An Under Rated Man of Letters
BHAVNAGAR:
Some people are like an iceberg; only one-tenth of their person-ality would be visible. Krishnalal Shridharani, who would have been only two years short now of centenary, had he been alive, is a prime example.
Known to Gujarat mostly as a very sensitive poet of the freedom struggle vintage, he is also vaguely recalled as having been a jour-nalist. Even in the city of Bhavnagar that boasts of him as one of its own, most think of him as Kavi Shridharani, a poet in Gujarati. Yet, this was only one part of his warm, vibrant, radiant and multifac-eted totality.
Though little remembered today, Krishnalal's lasting contribution in the world beyond the boundaries of Gujarat, was in his pioneer-ing efforts at explaining Gandhi and his tactics of fighting the British Empire, to the world at large in English, through writing and books. He was a follower of the Mahatma in strangely contrary ways. He did not believe in aping the Mahatma in his outward appearance and style; he loved pipe-smoking, was always nattily dressed and could easily pass off as a pucca Brown Sahib. But he was not. At heart, he was an Indian, who understood Gandhi and opted to tell the world about the Mahatma through words, rather than through clothes. In the process, he acquired the Western idiom, but re-mained a staunch Indian in values.
It is perhaps ironical, as also symbolic of his home state, Guja-rat, hardly anyone seemed to think of Shridharani, the youngest participant in the epoch-making Dandi March in 1930, save in Bhavnagar.
The city Bhavnagar appears to particularly revel in nostalgia in a general way, and in remembering those who made a name for themselves in arts, literature and culture. It boldly takes pride, pleasure and initiative in reminding itself and others of the greats it had produced.Shridharani's alma mater, Dakshinamurti, the Bhav-nagar Sahitya Sabha, his friends and admirers unfailingly think of the man, with gratitude and affection, on his birthday in September, something the rest of the State too ought to do, at least to erase the stigma that it is a land of the forgetful and the ungrateful.
Although he studied at Dakshinamurti and Gujarat Vid-yapeeth,Shridharani was apparently not cut out to be a conven-tional khadi-clad.He struck his own path and went to Shantini-ketan.Rabindranath Tagore was highly impressed by the sensitive Gujarati and urged him to travel to the West. It was to be a mo-mentous journey; it changed the course of his life.Gujarati literature was perhaps the only loser.
Late Harindra Dave, another sensitive soul, poet and journalist, once introduced Shridharani as a man who would swim against not just the current but also the flood. Anybody can make speed with the current, but only those with a rare force of soul could do so against the flow. At Karadi, just before reaching Dandi for the salt satyagrah, Krishnalal wrote a piece, Saput, and earned Gandhiji's affectionate rebuke for spinning yarn instead of the wheel.
His lifelong passion was writing. He was a journalist par excel-lence and an equally perceptive radio commentator, and in those days one of the rare breed of those who would wield their pens with facility both in Gujarati and English.
His books in English, including his auto-biography, My India My America, became best-sellers in the early 1940s.Long before he went abroad and began writing in English; Shridharani had won recognition as a poet and dramatist in Gujarati.
Born on September 16, 1911, at Umrala, Krishnalal's childhood passed mostly in Umrala, Bhavnagar and Junagadh. He lost his fa-ther, Jethalal, a lawyer with a roaring practice, when Shridharani was barely eight. The man that grew up did not remember much about his father, but a lot about his mother, Laheriben.
Krishnalal wrote about his mother in a poem, Maari Baa
Aradhanaman smarun roop Baanu,
Ne Baane smarine Prabhuroop pamun.
In 1957,in the revised edition of Kodiyan, Krishnalal noted that the first thing he would see while doing dhyan, just before getting up and when retiring for the day, was that instead of Om,his mind will show him the image of his mother.
His early days carried vivid memories of Girnar, the Gir, its flora and fauna. He joined an innovative educational institution, Dakshi-namurti in Bhavnagar. The schooling, full of experiments, proved beneficial for Krishnalal. He would not only take interest in poetry, but also took a hand at painting. When he was hardly 12,he wrote a raasdo, a folk song ,Halya Talakchand Sasare Lo.He penned in-numerable such things while in school, but his critical faculty was so sharp that he never included many of these in his collections published later, rejecting them as containing little of poetic ele-ments. But some were really brilliant, such as when he wrote about Gandhi, Daahbhari aankhon Matani,tenu tun aansu tapakyun. His love for painting reflected in his poems too.
Way back in 1941, Balwantray Thakore thought that Krishnalal's poetry was markedly different from that of either Umashankar Joshi or Sundaram, both tall poets. How and in what specific way,Thakore could not pinpoint but he underlined the language and art as having achieved a fusion in Krishnalal's poems.His dic-tion, other critics judged , was superb and the sensuousness of his poetry reminded a reader of Keats.
Poetry was not all. Shridharani also did considerable work in drama.
He joined Gujarat Vidyapeeth and was with Mahatma Gandhi during the Dandi March. For his part in the freedom struggle, Krishnalal served a term in jail. He also spent a couple of years at Shantiniketan and was one of the Gurudev's favourite pupils. He then went to the U.S. for studies ,and during his 12 years there took PhD in Sociology and Political Theory at Columbia University.
He continued writing at a breakneck speed in America, and the outcome was spectacular. In 1939, he gave a book in English, War Without Violence, explaining to the materialist West,the spiritual onslaught of the satyagrah, a non-violent and yet deadly weapon against repression and injustice. In 1946, he returned to India and made Delhi his home, joined the External Affairs Ministry, then un-der Jawahar Lal Nehru as an officer on special duty. But the poet did not fit in with the Babu culture of government and left the job to become a journalist, writing for the Amrita Bazar Patrika, travelling all over the country and world. In those days Delhi was not as crowded as it is today, and certainly not the madhouse of busybod-ies that it has become in the past three decades. He used to pen a column for the Gujarati daily, Sandesh too.
He married Sundari, artist daughter of noted Sindhi writer,philosopher and nationalist,Dayaram Didumal,in March,1950.He had wide ranging contacts and was very friendly with a lot of leaders including Nehru, Mrs Indira Gandhi, her hus-band, Phiroze Gandhi,and Dr S.Radhakrishnan,as also a host of foreign dignitaries.
When in Delhi and not doing anything else, he would potter around his flower-beds and lilly-ponds and read stories to children.
His contribution to the Gujarati literature was immense, mainly as a poet and dramatist. Yet, he was recognised rather belatedly only. Even Gujarat did nothing. It was only in 1958, Krishnalal was suddenly discovered by the literary establishment. He was named for the Ranjitram gold medal for services to literature.
Krihsnalal died unexpectedly on July 23,1960,when he was hardly 49. It was not an age to go and considering what he had al-ready written, much more was yet to come. That was not to be.
Among the noteworthy literary creations of Krishnalal, besides Kodiyan, are Punarpi, Vadlo, Sonapari and three plays, Piyo Gori, Morna Inda and Padmini. His English books include My India,My America, War Without Violence, Warning to the West, The Big Four of India, The Adventures of the Upside-Down, The Journalist in India, Smiles From Kashmir and the Mahatma and the World.
All his works in both languages have a common thread; all re-veal him to be a highly sensitive and equally perceptive person. My India,My America won Shridharani ecstatic reviews in the American Press. Thomas Sigrue writing in the New York Herald Tribune hailed it as a "fascinating mixture of autobiography, biography, po-litical analysis,philosophical exposition and fine writing." The 646-page book's writer was described by others as a young man who has the wisdom of the ages of his people.
On his return to India, he kept on writing. His four portraits in words of Nehru,Rajendra Prasad,Rajaji and Sardar Patel,as also his monograph on journalism show him as a journalist far ahead of his time,in his style of wrting, his assessment of people and events and his perception of the future.He wrote of India's first prime min-ister,Nehru , as a man who seldom had intimate friends who was most of the time,"mangificently and dangerously aloof.The passing away of the Mahatma and Patel had removed from the Indian scene the last men who could admonish Nehu."Every individual,in order to keep his sanity, must have some people who can tell him when the occasion arises that ' you are making a fool of yourself'. The man who occupies too high a pedestal for anybody to stand on equal level with him,runs the risk of losing his sense of proportion", Krishnalal observed.Of Sardar Patel whom he called a practical man,Krishnalal said: "The death of Patel marked a sharper turning point in the infant career of independent India than did the martyr-dom of Mahatma Gandhi....Gandhi left a universal void; the void created by Patel's passing away is purely national, and so it is felt more intensely...Patel was a strong man, and now India is without a strong man.The passing away of a strong man always creates a serious situation.For,when a strong man dies, he not only creates a void,but he also removes the lid. Pent-up, seething forces begin to find expression." These portraits were illustrated by caricatures drawn by late cartoonist, Shankar, who later started the celebrated, and now defunct Shankar’s Weekly, a world class cartoon journal.
