Ratnottma Sengupta revisits an exhibition full 25 years later
Images from exhibits at Anadi . Provided by Ratnottama Sengupta
On November 1 of 1956 was born a state in Central India called Madhya Pradesh. And 44 years later, on exactly the same day of November 1, in the year 2000 it was remapped. A new state — Chhattisgarh — was carved out of the land that had been home to the oldest Indians: the men and women who had peopled the caves at Bagh and Bhimbetka.
Standing at the threshold of that new beginning, I had curated an exhibition titled Anadi – that which has no beginning and, therefore, no end. The exhibition card was designed by M F Husain who came on the inaugural day in Delhi. The next day was graced by the presence of Madhavrao Scindia, scion of the royal family that continues to throw up political leaders. I was fortunate to have friends like collectors Anand Agarwal and H K Kejriwal, bureaucrats Bhaskar Ghose and Sarayu Doshi, art lovers like poet Gulzar and artists like Yusuf Arakkal. Happily, then, the exhibition travelled to Birla Academy in Kolkata to Chitrakala Parishath in Bangalore to the National Gallery of Modern Art in Mumbai. And with it travelled a batch of youngsters who were soon to be among the most sought after names in Indian Contemporary Art.
What made that exhibition so special? The card? The multi-venue display? The star viewers? The exhilarating combination of tribal paintings, figurative sculpture, and abstract images? Twenty five years later, I will look back to find an answer.
Images from exhibits at Anadi . Provided by Ratnottama Sengupta
At the intersection of two millennia I was amazed to note there was no rupture in continuity. Anadi offered a fresh look at a continuum that lives on beyond the geopolitical redefinition, because it began at a time when Chhattisgarh was not Madhya Pradesh, nor the Central Province of the Raj. Bhopal, Indore, Raipur, Jagdalpur, Sanchi, Vidisha, Malwa… these cities had no chief minister back then, nor a Prime Minister. Why, there were no Begums nor a Buddha. No Baj Bahadur loved a Roopmati nor did Kalidasa send a Cloud as Messenger. It was a time when the intrepid fingers that harnessed stones and hunted hides also painted rocks to sing of life. In the process – around 10,000 BCE – they crafted the rockbed of Indian Art at Bhimbetka, the UNESCO World Heritage Site mere miles away from Bhopal.
Bare lines that captured with only a twist and a turn the vigor of hunting and the verve of dancing, rock art is that elusive genre which is narrative, figurative and abstract – all at one go. And that is a characteristic common to the tribal stream of art which flourishes in the state from a forgotten past. There is a story in every figure painted by Bhuri Bai or Sukho Korwa. She paints a cart and tells you of the festival day when on its wheels it goes round habitats, collecting all the bimari and driving illness out of the village. He paints a bird that pounces on a snake which devours a rat, recounting the lifecycle that sustains ecological balance. But where is the third dimension? Where’s the likeness to the world of five senses? We see no effort here to evoke either. Instead, there is a stylization which is unique to the region that is home to the Bhil, Gond, Sahariya, Baiga, Saur and other tribes. A stylisation that abstracts the essence of the physical reality they celebrate through colour and line.
Images from exhibits at Anadi . Provided by Ratnottama Sengupta
Dots and crosses, circles and squares all come into play as the vivacious blues and reds, yellows and greens acquire life. A line is not simply a straight line or curve: that would be an unappetising repetition. The quest for variety and individuality finds Kala Bai, Lado, Sumaru break up the lines into an intricate arrangement of countless motifs. When the subject is the same, as too the colour, it’s the dots and crosses, dashes and stars that give the work the imprint of individuality. In the process, these artists who work in a community and send off their creations to markets in distant cities, have worked out a way of ‘patenting’ artistic property. Tradition did not require them to ever sign off a work with their names. In the age of copyright awareness and intellectual property rights, they might put their signatures on the canvas – but the unmistakable imprint of the artists lie in the manner of their assembling the familiar patterns.
That, make no mistake, is the sign of a master, be he in the tribal mould or a modernist. For corroboration, we have only to look at a painting by Maqbool Fida Hussain, N S Bendre or Syed Haider Raza. Madhuri or Mahabharat, Gandhi or Indira, M F Husain constantly painted figures. Eminent and easily recognised ones at that. And yet, they lived not in the details of their features but in the lines and colours that spelt ‘Husain’ to seasoned viewers. Likewise Bendre’s forms had little concern for photographic realism. In Raza’s case, it is the arrangement of colourful geometrical bindus (circles) and squares alone that speaks of the artist. So, regardless of whether or not there is a ‘McBull’ or ‘Bendre’ inked on the canvas, we readily identify these masters who, incidentally, all came from this same state of Madhya Pradesh.
Images from exhibits at Anadi . Provided by Ratnottama Sengupta
Note one more thing about these names. Each of them had set new watersheds for Indian contemporary art. All of them had opened up new avenues for artists who came after them. Bendre, the first to head the art education at the Maharaja Sayajirao University of Baroda, gave not just one more centre for mastering the brush. He gave shape to an institution which still assimilates the best of the home and the universe, giving the MSU artists a rare acceptability in India and in the West. Raza, who lived in Paris for years and years, did not sever his umbilical cord with this soil, yet carved a niche for Indianness in the Mecca of contemporary art. And Husain? The life as too the art of this ‘Picasso from Indore’ had become a legend in his own lifetime. Who else but MF could raise the high water mark at auctions, again at again, at home and abroad? Who but him could open up the markets for Indian artists, including those who preceded him like Jamini Roy?
Images from exhibits at Anadi . Provided by Ratnottama Sengupta
Talking of the masters who opened vistas, especially in the context of Madhya Pradesh, one comes to J Swaminanthan who facilitated a two-way transaction. While holding the reins of Roopankar Museum in Bhopal, he assimilated tribal art to such an extent that he could understand it, explain it, talk about it, write about it and paint after them, using their earth colours, and the bareness of their lines. At the same time, the outsider who became an insider gave, through Bharat Bhavan, all of Madhya Pradesh a new standing in the realm of contemporary art. Artists from all over the country would congregate in Bhopal with their art, exhibit it, discuss it threadbare in seminars, impart it to those keen to learn. Small wonder, the state boasts a host of artists like Akhilesh and Anwar, Seema Ghuraiya and Manish Pushkale, Yogendra and Vivek Tembe, Jaya Vivek and Jangarh Shyam. Artists who steal the attention of the world today.
This breed, which was born with the emergence of the state, came of age in artistic terms as the province consolidated its presence on the marquee. And an overwhelming number of them express themselves in just lines and colours. They care not for things like market – which seems to have an insatiable appetite for figurative art. Nor for the narrative tradition of the forefathers who painted on rocks. These neo-masters are all distilling forms, extracting experiences, working out their own equations with abstraction.
But, come to think of it, isn’t this exactly what the original artists of this land – and every other land on earth – set out to do when they picked up the sharpened tool that was millennia away from the paint brush?
Ratnottama Sengupta, formerly Arts Editor of The Times of India, teaches mass communication and film appreciation, curates film festivals and art exhibitions, and translates and writes books. She has been a member of CBFC, served on the National Film Awards jury and has herself won a National Award.
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The idea of spring heralds hope even when it’s deep winter. The colours of spring bring variety along with an assurance of contentment and peace. While wars and climate disasters rage around the world, peace can be found in places like the cloistered walls of Sistine Chapel where conflicts exist only in art. Sometimes, we get a glimpse of peace within ourselves as we gaze at the snowy splendour of Himalayas and sometimes, in smaller things… like a vernal flower or the smile of a young child. Inner peace can at times lead to great art forms as can conflicts where people react with the power of words or visual art. But perhaps, what is most important is the moment of quietness that helps us get in touch with that inner voice giving out words that can change lives. Can written words inspire change?
Our featured bookstore’s owner from Bangladesh, Amina Rahman, thinks it can. Rahman of Bookworm, has a unique perspective for she claims, “A lot of people mistake success with earning huge profits… I get fulfilment out of other things –- community health and happiness and… just interaction.” She provides books from across the world and more while trying to create an oasis of quietude in the busy city of Dhaka. It was wonderful listening to her views — they sounded almost utopian… and perhaps, therefore, so much more in synch with the ideas we host in these pages.
Our content this month are like the colours of the rainbow — varied and from many countries. They ring out in different colours and tones, capturing the multiplicity of human existence. The translations start with Professor Fakrul Alam’s transcreation of Nazrul’s Bengali lyrics in quest of the intangible. Isa Kamari translates four of his own Malay poems on spiritual quest, while from Balochi, Fazal Baloch bring us Munir Momin’s esoteric verses in English. Snehprava Das’s translation of Rohini K.Mukherjee poetry from Odia and S.Ramakrishnan’s story translated from Tamil by B.Chandramouli also have the same transcendental notes. Tagore’s playful poem on winter (Sheeth) mingles a bit for spring, the season welcomed by all creatures great and small.
We have good news to share —Borderless Journal has had the privilege of being listed on Duotrope – which means more readers and writers for us. We are hugely grateful to all our readers and contributors without who we would not have a journal. Thanks to our wonderful team, especially Sohana Manzoor for her fabulous artwork.
Hope you have a wonderful month as we move towards the end of this year.
Five poems by Rohini K.Mukherjeehave been translated from Odia by Snehaprava Das
Rohini K.Mukherjee
AT THE MYSTICAL SANCHI
An unknown voice beckons At the early hours of the morning. Moved by a new surprise Buddha relapses into meditation. A crystal dawn, cold as marble, Is traced On his hands and feet And his eyes and forehead. Some instant, invisible signal prompts him To turn on his side and sleep.
After Buddha’s Nirvana, Calm settles in the valley, slowly. Thousands of Branches and branchlets Radiate blissful divine light. The trees too, in a lavish growth, Spread out everywhere -- From the earth below to the sky above -- And meditate!
THE EXECUTIONER
No one could predict The next scene. But in the one enacted now The executioner has A prominent presence.
The executioner stalks the moon, His face hidden in the veil of clouds, Knife in hand, a gleam of smile On a phony face, A sharp, keen gaze under the glasses, Exuding the smell of An expensive perfume.
The indistinct footfalls may Prompt one to flick a look back But there would be no one behind Only clouds clad in midnight blue Sailing in the sky. From somewhere far floats in the music Of a mountain stream. Slowly, sorrow dissipates and a Path opens up for the spring, A wonderland of fairies. In his unguarded moments, The knife in the executioner’s grip Glitters in the furtive moonlight. Any moment that poison-coated knife Could find the moon’s throat, The moon knows that well. But it forgives, Because it also knows well That the executioner cannot Hide for long And will be trapped in The moonlit garden of tangled clouds.
THE DEATH OF A HAPPY MAN
One day, the eyes lost sleep And all the locusts flew away,
Not one spectator had guessed That one day The man will sprawl out on On the sea beach sands Washed away by the waves From distant lands.
