Birth Death and Interval

Disillusionment, disease, debility and death may be the most accursed terms but much of philosophy, medical science and spirituality have evolved and flourished around them. Disillusionment transformed Gautama into Buddha. His father's death led the boy Venkatramana on the path of inquiry, turning him into Ramana Maharshi. An incurable disease propelled Narayana Bhattatiri to repackage the Bhagavatam into an epic poem called Narayaneeyam.

Understanding death is not possible without understanding birth and what caused it. Why are we here? From the darkness of the womb we go unto the womb of darkness called death after traversing a well lit zone called life. People are born to fulfill residual desires and the outstanding obligations of their previous tenure. The earth is karma bhoomi and here alone and nowhere else, human being has a facility to execute their desires and obligations. What is born is not man but a medley of accumulated desires, hatred, anger and frustrations. The physical frame is just a bundle of electrical bulbs through which the cross-currents of emotions express themselves. We are here on our own volition, to undergo pain and pleasure and gain vital knowledge necessary to go beyond pangs of birth.

Seeking an answer to the question: What after death? Is like wanting to know what lies beyond the edge of the universe. No one has gone there on a fact-finding Mission and come back with a status report. However, there have been reports of evidence being available on reincarnation and rebirth. Strangely, while there have been numerous incidents of people remembering their previous births with fair amount of accuracy, three has been no instance of people recalling what transpired in the interval between two births. The plausible explanation for this could be that mind remains in hibernation in the intervening period.

Death is a welcome pause in a long journey of the soul in its evolutionary course. Death is stocktaking time. After assessing the merits and demerits of the previous birth the soul is replenished with newer equipments to resume its journey. There is as much purpose in death as in life.

More often than not, death is dreaded for its timing rather than its occurrence. When a young person dies, we react far more intensely than we do when an elderly person dies. But the difference is only in perception. When the physical body or mind or mind loses its capacity to execute karma or finds no further scope within the existing framework, it contrives to have a tryst with destiny.

Every death is an inconsolable loss for near and dear ones. For the bereaved, death is a source of sorrow but for the deceased it is the cessation of all pain. We weep not because somebody had got relief but for our own sorrow. All considered death is the only viable option for this organic body, which past its prime, tends to degrade even while alive. Today has to vacate its place for tomorrow to come in Ramana Maharshi was once asked by a group of disciples. 'Where do people go after death? He responded: Did you enquire where they came from, to be able to ask this question?

None has escaped the jaws of death but some have escaped the jaws of birth and attained immorality.

Best Work

Meaning: As the stanza of the Rigved 1/90/7 the meaning can be given like this - "Do such work in the world whereby everyone will enjoy happiness, peace and cheer.

Message: The corner stone of man's stability and progress is his dedication. If we ignore our responsibilities and the prescribed duties, then such obstacles will be created, that life itself will become difficult, let alone progress and achievement. Every achievement in life depends on dedication to work. The stability and safety of every achievement depends only on dedicated faith in work. It is our own responsibility to keep this very valuable body healthy, nourished and long-lived so that we can perform maximum deeds for people's welfare and create an atmosphere of peace, happiness and cheer everywhere. It is our duty to save the mind from worry, sorrow, disappointment, fear, anger, impulsiveness etc, for maintaining mental capacity and excellence. With that only the qualities like joy, enthusiasm, patience, courage, satisfaction, balance, stability, concentration and trust can enter the heart. If the mind is allowed to grow like wild grass, it becomes our own enemy. It is every man's duty to bring his mind under control and make himself cultured.

The joy of family-life is incomparable. But it is possible only when every member of the family carries out his responsibility properly with full involvement, care and honesty for all the needs of every member regarding health, comforts, satisfaction and development. We must also fulfill the responsibility of giving our love, time and cooperation to make the children cultured and organized. Only responsible people are able to get the joy of family-life.