Most of Shridharani’s English books are not available now. Those few copies that are there are the possessions of pride for their owners.That Krishnalal Shridharani should have passed away so early in his life was a tragic loss not only to literature but also to journalism.The best way to commemorate his memory would be to republish some of his unavailable literature and scan the family ar-chives to see if there was anything unpublished left behind.
By Tushar Bhatt
Are we, Gujaratis, a forgetful people or ungrateful people? The question is more than a million dollars worth because you have no answer many a time. One such occasion was the birth centenary of an extra-ordinary ordinary Gujarati, Jagan Mehta. It fell on January 29, 2009, a day before the Martyrs’ Day, which coincided with the day of assassination of Mahatma Gandhi.
Only one low-key function washeld under the auspices of Gujarat Lalit Kala Akadami.An exhibition of Jagan Mehta’s photographs of Gandhiji and others was opened in Ahmedabad as the sole tribute to the camera wizard. Gandhian leader Narayan Desai and some others were to speak but skipped speaking as a mark of respect for the late President R Venkataraman, whose passing away was be-ing mourned by the nation and no official celebration could be held.Everybody grumbled privately, but being good, obedient Guja-ratis, refrained from unburdening their souls.
Gujaratis as a people are largely unaware of the tall feats by the photographic excellence of Jaganbhai. The apathy also brought back a flood of memories of a meeting with him in 1986. The hour-long encounter with the camera wizard remains firmly etched in the mind. The memory trailer has been ever green because thereafter Jaganbhai became a phone friend.
The body showed the ravages of time, the face a map of wrin-kles, veins standing out like a canal network on the back of his palms, the left hand supported by a cast owing to a shoulder bone injury in a fall, and a corset around the spine.
But, then the 86-year-old Jagan Mehta, a photographer who is world famous for his sensitive Gandhi pictures taken during the Mahatma's peace march in the riot-torn Bihar in March,1947, was old in flesh only. The spirit, as revealed by his firm voice and bub-bling enthusiasm about his lifelong passion, photography, was young - and willing.
He said, with obvious pride: “I can still wield a camera, maybe not with a great speed. But I can still capture good photographs." Before he had a fall, hurting his shoulder, he had taken a couple of lovely shots of the noted Gujarati writer, Josef Macwan.
Of the innumerable photographs Jagan Mehta had clicked over the past decades, pictures captured during the six momentous days, stood out. The 40-odd pictures of the peace march of Gan-dhiji earned him a world-wide recognition, not because these were news pictures, but because these were superbly evocative studies of the agonies and sorrow of someone whom millions of his coun-trymen had ,during his lifetime only, hailed as the Great Soul, Ma-hatma.
These pictures have been shown all over the globe, including for a year-and-a-half in the United States of America alone.
These and other treasure-trove of photographic records of yes-teryear are now in steel cupboards at Mehta's house in Chandranagar society, in Paldi area of Ahmedabad, not far from the bed on which the old photographer slept and breathed his last. In the Spartan house, there is no indication of the documentary wealth it is holding.”I never was good at making money all my life", Jagan Mehta used to explain, without a trace of regret.
In truth, his life has been a story of grit, determination and strug-gle throughout. And, yet, for all the trials and tribulations, the man, now known as Jagan but originally christened as Jagannth, was a jovial person. He smiled easily, laughed heartily, launched into a discussion readily and pottered around the room, rummaging the cupboards and bags to locate a photograph about which he was talking. Dressed in a khadi shirt and pyjama,he was more than ready to help a younger man in photography. Even as he remem-bered the olden days,in 1986,he noticed the camera of a friend, Gautam Mehta. Surfacing in the present from the past he asked Gautam: "Is it a Pentax ?"
Born in 1909,in the house of Vasudev Vaidya, Jaganbhai was in-terested in painting from his school days, doing art work in both pencil and colour. His father was a well-known Ayurveda physician in Gujarat in those days and his grand-father, Ganpatram, too was a vaidya of repute,having studied Ayurveda under the renowned specialist of yesteryear,Zandu Bhatt. Recalled Jaganbhai:” Al-though my father was a noted vaidya himself, he never made much money for two reasons. He was a very sensitive soul, never able to bring himself up to charging the poor for treatment. He would say,' If I charge fee from a poor, the money creates a burning sensation in my hands.' Secondly, he had been a follower of Mahatma Gan-dhi ever since the Mahatma came to Ahmedabad, first to the Ko-chrab Ashram and then to the Sabarmati Ashram.Vasudevbhai was among the pioneers, along with Indulal Yagnik,Hariprasad Desai and others to have attended the Congress session in Godhra in days when the session did not attract many."
Vasudevbhai had settled in Sanand, some 18 km away from Ahmedabad,and was never hankering after either wealth or fame. The son, who had an innate liking for art, had begun to do draw-ings and paintings quite early in his student days. Ravishankar Ra-val, who was hailed as Gujarat's kala guru ,was a close friend of Jaganbhai's father.So,when after failing in his matriculation exami-nation in 1929,Jagan told his father that he wanted to pursue paint-ing as a career and would like to go to Bombay to join the J J School of Arts, the first thing the vaidya did was to consult Ravis-hankar Raval.Recalled Jaganbhai:"My father could not afford the money for sending me to Bombay,although we had no problem in meeting day to day expenses. A living example of Gandhian sim-plicity,father never had that kind of money."
Raval at that time was bringing out Kumar magazine in Ahmed-abad,along with an associate, Bachubhai Rawat. He saw young Jagan's art output, and asked him to work with him for Kumar."Ravibhai guided me in painting and also got me interested in photography, impressing upon me that photography was going to play an important role. I would go out of town also with Ravibhai and take photographs. I was barely 20 years of age then."
Jaganbhai was very proud that he had learnt the ABC of painting as well as photography from Ravishankar Raval."I took to photog-raphy very keenly, and got so much into it that painting got left be-hind. Soon I was good at working in the dark room too, washing, developing and printing pictures."
Ravibhai had set the young man on the road to photographer's life by presenting him with a Maximark camera. It was in 1933 that Jaganbhai took his first photograph of Gandhiji. Bapu had come to the Sharda Mandir for a meeting. Remembered the photographer: "I took the camera and the open stand to keep it on. I took three or four snaps, one of which came out very well. It was a very evoca-tive picture."
In 1934,Jaganbhai got a scholarship of the then Bhavnagar state for going to Vienna, Austria to study at the Institute of Graphic Arts there.” Mind you, I was not a resident of the old Bhavnagar state. I used to go there with Ravibhai and still the ruler, Krishnakumarsin-hji, was so nice that he gave me the scholarship." In August of that year,Jaganbhai left Ahmedabad for Austria, leaving behind wife,Malti,and his parents, friends and the familiar surroundings.
He pursued studies and research in photography, reproduction techniques, and photo-gravure printing and allied areas for more than a year and a half. During this period, he came in contact with a number of Indian leaders such as Netaji Subhash Chandra Bose and became secretary of the Hindustan Academical Association set by Bose in Vienna,and later the underground movement in In-dia.
In Vienna,everything seemed going well when tragedy struck. Well into the second year of his scholarship and assured of the third year,Jaganbhai fell sick. He had very high temperature in the beginning,later it was judged that he had a spinal problem, proba-bly TB of the spine. He was hospitalised for 33 days, and when dis-charged at the end, he was told to spend a lot of time resting at hill stations and nursing his health back.” I had been living very frugally in Austria, cooking my own meals.But,after this illness, there was but no option to return home. My family too was worried stiff. I had been wearing a leather corset, sleeping on a flat bed, just like a liv-ing mummy in a coffin. I had such an excruciating pain in the ver-tebrae that I sometimes felt it was better to die than to suffer like that. I spent some five months in different sanatoria and hill sta-tions in Austria before returning to India in May, 1936."
The old man looked out of the verandah of his modest home as he recalled those painful days. In the trees outside,crows were making a ruckus,but he did not seem to register it. "I was really in the state of a Trishanku,suspended between the planet earth and heaven. Back home, my father started my treatment, his medi-cines, sunbath, and home-made food rich in calcium. I began mov-ing around on my own in 1938.But a big question was: what next?"
