Desicritics

Book Review: Bhagwata Purana, Skandha Two, Part One

Dr Bhaskar Dasgupta — Mon, 15 Mar 2010 19:57:57 EDT

You know my great idea about writing one essay on each Skandha? Well, I am afraid that it became impossible for me to stick to my original plan in the second Skandha itself, as there are far too many concepts and ideas that I want to try and do justice to. The Skandha starts with the story of how Vyasa Muni first composed the Bhagwata Purana (BP).

You might already know that Vyasa Muni was the original compositor of the Vedas, but the Purana is silent on when exactly he wrote it in Hindu cosmological terms, although we know it was written after Krishna’s death, which is tentatively given as 3228 BCE (according to the wiki entry). The Purana, on the other hand, says that Vyasa was born in the Dwapara Yuga. Take a look at this calculation which talks about some seriously huge time frames. Time is defined in the top level as Brahma Years. We are in the first day of the 51st year of Brahma (he is a middle aged God right now). Each day and night in an year comprises of a Kalpa, which is further divided into 28 manvantaras and we are in the 7th day manvantara. Each Manvantara is made up of 71 mahayuga’s and we are in the 28th mahayuga. Each Mahayuga comprises of four yugas namely Satya Yuga, Treta Yuga, Dwapara Yuga and Kali Yuga. We are currently in Kali Yuga. The time in human Christian Gregorian Years is roughly 432,000 solar years.

So extrapolating from this (and bear with me, I have no way of confirming this), Vyasa was born before 3228 BCE. Given that the average human life span in the Dwapara Yuga was considered to be approximately 1,000 years, he could have been born and actually composed the BP any time between 3228 BCE to 4228 BCE, but the actual book took shape in the 3rd millennium BCE. For the longest time, this kind of thinking about time blows my mind, but I have that down as a potential research project to think about. Take a look at this article by Ramesh Rao for an interesting perspective on time.

But let’s get back to the BP and its origins. The above is from a mythological perspective that is; the real truth is much more complicated. As of the current state of historiographical research, there is simply no evidence of when it was originally written and by whom. The wiki entry for the Vedas is a good example of the confusion about the dates on the origins of the Vedas, but it’s aimed at a date of 1,000 BCE. This sort of conflicts with the reputed death of Krishna around 3228 BCE, so what happened in the middle 2 millennia?

However, I am not writing an analytical paper here, I am talking philosophy and mythology. Hindu philosophy (if this kind of a formulation can even be said) simply has too many strands to worry about exact timing or authenticity of the author, unlike say the fact that Gabriel taught Mohammad the Quran or there is a gospel by Mark. How about the philosophy that time is essentially an illusion (maya)? If it’s maya, then is it really important to know the author or the time? We also need to know that if we start ascribing the authorship to a particular person and time, we run the risk of it sounding fallible, which really cannot be done now, can it? The other way of looking at this is that there is simply no origin or that the Vedas and the Puranas were and are: unauthored, unreal and eternal at the same time. When the (atma) soul can be pure consciousness without content, then extending that analysis to the Vedas and Purana can mean content without consciousness relating to temporal aspects such as authors or time.

The BP talks about how Vyasa Muni divided the original single Veda into the four Vedas that we know now, mainly because he realised that in the Kali Yuga, mankind cannot handle the full weight of God’s word, so had to be fed in small broken down chunks. He then gave each Veda to one of his disciples and asked them to further teach humans. As women, sudras and other impure members of the Brahman class were not eligible to read and hear the Vedas (don’t go there yet, I will return to this topic sometime in the future), he also wrote the Mahabharata so that even the women, sudras and impure people could attain moksha. But Vyasa Muni was not happy and less than satisfied with his work on the Vedas and Mahabharata. Narada Muni came around and identified his cause of dissatisfaction. Narada Muni said that he has not described the Lord Vishnu in detail and that is the reason why his work does not satisfy him. Narada Muni then proceeds to tell Vyasa his own life story and how he became a Vishnu devotee. In one of his past lives in another Kalpa, he wandered the earth in search of God and finally he sat to meditate for eons. Finally, Vishnu manifested himself to him and Narada was enlightened. Vishnu said that Narada will find the Lord when all desires have been quelled, but he will be with Narada all the time. Saying this, Narada departed leaving behind Vyasa full of determination to explore and compose the story of Lord Vishnu. Upon completion of the BP, Vyasa Muni taught the secret Purana to his son, Suka.