The eyes lost sleep one day. The flock of locusts flew away.
But no one could guess The pains, the sobs That seared that forlorn soul.
Petals drifted in piles To make him a delicate shroud. The smell of sandalwood came wafting In the sea-breeze from the north. Seagulls flocked around the body, Unintimidated by the crowd in the beach, Drowning the voice of The living men there With their loud squawks of dissent. Ooh! What a long wished-for Happy death On a cool and blissful sea beach!
After the flock of locusts flew away Carrying all the dreams back On their wicked wings, The eyes lost sleep!
ANKLETS OF THE NIGHT
There is still time for the nightfall. But the air tinkles with the sound of The anklets of the night As if someone is retreating from An ineffectual, moon-washed garden, As if someone from the grave Watching the landscape, Or someone standing at the riverside Hums the tune of a departed season, Or someone hurrying aimlessly away To escape the approaching dawn.
It is not yet night, But the night’s anklets ring. You are probably returning To your shelter of old times In search of a new hope. Just take a look behind to see The painting of a conflicting wind Fluttering across the courtyard.
It is not yet night But its anklets begin to jingle in the air.
How cool you appear in your Evening chanting of the mantras! How calm and steady you are In the pure fragrance of the descending steps As you set out on the journey Holding your heart on your palm Like a burning clay-lamp. May be when you arrive there The dawn around you would be sonorous With the notations of Raga Bhairavi.
There is still time for the nightfall But the night’s anklets tinkle in the air!
THEY DID NOT COME
I waited for them, but They did not come, I waited all this time in vain, and Knowingly, let myself fall a victim To the first rays of the sun. The sun’s whiplash spurred me on To the jungle. It forced me to cut wood And tie them in bundles. The hunger of the sunset hour Prodded me back to where I had started. The smell of soaked rice, and the aroma of Onions and oil Drifted thick in the air of my house.
The sun came in, an intruder, Sat by me and watched. Then it devoured all the food, Leaving nothing, Not even a single dried-up onion-peel.
Because they did not come, For me the morning was Meaningless in its futility. I knew I was never one In the list of their ultimate interests When their tenure of life here ended.
The footfall of the light Trod easy on my skin. Days rolled on this way In sun and light. The sun was everywhere, all the time. Whenever the door opened, The sun stood there. When the meteor came shooting down, When words rode over the waves of sleep to float in the air, The treacherous sun always appeared.
And for me, there was No hope of their coming back.
But, one day as I leapt up in a hurry At the Sun’s summon, I discovered the Sahara Desert That I believed had Remained hidden in my School Geography book, Lying face down all these days Under my own hooves!
Rohini Kanta Mukherjee has authored, edited and co-edited several volumes of poetry and short stories in Odia and English. Many of his poems have been translated and published in various Indian languages , broadcast over several stations of All India Radio and Doordarshan . Some of his poems and translations have appeared in Wasafiri, Indian Literature, The Little Magazine , Purvagraha, Samasa among others. He retired as Associate Professor of English, from B.J.B Autonomous College, Bhubaneswar, Odisha.
Dr.Snehaprava Das, is a noted writer and a translator from Bhubaneswar, Odisha. She has five books of poems, three of stories and thirteen collections of translated texts (from Odia to English), to her credit.
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Whirling Dervishes, painting by Jean Baptiste Vanmour (1671-1737). From Public Domain
In 1976, I bought a small country cottage very pleasantly located near the town of Sheffield at Dronfield in South Yorkshire from an elderly woman who informed me she that had travelled quite extensively throughout Asia in the nineteen twenties and thirties before settling down here. She never married. The learned woman left no forwarding address.
Settling in took much time and energy because of my abundant belongings. At last, one rainy afternoon having nothing to do, I climbed the shaky stairway that led to the garret. The door had been left ajar. Inside the low-ceiling, ill-lite space, there was nothing but a large chest placed in the middle. The lid lay aslant. Its hinges were broken.
Curious about its contents, I began rummaging through the numerous newspaper and magazine clippings, booklets, letters and other documents. A particular envelop caught my eye because the red wax seal had been broken. Wax-sealed letters are very out-dated these days. When I opened the envelop I understood why it was sealed. A seven-page letter had been written in fine, elegant script, by Lady Sheil, dated 1869. Lady Sheil was quite a prominent woman in her time[1] . This indeed was a remarkable find. It baffled me why the former proprietor would leave in a chest of documents a letter of such archival interest. Since there was little light in the garret, I took the letter downstairs to read it. Unfortunately there was no addressee, so I assumed it was sent to the former proprietor. I must confess that a feeling of guilt touched me when I began my reading. Luckily I overcame this sensation because the contents of the letter proved extraordinary …
Lady Sheil details a very peculiar adventure of an Englishman who named himself Ali the Dervish -or as she spelt it, Deervish — who had undertaken a voyage to ‘Balochestan, Persia’[2]. As I read through her letter, I came to realise that the Englishman had abandoned his British ways entirely, adopting those of the semi-nomad Balochi. To such an extent was his assimilation that he even married a Balochi woman, something utterly unthinkable at that time — in the year 1856. Why Lady Sheil would write a long letter about this chap to an unknown reader or readers heightened my curiosity.
I began investigations at the Sheffield library and found Lady Sheil’s Glimpses of Persian[3] though I found nothing at all about Ali the Dervish. Lady Sheil mentioned something about his diary but nothing substantial came of this. Be that as it may, the letter fascinated me by its mysterious allusions and ellipses, especially concerning this unusual identity change. Not a simple task for a European in the nineteenth century, or even in our century for that matter. This Ali even outdid Sir Richard Burton’s bursts of outlandish impersonation …
Examining the letter carefully, I felt a strange, slight tremor goading me to do justice to this eccentric Ali. Something unsaid in the sentences urged me to read between them, to scrutinize the margins and the paragraph indents as if Lady Sheil had deliberately left out parts of her narrative for her reader to fill in those blank, yellowing spaces.
I picked up my pen, imagining myself to be both Lady Sheil and Ali the dervish, and began filling in the those blanks, writing in the gaps, the lacuna, the untold events and details so to speak. Indeed, I had convinced myself that the letter had been destined for me. And this resolution was enough for me to divulge the mystery of Ali …
Ali, whose English-born name was left unknown, had had the best of aristocratic educations in the fine arts, especially languages. He was fluent in Hindustani, Persian, Pashtun and Turkish, besides having mastered four or five European languages, including Hungarian. This was quite a linguistic feat, second only to Richard Burton whom, by the way, Ali had the occasion to meet in Lahore. A meeting which lasted two or three weeks according to a friend of Burton’s memoirs. Little, however, is reported about their relationship.
Prior to Ali’s arrival in India and that fortuitous encounter with Burton, he apparently had led a rather lukewarm existence in England, and this in spite of his family wealth, or perhaps because of it. His accumulation of capital was analogous to his successive accumulations of prolonged bouts of depression. They left him utterly exhausted. How and when he left England is not written in the letter, although he probably reached India by ship, then on horseback or foot into Northwestern India, accompanied often by erring minstrels and story-tellers. From whom Ali learned the art of dancing, chanting and story-telling. It was not a question of imitating these rituals and customs. Ali had integrated them as if they had been part of some distant, latent self that required jolts of recollection to surge up from the depths of the unconscious. In fact, Burton was quite taken aback by Ali’s very ‘unEnglish’ appearance. His manner of speaking English, too, possessed a curious twist of Persian and Hindustani syntax — a ring of their tonal stress.
To Ali’s pleasant surprise, he no longer suffered from bouts of violent depressions. The former Englishman on leaving Burton, perhaps in 1849, rid himself of paper money, donating it to missionaries, then rode off into the verdant valleys of North-western India towards Afghanistan carrying only the clothes on his back, two gourds of fresh water, several loaves of acorn-bread and a pouch of Arabic gum. Ali carried no weapon.
Ali’s sound knowledge of Hindustani, Pashtun and Persian offered him unparallel glimpses of these undomesticated lands. Lands of shifting desert sands whose rising heat conjured in the distance illusions of ravishing oases and sparkling cascades off tree-laden crags. Ali had been warned about these deceitful mirages (by Burton?) whose marvellous vision had been the death of many a brave adventurer.
He kept to the clayey track, accepting food and board from the hospitable villagers or sleeping under the silver stars on his woven kilim-saddle cloth. He rode days or nights penetrating landscapes of indescribable beauty, of terrifying singularity, of unbearable heat in the day and equally freezing nights. At one point in his wanderings, Ali, slumbering on his horse due to the rising heat and lack of food, looked up to discover a gigantic Buddha hewn into a tuft-like cliff. A small stream ran in front of the lithic niche along which flourished many date trees. There the Buddha stood, calm, reposed, sedentary, encased in his stone casket, home to a myriad birds who had made their nests on his rounded shoulders and shaven head. Ali jumped off his horse, filled his gourds with clean water, scouted about for fresh dates. With one last look at the towering Enlightened One he set off towards Persia, filled with equivocal sensations. He felt that his nomad days would soon be numbered …
A month or two passed. Now villagers tilling their fields or collecting wood no longer greeted or spoke Pashtun to him, but in Dehwari or Persian. He welcomed this language shift. Ali felt more at ease in Persian, albeit it be the Dehwari dialect, which he had learnt from one or two erring Zarathustrian talebearers in India. By then his uncombed beard touched his chest and his hair his shoulders. In one village he traded his khaki-coloured shorts for a shalwar[4] and his boots for goat-skin sandals. In another his Safari sun hat for a turban and his heavy flax shirt for a long, cotton tunic. Whenever he met tillers or merchants they would greet him with the customary ‘hoş amati’[5]. By their pronunciation and vocabulary Ali knew he was travelling southwards into Balochestan. Temperatures rose and rose — 37° C … 42° C. His horse trotted slower and slower. Her rider drooped soporifically over her mane. Ali no longer calculated his wanderings in farsakhs[6] but by the risings and settings of the sun …
Notwithstanding these discomfitures, the persevering Ali carried on. To his delight the track widened, hospitable shepherds driving before them their herds of sheep or goats offered the solitary traveller the warmth of their camp-fires, goat’s milk, cheese and acorn-bread. Caravans of transhumance nomads pressing towards the high plateaus nodded to him. The stony-faced herdsmen chanted in their own language which translated means —
A breath of mountain breeze, A breath of wind from the Sea, In the middle, We trudge The pilgrims of the fountain…
Then they called after their huge, savage dogs. Ali seized upon that admirable chant and intoned it to himself or aloud …
One sparkling, azure day, Ali, road-weary, alighted from his horse in a large settlement of tents, called Sa’idi. There both Persian and Dehwari were spoken, judging from the scores of people who came to greet him. It was a charming settlement, surrounded by fields of red poppies, iris, bluer than the blue of the sky, crown imperials whose orange tints glowed like lit candles, and tulips. Horses, sheep and goats dotted the terraced rows of poppies on the hills and skirts of the low-laying piebald mountains, motionless. Ali, both dazzled and comforted by the undulating kaleidoscope colours decided to halt for the night in this welcoming settlement to rest his fatigued physical and mental state and his horse.