Every member of the society also is burdened with human responsibilities. Every citizen of a cultured society remains awake and alert towards his moral, societal and national responsibility and increases the reputation of the country. It is every man's duty to maintain the purity of thought, atmosphere and ecology in the society. The extent to which a man takes interest in the uplift of the society and personal abnegation for public-welfare, to that extent he is great.

It si necessary that all of us understand very properly our duties so that everywhere in the society, there is an atmosphere of peace and happiness and all can go easily on the path of progress. Let us listen to the voice of our soul and go on striving for making this human life meaningful by fulfilling the tasks decided by the God.

Arrivals and Departures

Flying has now become a terminal condition

Does it have something to do with Saturn becoming more saturnine, or kalam more calamitous? Blaming an Icelandic eruption would be too far-fetched, or simply too far, so instead of the volcano, should we blame El Nico? Is it the negative energy released by 'honor' killings and dishonorable top-cops? There has to be some reason not visible to the naked eye, or even to the fully addressed mind, that accounts for the serial aviation accidents, actual or averted, that have shaken us in the past fortnight.

The fiery end of AI express flight 812 on May 22, the worst ever Boeing 737-800 crash in terms of fatalities, was an unmitigated, unnerving, unconscionable tragedy, but the horror stories which have been streaming out of the skies ever since seem more like farce. Perhaps we should be thankful. For, if those near accidents had come any closer to their grim potential, we would have little to laugh about these either.

Just three days after Mangalore, the travel plans of the presidents of India and Turkmenistan managed to divert as many as 11 Delhi-bound flights. But why you are complaining it? You are getting a free ride to Chandigarh/Lucknow/Jaipur, no? And extra egg bhurji in addition to scrambled appointments too. Expectedly, the Rajasthatn expedition had the most adventure courtesy gusty winds, dust storms and no approach radar at Sanganer airport. When the jet Lite, kingfisher and jet Airways flights finally kissed the ground, they had only three, 10 and 13 minutes of flying time left in their respective fuel tanks. This kind of mathematical neatness may hold up the universe, but it could also have brought it crashing down for their 524 passengers.

In the past week, more bungles tumbled out of real life headlines than anything that could be thought up by a script writer of film drama or black comedy. A tire burst forced a Srinagar bound spice jet to return to Delhi and land with full emergency regalia. Air India had to perform a nail biting 'go around' at Patna airport. An AI express Dubai-Pune flight with 112 passengers rapidly descended several thousand feet above Muscat in a loonatic fashion - the pilot had gone to the toilet, the autopilot got disengaged, and the copilot couldn't control the plane. Then in Mumbai, an IndiGo Airbus 320 blithely entered a runway on which a jet airways boeing was cleared to land, and was already just about 1.8 km from touchdown. An alert ATC saved the day and 230 passengers calling out to the jet pilot to abort the flight, and  the two planes swished past each other.

Yes, Holy/ Bolly/ Tolly/ Molly-wood has been overtaken by folly-wood. Drama (and slapstick) in real life is now showing t an airport near you. And smashing the box-office and passenger confidence. \the descent is scary, dark and deep, and we have air miles to go before we sleep in peace.

Yet all this third world muddling is happening against the background of our swishy new terminals, the most visible proof of India's globalization  Sharad Pawar's disparaging of the earlier Mumbai airport as 'worse than a bus station' is a forgotten nightmare now that these spaces re as different from their socialist avatar as Mr Pateel is from Mr Pawar. Every arrival or departure revels a whole new extension or at least yet another, even more exclusive international brand outlet manned by women as sleek as cabin crew, and made up like the kitchen crew of saas-bahu serials. The runway too is getting the hi-tech treatment, but in the light of the recent adventures of our planes, perhaps it should be called a 'runway' instead.