"Till then, I had not pursued photography as an independent pro-fession. True, I had taken some pictures but that was not as a pro-fessional,"he remembered.Then,he got some assignments to go round Kankaroli,Udaipur and Mount Abu for photography and the work turned out to be very good. "I felt a surge of self-confidence and at the age of 30,in 1939, took a plunge as a photographer, launching what I called photo home service. The idea was to tell people that so long they were going to a studio for getting their pic-tures taken. Here was I who would go to their home and snap them in familiar, homely situations. I can see in my mind's eye even to-day myself going round in 1940 on a bicycle,with folding reflectors and a camera,for photography.I used to eke out enough to make both the ends meet,but I was never unduly worried,or impressed by money.Probably, it was the Gandhian upbringing in our house—a nationalist’s house- that led to it."
He had a friend,Dr Manubhai Trivedi, the son of a well-known Gujarati J.P.Trivedi who had made a name in Pune in those days. Manubhai had been to Vienna to study medicine, chiefly because he did not want to study in England. Later he shifted to Wardha at the suggestion of Late Jamnalal Bajaj and settled there as a med-ico.
Said Jaganbhai: "I had got an idea around that time that Gan-dhiji's day-to-day activities and life should be documented in pho-tographs, and if possible on film too because one day all this would be of immense historic value. I had been writing to Manubhai in Wardha, tossing about the idea. Manubhai said it was a good idea and encouraged me to pursue it.
Recalled the photographer: "Though Manubhai was enthusiastic, I could not avail of his invitation to go to Wardha for several years.As I do introspection today, perhaps, I was lacking in a spirit of adventure. Or, perhaps it was because of the principle that I would never borrow money for anything.
He said,” Maybe God had ordained it that way. But an opportu-nity did come by in 1947.I was close to Madhavsinh ,a follower of Shri Devendraprasadji Maharaj of the Kalupur Swaminarayan tem-ple and a painter himself.He asked me to accompany the entou-rage of the Maharaj to Ayodhya where at the Haumangadhi the mundan ceremony of today's Kalupur acharya,Shri Tejendra-prasadji was to take place.I went there to do photography and chanced upon a news item that Gandhiji was to make a peace tour in the riot-hit Bihar where communal trouble had sparked while the Mahatma was in Noakhali.I sought permission of the Acharya for going to Patna." Not only permission, Devendraprasadji also gave him Rs.400.Jaganbhai already had some Rs.200 he brought from home when going to Ayodhya. With this princely amount the pho-tographer set out on his mission; he had no introduction from any newspaper, no idea if he would be allowed to join the tour.
In Patna,an old friend,Gunwant Jani, who had been living there for some years, helped him get aboard the train on which the Ma-hatma was travelling.
The historic pictures, taken in the last week of March, were in natural light, without any flash. Nor was Jaganbhai in mad competi-tion with news photographers. He approached the subject as a pic-torialist,intent on achieving best composition possible to reflect the inner divinity of Gandhiji. One of these, showing Bapu going for a walk,with hands on the shoulders two associates and the tall figure of Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan,the Frontier Gandhi,walking on a side, has since been used countless times. The photograph has achieved a sort of immortality because of the perfect light and shade combination.Another showed Gandhi and his col-leagues,talking as they walked.The third one depicted the agony of the carnage,with a riot-hit sitting on ground with folded hands in front of Gandhiji.The Mahatma listened to the man's woes with his head down,as if the burden of the misguided deeds of his country-men was solely on his head.Yet another photograph brought out the pensive mood in which Bapu was sitting at a meet-ing,surrounded by followers, present physically, but wearing an ex-pression of profound sorrow on the face, as if he were somewhere else.
Jaganbhai remembers one episode most vividly, although he could not locate the print of the picture immediately. "I learnt that Bapu was to visit a poor man's house badly damaged by the mobs.I reached it early, and occupied a vantage point in a corner of the hut.As Gandhiji entered the place,the woman of the house touched his feet, crying. Bapu and another associate bent down to help her rise to her feet. I clicked away, capturing the moment showing the Mahatma lending a helping hand to the hapless woman, agony of the mankind writ large on his face. The frame was very moving and everybody around wept.
The pictures made him world-famous, but never rich. On return to Ahmedabad,Jaganbhai opened a studio on the Relief Road in 1948,only to close it down six years later in 1954. "To succeed in business was perhaps not in my stars," he ruminated.
For ten years from 1957,he served as an official photogra-pher,the last one, at the Prince of Wales Museum in Bom-bay,capturing in his camera excavated ancient bronze sculp-tures,paintings,stone carvings and other archaeological invaluables ,which too have been shown in a number of exhibitions in different parts of the country.The starting salary was Rs.250 a month.
Returning home, he worked for a year at the National Institute of Design for the Nehru exhibition project. In 1968, he joined the C.N.Fine Arts College to teach phtography on a nominal remunera-tion. It was a part-time job,but he used to devote full five days a week since his friend Rasiklal Parikh, a great painter, was the prin-cipal.
He had another passion-- that of photographing Gujarati writers and poets of repute,even if he were not to earn a single paise from the work.He had a collection of some 250 such pictures of literary personalities,another invauable collection of which many do not know.
In his twilight years, he lived with his son and grand-son, relish-ing the rich memories."I had to face trials and tribulations, but my wife, Malti, who died at the age of 75, stood by me like a rock. Dur-ing my studies and illness in Vienna, it was she who looked after the family,as also when I went away to Bombay. Never did she-grumble about anything in our life. Both my sons, Upendra and Bipin too owe a lot to her."
Jaganbhai was different from other old achievers; he rarely said "I did this or I did that." Instead, he would say such and such work got done through him. His modesty was matched only by his gen-erosity to give of his time ,experience and knowledge to other young professionals. :"Whatever one has learnt should be passed on to others. We should not become possessive, even of knowl-edge, wisdom or experience. Doing so gives me great pleasure in life.I am in the evening of my life, contented and happy to be with family members. God has been greatly kind to me." Vishwa Gurjari bestowed upon him the 1995 Gujarat Award ,commemoriating his achievements. By a sheer coincidence,this happened to the 125h birth anniversary year of the Mahatma.
The uncomplaining wizard left this world quietly. He never as-pired fame and we the Gujarati people have ensured it that he re-mains in the small print in the footnotes of our history.The question still begs an answer: are we forgetful or ungrateful? God only knows. Hey Ram!!!
(The End)
Re: [Tushar Bhatt Journalist] 12/07/2009 08:29:00 AM
Jayant Meghani
PRASAR
1888 Atabhai Avenue, Bhavnagar (Gujarat)
India 364 001
Remembering Khodidas Parmar,a little-known great painter
BHAVNAGAR.
He is no more, but Khodidas Parmar was a great presence as an artist and a greater gentleman that one does not relish it to talk about him in the past tense.
His is a decidedly low-key profile.The round head sports a closed cropped hair,bristling with a mix of black and silver,which tend to make his ear seem rather prominent.The black-framed spectacles are as if trying to conceal his keen eyes as well as age even as strands of grey fight for a majority in his bush mous-tache.The black jacket over the snow-white zabhbha and pyjama which have been for more than four decades his standard wear.But overall all these features do nothing to promote the real identity of the man,Khodidas Bhayabhai Parmar as someone distinct from other similarly dressed people.
That is,until one has seen a rather fabulous,mountainous portfo-lio of his paintings,many original,others derived from the folk-art of his native area of Gohilwad,as Bhavnagar district of today was known in olden days. Add to these ,an equally impressive array of anthologies in which folk-tales,songs ,stories for children,excavated like nuggets of pure 24-carat gold from villages from the mists of time.
For good measure,throw in a collection or two on traditional em-broidery of Saurashtra,and sundry writing on related subjects.Put in as bonus,the teaching of painting to students at a home class,totally free for more than a quarter century.
The smiling ,diffident ,almost self-effacing profile of Khodidas would thenundergo a sea-change to bring up a quintessential re-searcher whose world, although revolving round Bhavnagar and Gohilwad,somehow encompasses a larger universe of world-class work in folk-art and literature.The man wields a facile brush and an equally facile pen in Gujarati; if very few know of him,it is because he has preferred to work mainly in the 52 villages around Bhavna-gar;perhaps also because he has not bothered to master the tricks of bringing the spotlight on to himself,tricks with which many lesser artists would have bathed themselves in greater glory than they deserved and far more cash than they could dream of.
Yet, art connoisseurs not only in India but also abroad know of Khodidas Parmar's work and worth, if not the man himself.His works have won as many as nine painting awards,ten of his paint-ings have gone into various collections in the country.four of his murals adorn different places.Ten of his books have been brought out.To top it all, the Gujarat government has just announced the Zaverchand Meghani folk art and literature award of Rs.one lakh to him for the current year.