When he asked for the elder of the settlement, he was directed to a very large white tent. In fact, since his arrival the snowy-bearded elder had been eyeing the stranger askance. He threw open the flap of his tent and greeted him in Persian as custom would have it, inviting his visitor inside for tea. Sipping their respective glasses of sugared tea, the snowy-bearded elder’s deep-set black eyes peered into those hazel-brown of Ali’s. Though he was pleased to meet this curious traveller, he was confused about his identity. Finally he put the question point blank to his sipping visitor: “Are you Persian?”
Ali nodded neither yes nor no. His ambiguous nod set off the string of events that followed. events that transformed the already transforming Ali into a rather ambiguous Other …
The snowy-bearded elder had read that ambiguous nod as a sign of belonging. Ali’s sun-mat complexion, his extraordinary command of both Persian and Dehwari, his knowledge of social and religious habits and practices, mostly acquired during his years on the road, opened the elder’s heart and those of the Balochi people of Sa’idi, people who now had stepped into the tent, forming a large circle round Ali and the snowy-bearded elder. Out of this wide circle came the elder’s three sons and daughter to lead him to his own red tent at the outskirts of the settlement. His horse was led to pasture with the others.
On the thick carpets of his medium-sized tent, Ali sat and meditated upon that ambiguous nod. Had he really become the one of them? Deep within his heart, the former Englishman rejoiced … rejoiced at his ‘crossing over’. He had become what he really was …
Several years passed. Ali no longer felt guilty about leaving his past behind. His immersion seemed complete. He sang and danced round the ritual fire at night. He told stories night after night after a hard day’s work in the poppy fields, apple and peach orchards and the vineyards, the tribesmen chanted their chants of ancestral lore, joined him in his whirling dance, one palm to the Heavens and the other to the Earth, eyes staring into a void of quiescence …
It was in Sa’idi that he began to be called Ali the Dervish, whirling as he did before and behind the leaping flames. Ali taught his dance to the snowy-bearded elder’s three sons. In turn, the elder offered his daughter to him in marriage — a privilege since this signified entrance into the chieftain’s family.
Once the three-day marriage ceremonies were over, his lovely bride — for she was truly lovely — sat next to him in the nuptial red tent. His wife, whose name has never been recorded, demanded nothing of him. She accepted all his nightly hesitations … ‘failings’ … Her fruity laugh and obsidian back eyes spoke a language that communicated higher values … loftier treasures than uncertainty, physical gratification or hereditary obligations.
Ali slowly discovered that his young bride possessed the quality of a seer, perhaps even belonged to a long lineage of Central Asian mystics. Intense were her meditations and visions of the Other World, of events passed and those to come … His past … Their future … Ali, both bewildered and beguiled by this power of prophesy, would timidly question his bride about her unusual gifts. She would answer enigmatically: “One must remove the Husk before bringing in the Bride,” an adage he never fully understood, nor would she ever elucidate.
On other moonlit nights, alone within the sanctuary of their intimacy, Ali’s wife would envision scenes of his long aristocratic lineage, each member afflicted by physical or mental atrophies, plagued by wasting ennui. The Dervish listened in awe as she revealed events quite unknown to him. Yet, he remained speechless, peering into the almond-shaped eyes of this woman depicting scenes that could very well cost him his life. She said nothing. He yearned to avow everything to her but some fey voice prevented him each time. She read his mind and laughed her fruity laugh, delving ever deeper into his life … theirs !
Ali accompanied her with his eyes then turned them to the dying embers of the stove fire, the glowing logs sizzled lightly in the silence. Was he deluding himself? He knew that his wife had discovered his native idenity. But were all those past scenes his true identity? He indeed stemmed from that hoary lineage, the last scion. Was he the last to play a role on this world stage of masquerade and mummery? No ! He was Ali the Dervish … Here amongst these hearty tribesmen he played no role. He had overcome the hardships of childhood as a fatherless boy. That unknown gentleman had left for Africa never to return! Never a letter nor a message brought by acquaintances. Before dying of grief, his poor mother repeated to him everynight: “Look to the stars.” And the sullen boy looked, and believed that they would lead him to another life … another identity !
Once Ali began to cry softly listening to the sizzling embers and the light, rhythmical breathing of his strange wife.
Many years had passed and yet, they had no children. His hair and beard had greyed. Yet, no reprimand, no rebuke, no judgement ever came from the community, especially from her aging father. Was the power of her revelations known to him ? Would he be the last branch of that gnarled and rotten aristocratic tree ?
Ali rode often into the fields and mountains to gather wood to build tent-frames or glean fruit from the many apple and peach trees. During these solitary moments his past crept up on him, making him feel guilty. There seemed only one solution : speak openly, candidly to his wife about his British birth, his genuine desire to become the Other. She would surely understand since she had already read his former life by sounding his heart. That night he would go straight to his wife.
But, just then out of the blue sky his wife came galloping towards him, whipping up her stead. She jumped off, an odd expression wrinkling her forehead. Ali ran up to her, took her shoulders gently, admiring the sapphire blue that framed them so perfectly like a painting. There she stood, basking in the soft glow of the mellowing, evening sun. Before he could utter his rehearsed confession she put a hand to his lips.
“Father has just passed away,” she whispered softly, without emotion. “He has been freed from the trammels of worldly existence.” She smiled. “Now you too are free to divest yourself of a personage that has been conferred to you by the stars and the strength of your will.”
“But who am I really, my dear?” her husband wondered. She caressed his bearded, burning cheeks. She answered: “If you want the horse to neigh, you must slacken the reins.” Turning round, she rode back to the settlement to wash the body of her deceased father and prepare the three-day funeral rites with her brothers. Ali puzzled by that enigmatic counsel trudged to his horse.
He rode back far behind her, meditating his ‘freedom’. What other choice had he?
This sentence was the last in Lady Sheil’s long, detailed letter. On further investigation into this strange fellow at the London library, I discovered that Ali the Dervish had divorced and remarried his bride to one of her brother’s mates, then left Sa’idi. He was last seen in Tabriz, Persia. No document reports his whereabouts after his reaching that northwestern town in the lands of the Azeri people.
I have often wondered whether Lady Sheil ever knew who Ali the Dervish really was. I have my doubts. Only his Balochi wife knew, and of course, that mysterious person could have never been questioned. It’s also odd that Ali himself — whatever self that be– had never woven his thoughts and experiences into a book, never enlightened a Western public on integration and assimilation into a foreign culture.
As time went by I even considered that this letter might have been a hoax to hoodwink a naive fellow like myself into clothing Ali in legendary fashion. On second thought, though, who’s to arbitrate between fact and fiction ? Not I, in any case. For isn’t it a refreshing act of freedom to slip from one to the other without a pinch of guilt ?
[6] A Persian measurement equivalent to 5.35 kilometres
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Paul Mirabile is a retired professor of philology now living in France. He has published mostly academic works centred on philology, history, pedagogy and religion. He has also published stories of his travels throughout Asia, where he spent thirty years.
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Titles: Little Lhasa: Reflections in Exiled Tibet and Tibetan Suitcase
Author: Tsering Namgyal Khortsa
Publisher: Speaking Tiger Books
Following the forced escape of His Holiness the Dalai Lama in March 1959, thousands of Tibetans were forced to flee Tibet, and it was these refugees who formed the early exiled community. The refugee community now stands at a figure of around 130,000, with Tibetans spread across numerous settlements in India, Nepal and Bhutan, and thousands more displaced all around the world. The Tibetan government in exile is based in Dharamsala, India. It is called the Central Tibetan Administration (CTA) and was founded in 1959 by the 14th Dalai Lama. In the 1980s, a second wave of Tibetans fled due to political repression. The CTA advocates for human rights, self-determination, and the preservation of religion and culture for Tibetans. The CTA has a parliament, judiciary, and executive branch and its principles include truth, non-violence, and genuine democracy. The Dalai Lama has said that the exile administration would be dissolved as soon as freedom is restored in Tibet.
After over seventy years of being in exile, a whole generation of Tibetans have come of age in a land far from home. With the Dalai Lama and other great masters as their spiritual guides, they have grown up cut off from their homeland. Their experiences have been unique, as they have, despite globalization, kept alive their religion and culture. In Little Lhasa: Reflections in Exiled Tibet, Tsering Namgyal Khortsa writes comprehensively about the different aspects of their life today. Comprising of ten essays and six interviews, this volume becomes an eye-opener on the multifarious aspects of the present situation of Tibetans at large. Beginning with different writers writing about Tibet and exile in the very first essay titled ‘Little Lhasa’, the next one ‘Shangrila Online’ tells us about the role of social media, internet cafes and how technology in remote Dharamsala often enables one to participate in other people’s experiences in real time. The writer describes in detail how such lifestyle changes in contemporary times have enabled the creation of a “virtual Tibet”. In the next essay ‘Buddha’s Children’, Khortsa describes the young generation of exiled children in India and how their religious identity has triumphed over all other identities. We are also told about the different kinds of foreigners who come to India to take religious courses, and the writer wonders whether they go home feeling merely inspired by their visit to India and their meetings with Tibetan masters or whether such exposure and experience actually triggers a paradigm shift in the way they view the world.
In the next essay we are told how Tibetans lead demonstrations in Dharamsala and other parts of India every year, especially the one held on March 10th that commemorates the anniversary of the failed uprising against Chinese invasion. ‘Movies and Meditation’ mentions a film festival in Dharamsala which reveals how recent Tibetan films highlight a growing and vibrant filmmaking community within the Tibetan diaspora, but Khortsa laments the paucity of full-length films about Tibetans in exile and the issues they confront, namely patriotism, individualism, and reconciliation of personal fulfilment with the Tibetan cause. The titles of the three following essays, ‘Dharma Talk’, ‘The Lure of India’ and ‘The Monk at Manali’ are self-explanatory. The last essay of this section ‘Nation of Stories’ tells us about writers who write and publish in the English language, and though diverse in terms of their education, upbringing, background and geographical location, one common condition that they all share is the collective trauma of the Chinese occupation of Tibet, which is invariably a leitmotif in Tibetan literature.
Part Two consists of six interviews, each one different in perspective than the other, and they must be mentioned here to understand the kaleidoscopic nature of the people involved in the Tibetan cause. Thus, we have conversations with Lisa Gray as ‘A Western Buddhist’, Ananda Nand Agnihotri as ‘An Indian Tibetan Buddhist,’ Ngawang Woeber, ‘An Ex-Political Prisoner’, Nyima Dhondup, ‘A Swiss Tibetan’, Tenzing Sonam, ‘A Tibetan Writer and Filmmaker’ and Tenphun, ‘The Tibetan Poet’. All in all, Little Lhasa becomes a valuable record of the life of a people who refuse to bow down or forget, and even while adapting to a rapidly changing world, continue to nurture their roots.