Then there is a bit of a jump and the third section talks about the life history of Pariskshit, son of Abhimanyu, who is the ruler of Hastinapur. Remember the story about how he was saved in his mother Uttara’s womb, by Krishna when Ashwathama tried to kill him using the brahmastra? Anyway, moving on, the BP talks about how righteous he was, how he banished the demon Kali (not the Goddess Kali) and saved one legged Dharma Deva, the God of Truth and Bhumi Devi, Mother Earth from Kali’s depredations. Interestingly enough, the four legs of Dharma Deva, who manifested himself as a Bull, represent austerity, purity, compassion and honesty, but Kali Yuga broke three of them by pride, lasciviousness and inebriation. Only honesty was left and even that was being destroyed by the Demon Kali. So Parikshit banishes the Demon Kali to the gambling dens, whorehouses, and in houses of slaughter. By doing so, Parikshit kept the demons of the Kali yuga at bay, but then disaster befell him.

He was hunting and reached an ashram thirsty and hungry. Looking around, he could only see a rishi deep in meditation and despite Parikshit’s entreaties; the rishi would not wake up to give him water or food. Becoming furious, Parikshit draped a dead snake around the rishi’s neck and rode away angrily. Then the rishi’s son came back, saw the snake, learnt the background and cursed Parikshit with death in seven days from snakebite. On his return to the palace, Parikshit was beset with sorrow and regret at his treatment of the rishi and then learning of the curse, decided to renounce his kingdom, go to the banks of the Ganga river, medicate on Vishnu for the remainder of his days while fasting.

When he sat down, a whole host of other great rishis came to him. Atri, Vasistha, Chyvana, Shardavana, Arishtanemi, Bhrigu, Angirasas, Parasara, Viswamitra, Parasurama, Utathya, Indrapramada, Indhmavaha, Medhatithi, Devala, Arishtisena, Bharadvaja, Gautama, Pippalada, Maitreya, Aurva, Kavasha, Agastya, Dwaipayna Vyasa and Narada all joined him. There is a reason why I am repeating all these names. These names are our greats. They have, in effect, given us our religion. They were the first teachers and telling their names again is a way of worshiping them, paying obeisance to them and recognising our debt to them.

Finally Suka Muni arrives and Parikshit asks him how best to purify himself before death, to which Suka Muni replies referring to the BP as the best way to purify the body and soul. Parikshit asks about the form of Vishnu that he would meditate on and Suka describes the Lord to him. This was a stunning description and I was seriously taken aback. I am not going to give the full description, but it involves patala, the soles of his feet, bhumi his hips, and the sky as his navel. Indra and other Devas are his arms, agni his tongue, the sun and moon are his eyes, Yama is his teeth, his laughter is Maya, modesty is his upper lip, while greed is his lower. Prajapati is his penis, while Mitra Deva and Varuna Deva are his testicles. Vayu is his breath, time is his movement. Twilight is the garment he wears, brahmana his mouth, kshatriya his arms, vaisya his thighs and sudra is his feet. This is whom Parikshit should visualise.

The formulation of the Lord’s description took my breath away. With my puny mind, I simply could not comprehend this vast assemblage at all, which is why I am quite envious of those who can. Can you imagine somebody being able to visualise this wondrous image? What an imagination one would require! What a breadth of vision, what faith! I felt so insignificant at just the description of the Lord Vishnu.

But now I have to draw this exercise to an end. In the next part, I will be talking about how Suka explained the way of the Dhyana, the route to Moksha. This is not an esoteric description, but something with concrete details which man can grasp. This will follow with a description of how Brahma created this universe and a description of the incarnations of Vishnu and ending with the numerous questions that Parikshi asks of Suka.

All this to be taken with a grain of piquant salt

Bhagvata Purana, Skandha 1

Dr Bhaskar Dasgupta — Tue, 2 Mar 2010 22:40:03 EST

I have to admit that I did not even know about this book till somebody told me that the Bhagvata Purana is also known as the fifth veda. I further saw references to this Purana in the Dharmasahastra book by Kane and then figured, it is high time that I actually take a look at this book praised by so many, but not discussed enough. And once I actually got my hands on a couple of copies, I think I figured out why this is relatively obscure (compared to the Vedas, Upanishads, Shruti’s and Smritis). Depending upon the version, the books range from 1500 to 2240 pages in length, containing north of thirteen thousand Sanskrit verses. One needs to be very dedicated or locked up for some serious time to really go through this. Nevertheless it is a beautiful book with lovely tales and I thought of reviewing it, as I really could not find any good reviews elsewhere.

Before I start, first some background and logistical points. I used the following books:
1. The Bhagavata Purana: v. 7 (Ancient Indian Tradition and Mythology) by J.L. Shastri and Ganesh Vasudeo Tagare (1994)
2. Bhagavat Purana by Ramesh Menon (2007)
3. A Study of the Bhagavata Purana or Esoteric Hinduism by Purnendu Narayana Sinha, 1901.
4. Srimad Bhagavata Puranam, Sanskrit, 2004.
5. Bhagavata Puranam, Sanskrit, 2006 (under revision)
6. Srimad Bhagavatam (Bhagavata Purana) by Swami A. C. Bhaktivedanta Prabhupâda.

