Verrier Elwin and his Tribals

It was a chance encounter with Verrier Elwin at the most unlikely place, the Sahitya Akademi book store. The book is a collection of his articles and excerpts. No less than Mahasweta Devi associated herself with this book as ranslation editor.

What a man! Left oxford; left the missionery service; deserted the possibility of becoming another Hume or Besant in the company of likes of Gandhi, Patel etc. Reached Bastar and made for himself a hut, married a maria gond woman and transformed himself into a tribal carrying out all rituals including marriage and sex. What was his motivation to embrace a life sans all modern comforts? It was amusing to learn from his contemporaries that he started enjoying life only at that stage of life with all the ingredients-wine, woman, nature.

Ram Guha heard about him in a tribal district of Orrissa. North East people still remember him for the NEFA policy he could push through, which is largely responsible for relative survival of the tribal culture in north-east. Till his death in sixties he managed to keep away the predators from Bastar to a large extent. What more can a British turned Adivasi do for India?

Germination
It's a rally out there, Shouting:
Silence the lone shrill voice of protest!
Long live the noble thoughts!
Wipe out the blot,
Slowly build up the slogans-
Sharper, finer and focussed.
One stroke should be enough
To open up the skull of dissidence.
Let it live till it is on the screen
Let it be in headline for sometime.
Once it goes to the archivesWho bothers?

It's a crowd out there;
The lonely corpse in a bolted room,
The bullet hole on the saffron robe, or
On the widow white cloth,
Or blood stained sharee of a virgin
Spread over the bush on a barren land.

It's a procession of ghosts out there.
Come together from each corner of the earth;
Holding each others' hands in a chain.
The awakening of the dead soldiers of freedom.
It's a chorus out there:
All singing in unison in a moonlit night.
It's the warm lap of rain drenched earth,
Dark shadows of leafy trees guarding the fence.

It's the kingdom of ghosts.
It's the only hope of the chained souls,
The misfits and the weaklings,
Who also inherited the earth.

Musings on "Medea" by TeatroInstabile Di Aosta

Medea!

For thousands of years

You perpetuated the horror of love

Not the pining.

How did you think that it's you

Who will decide what to happen.

It's your life, your beautiful body,

You decide what to do with it.

But you played omnipotent and

Took upon yourself

The task of correcting the course of life

Of yourself and all those around you.

Was it infatuation?

Or the jealousy of Euripidis?

Whatever it may be -

You wont ever be Shakuntala

The woman who sired a dynasty.