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After the non-fiction, Tsering Namgyal Khortsa comes up with a brilliant piece of fiction and read together, each text complements the other beautifully. In the ‘Editor’s Note’ at the very beginning of the novel Tibetan Suitcase, Tsering Namgyal Khortsa tells us that while he was working as a business journalist in Hong Kong he once ran into Dawa Tashi, an old acquaintance and an aspiring novelist from Dharamsala, India who was working as a meditation teacher and was quite busy with his job. He had a suitcase full of letters and documents and wanted him to turn the contents of the suitcase into a book. After going through the collection, Khortsa discovered that the contents of the suitcase, if organized with care and discipline, could indeed make for an epistolary novel. So, he declares that except for correcting a few typos here and there and add note and datelines to the letters, he had not done anything. He also categorically states, “None of the letters are mine, except some entries that I wrote, making the book partly fictionalized.” He also wanted to leave room for readers to imagine (or ‘feel’ for themselves) what is not mentioned in the book, in deference to the Tibetan culture of reticence and taciturnity, rather than turning himself into an all-knowing chatterbox.
Tibetan Suitcase is a remarkable novel about the peripatetic Tibetan community in exile. It is divided into six parts, beginning roughly from 1995 to 2000. It opens in Hong Kong where a tycoon Peter Wong opens a meditation centre and employs Dawa Tashi, our protagonist as a meditation teacher and a guru, though he is not really trained to be a lama. Dawa Tashi is an India-born Tibetan. His parents fled Tibet when the Chinese invaded, and Dawa has grown up in the quiet, verdant Indian Himalayas. When Dawa applies to a well-known university in America (Appleton University in Wisconsin) to pursue a course in creative writing, his hitherto ordinary life changes dramatically. At the university he befriends, and falls in love with, Iris Pennington, an unusual American student who is studying Buddhist literature. He also comes in contact with Khenchen Sangpo, a renowned scholar of Buddhism and a reincarnated Rinpoche himself. Circumstances lead Dawa back to India too soon, but the connections he makes take his life into many new directions. Some, with Iris and Khenchen, take him deeper into the mystical and mysterious world of Buddhist scholarship. Other journeys take him back to his roots, making him question his life’s directions.
Apart from the interesting incidents and characters we meet in the first four parts of the novel, Part Five is an exceptionally engrossing to read. Beginning with the reportage in the Fall Issue of the journal Meridian, which is edited by Brent Rinehart, we are told that on his seventy-ninth birthday Khenchen decided that he had to go back to Tibet to see his native land. Having gained a quick residency status in the United States, and possessing an American passport, Khenchen still had many relatives in Tibet, some of them quite alive and well, despite the Chinese occupation. He travels to Lhasa in 1996 and goes for a trip to Lake Manasarovar but things take a different turn when he is arrested by the Chinese authority because he was apparently “endangering national security”. What follows are different press releases from the US Statement Department, reports from the International Association of Tibetan Studies in London, address by the President of Appleton University and as Iris writes to Dawa, she never expected herself to be so politically involved and “did not realize Tibet was such a political subject”. It was ironic that one of the world’s most spiritual places was one of its most burning political issues. Tibet might be a small place, but it has a reasonably big space in the collective consciousness of the world. Of course, Khenchen Sangpo is ultimately released and without disclosing the actual ending of the novel, which in a circular fashion ends in Hong Kong from where it began, many loose ends are tied up and life came to a full circle for everybody, especially for Iris Pennington who finally managed to find her roots.
Both the non-fiction and the fiction book by Tsering Namgyal Khortsa prove to be eye-openers for all readers who have very little knowledge about the sorrow and plight of the uprooted Tibetans who live in exile and many of whom do not even have a country to call their own. Based in Dehradun, India at present, Khortsa’s narratives are so powerful that it has aptly prompted Speaking Tiger Books to reprint the updated versions of both the books in 2024 and one can call it a yeoman service to readers both serious and casual. A must read.
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Somdatta Mandal, critic and translator, is a former Professor of English at Visva-Bharati, Santiniketan, India.
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Farouk Gulsara on a cycling adventure through battleworn Kashmir
They say to go forth and explore, to go to the planet’s edge to increase the depth of your knowledge. Learning about a country is best done doing the things the local populace does, travelling with them, amongst them, not in a touristy way, in a manicured fashion in a tourist’s van but on leg-powered machines called bicycles. Itching to go somewhere after our memorable escapade in South Korea, cycling from Seoul to Busan, as the borders opened up after the pandemic, somebody threw in the idea of cycling from Kashmir to Ladakh. Long story short, there we were, living our dream. The plan was to cycle the 473km journey, climbing 7378m ascent in 8 days, between 6th July 2024 and 12th July 2024.
Our expedition started with us landing in Amritsar after a 5.5-hour flight from Kuala Lumpur. From there, it was another flight to Srinagar, where the crunch began.
Day 1. Amritsar
Amritsar Golden Temple. Photo Courtesy: Farouk Gulsara
After a good night’s sleep, everyone was game for a quick, well-spread breakfast and a leisurely stroll to the Harmandir, the Sikh Golden Temple. Much later, I realised the offering was 100% vegetarian and did not miss any non-vegetarian food. As a mark of respect, the vicinity around the temple complex served only vegetarian food, including a McDonald’s there. Imagine a McDonald’s without the good old quarter pounder! Hey, image is essential.
The usual showing of gratitude to the Almighty was marred by the unruly behaviour of the Little Napoleons, the Royal Guards. New orders were out, it seems, according to one guard with a chrome-plated spear and a steely sheathed dagger at his hip—no photography allowed. Then, on the other end of the Golden Pool, it was okay to photograph but only with a salutary (namaste) posture, with hands clasped on the chest. On the other side, it was alright. One can pose as he pleases. The guards were more relaxed there.
That is the problem when rules are intertwined with religion. People make their own goal post and shift it as they please. When little men are given power to enforce God’s decree on Earth, they go overboard. They feel it is their God-given raison d’etre and the purpose of existence. Since nothing is cast in stone and everyone in mankind is on a learning curve, what is appropriate today may be blasphemous tomorrow and vice versa. We distinctly remember snapping loads of pictures of the full glory of Harmandir day and night during our last visit, preCovid.
We all know what happened in the Stanford experiment when students were given powers to enforce order. It becomes ugly very quickly. Next, the flight to Srinagar.
Boat House Dal Lake, Srinagar
Srinagar. Photo Courtesy: Farouk Gulsara
My impression differed from when Raj Kapoor and Vyajanthimala were seen spending their honeymoon boating around the lake in the 1964 mega-blockbuster Hindi movie Sangam. Then, it had appeared insanely cold, with mists enveloping the lake’s surface. Serenity was the order of the day. What I saw in the height of summer with a temperature hovering around 30C, was anything but peaceful. Even across the lake, the constant blaring of car horns was enough to make anyone go slightly mad.
The lake is a godsend for dwellers around it. Many depend on the lake to transport tourists and sell memorabilia and other merchandise on their boats. The rows of boat houses are also popular sites for honeymooners and tourists to hire. Privacy may be an issue here. Imagine small-time Kashmiri silk vendors just landing at the boat house and showing produce to the occupants. They may want you to sample their kahwa,a traditional spiced-up, invigorating, aromatic, exotic green tea.
Day 2. Boat House, Dal Lake, Srinagar
Kashmiri Kahwa, a spiced tea. Photo Courtesy: Farouk Gulsara
Early morning starts with peaceful silence until the honking and murmur of the crowd start slowly creeping in. It was a leisurely morning meant to acclimatise ourselves to the high altitude (~1500m) before we began to climb daily till we hit the highest point of ~5400m. This would — aided by prophylactic acetazolamide –hopefully do the trick to keep altitude sickness at bay.
The morning tête á tête amongst the generally older crowd was basically about justifying our trip ahead. The frequent question encountered by these older cyclists was, ‘Why were they doing it?’ The standard answer was similar to what George Mallory told his detractors when he expressed his desire to climb the peak that became Everest.
“Why? Because it is there!” Mallory had said.
The cyclists told their concerned naysayers, “Because we can!”
Yeah, the general consensus was sobering. Time was running out, and so many things needed to be done before the big eye shut. There were so many places and so little time!
Lal Chowk. Photo Courtesy: Farouk Gulsara
Continuing the easy-peasy stance before the crunch, a trip to town was due. Backed with the symphony of the blaring of honks, we made a trip to the town square, Lal Chawk. After checking out how regular people got along with life, we realised the heavy presence of armed army personnel at almost every nook and corner of the town. Perhaps it was because it was Friday and prayers were in progress.
The return trip to our boat house was a trip down memory lane. After spending most of our adult lives in air-conditioned cars, the trip back on a cramped Srinagar town bus brought us back to our childhood, when rushing to get a place in the bus and squeezing through shoulder to shoulder in a sardine-packed bus was a daily challenge. That, too, was in the tropical heat minus the air conditioning.
By noon, temperatures had soared to a roasting 30C. So much for cool Kashmir!
Our trip coincided with the Amarnath Yatra, an annual pilgrimage for Shiva worshippers who pay obeisance to Holy Ice Lingam.
Dal Lake. Photo Courtesy: Farouk Gulsara
The evening was the time to familiarise ourselves with our machines, which involved a ride around the city. It was a nightmare of an experience where we had to simultaneously see our fronts, back, and sides. It was jungle fare. Nobody knew from which direction vehicles were going to barge at us. We survived somehow, if ever we were born in India, our most probable cause of death would be death by road traffic accident.
The ride brought us to the affluent part of Srinagar, which changed our perception of Kashmir as a war-torn zone. What we saw were nicely manicured lawns and neatly painted buildings. The only hint of disturbances is the apparent presence of armed army personnel nearby. It is said that the one single sign of peace is to see people hanging around lakes and esplanades. We did see this on this ride. Young families were strolling along the promenade to a string of shops selling potpourri of delicacies. Kashmir appeared peaceful.
Day 3. Srinagar…move it, move it…
Sunset at Dal Lake. Photo Courtesy: Farouk Gulsara
It was 4am in Kashmir, and all through the night, it had been raining with occasional threats of thunder in the distance. The plan was to start riding as soon as the day broke with the first ray of the sun. That could be 5am or later. And it has probably nothing to do with Indian timing. Today’s ride would be a 90km challenging ride with an ascent of 4.5%.
All the cyclists survived the ordeal. Starting around 6am, after checking the machines and last-minute briefings, we were good to go.