After Every Monsoon, There's a Flood of Bad News

In the great plains of India, there is nothing romantic about the monsoon; People's fate depends on the monsoon's mood swings. If it falls to keep its date with the country, there is drought. If it's over generous, the floods cause death and destruction. Even when it's "normal", some river somewhere exceeds the danger mark and kills a few hundred people. After the skies clear and the water recedes, armies of mosquitoes and bugs launch attacks. Millions fall prey with chills, cramps, fever. In this part of the world, drought, deluge and death are as much an annual phenomenon as the monsoon.

Bangladesh may be famous for its notorious floods, but India is not far behind. Every year, the monsoon floods leave a trial of destruction in India. Roughly 20% of deaths caused by flooding worldwide occur here; some 30 million people are evacuated every year. Every witness an "unprecedented flood". Every other year the "worst flood in living memory" leaves scores dead. Is India becoming ever more vulnerable to monsoon fury?

No, say Vinod K Sharma and AD Kaushik of the National Centre for Disaster Management in a recent paper on floods in India. They argue that states did not appear quite as vulnerable as before because there was less developmental activity and population pressure. "However; in the present time unabated population and high rate of developmental activities forced on the occupation of flood plains has made the society highly vulnerable to flood losses", they wrote.

In 2009, the monsoon was weak and deficient but it caused floods, deaths and displacement in Orissa, Kerala, Karnataka, Gujarat and the north-eastern states. In 2008, the monsoon was normal, but Bihar faced the worst flood crisis ever as the Kosi brqched its embankment, changed course and deluged several districts, leaving hundreds dead and three million homeless.

Call of Duty

It is better to perform one's own duties imperfectly than to master the duties of another. By fulfilling the obligations he is born with, a person never comes to grief. No one should abandon duties because he sees defeats in them. (Bhagavad Gita 18:44:48)

Duty, the essence of which is truth, is said to be the root of all in this world; it is truth that is the support of duty; everything has truth as its basis; there is nothing greater than the truth.  (Ramayana 109)

If one does not perform duty to one whom the duty is due, one becomes a thief of the duty.      (Avesta, Videvdad 4)

Do daily and hourly your duty; do it patiently and thoroughly. Do it as it presents itself; do it at the moment, and let it be its own reward ……. Never mind whether it is known and acknowledged or not, but do not fall to do it.   (James H Aughey)

A Package Deal

Our daughter's wedding was round the corner and my wife had been pestering me to make the arrangements. Lazy to the core, responsibilities, I had been avoiding this work on some pretest or the other. But when things reached a tipping point, I decided to take the bull by the horns and find a suitable tent-wala for the wedding.

My neighbors were kind enough to give me the address of a tent-wala whose services he had used for his daughter's wedding, with a word of caution. "You can't beat these guys as far as rates are concerned. But if you'll beat them in one thing, they will beat you in two," he warned. Nevertheless after a long discussion with the tent-wala, we arrived at a price for the shaming. "Are there any discounts"? I asked. "Sir, there are no discounts, but the price for you will be less if you take our package deal" came the cocky reply.

I'd heard about deals between Mittal and Arcelor, Sonia and Lalu and, more recently, Sonia and Mamatadi. But getting an offer from a tent-house salesman took me by surprise. The "package deal", it turned out, consisted of "all normal services plus furniture, decoration, mandap and food arrangements" I quipped: You are only a shamiana supplier, what do you know about furniture, decoration and food?" The salesman said: "We have a working relationship with other suppliers aimed t taking care of all our customers' need. Bring your cheque-book along and we'll take care for all your worries!

India's on the move, I told my wife when I got back home. Even tent-walas talk about working relationships, customer needs and what have you. "What's wrong with that? My wife asked. "If fast-food joints in cinema halls can offer deals, why can't poor tent-wala? This is what you call empowerment. Only, it wasn't just one tent-wala, there were four salesmen, each offering a deal different from the other. While one offered a free chair for every table, the other offered a free something else for every chair. I asked my wife: "If the number of guests we invite is fixed what we will do with extra tables and chairs? Besides, I hate this word deal. It makes me feel as if I am doing something's sinister, something under the table, like politicians. One more thing, the offers we get in cinema halls are not deals, they are combos"

"We never had these things in our times", said Arvin, a friend, who overheard our conversation. "All we had were Bata prices and off-season discounts. Marketing was largely transparent. Nobody hid anything from you. In fact there was nothing to hide. There were straightforward products with straightforward prices. You either took them or left them. These days they tell you only half the story, the other half is for you to guess. Or it's hidden behind asterisks saying conditions apply, in print you can hardly read.