The house in which Khodidas now lives in Bhavnagar's Takhteshwar plot,is called Parmanand,supreme bliss,underpinning the attitude towards life of its resident.Khodidas,who began life at a very modest level,is a contented man; he has no complaints ,nor has he any regrets.
The artist-writer does not even own the house called Parman-and; its owners used to employ his father,Bhayabhai as a chowki-dar first and then as a horse-carriage driver.Bhayabhai used to live in a tiny outhouse in the sprawling compound.Even today,Khodidas has his kitchen located in a small single room tenement,although he has been persuaded by the owners of the Parmanand Bhavan to occupy it since they do not live any longer in Bhavnagar and would not allow Khodidas to move away.
Says Joravarsinh Jadav,managing trustee of Gujarat Lok Kala Foundation and a researcher in folk-art himself;" Khodidasbhai is a very tall personality in the world of folk art and literature,in the world-clas,combining in himself the rare ability to paint extremely well and write in a matching manner.But, as a human being,he is perhaps even taller because he never allowed his accomplish-ments to inflate his ego.Khodidas Parmar is an affable,modest and unassuming man of quiet dignity.He has never felt the need to boast and has always counted his blessings to be more than his woes."
Born on July 31, 1930,Khodidas,was the only son of a poor Karadia Rajput family.His parents,pining for a male child,having got only daughters earlier,always believed he was the gift of the god-dess,Khodiyar,and named him after her.
Remembers the painter-writer: "My mother used to work as a la-bourer,digging up earth to be loaded on to carts.After a day of ceaseless toil, she would bring home ten paise.Bhayabhai had come to Bhavnagar to work for a wealthy person,first as a watch-man and then looking after his horse-carriage from a nearby vil-lage.Bhayabhai and his wife,Vakhatba,were determined that come what may,their son should get educated.They braved all the trou-bles to enable the boy to go to school.He more than justified their hopes,going on to take his M.A. with Gujarati and Sanskrit, learnt painting even as he studied and went on to become a guide to stu-dents doing doctoral research on folk literature for their Ph.D.
Poverty, which has crushed many a dream,however,appears to have gifted Khodidas with an ability to derive great aesthetic pleas-ure from what would seem to be trivial to others-- from folk songs, from the wall paintings in villages, from tales of the unlettered folks.Says the artist about his interest in all these : "Even when a small boy, I was immensely interested in the folk literature.I used to go to wedding ceremonies with relatives,one of whom,a widow in the family,used to recite a large number of folk songs,appropriate for different occasions. I had a God's gift in that I could remember them verbatim,along with their tunes,although I could never sing. I had as a boy managed to learn by heart a large repertoire of such songs".
When he was in Std IX,Khodidas wrote in a magazine an appre-ciation of a folk song,giving an advance testimony of his life's work.
Karadia Rajputs ,perhaps the poorest of the Rajputs, are an ag-ricultural people,quite rich in cultural traditions. A typical home of a Karadia would have embroidery articles,wall paintings,other arte-facts,and of course,music in the form of songs for all seasons and occasions. Their social traditions also encouraged women,as also men, to hone their craftsmanship; a girl would need to be given several embroidered skirts when she gets married and this would mean that right from the time of her birth,womenfolk in the house would be working on these presents.They would paint motifs,do in-tricate work on motif and other precious stones,to enrich their life-style.Poverty of a household could not stand in the way,and this tradition led to fostering of a tradition of arts and crafts among the rural folks in 52 villages inhabited by Karadia Rajputs. Not that this was the only community doing so.
Apart from the natural interest,Khodidas appears to have con-vinced himself long,long ago that there was something aestheti-cally superb in all this; it was an attitude unlike so many other rural youths who would abhor the indigenous lifestyle the moment they went to a school or college. The fall-out of the tinsel culture did not touch the young Khodidas at all.Nobody could say why.
In addition to the community background rich in arts and crafts,Khodidas counts amongst his blessing the fact that he got as his art teacher-- kalaguru-- Mr Somalal Shah. Wayback in 1948,he was in Alfred High School. Recalls Khodidas:" Somabhai held my hand and taught me everything I was to know in painting and draw-ing".Two years later,in 1950, the young Parmar sent three paint-ings to an exhibition organised in Rajkot by Saurashtra Kala Man-dal,bagging the third prize for his work, Shyamsakhi.The painting was bought up by an enthusiast.Years later,Khodidas was to pay an unsual double-tribute to Somabhai. Remembers Joravarsinh Jadav: "It was some three-four years ago that the government had first thought to giving an award in folk art to Khodidasbhai,but he wrote a polite letter ,suggesting to the authorities it be given to his guru,Somabhai.It was given.Khodidas has also completed a manu-script on the life and work of Somalal Shah,profusely illustrated and full of rare insights into the life of Somalal."
In 1951,even as he was learning painting,Khodidas passed his metriculation in the first class and joined the Shamaldas College where his understanding of the significance and relevance of folk arts to real life were deepened because of his contact with two other people who were to play a great role in his moulding-- Dr Ish-warbhai Dave and Mr Takhtasinhji Parmar.
Grateful as he is,Khodidas did not,however, copy his guru's style in his work.He evolved a highly personal,decorative style in paint-ing.Although the inspiration came from the vast repertoire of folk art he has been ceaselessly collecting,Khodidas,says Joravarsinh Jadav,did not merely copy what was available in villages. While his work draws on the details of village life,it does not blindly ape the loseness of composition.He made the motifs and wall paintings more compact,added his own sense of proportion and aestehtics to implant a soul of its own. His paintings impress and interest the onlookers because life is throbbing in these,not merely captured as in a photograph.He makes the beauty of these works even more enjoyable because of his own artistic input.The pleasing effect this creates has in all these years made Khodidas a highly original art-ist,even as he was engaged in rescuing it from being forgotten.
Says Jadav: "Krishna is a favourite subject wiith Khodidas and he scrupulously does one painting at least a year for the Janmast-hami day.Similarly, another favourite subject is a ship.He must have done more than 30 paintings with a ship at the centre."
Along with this,Khodidas has been scrupulously writing on a wide variety of folk topics, ranging from the Kathiawadi turban -- there are a 100 turbans of different types in Saurashtra -- to stories being told orally only in remote places. The work follows somewhat in the footsteps of the late Zaverchand Meghani.
The importance of this activity is immense because most of these stories and songs are part of the oral tradition only. With the advent of modernity,and the newer media of entertainment such as radio and television,less and less use of these traditional forms is being made.Since these were orally passed on, the danger is that if someone were not to put it on paper,they would be lost forever in the dust of time. Already a lot of rich heritage of this nature has been lost.
Khodidas Parmar's uniqueness lies in the fact that he has been not only collecting these,but putting them on paper in the form of words and paintings.The cultural richness of the material is enough to explode the myth that our rual society has been a dull,drab and singularly boring existence until the arrival of the western man on the scene.In truth,the old village society was not as isolated as is believed."The motifs about Ramayana are almost the same in most parts of the country",says Khodidas by way of a proof.Similarly the motifs of lions found in some villages of Gohilwad are akin to those found in ancient Iran.
The artist-writer retired from a job as a lecturer at the V.A.M.C.College in Bhavnagar.He was offered a chair in folk art at Rajkot but declined to move away from his home base,for there is a lot of work of be done. "So far, nobody has brought on to paper the innumerable occasion songs such as those sung at the time of death,or lighthearted banter called fatana.He is working on an illus-trated volume on turbans,and another on embroidery.He coaches a group of students in painting at home,without charging any fee.He does not paint to order;nor does he price his works skyhigh.His children are also following the father's suit.A daughter is a good painter and so is a son.Another son is a good photogra-pher,besides being a folk artist.His is a single track existence.His passion,his hobby,his work,his liesure and his recreation are all the same; painting and writing. "When I am tired of writing,I take up the brush,and the other way round."At 64,he is not resting on his lau-rels -- or his murals--,working regularly from 8.30 am to 11 a m and then from 3.30 p m to 5 p m. His only diversion is a walk for an hour that he religiously takes every evening after 5 p m."Fortunately,I do not know how to ride even a bicycle and have escaped being a social person." His sketchbook and a pencil are his permament companions wherever he goes.He comes across as a very reserved man,but his family says he can be extremely jo-vial among people whom he knows quite well.Joravarsinh Jadav says that although Khodidas is a contented man,the best of him in painting is yet to come.The artist himself does not permit himself to say any such things.Driven by some inner force,he goes on docu-menting folk literature,striving torevive folk arts,reinvigorate
--
Posted By Tushar Bhatt journalist to Tushar Bhatt Journalist on 12/07/2009 08:29:00 AM
BHAVNAGAR.