We did not know that Lake Dal was so huge. The first 20km was all about going around the lake. The first stop was at Mani Gam, a picturesque countryside with a massive tributary of the Sindh River, for an early breakfast of hot milk coffee.
As expected, the traffic was heavy because of the Amarnath Yatra. But one would expect attendees of a divine voyage like this to want to exhibit tolerance, patience, and softness. Unfortunately, the ugly side of drivers was in full glory. If the rest of the world would blare their honk with all their might just before a head-on collision, here, the same action is synonymous with informing another fellow road user that he is around.
To be fair, many pilgrims were in chartered vans, and the drivers were quite aggressive, overtaking in blind corners and swerving to the edge of the roads. All in the name of making more trips and making money for the family.
Sind River at Ganderbal. Photo Courtesy: Farouk Gulsara
They say with greater powers comes great responsibility. Apparently, the lorry drivers here missed the memo. Locally, they are known as the King of the Road, with multi-octaved ear drums rupturing high-decibel honks, sometimes to the tune of Bollywood numbers.
The cyclists continued grinding despite side disturbances that can push any person raving mad; the steady climb was unforgiving. Just when they thought that was the end of the climb, they were fooled for another just after the bend. The most gruelling part was the end of the day’s trip. We rode more than 85 km, climbed a total elevation of 2692 m, and still lived to tell.
Hotel Thajwass Glacier, Sonamarg
Along Srinagar…Ladakh Highway. Photo Courtesy: Farouk Gulsara
Dinner was entirely vegetarian as a mark of respect to the hotel’s occupants who were there to fulfil their pilgrimage at Amarnath temple. The brouhaha that struck a chord amongst many occupants was the cancellation of helicopter services to the pilgrimage site. The pilgrims were given the choice of either walking a 15 or 22-km track to fulfil their vows or they could pre-book a helicopter ticket to go there. The trouble with the helicopter services is that their feasibility depended on the weather. Weather is controlled by God, the logical explanation would be that God was not too keen to give audience to the so-and-so who were scheduled on flight.
After the light chat with fellow hotel dwellers and answering their curious questions about why able bodies would want to torture themselves, it was time to hit the sack. We could have asked them why fly when they could walk, but we did not.
Day 4. Sonamarg
Sonamarg. Photo Courtesy: Farouk Gulsara
We decided to make it a day of light and easy. Everyone was left to their own devices after the spirit-sapping grind the day before. Most took a rain check on the initial hike but went for a long walk instead.
So, we took a stroll in the Kashmiri Valley, admiring the result of Nature’s choice of colours in His palette: the symphony of rushing cool mountain water and the refreshing cool breeze.
We met a couple from Chennai at the breakfast table with a sad tale. They had recently lost their only child who was born with cerebral palsy. They had to part from her after caring for their child for many years. They suddenly found plenty of free time on their hands. They decided to spend the rest of their remaining post-retirement lives doing short gigs, earning enough money to tour around and help out other families undergoing the same predicament as they did with their special child.
When we think we do not have nice shoes, we should not forget about those with no feet. No matter how big our problems seemed, others could have had it worse.
Sonamarg can be classified as a tourist town with rows of hotels on either side of the road, occasionally laced with souvenir shops and restaurants. The township appears to have been newly built, with freshly tarred roads, loose pebbles on the road shoulder, and unfinished touch-ups.
Day 5. Off to Drass
On the way… Photo Courtesy: Farouk Gulsara
We were off to Drass, the coldest inhabited place in India in winter. A quick read and one might read it as Dr-Ass, rather fitting of a name as one could use an examination of one’s derrière after a climb that was upon us. We will see you in hell. But wait, hell is supposed to be hot, is it not? Or hath hell frozen over?
At one point in the 1947-48, Drass was invaded and captured by Pakistan. Soon later, India recaptured Drass. We were only 12km from the line of control (LOC).
Hotel D’Meadow Drass
As expected, it was a gruelling ride. The first 21km were excruciatingly torturous, with narrow roads that had to be shared with the notorious motorists who thought that without the honk, one could not drive. We had to test our trail biking skills later as quite a bit of the stretch was undone or probably collapsed as a result of downpours. We were left with a sand tract and later fabricated stone tracks, which gave good knocking on our posterior ends. Remember our appointment with Dr Ass?
Zojila Pass. Photo Courtesy: Farouk Gulsara
After the 21 km mark, it was generally downhill, but our guide told us to unlock the mountain bike suspension for more comfort due to the violent bumping. The road improved as we entered Ladakh but was interspersed with occasional potholes that shook the machine.
After a short lunch break at a remote restaurant (referred to as a hotel), we were good to go and finally reached Drass at about 3 pm.
We had gone through the gruelling Zojila Pass. A tunnel is currently being built to connect Sonamarg and Drass. It would cut down travel from 4h to 1.5h.
Point to note: this Pass lives up to its name. When Japan was attacked by many post-nuclear attack monsters, the biggest one was referred to as Gojira. Hollywood decided to christian Gojira as Godzilla, giving rise to the meaning of gigantic as in Mozilla and Godzilla’s appetite. Zojila Gojira, what’s the difference? Both were scary.
Day 6. Drass to Kargil
Leaving the ‘Gateway to Ladakh’ and the ‘Coldest place in India’, we headed toward Kargil, which had been immortalised in annal of history when Pakistan and India fought a war in 1999.
Today’s cycling routine was less enduring compared to our previous rides. Most of the route was a downhill trend lined by dry, stony mountains on one side and the gushing blue waters of a tributary of the Indus on the other. The road condition was pretty good, with recently tarred roads, barring some stretches being tarred and resurfaced in various states.
After completing the close 60km trip to Kargil, we were told we were the fastest group the organiser had ridden with. Eh, not bad for a bunch of sixty-something madmen! Maybe they were just words of encouragement.
I was surprised to see Kargil as a bustling town with many business activities. Construction is happening here and there. Vendors were spreading their produce. Touters were busy looking for clientele. Hyundais, Marutis, and motorcycles thronged the streets, which were obviously not built to handle such tremendous volumes. Everyone was in a hurry. That is a sign of development.
We were housed in the tallest building around here. It was a four-story, four-star hotel with a restaurant and 24-hour hot water services. In most places we stayed, hot water was only supplied at short, predetermined intervals.
Day 7. Kargil to Budkharbu
The day started at about 6:45 am, with temperatures around 9C. This leg was expected to be tough. Two-thirds of our journey would be climbs, and there’d be more. It is expected to be sunny throughout, so we could expect a lot of huffing and puffing.
Today’s ride was easily the toughest one. Straddling on our saddles for 7.5 hours was no easy feat by any means. The climbs went on and on. The steepest and most prolonged ascent came after 39 km. It was a sustained climb for the next 10 km, hovering between 4% and 12% ascent.
Photo Courtesy: Farouk Gulsara
Nevertheless, we were feasted with some of the most mesmerising views of barren, arid landscapes, as though someone had painted them with hues in the brown range, occasionally speckled with malachite green and a top of sky blue. It was a feeling as if we were at the edge of heaven.
We pass through a small town called Malbech, which appears to be a Buddhist town with many temples and chanting over its public address system. I guess no one wants to keep their sacred words of God to themselves. They had a compelling desire to broadcast it to the world.
Many Shiva temples and mosques lined the road of our ride, all showing their presence with specific flags, colours and banners claiming those areas.
We finally reached Budhkharbu at 2 pm in the heat of summer Ladakh. The temperature was about 22C. The total biking time was 5h 43m. Everyone was shrivelled, depleted of glycogen and energy.
Budhkharbu is so far from civilisation that the occupants do not feel the need for digital connectivity. Only we, the town folks, were having withdrawal symptoms for not being able to upload our Strava data to earn instant gratification. Foreigners were not allowed to purchase SIM cards, so we were essentially crippled for a day.
Day 8. Padma Numbu Guest House, Budhkhorbu to Nurla
Photo Courtesy: Farouk Gulsara
Rise and shine. Rinse and repeat. Breakfast at the Guest House to a vegetarian, sorry, no eggs too, accompanied by the aroma of incense and the tune of ‘Om Jaya Jagatheeswara Hare1‘, we were good to go. I suspect the owners of this guest house were ardent BJP supporters. The keyholder to our rooms carried a lotus symbol. And the BJP mission office was their neighbour.
We were up on the saddle and ready to move by 7:15 am. The sun was already bright and shiny by then, and we were all enticed by the 26kms steep decline.
After 9 kms, we did not mind the initial steep climb traversing the unforgiving Fotula Pass. At one point, we almost reached 4,200m above sea level. Other than the occasional passerby and military barracks, there wasn’t a single inkling of life there. It was just barren, arid land for miles and miles.
64 km later, we arrived at our destination, Nurla. Nurla is a no man’s land and is not featured for first-time visitors to Ladakh. Nearby is a self-forming statue of the Sleeping Buddha and a giant statue of Maitreya Buddha. Here, the seed of the Namgyal Dynasty started. It is famous for Tibetan paintings. As temporary sojourners, we just learned and moved along.
By now, we had learnt how the honking system worked. Even the brotherly advice from BRO (Border Road Organisation) advises using vehicle horns, especially at blind corners and overtaking another vehicle. At a telepathic level, the driver seems to converse with the other, ‘I can take charge of my vehicle as I overtake you. Now, don’t you make any sudden moves, can you?’ The melodious tone of honks, especially of lorries and buses, is just to liven up the monotonous journey, as do music (and movies).
Day 9.Travellers’Lodge, Nurla to Leh
We were told today’s leg would be challenging, with 85 km to cover and a steep one. Hence, we had to be up on our saddles by 5 am.
In essence, today’s outing was the toughest by far. We climbed two hills, and just when we thought everything was done and dusted, another climb to our hotel came. Overall, we covered 85km and 1672m elevation in 7h 2m.
We saw two essential tourist attractions as we approached Leh: Magnetic Hill and gurudwara. Magnetic Hill is believed to create an optical illusion of a hill in the area and surrounding slopes. The cars may be going uphill when they are, in fact, going downhill.
Sourced by Farouk Gulsara
The Guru Pathan Gurudwara is another curious worship site in the middle of nowhere. Legend has it that Guru Nanak stopped at this place, coming from Tibet and towards Kashmir. It was a Buddhist enclave. While meditating, an evil demon tried to crush him by rolling down a boulder. Hold behold, the stone turned waxy soft and did not injure the Guru.
An indestructible piece of rock was encountered while constructing this stretch of the highway. The Buddhist monks told the authorities of the legend, and the Gurudwara was erected. The Buddhists revered Guru Nanak and treated him as a great teacher.
The journey ended with a brutal, unrelenting climb to our final destination, Hotel Panorama in Leh.
The next journey the following day to Khardungla was optional. Only the young at heart opted for it. A 37 km journey with an inclination of 8% constantly with possible extreme subzero temperatures was too much to ask from my gentle heart. I opted out.
