reading. I read five to six books a month,
I read non-fiction and my favourite
genres are mythology, spirituality, sci-
ence, politics, economics. I travel a lot
and learn something about local ways.
For instance, in Kenya I was fascinated
by the warrior culture of the Masais.
Raavan is a very dark character. But he
is different from your ordinary villain.
He’s a scholarly, very complex man, he is
not just violent. He is a brilliant musician,
poet, good dancer, a good administrator.
He is a fascinating, and troubling, charac-
ter to write about. Even his violence is
kind of studied...he will actually behead
someone and look closely at the gaping
neck, how the blood is spurting out. For
him that’s a path to knowledge.
In our popular culture, do you think
depictions of Raavan have become
monochromatic?
Not just him. Sadly, in popular culture we
have lost much of the depth and nuance
of the original. I blame our education
system. We teach little about our anc ient
culture, our ancient texts, our traditional
plays. In an atmosphere of ignorance,
half-baked knowledge will prosper.
What do you mean by not teaching our
culture?
Why should literature have Shakespeare
and Tennyson? It should have Kalidasa or
Thiruvalluvar, it should have Mirza
Ghalib, it should have Bhasa. Why should
mathematics have only Euclid and Pytha-
goras? It should have Bhas karacharya.
Why should the Mahabha rata and the
Ramayana not be taught as it was in our
gurkuls and madrasas till the British
came. It is the heritage of everyone, irre-
spective of caste, religion or region.
But you know there is the narrative
that our past was not all great....
No, that’s not what I am saying. Yes, there
is a painful part of invasions as well. I
think one of the misfortunes of India is
that our historians called the Turkic colo-
nial rule ‘Islamic rule’. Nobody calls
British colonial rule Christian rule. To my
mind, calling Turkic colonial rule Islamic
is a major mistake. Islam didn’t come to
India with the Turk invaders. Islam came
a lot earlier. In fact, the second oldest
mosque is in India. The Delhi sultans
were Turkic. You read the list of nobles,you will find no Indian Muslims there;
they were all Uzbek, basically all Turks,
and their administrators were all Persians.
But that’s not what our history books say.
We must be the only culture which is not
proud of its past.
Only sometimes, pride touches fantas
tical levels—there was plastic surgery
in ancient India, or there were test tube
babies, that we had missile technology.
That is when the problem starts.
Test tube babies and missile technology
are clearly fantasies. But of plastic surgery,
there is evidence. The first recorded rhi-
noplasty, or nose reconstruction surgery,
was recorded in a British magazine byBritish soldiers who saw it being done on
a soldier of the Maratha army. The proce-
dure the surgeon follo wed was exactly the
same thing spoken of by Sushruta a
thousand years ago. Our education sys-
tem doesn’t teach us that, so genuine
achievements get merged with fantasies.
What I meant was halfbaked knowl
edge leads to some bizarre claims
about our past....
Yes, absolutely. No knowledge is as
dangerous as half-baked knowledge.
But rather than beating our chest about
the achievements of our ancestors I
would like us to take inspiration from it.
Compared to the rest of the world our
ancestors had great achievements. But
where are we today? The solution really
is only knowledge—or fantasy and igno-
rance will prosper.In the present political atmosphere,
everything seems to be getting lost in
this extreme right or extreme left
arg uments. The middle core, which
perhaps forms the largest part of our
country, is getting lost in it as you
have pointed out.
I never comment on politics. As for
politicians, it’s their job to get votes.
India is a difficult country and I have a
lot of respect for politicians. My thing is
more on the public debate space. This
has sadly been captured by two groups
of extremists. Left-wing extremists
want to deride everything about our
past, don’t want to talk of religion, our
spirituality, our achievements. And
right-wing extremists think we were
the only great people. I genuinely bel-
ieve a vast majority of Indians are in the
centre. But perhaps we don’t speak
loudly enough. Or are so fed up with the
debates and say ‘I don’t want to be a
part of this’. I think those of us in the
centre must speak out more.
You have also said that some feel
going back to our past is at variance
with liberal thought, which is equated
with Western thought, while we had
the most liberal thinkers.
I think there is a reason why liberalism is
losing the argument. It is sad because if
there was ever a point in time when the
world truly needed liberalism, it is today.
The biggest enemies of liberalism are
liberals themselves. They don’t truly
understand the land they are in. Almost
none of us resonate with the West. So, we
have to use arguments which connect
here. And fortunately we don’t have to
make things up; you only have to read our
ancient texts. Sadly, modern Indian lib-
erals don’t rea lise that the ancients are
their biggest ally, but they haven’t read
many of our ancient texts. They have
been brought up largely on Western texts.
The ancient versions of the Ramayana,
the Mahabharata, the plays of Kalidasa,
of Bhasa, of Shudraka, will have a huge
positive impact. It’s not just a Hindu
thing; Buddhist, Jain, Sikh, Indian
Islamic interpretations. Only an Indian
Muslim could have said: Ya toh masjid
mein sharab peene de saaki/ ya aisi jagah
bata jahan khuda na ho. O“Sadly, modern Indian
liberals don’t realise
that the ancients are
their biggest ally. But
they haven’t read any
of the ancient texts.”“In our popular culture
we have lost so much
of the depth or nuance
of our ancestors. I put
the blame entirely on
our education system.”‘Those in the centre of the nati onal debate must speak out’
29 July 2019 OUTLOOK 93