I agreed. It was like incoming and outgoing call schemes or mobile companies. Only when you get the bill do you realize what you've gone and done. Two years since I took my connection, I am still to understand the business of incoming and outgoing calls. Arvin reminded me that they also wanted us to believe we can save more by spending more!

At this point, my wife interrupted: "Bata prices and discounts are passé. These are the days of happy hours, combos, grand slams, early bird discounts, and buy two-get one free, buy talc-get soap free and of course, package deals all aimed at making you buy what you don't really need. Go the mall I go to and you'll know what presentday marketing is all about." And that's how the tent-wala came to be absolved.

A Dualistic Interpretation

Implicit in bhakti or devotion is surrender to a personal deity. Herein lays the meta-physical doctrine of tattvavada, a uniquely dualistic interpretation of the nature of reality as advocated by Madhavacharya. Madhana's philosophy of making a distinction between the Absolute and individual soul also known as the dvaita school of Vedanta, proposes bhakti as an imperative, as the only means of merging with the self. This dualistic metaphysics is the basic of theistic Vaishavite school of thought.

Madhava's concept of Five Distinctions is his elaboration of the dualistic vision of reality. The Panch Bheda doctrine provides the logical and empirical basis for philosophy of realism, tattvavada,  by looking at the difference between one jiva or individual being soul and another, the difference between Ishwara the creator and jiva, the difference between jiva and jada or inanimate, between Ishwara and jada and between jada and jada. By formulating  an uncompromising dualism at all levels especially the rigid separation of creator and individual soul, Madhav not only lays down the pristine purity principle of God, but also goes on to emphasize bhakti as the only means to bridge the gulf between the Absolute and empirical world.

While Sankara's advaita sees the external world as Maya or illusion, vyavaharika or a sort of temporary reality, and Ramanuja's vishishtadvvaita views the outer phenomena and objects as a projection-spark of the Absolute, Madhava focuses on difference as the only genuine pramana or experience of every being - everything and everyone is different, our experiential life recognizes only that, as is borne out by pratyaksha or our sense perception. Madhav says other realities are also not created by the Creator, but exist simultaneously with the self. This kind of bipolar consciousness, where the knower and the object of knowledge remain distinct, lays the foundation for his theistic view of life as well.

Madhav asserts that jinana or knowledge is not capable of giving liberation, as the empirical world and its bondages are willed by Brahma, whom Madhav identifies with Vishnu. In contrast to the knowledge Principle of Sankara, Madhav says that moksha is possible only through grace, the grace of the creator, whose is the only independent tattva or reality in the dvaita system. All other beings are termed dependant realities, not created but coexisting with Vishnu the creator, and will continue to coexist in their distinction, even after realization.

Madhava contends that sublimation of the world is not only impossible, but not required since the time-space framework model is all there is; even God as Vishnu loves it the way it is. According to Madhava, knowledge of the self experienced intuitively by the sakshi or witness, the energy of atman, does not imply the illusory character of the physical world as sankara held. The realization of God as the Prime Mover, on the contrary, further establishes the yathrartha or faucal character of the world we live in.

The nation of bimba-pratibimbavada - sources as Vishnu and reflection as all dependant beings - puts Madhana's dvaita school of thought as the philosophical fountainhead of letter Vaishnavite bhakti traditions. For, bhakti, according to Madhavacharya, is one of the greatest spiritual values for the average person.