He is no more, but Khodidas Parmar was a great presence as an artist and a greater gentleman that one does not relish it to talk about him in the past tense.
His is a decidedly low-key profile.The round head sports a closed cropped hair,bristling with a mix of black and silver,which tend to make his ear seem rather prominent.The black-framed spectacles are as if trying to conceal his keen eyes as well as age even as strands of grey fight for a majority in his bush mous-tache.The black jacket over the snow-white zabhbha and pyjama which have been for more than four decades his standard wear.But overall all these features do nothing to promote the real identity of the man,Khodidas Bhayabhai Parmar as someone distinct from other similarly dressed people.
That is,until one has seen a rather fabulous,mountainous portfo-lio of his paintings,many original,others derived from the folk-art of his native area of Gohilwad,as Bhavnagar district of today was known in olden days. Add to these ,an equally impressive array of anthologies in which folk-tales,songs ,stories for children,excavated like nuggets of pure 24-carat gold from villages from the mists of time.
For good measure,throw in a collection or two on traditional em-broidery of Saurashtra,and sundry writing on related subjects.Put in as bonus,the teaching of painting to students at a home class,totally free for more than a quarter century.
The smiling ,diffident ,almost self-effacing profile of Khodidas would thenundergo a sea-change to bring up a quintessential re-searcher whose world, although revolving round Bhavnagar and Gohilwad,somehow encompasses a larger universe of world-class work in folk-art and literature.The man wields a facile brush and an equally facile pen in Gujarati; if very few know of him,it is because he has preferred to work mainly in the 52 villages around Bhavna-gar;perhaps also because he has not bothered to master the tricks of bringing the spotlight on to himself,tricks with which many lesser artists would have bathed themselves in greater glory than they deserved and far more cash than they could dream of.
Yet, art connoisseurs not only in India but also abroad know of Khodidas Parmar's work and worth, if not the man himself.His works have won as many as nine painting awards,ten of his paint-ings have gone into various collections in the country.four of his murals adorn different places.Ten of his books have been brought out.To top it all, the Gujarat government has just announced the Zaverchand Meghani folk art and literature award of Rs.one lakh to him for the current year.
The house in which Khodidas now lives in Bhavnagar's Takhteshwar plot,is called Parmanand,supreme bliss,underpinning the attitude towards life of its resident.Khodidas,who began life at a very modest level,is a contented man; he has no complaints ,nor has he any regrets.
The artist-writer does not even own the house called Parman-and; its owners used to employ his father,Bhayabhai as a chowki-dar first and then as a horse-carriage driver.Bhayabhai used to live in a tiny outhouse in the sprawling compound.Even today,Khodidas has his kitchen located in a small single room tenement,although he has been persuaded by the owners of the Parmanand Bhavan to occupy it since they do not live any longer in Bhavnagar and would not allow Khodidas to move away.
Says Joravarsinh Jadav,managing trustee of Gujarat Lok Kala Foundation and a researcher in folk-art himself;" Khodidasbhai is a very tall personality in the world of folk art and literature,in the world-clas,combining in himself the rare ability to paint extremely well and write in a matching manner.But, as a human being,he is perhaps even taller because he never allowed his accomplish-ments to inflate his ego.Khodidas Parmar is an affable,modest and unassuming man of quiet dignity.He has never felt the need to boast and has always counted his blessings to be more than his woes."
Born on July 31, 1930,Khodidas,was the only son of a poor Karadia Rajput family.His parents,pining for a male child,having got only daughters earlier,always believed he was the gift of the god-dess,Khodiyar,and named him after her.
Remembers the painter-writer: "My mother used to work as a la-bourer,digging up earth to be loaded on to carts.After a day of ceaseless toil, she would bring home ten paise.Bhayabhai had come to Bhavnagar to work for a wealthy person,first as a watch-man and then looking after his horse-carriage from a nearby vil-lage.Bhayabhai and his wife,Vakhatba,were determined that come what may,their son should get educated.They braved all the trou-bles to enable the boy to go to school.He more than justified their hopes,going on to take his M.A. with Gujarati and Sanskrit, learnt painting even as he studied and went on to become a guide to stu-dents doing doctoral research on folk literature for their Ph.D.
Poverty, which has crushed many a dream,however,appears to have gifted Khodidas with an ability to derive great aesthetic pleas-ure from what would seem to be trivial to others-- from folk songs, from the wall paintings in villages, from tales of the unlettered folks.Says the artist about his interest in all these : "Even when a small boy, I was immensely interested in the folk literature.I used to go to wedding ceremonies with relatives,one of whom,a widow in the family,used to recite a large number of folk songs,appropriate for different occasions. I had a God's gift in that I could remember them verbatim,along with their tunes,although I could never sing. I had as a boy managed to learn by heart a large repertoire of such songs".
When he was in Std IX,Khodidas wrote in a magazine an appre-ciation of a folk song,giving an advance testimony of his life's work.
Karadia Rajputs ,perhaps the poorest of the Rajputs, are an ag-ricultural people,quite rich in cultural traditions. A typical home of a Karadia would have embroidery articles,wall paintings,other arte-facts,and of course,music in the form of songs for all seasons and occasions. Their social traditions also encouraged women,as also men, to hone their craftsmanship; a girl would need to be given several embroidered skirts when she gets married and this would mean that right from the time of her birth,womenfolk in the house would be working on these presents.They would paint motifs,do in-tricate work on motif and other precious stones,to enrich their life-style.Poverty of a household could not stand in the way,and this tradition led to fostering of a tradition of arts and crafts among the rural folks in 52 villages inhabited by Karadia Rajputs. Not that this was the only community doing so.
Apart from the natural interest,Khodidas appears to have con-vinced himself long,long ago that there was something aestheti-cally superb in all this; it was an attitude unlike so many other rural youths who would abhor the indigenous lifestyle the moment they went to a school or college. The fall-out of the tinsel culture did not touch the young Khodidas at all.Nobody could say why.
In addition to the community background rich in arts and crafts,Khodidas counts amongst his blessing the fact that he got as his art teacher-- kalaguru-- Mr Somalal Shah. Wayback in 1948,he was in Alfred High School. Recalls Khodidas:" Somabhai held my hand and taught me everything I was to know in painting and draw-ing".Two years later,in 1950, the young Parmar sent three paint-ings to an exhibition organised in Rajkot by Saurashtra Kala Man-dal,bagging the third prize for his work, Shyamsakhi.The painting was bought up by an enthusiast.Years later,Khodidas was to pay an unsual double-tribute to Somabhai. Remembers Joravarsinh Jadav: "It was some three-four years ago that the government had first thought to giving an award in folk art to Khodidasbhai,but he wrote a polite letter ,suggesting to the authorities it be given to his guru,Somabhai.It was given.Khodidas has also completed a manu-script on the life and work of Somalal Shah,profusely illustrated and full of rare insights into the life of Somalal."
In 1951,even as he was learning painting,Khodidas passed his metriculation in the first class and joined the Shamaldas College where his understanding of the significance and relevance of folk arts to real life were deepened because of his contact with two other people who were to play a great role in his moulding-- Dr Ish-warbhai Dave and Mr Takhtasinhji Parmar.
Grateful as he is,Khodidas did not,however, copy his guru's style in his work.He evolved a highly personal,decorative style in paint-ing.Although the inspiration came from the vast repertoire of folk art he has been ceaselessly collecting,Khodidas,says Joravarsinh Jadav,did not merely copy what was available in villages. While his work draws on the details of village life,it does not blindly ape the loseness of composition.He made the motifs and wall paintings more compact,added his own sense of proportion and aestehtics to implant a soul of its own. His paintings impress and interest the onlookers because life is throbbing in these,not merely captured as in a photograph.He makes the beauty of these works even more enjoyable because of his own artistic input.The pleasing effect this creates has in all these years made Khodidas a highly original art-ist,even as he was engaged in rescuing it from being forgotten.
Says Jadav: "Krishna is a favourite subject wiith Khodidas and he scrupulously does one painting at least a year for the Janmast-hami day.Similarly, another favourite subject is a ship.He must have done more than 30 paintings with a ship at the centre."
Along with this,Khodidas has been scrupulously writing on a wide variety of folk topics, ranging from the Kathiawadi turban -- there are a 100 turbans of different types in Saurashtra -- to stories being told orally only in remote places. The work follows somewhat in the footsteps of the late Zaverchand Meghani.
The importance of this activity is immense because most of these stories and songs are part of the oral tradition only. With the advent of modernity,and the newer media of entertainment such as radio and television,less and less use of these traditional forms is being made.Since these were orally passed on, the danger is that if someone were not to put it on paper,they would be lost forever in the dust of time. Already a lot of rich heritage of this nature has been lost.