Thus ended our little cycling escapade from Srinagar to Leh, Ladakh. Few will attempt this journey with SUVs or superbikes; only madmen will do it with mountain bikes.
P.S. I want to thank Sheen, Adnan, Basil, and Samir of MTB Kashmir for their immaculate planning and supervision of the rides.
A holy chant extolling the lord of the Universe ↩︎
Farouk Gulsara is a daytime healer and a writer by night. After developing his left side of his brain almost half his lifetime, this johnny-come-lately decided to stimulate the non-dominant part of his remaining half. An author of two non-fiction books, Inside the twisted mind of Rifle Range Boy and Real Lessons from Reel Life, he writes regularly in his blogRifle Range Boy.
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Translations bridge borders, bring diverse cultures to our doorstep. But here is a translation of a man, who congealed diversity into his very being — Syed Mujtaba Ali (1904-1974), a student of Tagore, who lived by his convictions and wit. Like his guru, Mujtaba Ali, was a well-travelled polyglot, who till a few years ago was popular only among Bengali readers with his wide plethora of literary gems that can never be boxed into genres precisely. People were wary of translating his witty but touching renditions of various aspects of life, including travel and history from a refreshing perspective, till Nazes Afroz, a former BBC editor, took it up. His debut translation Mujtaba Ali’s Deshe Bideshe as In a Land Far from Home: A Bengali in Afghanistan in 2015 was outstanding enough to be nominated for the Crossword Prize. Recently, he has translated another book by Mujtaba Ali, Tales of a Voyager (Joley Dangay[1]), a book that takes us back a hundred years in time — a travelogue about a sea voyage to Egypt and travel within.
This narrative almost evokes a flavour of Egypt as depicted by Agatha Christie’s Death on the Nile (1937) or The Mummy (film, set in 1932), simply because it is set around the same time period. Afroz in his introduction sets the date of Mujtaba Ali’s travels translated here between 1935 and 1939. The book was published in 1955. This book is a treasure not only because it gives a slice of historic perspective but also weaves together diverse cultures with syncretism.
Mujtaba Ali has two young travel companions, Percy and Paul, who despite being British (one of them is on the way to study in Oxford) seem to have a fair knowledge of Indian lore and there is the inimitable Abul Asfia Noor Uddin Muhammad Abdul Karim Siddiqi, who almost misses a train while trying to argue about the discrepancies shown in the time between his Swiss watch and the clock at Cairo. The description is sprinkled with tongue-in-cheek humour.
The voyage starts at Sri Lanka and sails through the Arabian Sea to Africa, where the ship pauses at Djibouti. Here, Mujtaba Ali expands his entourage with the addition of the long-named Abul Asfia, well-described in the blurb as a man who “carried toffees, a gold cigarette case, and other sundry items in his capacious overcoat pocket and who had the answer to all problems though he barely spoke a word ever.” Afroz himself has given an excellent introduction to the writer and the book — almost in the style of Mujtaba Ali himself. This is a necessary addition as it highlights Mujtaba Ali’s perspectives and gives his background to contextualise the relevance of this translation.
Mujtaba Ali’s style is poetic and humorous. It demystifies erudition and touches the heart simultaneously. His ability to laugh at himself is inimitable. He tells us a story about how the giraffe from Africa was introduced to China by a king from Bengal. At the end, he and his companions reflect about the tallness of this tale!
Mujtaba Ali contends: “‘…One of my friends is learning Chinese in order to read Buddhist scriptures in that language. Possibly you know that many of our ancient scriptures were destroyed with the decline of Buddhism in India. But they are still available in Chinese translations. My friend came across this story while searching for Buddhist scriptures. He had it translated and published in Bengali with the copy of the painting in a newspaper. Or else Bengalis would never have known of this because there is no mention of it in our history books or documents in the archives in Bengal.’”
The irony is not lost that Buddha is of Indian origin and yet an Indian has to learn Chinese to read the scriptures. The narrative continues with more dialogues:
“Percy said, ‘But sir, it didn’t sound like history. It [the giraffe’s story] exceeds fiction.’
“I [Mujtaba Ali] replied, ‘Why, brother? There is the saying in your language, ‘Truth is stranger than fiction.’
“And my personal opinion was that if the narrative of an event could not rouse interest in someone more than fiction, then that event had no historical value. Or I would say that the narrator was not a true historian. In our land, most of our historians are such dry bores.”
As Mujtaba Ali’s renditions are colourful – is he a ‘true historian’ by his own definition? Such narratives dot the travelogue, generating curiosity about major issues in a light vein and linking ancient cultures with the commonality of human needs, creating bridges, taking us to another time, finding parallels and making learned, hard concepts comprehensible by the simplicity of his observations.
Similarly, he says of the rose: “The Mughal-Pathan era of India ended a long time ago, but can we say for how long the roses brought by them will continue to give us fragrance?”
Some of his renditions are poetic and beautiful. Mujtaba Ali watches the sunrise by the pyramids and describes it: “Streaks of light were gradually lighting up the liquid darkness. The white parting in the middle of black hair was becoming visible. There was a light daubing of vermillion on that.”
Borrowing from diverse cultures, Mujtaba Ali skilfully weaves the commonality of cultures, customs and countries into his narrative under the umbrella of humanity. Afroz with his journalistic background and a traveller himself, is perhaps the best person to translate this narrative of another traveller from the past. The depth of erudition simplified with humour has been well captured in this translation too. In this interview, Afroz discusses more about the author, his new translation and the relevance of the book in the present context.
Nazes Afroz
You have translated two books by Mujtaba Ali. Is he essentially an essayist? Were there many essayists and travel writers at that point, especially from within Bengal? Where would you place him as a writer in the annals of Bengali literature?
I don’t think that ‘essentially an essayist’ is the right description of Mujtaba Ali. Of course he wrote many essays but his repertoire included novels, short stories, funny anecdotal pieces based on his experiences (in Bangla they are called romyorochona) and stories from his travels, his encounters with extremely interesting people across the globe. He was deeply interested in culinary experiences. So he wrote a lot about food habits, multitude of cuisine and also gave recipes. Hence, it is difficult to box him into one genre of writing. With the publication of his first book, Deshe Bideshe, (serialised in 1948 in Bangla literary magazine Desh and as a book in 1949) he instantly occupied a significant place in Bengali literature.
Syed Mujtaba Ali
His Bangla prose, steeped in effortless and seamless multilingual and multicultural references, swept the discerning readers of Bangla literature off their feet. It was not only the prose that he created but the breadth and depth of subjects his pen touched was unparalleled. No author in Bangla language has been able to write on such a wide range of topics till date.
Coming to the other part of the question about travel writers and essayist in Bengal in early part of the twentieth century: the short answer is, yes there were many. Travel writing has been an important genre in Bangla literature. Bengalis had been travelling – for pilgrimage, for rest and recuperation following illnesses, or just for pleasure since the middle of the nineteenth century, which was the time of Bengal renaissance. Writers who undertook such journeys, wrote about their travels too. So Mujtaba Ali is no exception in that regard. He followed in the footsteps of his predecessors and also his peers.
You have called the book ‘Tales’ of the Voyager — would you say that some of the stories are like tall tales here — perhaps tales to convey an idea or a thought which in itself would be larger than history in explaining the truth of a civilisation, like the tale of the giraffe? Would you see this as a comment on the gap between popular and documented narratives in history and on the different interpretations of history?
Ali was an excellent raconteur. He was also gifted with an almost eidetic memory. This allowed him to learn a dozen languages – some with native proficiency. He was a voracious reader too. So, not only did he read tomes on history and philosophy in many languages across cultures but also he gathered fascinating tales from many corners of the world as he loved storytelling. Whenever opportunities came, he masterfully wove those stories into his writing. Thus the tale of the giraffe’s journey from Africa to China via Bengal found its way in this book as he was narrating stories from the east coast of Africa. There is another thing that makes Ali’s writing attractive. He weaves in fascinating quirky funny stories while discussing something apparently dense and dry. I have not come across many writers who have done that. I don’t know whether to name it as his comment on bridging the gap between popular and documented history. There’s no evidence to prove that he was trying to achieve that as he never mentioned it. We could only conclude that it was a style that he invented and mastered in an effort to engage with his readers.
A writer that came to mind while reading this book of Mujtaba Ali is, one who is really more entertaining than accurate –Marco Polo. We know he lived five centuries before Mujtaba Ali. Mujtaba Ali of course is erudite, a scholar, but he seems to have a similar fire within him, a wanderlust. Do you think he would have been impacted by the writings of Marco Polo? Was wanderlust not a very typical phenomenon that was part of the culture that had evolved in Bengal post the Tagorean renaissance? Did Mujtaba Ali also travel for wanderlust?
Reading Ali’s books, one may think that he had wanderlust in the true sense. It will be correct to assume that he was fidgety; he refused to settle down; he moved jobs; he moved cities and even continents. But to be truly smitten by wanderlust, one has to enjoy the travel, which wasn’t possibly the case for Ali. His son told me that even though he travelled extensively, Ali didn’t enjoy travelling much. There had been many, of his time, who were really smitten by wanderlust — like Rahul Sankrityayan (1893-1963, walked to Tibet twice and wrote only in Hindi), Bimal Mukherjee (1903-1996, a true globetrotter who cycled to London from Kolkata), Umaprasad Mukhopadhyay (1902-1997, who crisscrossed the Himalayas from one end to another), Probodh Kumar Sanyal (1905-1983, his travelogues of the Himalayas), Premankur Atorthi (1890-1964, author of Mahasthobir Jatok) — to name a few. While these authors were inherently bohemian and were drawn towards travelling only for the sake of it, Ali was more of an unsettled soul who travelled with a particular purpose and wrote about his experiences as he had picked up fascinating stories and observed connections between cultures. Because he loved to tell stories and also because he was infused with the idea of internationalism that he inculcated from Tagore, there was no way he could escape but narrating the stories and cultural experienced from his travels.
Tales of a Voyager takes us on a sea voyage to Egypt. Did you travel to Egypt while translating the book? Would you say that the Egypt of those times still resonates in the present day — especially after the 2011 uprising?
Even before his one night stopover in Cairo that he narrated in Tales of a Voyager, Ali had previous experience of Cairo where he spent a year as a post-doctoral scholar in 1933-34 at the Al-Azhar University. So there are many short pieces on Cairo and Egypt by him in his other books. He raved about the café-culture of Cairo and came to the conclusion that Egyptians surpassed the Bengali in terms of adda—hours of the purposeless sessions of chitchat and chinwag. I have been to Cairo at least half a dozen times and realised how acute his observation was. I witnessed in person why Ali mentioned that this was a city that never slept. The cafes and shops were open all night and the streets were full of people with families including children until well past midnight.
