with Vardhamana Mahaveera.

The program brochure claimed that this was a world premiere of a Bharata Natyam performance narrating a Jain story - there have been narrations from other major world religions before. I have seen an earlier performance by Ananda Shankar and her troupe - Darshanam: An ode to the eye, which was another example of her pushing the boundaries of her art. A Hindu art form narrating stories from other religions is indeed a great example of India's multiculturalism (Prof. Amartya Sen's point in The Argumentative Indian - see my earlier post).

The performance itself was top-notch, to a layman's eye such as mine and to more discerning eyes, as attested to by none other than Chitra Visweswaran (a guest of honour for the function) during the "blessings" ceremony in the middle of the event. I did feel that Chelna danced better in the second half when she perhaps was more relaxed after the big examination (the varnam) was over and the grades were in.

It is great to see this art in its modern mode of operation - being passed from guru to disciple while both are performers. Chitra Visweswaran talked about students today having the added advantage of watching their teachers perform; while the performers of yesteryears learnt from nattuvanars, who were pure teachers.

Right from starting on time, up to the stage design, lighting, the composition and singing by Venu Madhav, this was a professionally organized event and it was free to boot. Looking forward to another one in a month or so.

- R. Balaji

Arguing about the Argumentative Indian

2009-08-21T20:44:00.000-07:00

Since my return to India, I have been drawn to authors of Indian origin or books with an Indian setting. Around this time, I also wanted to read more ""improving"" books as P. G. Wodehouse would have put it. One of the first books I tried to read was The Argumentative Indian by Amartya Sen.

I am still scratching my head about what this book is about. The book starts with a lot of promise talking about the multi-faceted, multi-religious past of India and how argument (as in debate) and dialog is a central theme in Indian culture citing examples from the Upanishads, Buddhist and Jain texts and the Bhagavat Gita (which in some sense can be considered a debate between Arjuna and Lord Krishna).

Then the book starts making an elaborate argument about how India is really much more than a "Hindu country" (for instance, we could have been called a Buddhist country until the 5th century A.D. ) and makes a strong criticism against the BJP's Hindutva movement along the way. I was fine with this sentiment until Prof. Sen repeated this in multiple forms for a few chapters when I got tired of the subject.

Don't get me wrong, I like to think of myself as secular and I look at BJP's strategy to win elections with as much disapproval as other shady tactics used by parties such as caste politics, casting matinee idols as political heroes and plain old thuggery. The book was compiled in 2004 just after the BJP's electoral defeat. Back then, it might have felt like a timely counterpoint to the Hindutva movement, but as I read it now, especially after BJP's recent electoral repeat, it reads like beating a dead horse. You might have read in recent news reports about the internal squabbles of the BJP.

Besides the BJP did seem to govern a little better than how it campaigned. On the broader point, Prof. Sen may be right in saying that the Hindutva is overstating its point. But is he overstating his? Underplaying a substantial (if not the single most dominant) chunk of our heritage seems dangerous. There is something to be said about managing to remain 80% Hindu even after 600 years (or is it 800?) of non-Hindu rule.

Anyway, I stopped reading after the first few chapters; may be one of you can tell me if I should bother with the rest.

One of the chapters I did find interesting and informative was the one on Rabindranath Tagore and his relationship with Gandhiji. This had a few surprises for me; more on that later.

- Balaji R.

World Badminton Championship in Hyderabad

2009-08-20T21:26:00.000-07:00

We saw the last 3 days of action at the recently concluded WBF Championships in Hyderabad at Gachibowli stadium. This is the 2nd International sports event Hyderabad has held in the last 2 years; the previous one was the World Military Games in 2007.

We got full tournament passes in the middle of the week for Rs. 2000 a pop after muddling through poor information on where to get tickets.

Sadly, Saina Nehwal, the lone Indian hope lost in the quarterfinals. You may recall she won a major tournament (Indonesian Open) recently, beating World No. 2 Lin Wang of China. Saina, unlike her almost name-sake Sania Mirza (also from Hyderabad), has broken into the Top 10 in her sport. I don't know what they put the water in Hyderabad (or is it that they have water, period) that they keep producing these athletes in ahem a steady stream (steady, I mean by Indian standards).

Anyway, Saina lost to the same Lin Wang this time around. This is the first time I am seeing world-class badminton live and it was quite thrilling. It was good to see that courts are not actually painted in fluorescent green as they appear on DD Sports. You hear the thwack of racquet meeting shuttle and feel the speed and reflexes of the players as they glide, skip and dive across the court. The frenetic pace of men's doubles with feroicous exchanges was a treat. The Chinese may lack the fluid grace of Morten Frost or our own Prakash Padukhone (who I remember watching as a kid in the early 80's). But they dart across the court with a speed that defies belief and leap for their smashes to Jordanesque heights. They also find a way to return almost anything thrown at them.

Saina herself I thought played with a maturity beyond her 20 years; she led the 2nd game 10-2 before succumbing to an overall superior player at this point in time. Was the Indonesian Open a flash in the pan? Time will tell, though I think she has the game and needs to cut down on unforced errors (to say zero which is what I see from the Chinese). Go Saina!

On the final day, there was only one non-Chinese - mixed doubles from Denmark - win. It was weird to see Indian Jawans ceremonially carry the Chinese flag time and again as the winners were medalled.

Security arrangements and the overall conduct of the tournament seemed smooth (it was annoying to see the Brits pull out because of security fears) and it was gratifying to see us pull off an international event in the middle of security and swine flu concerns.

- Balaji R.

Solar water heaters do work

2009-08-19T22:31:00.001-07:00

We just moved into our newly constructed home in Hyderabad, a 3 bedroom "Villa" (yes, in India, we have really downgraded that term). We do really like this indulgence that cost a fortune and as lame attempts to assuage vague misgivings about such things, we installed a solar heater, light bulbs that consume 12w or less everywhere and laid natural stone tiles that came from a village called Thandur less than 100 km away (actually, they just happened but I am taking credit anyway).

The flooring is getting mixed reviews from visitors, parents and in-laws although we love them.
As for the solar water heater, the thing set me back by Rs. 45,000 but produces scalding hot (can vouch for that one personally) water 24 hours a day during rainy (actually this year just cloudy) season in Hyderabad.

Succumbing to the temptation

2009-08-19T22:13:00.000-07:00

What better day to join the blogging community - the ultimate modern-day exercise in vanity - than the occasion of one's 40th birthday.

I hope to write a public diary of my life in India as a Newly Returned Indian (actually not that new, about 2 years now); if not actually entertaining, hopefully someone among my friends and relatives (I don't expect anyone else to actually want to read this) who is pondering a return themselves will find this useful.

I also hope to write about pursuits in my interests and hobbies - travel, sports, movies, history, Tamil culture etc, and truly noble causes that I don't plan to do anything about - saving the environment, education among other things.

- Balaji R.