Khodidas Parmar's uniqueness lies in the fact that he has been not only collecting these,but putting them on paper in the form of words and paintings.The cultural richness of the material is enough to explode the myth that our rual society has been a dull,drab and singularly boring existence until the arrival of the western man on the scene.In truth,the old village society was not as isolated as is believed."The motifs about Ramayana are almost the same in most parts of the country",says Khodidas by way of a proof.Similarly the motifs of lions found in some villages of Gohilwad are akin to those found in ancient Iran.
The artist-writer retired from a job as a lecturer at the V.A.M.C.College in Bhavnagar.He was offered a chair in folk art at Rajkot but declined to move away from his home base,for there is a lot of work of be done. "So far, nobody has brought on to paper the innumerable occasion songs such as those sung at the time of death,or lighthearted banter called fatana.He is working on an illus-trated volume on turbans,and another on embroidery.He coaches a group of students in painting at home,without charging any fee.He does not paint to order;nor does he price his works skyhigh.His children are also following the father's suit.A daughter is a good painter and so is a son.Another son is a good photogra-pher,besides being a folk artist.His is a single track existence.His passion,his hobby,his work,his liesure and his recreation are all the same; painting and writing. "When I am tired of writing,I take up the brush,and the other way round."At 64,he is not resting on his lau-rels -- or his murals--,working regularly from 8.30 am to 11 a m and then from 3.30 p m to 5 p m. His only diversion is a walk for an hour that he religiously takes every evening after 5 p m."Fortunately,I do not know how to ride even a bicycle and have escaped being a social person." His sketchbook and a pencil are his permament companions wherever he goes.He comes across as a very reserved man,but his family says he can be extremely jo-vial among people whom he knows quite well.Joravarsinh Jadav says that although Khodidas is a contented man,the best of him in painting is yet to come.The artist himself does not permit himself to say any such things.Driven by some inner force,he goes on docu-menting folk literature,striving torevive folk arts,reinvigorate
Tushar Bhatt
BHAVNAGAR:
Some people are like an iceberg; only one-tenth of their person-ality would be visible. Krishnalal Shridharani, who would have been only two years short now of centenary, had he been alive, is a prime example.
Known to Gujarat mostly as a very sensitive poet of the freedom struggle vintage, he is also vaguely recalled as having been a jour-nalist. Even in the city of Bhavnagar that boasts of him as one of its own, most think of him as Kavi Shridharani, a poet in Gujarati. Yet, this was only one part of his warm, vibrant, radiant and multifac-eted totality.
Though little remembered today, Krishnalal's lasting contribution in the world beyond the boundaries of Gujarat, was in his pioneer-ing efforts at explaining Gandhi and his tactics of fighting the British Empire, to the world at large in English, through writing and books. He was a follower of the Mahatma in strangely contrary ways. He did not believe in aping the Mahatma in his outward appearance and style; he loved pipe-smoking, was always nattily dressed and could easily pass off as a pucca Brown Sahib. But he was not. At heart, he was an Indian, who understood Gandhi and opted to tell the world about the Mahatma through words, rather than through clothes. In the process, he acquired the Western idiom, but re-mained a staunch Indian in values.
It is perhaps ironical, as also symbolic of his home state, Guja-rat, hardly anyone seemed to think of Shridharani, the youngest participant in the epoch-making Dandi March in 1930, save in Bhavnagar.
The city Bhavnagar appears to particularly revel in nostalgia in a general way, and in remembering those who made a name for themselves in arts, literature and culture. It boldly takes pride, pleasure and initiative in reminding itself and others of the greats it had produced.Shridharani's alma mater, Dakshinamurti, the Bhav-nagar Sahitya Sabha, his friends and admirers unfailingly think of the man, with gratitude and affection, on his birthday in September, something the rest of the State too ought to do, at least to erase the stigma that it is a land of the forgetful and the ungrateful.
Although he studied at Dakshinamurti and Gujarat Vid-yapeeth,Shridharani was apparently not cut out to be a conven-tional khadi-clad.He struck his own path and went to Shantini-ketan.Rabindranath Tagore was highly impressed by the sensitive Gujarati and urged him to travel to the West. It was to be a mo-mentous journey; it changed the course of his life.Gujarati literature was perhaps the only loser.
Late Harindra Dave, another sensitive soul, poet and journalist, once introduced Shridharani as a man who would swim against not just the current but also the flood. Anybody can make speed with the current, but only those with a rare force of soul could do so against the flow. At Karadi, just before reaching Dandi for the salt satyagrah, Krishnalal wrote a piece, Saput, and earned Gandhiji's affectionate rebuke for spinning yarn instead of the wheel.
His lifelong passion was writing. He was a journalist par excel-lence and an equally perceptive radio commentator, and in those days one of the rare breed of those who would wield their pens with facility both in Gujarati and English.
His books in English, including his auto-biography, My India My America, became best-sellers in the early 1940s.Long before he went abroad and began writing in English; Shridharani had won recognition as a poet and dramatist in Gujarati.
Born on September 16, 1911, at Umrala, Krishnalal's childhood passed mostly in Umrala, Bhavnagar and Junagadh. He lost his fa-ther, Jethalal, a lawyer with a roaring practice, when Shridharani was barely eight. The man that grew up did not remember much about his father, but a lot about his mother, Laheriben.
Krishnalal wrote about his mother in a poem, Maari Baa
Aradhanaman smarun roop Baanu,
Ne Baane smarine Prabhuroop pamun.
In 1957,in the revised edition of Kodiyan, Krishnalal noted that the first thing he would see while doing dhyan, just before getting up and when retiring for the day, was that instead of Om,his mind will show him the image of his mother.
His early days carried vivid memories of Girnar, the Gir, its flora and fauna. He joined an innovative educational institution, Dakshi-namurti in Bhavnagar. The schooling, full of experiments, proved beneficial for Krishnalal. He would not only take interest in poetry, but also took a hand at painting. When he was hardly 12,he wrote a raasdo, a folk song ,Halya Talakchand Sasare Lo.He penned in-numerable such things while in school, but his critical faculty was so sharp that he never included many of these in his collections published later, rejecting them as containing little of poetic ele-ments. But some were really brilliant, such as when he wrote about Gandhi, Daahbhari aankhon Matani,tenu tun aansu tapakyun. His love for painting reflected in his poems too.
Way back in 1941, Balwantray Thakore thought that Krishnalal's poetry was markedly different from that of either Umashankar Joshi or Sundaram, both tall poets. How and in what specific way,Thakore could not pinpoint but he underlined the language and art as having achieved a fusion in Krishnalal's poems.His dic-tion, other critics judged , was superb and the sensuousness of his poetry reminded a reader of Keats.
Poetry was not all. Shridharani also did considerable work in drama.
He joined Gujarat Vidyapeeth and was with Mahatma Gandhi during the Dandi March. For his part in the freedom struggle, Krishnalal served a term in jail. He also spent a couple of years at Shantiniketan and was one of the Gurudev's favourite pupils. He then went to the U.S. for studies ,and during his 12 years there took PhD in Sociology and Political Theory at Columbia University.
He continued writing at a breakneck speed in America, and the outcome was spectacular. In 1939, he gave a book in English, War Without Violence, explaining to the materialist West,the spiritual onslaught of the satyagrah, a non-violent and yet deadly weapon against repression and injustice. In 1946, he returned to India and made Delhi his home, joined the External Affairs Ministry, then un-der Jawahar Lal Nehru as an officer on special duty. But the poet did not fit in with the Babu culture of government and left the job to become a journalist, writing for the Amrita Bazar Patrika, travelling all over the country and world. In those days Delhi was not as crowded as it is today, and certainly not the madhouse of busybod-ies that it has become in the past three decades. He used to pen a column for the Gujarati daily, Sandesh too.
He married Sundari, artist daughter of noted Sindhi writer,philosopher and nationalist,Dayaram Didumal,in March,1950.He had wide ranging contacts and was very friendly with a lot of leaders including Nehru, Mrs Indira Gandhi, her hus-band, Phiroze Gandhi,and Dr S.Radhakrishnan,as also a host of foreign dignitaries.
When in Delhi and not doing anything else, he would potter around his flower-beds and lilly-ponds and read stories to children.
His contribution to the Gujarati literature was immense, mainly as a poet and dramatist. Yet, he was recognised rather belatedly only. Even Gujarat did nothing. It was only in 1958, Krishnalal was suddenly discovered by the literary establishment. He was named for the Ranjitram gold medal for services to literature.