Late night, a cafe in Cairo. Photo Courtesy: Nazes Afroz
As expected, the political landscape that you mention in the question, would be completely different between Ali’s time in the 1930s and in 2010 when I started visiting Cairo. When Ali first went to Cairo in 1933, Cairo had just gained full independence from the forty years of British occupation (not as an annexed state but more of a protectorate). So there are some references of the political figures like Sa’ad Zaghloul Pasha[2] in his various writings but the main focus was on its cultures.
When I started travelling to Cairo from 2010, I witnessed some similarities in the cultural traits as elaborated by Ali. But politically by then, Egypt had moved far from where it was in the 1930. It had become an architect of the Non-Aligned Movement in the 1950s. It was the most prosperous country in North Africa and an important leader among the Arab nations. But it was also reeling under the oppression of one party rule and the youth were bubbling to break away from that. This is something we witnessed unfolding from 2011.
What were the challenges you faced while translating this book? Was it easier to handle as it was the second book by the same author?
The main challenge of translating Mujtaba Ali is transposing his unique language steeped in multi-lingual references into English. Also to get his oblique sense of wit and puns from Bangla into another language, which at times, may not have the right words for them. Translating the second book of the same author doesn’t make it easier as the challenges I just mentioned remain for every book.
Tell us what spurs you on to continue translating Mujtaba Ali. Please elaborate.
Syed Mujtaba Ali’s writing had a huge influence on me from my young age. His writing shaped my worldview, planted the seeds of curiosity about many societies, taught me how to make friends in distant lands and start making connections between cultures. So what I’m today is largely due to his writing. As an avid reader of his texts, I felt that it was my duty to introduce him to a wider readership. That’s the motivation of my taking up the translation of Ali. It is also a tribute to a writer who had such an impact on me.
In your introduction you have written of Mujtaba Ali and his writing. What had he written to be put on the Pakistani watchlist in 1950s?
He had penned an essay opposing the imposition of Urdu as Pakistan’s national language on the Bengalis who were in majority in the newly created East Pakistan. He even predicted how the Bengalis would rebel against such a policy, which came true in 1952 in the form of the Language Movement. He wrote this when he was the principal of a government college in Bogura. So he drew wrath of the Pakistani leaders and an arrest warrant was issued against him. That was the time when he left Pakistan and returned to India in 1949.
There also the other difficult personal situation. His wife (married in 1951) who was from Dhaka and was working in the education ministry, continued to live in East Pakistan with their two sons while he lived in India working for the Indian Government. So Pakistanis always thought he was an Indian spy while he was under suspicion in India that he was on the side of Pakistan!
Did Mujtaba Ali participate in the political upheaval between Pakistan and Bangladesh? Please elaborate if possible.
Ali was hugely affected in 1971 because of his personal situation as I just mentioned. I don’t know how deeply he was involved with the liberation war in Bangladesh but he wrote a novel, Tulonaheena (his last novel), against that backdrop – based in Kolkata, Shillong and Agartala and told through the story of a lover couple – Shipra and Kirti. So it is likely that he was involved in some capacity with the war efforts.
Tulonaheen( Incomparable), Syed Mujtaba Ali’s last novel Gurudeb and Santiniketan by Syed Mujtaba AliMore books by Syed Mujtaba Ali
Mujtaba Ali studied in Santiniketan — that would have been in the early days of the university. Would he have been influenced by Tagore himself and the other luminaries who were in Santiniketan at that time? Can you tell us how? And did that impact his work and outlook?
The simple answer is: it was huge. Tagore was the polar star for Mujtaba Ali, which he acknowledged every now and then in his writing. This experience also decided his life’s journey. He imbibed humanism and internationalism as a direct student of Tagore in Santiniketan. He also developed deep apathy towards all sorts of bigotry. So it was not surprising that he would find it very difficult to accept a country that was created on the basis of religion.
Do you find him relevant in the present-day context? Is your writing influenced or inspired by his style?
I feel that his relevance will never fade. His ability to create cultural connection from different corners of the world will continue to fascinate readers for generations. Yes, in this globalised world when information from around the world are at our finger tips with the click of a button but one also needs to learn how to look at those information beyond mere facts and go deep underneath to make a sense. Apart from being fun and entertaining read, I feel his writing is one such training tool to learn how to make cultural connections. This way, if one wants, one can truly become a global citizen.
As for me, my outlook towards the world is massively influenced by Ali’s writing but not my writing style. It’s simply because I’m not a polyglot like him! I’ll not be able to come anywhere close to his style even if I try.
Well, that is for the reader to judge I guess! You have books on Afghanistan. But you do travel with your camera often. Will you write of your own travels at some point — like Mujtaba Ali but in English?
I have only one book on Afghanistan – a cultural guide book that I co-authored with an Afghan friend. I was working on my own book on Afghanistan, which would have capture one decade of Afghan history and interspersed with my own direct experiences of the country between 2002 and 2015. But the research got stalled for lack of funding. I hope to revive it at some point. And, yes I would like to do my own writing from my travels. That’s there in the wish list.
What are your future plans as a journalist, writer and photographer?
Travel more, see the world more, make more friends and photograph more!
Thanks a lot for giving us your time and the wonderful translation.
[1] Literal translation from Bengali, In Water and On Land
[2] 1857-1957, Egyptian revolutionary and statesman
I sipped on my cup of piping hot, sugary tea at Kardang monastery, twelve thousand feet above sea level. The chomo who prepared it chatted away the details of the snow festival that happened a few months ago. The edges of her maroon robes fluttered in the wind. ‘Chomo’ — I learned a new word that day – in Tibetan, it means a female Buddhist monk.
The monastery is an important one of Drukpa lineage[1] built in the twelfth century. The beautiful white facade with gold details gleamed in the sunlight. Intricate thangka paintings adorned the walls and ceiling of the monastery. It was perched on the barren mountain of Lahaul with multi-coloured Buddhist flags swaying in the wind. An imposing statue of Lord Buddha sat in the courtyard, looking over the whole valley. There was still some snow on the mountain tops, spring had just set in.
The chanting of the lamas filled the air. It was part of the evening ritual. Gentle drum beats punctuated the chanting. I felt fortunate to be in such a tranquil space. It was a happy concoction of the high altitude, the rhythmic rituals, and the lack of human habitation around the monastery that left me in a self-contained peace bubble.
A thangka painting
“How did you know about this place? Not a lot of tourists come here,” the chomo asked me with a twinkle in her eyes. My mind browsed through the incidents that led me here.
It all started two years ago. My penchant for zoning out to Tibetan chanting mantras on YouTube, and love for off-beat places in the Himalayas led me to some serious research. Lahaul district in Himachal seemed to fit the bill perfectly to get a taste of both. It was easily approachable from Manali, where my family could stay with all creature comforts. Our travel group included our one-year-old son and elderly parents.
The beautiful monasteries in dramatic mountainous settings were as much a reason to visit Lahaul as the adventure to travel to such harsh terrains. We based ourselves in Manali and acclimatised ourselves for a few days before climbing to twelve thousand feet. We hired a local car and driver to visit the Lahaul district. When we told our local driver that we wanted to go to the Kardang monastery, he looked at us blankly. It dawned upon me that it was even more remote than I had realised.
We started from Manali towards the Atal tunnel, a nine-kilometre-long highway underpass in the Pir Panjal range of Himalayas, on the Manali- Leh highway that connects two districts of Himachal. The Atal tunnel was opened in October 2020 after several years of work and today connects the remote Lahaul district with the rest of Himachal.
We left the verdant coniferous forests and mountains with gushing streams on one side of the tunnel and gaped at the dry snowy mountains with freshly sowed fields at the base of the mountains of Lahaul on the other side. It was a dry desert with farming done in little patches at the base of the mountains. The difference was stark.
We stopped at the helipad by the Sissu waterfall in Lahaul district, to recharge ourselves with tea and steaming momos. I saw my father-in-law skip around like a little boy, his jaws dropping every time he looked at the waterfall coming straight out of the glacier that cradled it. It was his first time being in such a terrain. All of us, including my one-year-old son, seemed to be breathing fine and enjoying ourselves, in spite of the sudden gain of altitude to eleven thousand feet. I sighed in relief; no acute mountain sickness (AMS) for us.
We set out to the monastery following google maps and stopped for lunch on the way. After some conversation, the restaurant folks told us that we were going in the wrong direction. Apparently, google maps didn’t work very well in this region beyond the well-travelled tourist circuit. They told us how to reach and from the sound of it would involve off-roading. After losing our way twice, we finally discovered a bumpy path that led to the monastery. We found out later that the best option was to take the mud road on the right after the lone petrol pump in Sissu.
The bumpy mud road that we took instead was devoid of human habitation or road signs till the Kardang village. On each serpentine turn, I could see my travel companions digging their fingers deep into the seat in anxiety. On some stretches, there were walls of ice on the mountain side and the car had to cross the several streams that these walls caused. Later, we all laughed about how each of us was praying for dear life during that treacherous journey.
After a good thirty-minute climb we finally reached the Kardang village and the metalled road was in sight. The Kardang village had a few homestay signposts but none were open in spring. Soon we crossed the signs of the pilgrimage trek of Mt. Drilbu Ri and we were at the gate of the monastery. The short walk to the monastery was nice but we did it slowly as the lack of oxygen was palpable. Kardang monastery is nestled in the ridge below the fifteen thousand feet Rangcha peak. Kardang is the starting point for the Buddhist pilgrimage of Mt. Drilbu Ri.
Upon reaching, we found the door of the monastery closed. Soon we were greeted with the Tibetan greeting ‘Juley Juley’ by a smiling monk who opened the door for us. His name was Sonam Dawa. He was happy to show us around and answer our questions about the prolific thangka paintings on the walls and ceiling of the monastery, on Buddha’s life, dakinis [woman spiritualists], and other important figures of Tibetan Buddhism. Tibetan Buddhism with its characteristic animism and symbolism of Bon culture is a hallmark of this Lahauli monastery. A few lamas and chomos joined us and offered us tea. We were touched by their warmth. They played with my son, told us a lot about the snow festival that happens every February and asked us to come back during the celebration.
To this day I am not sure if it was the high altitude, the aromatic incense, or the space itself that made it feel so special. I remembered the chant on Youtube that started this journey for me and am glad I followed that instinct.
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[1] The Drupka lineage of Tibetan Buddhism dates back to the twelfth century.
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Sayani De is a bibliophile, compulsive traveller and sustainability enthusiast. Her work has been featured on Women’s Web and been selected for publication at Muse India for its May-June issue.
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In Conversation with Advait Kottary about his debut historical fiction, Siddhartha: The Boy Who Became the Buddha, published by Hachette, May 2023.
At a time, when the world looks for compassion, acceptance, love, kindness, relief from wars, economic downturns, divides drawn by multiple human-made constructs, what kind of a book could provide entertainment, solace and also suggest solutions to human crises?
