RIFLE RANGE BOY

The Saraswati Civilisation. (2019) (A Paradigm Shift in Ancient Indian History) Author: Maj General Dr GD Bakshi In secondary school history class, we were taught to believe that civilisation developed circa 1500 BCE around the Indus River. Then came mighty learned men from the Steppe Land on horsebacks to bring knowledge and wisdom to this region. The original inhabitants of this region ran helter-skelter, crossing the Vindhya Hills to root themselves in the Southern part of the subcontinent. We vaguely remember being told about the Aryan Invasion Theory and the clear demarcation between the Northern part of India and the South. . Later in life, we were exposed to Mahabharata, Ramayana and Bhagavad Gita. What was taught as mythological tales, we later found out, was actually backed with scientific facts. For starters, the birth dates of specific icons could be fact-checked as their birthdates were described in relation to astronomical positions. These scriptures also illustrate a lush...

Sathyathai Thedi  (Seeking the Truth; @ Asothoma Sathgamaya,  2013) First, it was Zakir Naik who was heard telling his congregants that the old Hindu scriptures did indeed quote of the arrival of a messenger of God. In his usual style, he went on ranting his references to the said inscriptions. Just that people are too set in their mindsets to accept that, he alleged. Now I hear the same pitch being repeated. This Christian evangelist film tries to sell the idea that the Ama Veda did hint of Prajapathi, the Lord of the Universe, being Jesus Christ himself. Somewhere in it, it was apparently mentioned of the Creator who needed to be sacrificed for atonement. In their eyes, it fits perfectly in their narrative that Jesus, who is God himself, had to be sacrificed to wash the sins of Man. The whole film can be described as a hermeneutical gymnastic as the protagonist goes on rattling verses after verses from the Veda, Upanishads and even Kural to drive home the message that...

Unnal Mudiyum Thambi (உன்னால் முடியும் தம்பி, You  can do it Brother, Tamil; 1988) Direction: K. Balachander A young Brahmin boy is busy chanting hymns under his breath as he walks to the temple lake to perform his daily abolitions. He sees a blind, hungry beggar struggling to pick up a piece of banana thrown for her. He can see that she is going to fall off the stairs, but he does not help her. He does not want to break his ritual. Another beggar who sees the whole scenario helps her but admonishes the boy for giving more importance to rituals than humanity. Herein lies the dilemma that plagued the adolescent for the rest of his life. One one hand, his father, is a dogmatic stickler of Vedantic scripture and a classical Indian music maestro who would rather die than to have the age-old Hindu traditions desecrated. One the other hand, the boy, Udayamurthi (Kamalhasan), can see so much social injustice around him that his father, a big man in the society, is turning a blind e...

The Hindus, An Alternative History Author: Wendy Doniger Everything that happens in life is seen from a particular perspective. One can say that a cup is half full or half empty, both indicating the same thing. A tiny structure that we see from the corner of our eye over the horizon is actually a mammoth ocean liner that dwarfs everything adjacent to it. It is all in its interpretation. It also depends on our understanding fueled by our past experiences and know how. We see what we want to see. We sometimes are blind to the elephant in the room. And the senses do not appreciate what the mind does not know! From the outset, the author, a holder of doctorates in Sanskrit and India studies, qualifies her work as an alternative interpretation of the history of Hinduism in India. Just like the picture of the markings on the moon which is depicted below, the impression on the moon can be interpreted as a man (Cain the wanderer and murderer), rabbit or duck, depending on his background...

The manipulation by the practitioners of the second oldest profession in the world can be seen as early as the Rig Vedic times. Hoodwinking of the public by invoking pseudo-religious mumbo-jumbo traditions can be seen even here. The unholy union of the warrior class and the educated class seem to legitimise the ritual of horse sacrifice to appease the divine powers to prosper the kingdom. A white horse is let to run loose in the wild for a whole year under the hawk-eyed scrutiny of the kings men and officials. The animal would graze with impunity on peasants’ land. Any form of resistance or resentment would be a good enough reason for the ruling clansmen to rage war and take over possession of the property. Sure, this ritual smells prosperity from the word go. During one of these God-name invoking expansion exercise, King Rama met his long lost twin sons Luv and Kush. The scriptures tell of the fate of Sita, who was rescued by Ram and his Tamilian friends down south. Doubts about...

“It is 5.23 am,” I told myself as I glanced at my watch. “I guess I got up early. Anyway, SK should be here right about now, right on the dot at 5.30am, as he has always been. Today is not going to be any different.” I plugged on my earphones to hear the continuation of a podcast that I listened to all through the previous week. It was a day before the full moon, but the cloudy skies and the lack of street lights made the street look pretty dark. I sat on the raised stone fence as the auto-gate slowly closed from inside. Far behind a parked car, I could see a moving shadow. It looked like the silhouette of two stocky legs pacing haphazardly as if they were swaying. At once, I thought that it must be the neighbour’s son who must be struggling back to his home after a long Saturday night out with the guys. “Wow!” I was thinking as I symbolically pat myself on the back for keeping up with the routine all these years despite the raging inner demons and concerned naysayers who ke...