Krihsnalal died unexpectedly on July 23,1960,when he was hardly 49. It was not an age to go and considering what he had al-ready written, much more was yet to come. That was not to be.
Among the noteworthy literary creations of Krishnalal, besides Kodiyan, are Punarpi, Vadlo, Sonapari and three plays, Piyo Gori, Morna Inda and Padmini. His English books include My India,My America, War Without Violence, Warning to the West, The Big Four of India, The Adventures of the Upside-Down, The Journalist in India, Smiles From Kashmir and the Mahatma and the World.
All his works in both languages have a common thread; all re-veal him to be a highly sensitive and equally perceptive person. My India,My America won Shridharani ecstatic reviews in the American Press. Thomas Sigrue writing in the New York Herald Tribune hailed it as a "fascinating mixture of autobiography, biography, po-litical analysis,philosophical exposition and fine writing." The 646-page book's writer was described by others as a young man who has the wisdom of the ages of his people.
On his return to India, he kept on writing. His four portraits in words of Nehru,Rajendra Prasad,Rajaji and Sardar Patel,as also his monograph on journalism show him as a journalist far ahead of his time,in his style of wrting, his assessment of people and events and his perception of the future.He wrote of India's first prime min-ister,Nehru , as a man who seldom had intimate friends who was most of the time,"mangificently and dangerously aloof.The passing away of the Mahatma and Patel had removed from the Indian scene the last men who could admonish Nehu."Every individual,in order to keep his sanity, must have some people who can tell him when the occasion arises that ' you are making a fool of yourself'. The man who occupies too high a pedestal for anybody to stand on equal level with him,runs the risk of losing his sense of proportion", Krishnalal observed.Of Sardar Patel whom he called a practical man,Krishnalal said: "The death of Patel marked a sharper turning point in the infant career of independent India than did the martyr-dom of Mahatma Gandhi....Gandhi left a universal void; the void created by Patel's passing away is purely national, and so it is felt more intensely...Patel was a strong man, and now India is without a strong man.The passing away of a strong man always creates a serious situation.For,when a strong man dies, he not only creates a void,but he also removes the lid. Pent-up, seething forces begin to find expression." These portraits were illustrated by caricatures drawn by late cartoonist, Shankar, who later started the celebrated, and now defunct Shankar’s Weekly, a world class cartoon journal.
Most of Shridharani’s English books are not available now. Those few copies that are there are the possessions of pride for their owners.That Krishnalal Shridharani should have passed away so early in his life was a tragic loss not only to literature but also to journalism.The best way to commemorate his memory would be to republish some of his unavailable literature and scan the family ar-chives to see if there was anything unpublished left behind.
(The End)
मून बर्न्स
Tushar Bhatt Journalist
Neither Capitalism,nor Communism;
Tushar Bhatt
Sometimes we are so intent on the trees that we miss the forest altogether. In the thunder of heated arguments ,mostly heard in seminar halls and drawing rooms,over whether or not the policy of globalization is desirable for India, the meek voices of dissent are getting drowned.
Economics has been sometimes derisively dubbed as witchcraft because to a common man it appears that no hard and fast formulae for the economic growth are available. Add to this, the dense fog hanging over the entire spectrum of Indian polity because standard bearers of different party flags, ranging from the Congress to the Bharatiya Janata party are groping in the dark. Have we given up the cherished objective of eradication of poverty as the touchstone for our policies? Politicians still pay a lip-service to poverty removal as the goal, but to the ordinary people they sound hollow.
Politics and Economics are like twins who shape each other’s destiny. Economists can see through the thick layers of platitudes, clichés and rhetoric of politicians more quickly than others. For the average politico , economics remains elusive. Their perceptions can be compared with several blind men’s description of how does an elephant look like. Each one has touched a different part to speak about, but none has seen the whole beast.
The Congress had some elements of an economic policy but lost them in the post-Indira Gandhi era, heralded by none other than the present Prime Minister who was then the union Finance Minister,Dr. Man Mohan Singh.The reluctant manner in which he packaged the policy has forever remained in the vogue. The tsunami generated by the globalization and liberalization policies was supposed to sweep away the license-quota-permit raj. It did not do so.
But . it swept away the remains of Gandhiji’s tenets of Hind Swaraj, the Nehruvian model of economic development, Indira Gandhi’s Garibi Hatao call and venomous opposition to industry, the crown prince of the Capitalism.
An unspoken but obvious stress on Luxury Badhao call is implicit in the market blitz for selling cars and other consumption goods to an over-eager and voluble middle class. Politicians like to hear flattering noises from the chattering middle class. It provides sustenance to sagging self-confidence about one’s continuing prosperity. Sadly, this class is not in a majority which should account for electoral upsets. The media, especially the TV channels failed in correctly guessing the mood of the electorate during the last Lok Sabha elections because like newspapers the TV channels to are city-centred and unable to read the villagers mind. The bureaucracy too comes in this category but it escaped notice as it is customary to blame the “inept politicians” for every wrong.
It is the loss of their raison d’etre that bothers the political parties.
An ideological vacuum in our polity is discernible and this is at the root of all the confusion seen in government policies. Steps to globalize the economy cannot go hand-in-hand with ideals of a welfare society, visualized by our Republic’s Founding Fathers. Earlier, politicians wanted to come to power with a promise to work for larger good of society. Now they have to seek popular mandate for a lethal mix of laissez-faire and the right of the State to intervene for the larger good (read: for the protection of the down-trodden .
At the other end,in the world at large, the Communist bloc collapsed. All the carefully worked out equations among the Capitalist bloc of the West, the Socialist bloc under the tutelage of the Soviet Union and the Non-aligned bloc of India and other developing nations hoping to play a decisive role in the emerging world order, were thrown to the winds. As a result, the United States of America got by default the role of the economic and political policeman of the globe. It is a tough job, especially when America wants everybody to give primacy to the interests of the world’s wealthiest country.
The changing political paradigm has a relevance to what happens in the economies of populous countries like China and India. In the wake of the breaking down of the Berlin Wall, just 20 years ago, the unification of West and East Germany took place. Gradually, the Communism got dismantled in as many as 17 countries.
This rapid march of freedom for all was expected to lead on its own to new opportunities for an equitable distribution of wealth in the world. Unfortunately, this has remained a chimera.
If the Socialist ideals seemed to be on their death-bed, the notions of Capitalism being a natural growth engine were also terminally ill. Recent reports showed that people living in the former East German part of the country were able to face economic difficulties of the recession better than the residents in the West German territory. The reason was that the east German citizens were more disciplined.
Economic crisis is staring in the face of the 17 former Communist economies; some have a food shortage too. Some people have started wondering if the switch-over to the western model of governance was a wise step. One might wonder which side would win if the choice was between vote and lot (flour).
In India too price rise in essential goods and commodities such as food grains was causing concern even as luxury market did brisk business. It is interesting to note that computers, TV sets, air-conditioners, refrigerators and cars are becoming better and cheaper, the prices of vegetables, gur, sugar, food stuffs were not showing any signs of a fall.
Some experts argue that electronics goods were benefiting from better technological improvement almost every week. On the other hand,not only has the population increased,there has been no new addition of any higher-yielding variety in major food crops like wheat and rice. There has been a stagnation in farm research.
What are the implications of all this ? Is there a real recession in our country? Does our data collection give an accurate reflection of the reality? After all, all figures can lie and all liars can figure!
Whether they have an insight into economic policy or not, politicians do have a strong nose for sniffing the rising of an evil wind. The political hierarchies of different parties are all agreed upon a feeling that something is wrong.
Of course, they still do not have any clue to what to do to wither it and this adds to their fearfulness. Some conflicting points have emerged.They realize that even the half baked new economic policy package has led to a smart industrial growth and the export-import balance has improved. The stock markets have generally been favourable to investors. The entry of the private sector has improved infra-structure facilities like roads.
But, this is only one part of the story. Industrial development is still incapable of any large-scale jobs generation. Modern industry is not employee-intensive. Take an industry like a petroleum products refinery which may cost several thousand crores of rupees but will give direct employment to less than 5,000 people. In fact, outside services like truck-tankers will employ four-fold more persons, who will get a fraction of the refinery operators, all highly skilled.
Yet, all the States including West Bengal’s Marxist have been wooing industrialist with ardour.Even the polit buro,the high command of CPM expressed its disappointment when Mr Ratan Tata decided to shift his Nano car factory out of WB because of hostility of Miss Mamta Banerjee’s Trunmool party.
Mr Narendra Modi was hailed as great persuader when he cajoled Tatas to locate Nano at Sanand in Gujarat. One CPM leader of south India was so much impressed that he asked leftist-ruled State to emulate Mr. Modi. He was thrown out, not because of his pro-capitalist views but for praising the Gujarat chief minister.