Perhaps, Advait Kottary’s Siddhartha: The Boy Who Became the Buddha, comes closest to the kind of book that would encompass all these demands. Many people have written about Buddha and Buddhism, but few have attempted to recreate vividly the life of a prince who rebelled against social norms to uncover a path that more than 2,500 years later continues to be seen as a refuge from violence and hatred. For those who misconstrue Buddhism in the modern political ambience, this book could well be a reminder of what Buddhism is all about.
The writer, Advait Kottary, is an engineer turned actor. Perhaps that is why the visual vividness of the narrative is almost cinematic. The story flows like a stream taking the reader back in time to a period we know very less about. What is amazing is the way in which the author has unfolded the story beginning with Siddhartha’s enlightenment and his journey back through his life in that state. This unique situation gives the Buddha the advantage of not just revisiting scenes but also to visit those aspects of his life and that of others which he could not possibly have witnessed in reality. The Enlightened One witnesses his own birth, his mother’s demise, many battles and courts that he had never ventured into. At a point in his journey, Buddha brings to readers Prince Siddhartha’s dejection despite winning a war. Kottary narrates: “Siddhartha burst into tears. The man was right and all his anger was for the war itself, not directed towards the soldier in front of him… They had won the war, but at what cost?” These are pertinent questions that perhaps, if world leaders asked themselves, we would not have had Bakhmut (Ukraine) or the World Wars.
As Siddhartha finds his peace leaving his palatial home, he realises that he is fortunate to have a family that gives him the freedom to complete his quest (though initially with reluctance). He reflects on why he needs to go on this journey, upending the lives of his family, traditions and even his kingdom. He tells his first teacher, Alara Kalama, “At the root of all the customs and the things we consider to be tradition, I could find no answers, other than the ones that said we live in one way, simply because that is what we are accustomed to; whether it is by virtue of following the habits of one’s parents, or the habits of those in the world around us.”
While raising pertinent issues that need to be brought to the fore in the present context through Buddha’s journey, the detailed research that Kottary has put in is evident. People get drunk on Tongba, a pre-historic recipe for an alcoholic brew of millet which is still in use. Authenticity is enhanced by an interplay of historic incidents, including acceptance of Buddha’s beliefs by one of the bloodiest kings of Indian history, Ajaatshatru, who killed his own father, Bimbisara, drove his mother to death, fell in love with his father’s concubine and razed a city down to find her. Reading of the change wrought by Buddhism in such a ruthless man, one can find hope in the darkest of times. Maybe, like Ajaatshatru, mindless, warmongering political overlords will have a change of heart at some point.
The book is racy despite the factual content. It reads like a well-written fiction. Perhaps it is a bit of that for after all, could we really know what Buddha said to his wife? But what we do know is his wife supported him and became a bhikshuni at the end. The narrative flows — sometimes, calm and reflective while Buddha talks, and sometimes, moving through turbulence, war, intrigue and violence providing a counterfoil to Buddha’s own quest. At the end of every episode, there is that moment of stillness induced by the enlightened one’s comment as he moves towards a new scene from his past.
Each scene brings us closer to the resolution of how the personal and the larger-than-life quest combine to create a sense of harmony at the end. The narrative has the ageless innocence, elegance and wisdom of Oscar Wilde’s stories like “The Happy Prince”. Kottary, a debuting author with the ability to create a compelling tale, explains what went into the making of this remarkable book in this interview.
Buddha is a subject much written about. And yet, you have given this book a unique twist. What made you select the life of Buddha as your debut venture into the arena of historical fiction?
I think I’ve always been fascinated with history and stories from the past, wondering how much of it happened the way we imagine it, and constantly imagining what life was like in any age of the past.
The story of Siddhartha, or the Buddha, came to me at a very interesting time in my life. I had just quit my engineering job, and though I vaguely knew I wanted to act and write, I had no real clue what lay ahead. It was at this time that I found a copy of Old Path, White Clouds by the revered Buddhist monk, Thich Nhat Hath, at home. At the time, Mom (Gajra Kottary) was reading it for research for a television show she was scripting, and I began to read it, often just opening up to a different random page every time and reading about a fascinating story from Siddhartha’s life. Over the years, I began to read more and more about the life of Siddhartha, beyond the basic facts I had learned in school, and found it so striking that a lot of questions that Siddhartha had from his life and his world, were the same questions that we have from life today. At a stage I was trying to find my feet in life, something resonated within me, and I found so many facets of his life that barely anyone knew about… I felt compelled to tell the story, and it seemed only natural to tell it through his eyes.
What kind of research went into your book? How many years did it take you to create the final product?
If I’m honest I can’t really quantify the amount of research that went into it, I can just sum it up and say, A LOT! Through each and every draft of the book, I’d read more and more about the subject, and there were so many beautiful tales that couldn’t make it to the final manuscript too! But it took more than five years of writing, rewriting, and rethinking. Several drafts were involved. Of course, there were other things I was doing, but putting the book aside for a few months, and revisiting it made me come back with a fresh perspective too, which really helped the process.
How much is fact and how much fiction? Tell us about the journey of the book.
History is certainly the greatest storyteller, and most of what you read in the book is fact. The places, the people, and most of the incidents are all part of recorded history. I had to imagine a lot of the interpersonal relationships involved in the story while weaving the narrative, especially since I was telling the tale from Siddhartha’s point of view. It was therefore critical to understand where he was in his spiritual journey at the time those things happened.
And to be honest that is what fascinated me the most, the lesser-known parts surrounding the known facts and bullet points of history. I couldn’t find Siddhartha’s angst really being dissected before, or his pain being talked about, because history often makes us think of him as a sea of calm, a stoic man. As I went through the drafts, I understood that in this layer of emotions lay something that perhaps we hadn’t thought of before. And of course, we know now that Siddhartha found the answers he was looking for, but back when he left the palace and renounced his life, he had no idea if he would ever find what he was looking for. Can you imagine the turmoil of someone who can surrender the rest of their time to finding an answer they may never actually find? There was a great human tale there, and I wanted to delve into the things in his life that built up to that journey, while learning more about it myself.
You have unfolded the Eightfold Path through Buddha’s personal journey, bringing in his own life experiences into play. Is that something you found in the course of your research or was it your own conclusion? Please elaborate.
A lot of it was down to research, and documented incidents in the life of Siddhartha, but I feel like especially when telling the story of Siddhartha’s life from his own point of view, it was essential to bring his own life experiences into play. Siddhartha’s learnings were often through practice and self-experimentation, a theme that is echoed throughout the book.
There are many personalised details which recreate a distant time period that is unknown to us. What went into giving authenticity to these unknown persons, their thoughts, conversations and tying them up to give us a picture of the times? How did you create characters from the past that could touch on contemporary issues and hearts?
I think it’s easy to think of characters of the past as unidimensional beings. Often that is how history is academically taught to us; good person – bad person, winner – loser etc. But when telling a story, it would be a huge injustice on my part if I did the same. As an actor, the biggest strength one can have is empathy, and every character I’ve played, I’ve always had to personalise the motivations, the desires, the fears and the joys of them all. I tried to think of all the characters in Siddhartha in the same manner. For example, it would have been easy for us to think about Siddhartha’s father, King Shuddhodana, as wrong for sheltering him from the realities of life, like pain, suffering and death. But that would be such a myopic view of what happened, and not taking into account the prophecies that had been told to him, and the fact that Siddhartha had been born after years and years of wanting a child; the stakes were incredibly high!
All it took was a little curiosity and deep thinking into why these characters did what they did; they were simply following their convictions in that moment… Most of it seemed logical, given we knew what each of these characters wanted at different points in time, but of course there was a fair bit of imagination when it came to their conversations. I was always fascinated by how each character would be at their most vulnerable, because that is a part of history that is never touched upon, and I’ve tried to do that in Siddhartha.
You have touched on many contemporary concerns in your book— war, the need to question traditions. You have even said something very deep when you had Buddha say: “Acceptance can only happen when there is no ego.” Was all this done intentionally, or did it just happen in the flow of events? Please elucidate.
When I first began to think about the story of Siddhartha, what struck me was always the contemporary relevance of the questions Siddhartha asked, more than 2500 years ago… Siddhartha always questioned everyone around him, but it was with a view to understand the universe and the world that he was born into. If he didn’t understand, he asked, and with every answer he got from people or the world around him, came new understanding and new questions too. A lot of it happened in the flow of events; but what was challenging was understanding the internal journey of Siddhartha through these events, his emotions and learnings as he grew up, and that had to be intentional in journey and design.
You have been living in London. Did you visit the parts of the Indian subcontinent you have written about?
Yes! It was a surreal experience for me, I had the good fortune of being able to visit Sarnath and Bodh Gaya from Varanasi. I can tell you that photos do not do the Dhamekh Stupa justice, it’s a beautiful and tranquil place, almost like you’ve stepped into a different world.
Did any films, writers or books impact your choices and the way you executed the book? What writers, artistes impact you as a writer?
Growing up as the son of a journalist and a scriptwriter, I’d be lying if I said my parents Sailesh and Gajra Kottary hadn’t strongly influenced my writing. I’ve also been inspired by Antione de Saint Exupery’s The Little Prince and the way it spoke of such beautiful thoughts in such a simple manner, a principle I tried to keep in mind while writing Siddhartha. Some of my favourite films are Dr. Strangelove, the Batman Trilogy, and the television series, Succession. I’m quite fond of storytelling in general as an actor and creator, and I have this weird habit of trying to piece together the narrative in everything I see, maybe even an advertisement in a magazine, deconstructing it and analysing the choices made by the creators.
Your novel is very cinematic. Are there plans afoot to make it into a film, considering the choices you have made, choosing acting over engineering and cars? Did your mother, Gajra Kottary, a major screenplay writer in India, have an impact on the choices you made and your journey as a writer?
Thank you! I’m a very visual thinker, so when I read or write about something, I watch it unfold like a movie in my mind, perhaps that is reflected to some extent in my writing. I have had interest expressed in the book from a couple of wonderful filmmakers, and hopefully I’ll have some amazing news to share soon!
My mother has been the greatest writing influence in my life, and I have to give her credit in that she has only guided and taught me and never tried to influence my decisions in the kind of work or projects that I take up.
So, what are your plans for the future? Any more books coming our way?
Yes, most certainly! I’ve got two drafts screaming at me for attention. One is about the life of another historical figure, closer to modern times, who lead an unbelievable life. The other one is pure fiction and more in the genre of dark humour; a dystopian take on modern civilisation, but again centred around a clear protagonist.
I’m living in London now and continue to act and perform in theatre as well, so there’s always something exciting happening on that front. I’ve also had some interest in Siddhartha from some wonderful film makers, so fingers crossed something visually beautiful can be born from this. So the hunt for great stories continues!
Thank you so much for your time and your lovely book.
(The review & online interview conducted through emails are by Mitali Chakravarty)
Borderless 