Society over Self

The self versus society question has been a matter of intense discussion among thinkers. The current purpose is not go into that aspect, but to highlight thoughts of two Odia (Oriya) thinkers/social reformers who espoused the cause of society over self.

One is among the famous lines from the well known poet laureate (kavi samrat) Upendra Bhanj. It reads as follows.

Mo jibana pache narke padi thau,
jagata udhara hau

Translated to English it means:

Let my life be consigned to hell,
Let the universe be saved (redeemed of all ills).

Some critiques interpret it too literally and say if the universe is redeemed of all ills then the poet would also benefit from this and not be consigned to hell. In my interpretation, the poet is indicating that he wants to sacrifice his self for the benefit of the larger society, nay universe.

The other saying that I take is from Gopabandu Dash, a social reformer and freedom fighter from Odisha (Orissa). Once he left his ailing/dying son to address the call of his motherland. One of his famous lines reads as:

Misu mo deha a desha matire,
Desha basi chali jaantu pithire

Translated to English it means:

My body should become one with my country's land,
Let countrymen walk over my back (to get freedom)

The author does not mind becoming one with mother Earth so that people can walk over him to get freedom. Here again the sacrifice of the self over the larger good is espoused.

Loss of the Unseen

There is no fetal heartbeat. This news was shocking for Nandini and me when we had gone for a normal check up to the health centre on 7th September. Into the 10th week of pregnancy we were looking forward to completing the first trimester. But fate had something else in store...

Medically as also for religious purposes this cannot be termed as death, as this was not preceded by birth. For us (more so for Nandini and to a lesser extent for Nerika, our four year old daughter, and me) this was not so. For Nandini, it was life that had started growing in her. Yes, another life. A life that was not seen but felt in each and every moment.

Nerika was very excited. It was her need for a sibling, particularly a baby sister, that had led us to consider for this second child. Once we shared her the news after conception she would talk about the baby, give a kiss to her Amma's pota, keep a hand on Amma's pota while reciting the Gayatri Mantra before going to bed. When she heard the news on returning from school, she cried for a few minutes.

The first thought that crossed our minds was whether we did not do something properly. Were we not as carefully as we were during Nerika's time? Was my going away from Mumbai at this crucial juncture not the correct thing? Should we have done the sonography a week or ten days earlier? Were we little complacent in thinking that nothing would go wrong this time? Our doubts only remained as doubts because the Doctor as well literature indicate that such instances of miscarriage happens in 25-30 per cent of the cases. We went for a second opinion, not exactly hoping for a miracle, but just to reconfirm. That done, we were left with the question of why us?

Left with no answer we think that it is perhaps in the larger scheme of things, which is not known. This personal loss of the unseen was not of one unknown. It was from one among us who lived with us for those ten weeks. Equally disparaging is the loss of the seen and the (un)known* in Kosi ravaged Bihar.

* Unknown form a personal point of view but known to us from a larger humanitarian perspective.

Communal Strife in Kandhamal, Orissa

After a gap of one-and-a-half years I visited Bhubaneswar in the last week of August 2008. The reason was personal (my father has not been keeping well) as well as professional (to attend a workshop at the University). Apart from these personal and professional aspects, two things have drawn my attention - the communal strife in Kandhamal and some positive changes in Bhubaneswar.

On the wee hours of August 24 while Janmashtami (festival associated with the birth of of Lord Krishna) preparations were on way Swami Laxmanananda, a Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) member, and four of his associates were killed by unidentified gunmen in an Ashram in Kandhamal district. The Government's immediate reaction was that this was the handiwork of Maoist whereas some others thought that this was the work of some Christian groups. This led to communal strife in Kandhamal and other parts of the state.

Kandhamal has about 52 per cent tribals (more than 90 per cent of these being Kondha - hence, the name of the district as Kandhamal) and 17 per cent scheduled castes (nearly 80 per cent of them being Panos). The political power is with the scheduled castes - one parliamentary seat and one assembly seat (both for Phulbani, the district headquarters) whereas the scheduled tribes have two assembly seats (Baliguda and Udayagiri). The overall economic situation is not good. It is a district in the southern region (the poorest across the three regions as per the National Sample Survey Classification with 73 per cent rural and 55 per cent urban being considered as poor). The district wise human development index of 2001 indicates that Kandhamal ranks 29 across 30 districts.

The communal divide in Kandhamal is not new. There were similar instances in December 2007 and also earlier. It seems that the communal divide, asF. G. Bailey stated almost 50 years ago, is a continuation of the caste-tribe divide. Different sects of Christianity have been working among both tribals and scheduled castes. Some Hindu group have also been working in this district. A recent write-up by Angana Chatterji seems to indicate that Swami Laxmanananda had a greater impact on the tribals and a conflicting situation with Christian scheduled castes did exist. The situation is definitely complex - poverty, caste-tribe divide, religious differences are some of them. The challenge before the state government is to address all these on a continuous basis. This will help in the long run to bring about progress.

While talking about progress, I was quite impressed by some developments in Bhubaneswar, the state capital. I was told that this is the handiwork of the Municipal Corporation. Well-kept roads, signs indicating directions at junctions, zebra crossings, vending zones, cycling paths, and painting in public walls depicting the multiple cultural ethos of Orissa. We need some similar out-of-the-box thinking for Kandhamal.