The leftist leaders were out to win and influence industrialists, something that would make both Mao and Marx turn in their graves. The industry tycoons were having best of both the worlds. They were ready to negotiate best terms without worrying about their host government’s ideology because they knew ideology did not matter a damn.
The Nano episode and Mr Tata mirrored this “secular” attitude admirably. He has had no trouble with the CPM and the BJP. He had to quit West Bengal because of a small regional party hell-bent on ending the 33-year-old rule of the CPM dominated government. What was more interesting is the reality that Miss Mamta Banerjee’s tiny personal political formation is an ally of the Congress which now runs the government at the Centre, not averse to Tatas at all. The irony is that yet the mercurial Mamta is a minister in the union cabinet. It is apparent that an ideological chaos prevails now in our polity.
The stock markets have been highly volatile but on balance generally favourable. But one might wonder if the notional spurt resulting from incessant trading adds anything to the primary capital formation. The gains in wealth of various crorepatis based on notional increase in their momentary worth in share prices is doubtful at best and comparable to Mungeri Lal Ke Sunhare Sapne. It attracts more international players to domestic market but this is good or bad depends on which end of the binoculars you are looking from.
A side effect is worth noting. Lured by the prospect of a quick buck, many small investors have entered the market, at the cost of small savings. Banks and finance authorities have fanned this trend by cutting down on interests payable on bank deposits. Clearly, the government is encouraging bigger spending by the people instead of savings. Are we now followers of Charvak who advised one and all to make merry even by selling off household goods like utensils to buy ghee for the rice? He did not clarify what was to be done when all the utensils had been sold and there was no money even to buy rice,let alone ghee.
There is one more crucial area where the promise of a welfare state has taken a big knock. Labour laws ,ensuring welfare of staff, have been given an unceremonious burial. Following the US model, companies have introduce ten-hour work days,cut down on the privilege leave,sick leave and even casual leave. Hiring and firing is a common happening now.Once hated, farming out of jobs to contractors whose workers are lower-paid is now widespread in the fancy name of out-sourcing. Opportunities for women in the upper echelons of society may have brightened, but in the case of women of the poor, the job opportunities are shrinking.
On the other hand, agriculture is still not picking up. The pace of urbanization has spectacularly quickened because jobless poor, especially the landless and marginal farmers are flocking to the cities.In Indian cities urbanization has been marked by a rapid growth of slums and deterioration in the quality of life. The stupendous growth of Surat in the past two decades is an eye-opening example. It sounds like a joke, but it is true that living conditions in the slums themselves have worsened as a result of the flood of new migrants. The situation in backward,poorer areas of Andhra Pradesh,Jharkhandand Maharashtra saw an upsurge in the violent movements such as Naxalism. Neither the Centre nor the States have been able to tackle the menace
The demographic composition of cities is also undergoing a sea-change.The Suratis have been grumbling over that non-Suratis or outsiders leaping towards a majority. The term outsider apply generally to people from other States such as Rajasthan,Punjab,Bihar and Orissa.
The term non-Suratis include people from other state and other regions like Saurashtra which within Gujarat.
The spurt in urban population automatically leads to a pressure on civic amenities like water,roads, housing, public transport and environment.Cities like Surat which are in the vanguard of growth may become industrial slums.
It is pertinent to note that while countries like India hope to hasten their growth rate, rich countries like the U.S.A. are also keen that we follow the policies of globalization. Why?
For the same reason that made Columbus set out for discovering a sea route to India or for which the British set up East India Company. The British ambassador who landed at Surat on way to Delhi to meet the Mughal Emperor did not come to found the British Raj. They merely wanted permission to start trading. The British flag, symbolizing power followed later and that too for protecting their trading interests and ended up ruling much of India.
The West, some people guess, has been operating an informal New East India company to advance its trading. The logic, which critics of this formulation say is that the collapse of what a president of the USA called the Evil Empire of the Soviet Union removed the need to maintain military levels of confrontation high. It led to cutting down of money of armaments and transport. Tank manufacturers started making tractors and so on. This cutback in industry operations may have sown the seeds of the current recession in America. They can produce all right, but….
Who will buy these goods?
For some quaint reason the two major Colas, Pepsi and Coke, have been considered a proof of open door policy. Along with them, other junk foods like pizza also arrive, wiping out local foods and colas, though there is nothing wrong with Locha Khaman in Surat and Fafda in Ahmedabad, or the soft drinks made by Parle products before the American cola invasion.
This is creating an artificial demand for the trivia.It is not too aggravating to imagine what will happen if multi-nationals were given a free-run in the
Dairy sector where the Anand-pattern of co-operative dairying has carved out a name for itself. Given a chance, multi-national entities can deliberately flood the Indian market with dairy products at prices half of our dairies’.to conquer the market. The loss would be huge but the multi-nationals can sustain the deficit for a longer time, undermining the existence our local dairies which do not have resources to survive the competition. It will not happen tomorrow, but it is plausible. What happened to an Indian company producing corn flakes? It got wiped out with the entry of an American firm, which later raised price to recoup losses suffered initially.This is just an appetizer.
One result of the liberal policy is slow death of our products. Foreign brands are aggressively marketed,sold at a low price initially and when indigenous competition is finished ,there inevitably will be a jacking up of prices.I ndia has a huge middle class-some say as many as 15 crore people or more than the population of Europe.
Think of a scenario in which India and China become sources of cheap man-power and raw materials suppliers and purchasers of goods and services ranging for junk food to jet planes,toys and tractors, machines and medicines—a vassal State..
Of course, this is an extreme view, but it needs to be kept in mind,lest we forget. Let us hope for the best but remain mindful of the worst too.
Even without considering such frightening spectres, we need to hasten slowly, carefully. Even though the current polity is sans a socio-economic ideology, in a country like India where the poor will remain in a majority for a long time to come, no political party can hope to survive in the race for power if it ignores the have-nots. Whether they are leftists like the Communist Party Marxist or the rightists like the BJP, everybody has to think of the poor in their policy making.
This a hurdle that tripped the Vajpayee government and is haunting the Congress. The age of making promises and give false slogans to clinch an election is gone.The parties need to find a way to forge a policy that will have plus points of globalization amalgamated with the policies of the State intervention such as food subsidies and protection of the poor as well as dovetailing expenditure on social sectors. Education has been privatized in a variety of fields, f rom play groups to self-reliant university education. Self-reliant is a deceptive description. Really speaking, it is nearer to the concept of pay and use at well-maintained public conveniences.
All it means is that your sons and daughters can study in such institutions even without good marks if you cough up money. This amount is normally beyond the reach of a common man who ends up taking a loan.
The same goes for toll-paying express ways. If you cannot pay, you can’t travel.
It has been forgotten that road network is also a social sector. Thousands of villages benefited from the State Transport buses plying between towns and villages, carrying boys and girls to schools and colleges, employees to work places, vegetables, milk and other perishable commodities traveling to market place.
The sector that stood to suffer the maximum damage is health. Hospitals owned like hotels by entrepreneurs charge fancy money, much above the capacity of an average Indian. The government-run health service is ill-equipped.
On top of it all is the rampant corruption. The prime minister has been repeatedly and publicly complaining about it even as Karnataka , Andhra Pradesh and Jharkhand States have been in political turmoil instigated by businessmen and mining lobbies. Mr Singh said that these were examples of poor governance in the States.
It would appear that the failure of both the Capitalism and Communism has left the political class globally bewildered. They badly need a third way and not the globalization of the economy. Throughout history, economic compulsions have always dictated political action.
The present time is no exception.Gandhi gave a vision of Swaraj, mainly inward looking. Jawahar Lal Nehru experimented with the proposition of a mixed economy with public sector at the commanding heights.
India and the world now need a Third Way that would provide a fusion of both the ideas plus the dynamism of a free market economy. As the Mahatma aptly said, there is enough in the world to meet everybody’s need, but not for everybody’s greed. A new world order is needed,
It is a tall task. But that does not mean it is impossible.
=====Tushar Bhatt
--
Tushar Bhatt,
J 3\14, Patrakar Colony No.1,
Vijaynagar, Naranpura,
A H M E D A B A D 380 013
phone 079 27432152
>
--
Tushar Bhatt,
J 3\14, Patrakar Colony No.1,
Vijaynagar, Naranpura,
A H M E D A B A D 380 013
phone 079 27432152
--
Tushar Bhatt,
J 3\14, Patrakar Colony No.1,
Vijaynagar, Naranpura,
A H M E D A B A D 380 013
phone 079 27432152
Tusharsworld
AddThis
