January 2018
Hindola is one of my favourite rāgas. The equivalent of Hindola in the Hindustani system is a rāga called Malkauns. Many feel that the manner in which it is rendered in South Indian classical music is different. In my opinion, however, Hindustani musicians have used Malkauns in a more aesthetic, mature, and creative manner as compared to the Carnatic musicians, barring a fewlike Dr. M Balamuralikrishna and Dr. Nagavalli Nagaraj. In fact, there...
For a cricket-crazed nation like India, we do not have to wait long before a cricket series starts, grooves us in to a sway of emotions, and causes a deluge of frenzied reactions to the victories or the defeats. Even as the cricket World Cup follows each other, every two years in the shortened 20-20 format and every four years in the longer version, the cricketing nations, a good number of them, are treated to a veritable swing of emotions from...
Introduction
The conception, origin, evolution, and development of temples as physical, architectural structures is perhaps as old as the dawn of human civilisation as we know it. Temples represent one of the finest, deepest, grandest, and most profound expressions of the Human Spirit of awe, wonderment, and a timeless yearning for spirituality, philosophy, art and creativity etched in stone, wood, and other mediums.
Indeed, when we notice the...
There lived a teacher by name Kṛpācārya[1] who taught archery to the kings of the Vṛṣṇi clan and other kṣatriya clans. The Kauravas and Pāṇḍavas were his disciples too. Bhīṣma was not content with this; he thought that his grandchildren should be trained under a person who was an expert in several śāstras and skilled in combat; he wanted the teacher to be a genius and nurture the grandchildren to turn them into extraordinary people. As he was...
Sri Ananta Sastri had distinguished himself as one of the most prominent (Classical) musicians of Bangalore. He possessed an extremely manly voice in both singing and teaching music. I listened to his music for the first time in 1904. He was in his youth back then. That particular concert was attended by quite a large number of Vidwans belonging to the older generation.
Sri Sastri was immaculately attired. A Felt hat on his head. An elaborate...
The Sanskrit Language
Our ancients sculpted a language to give perfect expression to their exuberant emotions. It has a well-developed scheme of letters and an inbuilt etymological structure that has endowed it with variety and a rare word-generation power. Being an inflected language, it is not tied down by a linear pattern of word order. It is thus highly flexible[1].
Ancient Indians also evolved a system that could, in a sense, transform...
Introduction
Over the centuries Sanskrit literature has stood witness to a variety of responses from readers across the world. There have been ‘innocent’ readers who showered genuine praise, often without highlighting what appealed to them. There have also been critics who dissected its poetry with all sorts of tools—political, sociological, economic and the like—and doled out half-baked opinions in pontifical tones. They derided Sanskrit...
Pushyamitra Shunga tried to liberate Bharata’s lands under Greek occupation. The Greek invasion that began with Alexander continued till the time of Menander. The same Menander came to be known as Milindara later. Buddhists texts mention his name. The dialogue between Nagasena and Menander is recorded in the Pali (Magadhi) text ‘Milinda Panho.’ For a prolonged period—nearly three hundred years—the Ionian incursions were a recurring feature....
As individuals, we can be utterly honest and upright. But that will not work at the societal realm. A public figure will have to resort to strategies. We see Krishna’s brilliance and foresight throughout. Long before he befriended the Pandavas, he was laying out a strategy for change.
As a raw teenager, raised in a village, he comes to the capital and kills Kamsa. Immediately he sends a warning to Dhritarashtra saying, Your brother’s widow and...
Around 1925-26, I had been to Delhi to undertake a political study--to gain knowledge about the condition, status, and the future of India's Princely States. I met Captain Ajab Khan to gather information about the army and other personnel employed by the Princely States. Ajab Khan hailed from Punjab. He had served as a Commander of one of the units engaged in the First World War (1914-18). He had been nominated as a Member of the then Rajya...