Kindness of Strangers

Let love of brethren continues. Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for by this some have entertained angels without knowing it. (Hebrews 13.1-2)

I try to treat whoever I meet as an old friend with dignity, with honor. (The Dalai Lama XIV)

Be generous in prosperity, and thankful in adversity. Be fair in thy judgment, and guarded in thy speech. Be a lamp unto those who walk in darkness and a home to the stranger. Be eyes to the blind, and a guiding light unto the feet on the erring. Be a breath of life to the body of humankind, dew to the soil of the human heart, and a fruit upon the tree of humanity. (Bha' I Prayer)

A Delicate Matter

A few months back a reporter of a Karachi-based local eveninger narrated a funny incident to me. An Urdu teacher in Lahore divorced his young wife when she inadvertently called him "tum" (the familiar form of addressing someone) instead of "aap" (the more formal form)! This is something uncommon in this linguistically indifferent era. But Urdu literature and culture is full of such amusing anecdotes and idiosyncrasies. Josh Malihabadi, the great Urdu poet, who migrated to Pakistan after independence, took umbrage when the Nawab of Hyderabad used "tum" for him. Ghalib wrote "Teri mehfil mein aakar bade beaabroo hue/ Aap se tum aur tum se tu hue" (I humiliated myself in your company/ From aap, I became tum and finallyu tu). Ghalib himself frowned upon the more familiar forms of address and likened them to abuse. It's  said that the main reason for Ghalib's growing disillusionment with his favorite city, Delhi, was the fast intrusion of these modes of address in the Urdu based local lingo of the 19th century city. Ghalib's coeval Daagh Dehlavi was so worried about this undesirable invasion of common language that he almost stopped talking to strangers, lest they address him in a familiar fashion! Abuse me, but don't say tum to me."

There's a famous and oft-quoted anecdote in Urdu literature. The great Urdu poet Mir Taqi Mir was once returning from Delhi to Lucknow. One gentleman from Delhi offered to give him a lift in his horse carriage. That man incessantly kept talking during the journey from Delhi to Lucknow. Mir remained silent. When he reached Lucknow, he profusely thanked that man for giving him a lift and gifted whatever money he had. That man asked him, "Mir Saheb, why didn't you utter a single word during the whole journey?" Because I didn't want to spoil my language by replying to your questions couched in an inferior tongue, "calmly replied Mir Taqi Mir. The late Urdu poet and judge, justice Anand Narayan Mulla, wrote of the legendary Urdu poet Firaq Gorakhpuri who never ever used 'tum' even for his pet dog. Once Mulla went to meet Firaq at his home. Firaq himself opened the door, then saw his dog sleeping on the sofa and mildly scolded it, "Mehmaan tashreeflaya hain aur aap so rahe hain? Jaiya andar jaakar letiye!" (the guest has arrived and you're still sleeping? Go inside and sleep!). Firaq's dog calmly woke up and went inside. Mulla wrote later that he was flabbergasted to see a man like Firaq talk to his dog in such a gentle manner. Moreover, his dog also understood the refined language of his master. Firaq once said proudly, "My dog starts barking the moment he hears tum and he faints if someone calls him tu!

"Tum" or "tu" may be words of endearment for many, but some, still steeped in that pristine culture, find them to be derogatory. Subcontinental Urdu directly originated from Mughal Persian, which was devoid of 'aap'or 'tum'. It's worthwhile to mention that Persian has just 'shuma' (aap) in its vocabulary. It was Arabic, a language rich in expletives as well, that influenced Persian, and today one cn find abuses as well as 'tum' and 'tu' in modern Persian.

But in our linguistically loose times, this is a rarity. Conversations start with tu and end with fighting. So in this rather uncouth era, Lahore's Urdu teacher's stress on polished language is heart-warming and reassuring, but at the same time, isn't divorce too harsh a punishment for a simple bride, who may have said "tum" to show love towards her husband? It's worth remembering that in Urdu culture, Allah is always addressed as 'tu'. And the rationale is, there's no formality between Allah and his worshipper.