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Reviews
Annam
Bahu Kurvita
The
Organiser, December 29, 1996
by M. V. Kamath
Two things that the British did to India – apart from
whatever good they may inadvertently have done to the
country – that are unforgivable and deserve condemnation are
this disruption of our agricultural economy and the
downgrading of Sanskrit as a “dead language”. Both were done
deliberately and with evil intent. The disruption of our
agricultural economy turned India into a destitute nation;
the downgrading of Sanskrit served to hoist a tremendous
inferiority complex on the people. Fifty years after we
attained Independence we are still struggling to regain our
lost heritage.
Consider this. Comparing Indian data with that relating to
British agriculture, a British economist found as early as
in 1804 that the productivity in India was several times
higher than in Britain. What surprised the economist even
more was the finding that the wages of the Indian
agricultural labourer in real terms were substantially
higher than those of his counterpart in Britain. Even under
the most tyrannical ruler, the agriculturist was spared. It
is generally accepted today that even during the reign of
Aurangzeb the maximum revenue receipts never exceeded 20%.
It has been wrongly assumed that the remaining 80% went to
the feudal lords. Not true. The overwhelming proportion of
revenue was left to the local level itself, to be spent on
activities prescribed by age-old customs such as running of
chhatrams or choultries, pathasalas or schools, maintenance
of tanks etc. What the British did was to dismantle the
entire fiscal and revenue systems. They demanded that the
state should get 50% of the gross produce after it was
converted into money and made into regular tax dues. Worse,
when the ancient rajas were stripped of their political
power they were elevated into Zamindars, modelled on the
British system with the difference that while the British
landlord paid only 10% of what he received as rent from the
cultivator, the Indian landlord was asked to pay 90%.
Inevitably, agriculture suffered. (Ref. PPST Bulletin,
November 1983.)
The deliberate downgrading of the study of Sanskrit by
condemning it into limbo as a ‘dead language’ was even more
sinister. It served to cut off Indians from their own
heritage which rightfully was theirs. It made them accept
the theory that they were inferior to the White man, more
specifically the Englishman. It helped undermine the
infrastructure of their culture and turn them to the West,
more specifically towards Britain. (We see today how
cast-away elements of western entertainment like the Miss
World tamashas are so eagerly accepted by the so-called
Indian elite). The whole enterprise was intended to destroy
India economically and culturally once it was destroyed
politically.
What is now remarkable and praise-worthy is that the process
of self-healing has begun. The work of Bajaj and Srinivas
reminds us of what production and distribution of food –
anna – meant to our ancestors and how those values were
integrated into what is described as dharma – that which
holds up – calls fro the highest commendation. The
production of food and its even distribution amongst all,
the giving of dana considered the supreme yajna have been
themes frequently discussed in our ancient religious texts
including the Taittiriyopanishad, the Shatapathabrahmana,
the Vishnupurana, the Agnipurana, Bhavishyapurana, the
Yajnyavalyasmriti, the Rivedasamhita, the Ramayana and the
Mahabharata… right down to Manimekalai. The basic theme in
all is what the title of this book says: Annam bahu kurvita,
tadavratam (endeavour so that there be a great abundance of
food. That is the inviolable discipline of mankind).
The authors quote copiously from our religious texts. In the
Mahabharata, for instance, Bhishma Pitamaha, the grand wise
old man of the Kuru clan, gives a long discourse to
Yudhishthira on all aspects of dharma. The discourse runs
into 25,000 verses and forms nearly a quarter of the epic.
Long afterwards, after Bhishma himself has gone and
Yudhishthira performs the ashvamedhayajna, the latter asks
Shri Krishna to sum up the essence of Bhishma’s teachings.
That Shri Krishna does in just fifteen verses, the first ten
of which lay down the centrality of anna dana, the giving of
food in the life of a householder, and the next five
celebrate the greatness of food, its emergence out of the
vital essence of the earth and its intimate connection with
all life. The very first verse of Shri Krishna is:
Annena dharyate sarvam jagadetachcharacharam
Annat prabhavati pranah prayaksham nasti samshayah
(The world, both animate and inanimate, is sustained by
food. Life arises from food; this is observed all around and
there can be no doubt about it).
And he ends his discourse by saying:
Annadah pranado loke pranadah sarvado bhavet
Tasmadannam visheshena datavyam bhutimichhata
(The giver of food is the giver of life, and indeed of
everything else. Therefore, one who is desirous of
well-being in this world and beyond should specially
endeavour to give food.)
What better advice could Bhishma have given to Dharmaraja as
the ultimate dharma of a King?
Incidentally, all descriptions of Ramrajya, the ideal times
that the Indian considers as the ultimate in good
government, involve an abundance of crops and the complete
absence of hunger and thirst. Thus, at the very beginning of
Valmiki’s Ramayana, in the fist chapter of Balakanda, the
great sage describes the forthcoming reign of Shri Rama
thus: “There is happiness and cheer all around. All are
contented. All are well nourished. All follow dharma. All
are in good health. All are without disease. And all are
free from fear and hunger. No parent witnesses the death of
a child. No wife witnesses the death of her husband. Fire
causes no disasters. No living being ever drown in water.
Winds remain benign… Nobody has to worry about hunger.
Nothing is ever stolen…
Such a book as this, explaining our past and our culture,
was waiting to be written. Now that Bajaj and Srinivas have
written it, it needs to be widely distributed and read. It
is a duty which we owe to ourselves to be one and whole
again.
The reason is that vast numbers of educated Indians are
sadly ignorant of their own past and glory. Many have been
taught even to be ashamed of their culture. We can do much
better than what we are doing now. Our production today is
lagging behind even that of China. How come that
productivity was very high in times past when today, for all
the availability of improved seeds and vaunted technology,
we can’t match the productivity of our neighbours? Why do
people starve and why are we indifferent to our social
responsibilities when early European observers and British
administrators in India repeatedly came across the Indian
habit of offering food and hospitality to all those who
happened to come to their door or the village? The Europeans
like Abbe J. A. Dubois, the French missionary who arrived in
India in 1792 and spent 31 years enjoying the fabled Indian
hospitality in the villages of Mysore, have written in
deprecating terms of Indian customs and manners but they are
pretty unanimous on one thing: the hospitality offered by
Indian to strangers, rich and poor alike.
We need to go back to those ancient times and learn not
merely how to produce more but how to distribute it
efficiently not so much through official outlets but through
private dana – giving. “We should”, the authors insist,
“begin to pay attention to the lands and to the fulfilling
of the inviolable discipline of annam bahu kurvita and to
follow the instructions given in the Vedas that anyone who
eats without sharing eats in sin, Kevalagho vai bhavati
kevaladi.” And they end with a prayer that can hardly be
questioned: “May we have the strength of mind and body to be
Indians again, and fulfil the vrata of growing and sharing a
plenty”.
Annam Bahu Kurvita: Recollecting the Indian Discipline of
Growing and Sharing Food in Plenty: Jitendra Bajaj and Mandayam Doddamane Srinivas: Centre for Policy Studies, 27
Rajasekharan Street, Mylapore, Madras – 6000 004; pages
lvi+217; Rs.400.
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