Quite a lot of the versions are different in formulation, usage of English and the so on. If one wants to be true to the Sanskrit versions (which themselves differ a bit), then the Prabhupada version is good, as it has the original Sanskrit, a word by word translation and a summary. In any case, my knowledge of Sanskrit is barely intermediate and I wouldn't be comfortable in dealing with a review based upon that language based book. Reading Sanskrit is one thing, but reviewing in pure ancient Sanskrit? No Sir. If one wants to have a bit more colloquial English usage and more understanding as per modern usage, then I suggest the Menon version. Rest of them use a bit of archaic English and can be a bit difficult to digest. So this review uses the Menon version.

So how do you review such a monumental book? I was struggling with the answer. I could have reviewed the full book down in one long essay but then this would have missed out on giant parts. Doing a translation is simply out of the question. So after discussing it a bit, I hit upon the idea of writing a summary per Skandha (canto or book) and then highlighting any interesting points that popped up in my mind. This means twelve rather long essays, but I think I can live with that on my conscience that one has done justice to it. If you want to rather get a quick overview of the purana, then the wiki entry is a good place to start. Without further ado, lets crack on.

My first impression after I finished the book was that it was mainly about love, very very intense love. Extremely emotional love. Something that makes you weep uncontrollably. Not bawl, but weep. Not sure if you have experienced this, but it's like none of your emotions (speech, sight, touch, smell…) are able to express it and tears are the only way to do so. I felt like this when I first held my kids in my arms. Or when I used to dance in front of Ma Durga during Durga Puja back home with the Dhunuchis. This book is an expression of very intense love towards Vishnu or his incarnation Krishna. Have you read Rumi? The feeling I got was a bit like what I felt when I read Rumi. Rumi, though, is a bit more earthy and this is a bit more esoteric, although some parts of the purana are quite earthy. It is Bhakti personified.

The purana is roughly dated to between 500 to 1000 AD, but it has gone through so many changes, accretions, embellishments, etc. that it is tough to date it correctly. Plus let us not forget that these are stories and generations of scholars and teachers in a vast land have told these stories in a variety of locales and to a huge number of people. It is a miracle that we actually get to a version in the first place.

The first Skandha introduces the purana, which written by Veda Vyasa, who writes this after completing the vedas and Mahabharat. The main reason behind writing this was that the Vedas and Mahabharat do not satisfactorily deal with the highest goal of knowledge and that is devotion to God (Bhakti). Another reason for for writing it, is to assist us in handling the Kali Yug, which came into being when Krishna died. When people begged him to leave something of him behind so that they can cope with the Kali Yug, Krishna poured his essence into the Bhagwat Purana.

Narada Muni is a key participant in the beginnings of the BP. An interesting story is said about him. Narada is disconsolate, because he is wandering around in Kali Yug and is observing the breakdown of divine order. While wandering on the banks of the Yamuna, he notices a young woman sitting next to two very old sick men, while being surrounded with many other young women. The young woman turns out to be Bhakti and the two old sick men are Gyan (knowledge) and Vairagya (detachment or renunciation). The other young women are the sacred rivers such as Ganga, etc. who are trying to provide comfort to Bhakti. The Kali Yug has devastated her two sons even though it spared her. Narada blesses her by saying that Bhakti will be the only way to salvation and then tries to rescue her two sons by chanting the Vedas and Upanishads in their ears, singing the Bhagvad Gita to them. They improved, but not completely. On beseeching the Lord to provide him with some guidance, a voice from the skies tells him to go speak to certain Munis. On searching and leter finding them, Narada asks the Munis about how to cure the two sons of Bhakti? The Munis state that he has to recite the BP to them and since it contains the essence of Lord Vishnu, it will revive them. So he does and Bhakti and her two sons are also revived.

But this was not the first time that the BP had been recited. Thirty years after Krishna died, Vyasa’s son Suka recited the BP to King Parikshit, grandson of Arjuna, son of Abhimanyu, who succeeded Yudhistra to the throne of Hastinapur. But this story is for later. The second great recitation of the BP happened two hundred years after the Kali Yug had started by Gokarna Muni.

The BP then embarks on a long tale of how a childless Brahman begged for a boon of a child from a Sanyasi. The Sanyasi gives a blessed fruit to him and asks his wife to eat it, keeping a vow of truthfullness, kindness and charity for an entire year, not eating more than one meal per day, and if that is done, then a pure golden hearted pious son will be born. But his wife did not want to ruin her figure or go through the pain of childbirth so she hatched a plan with her sister. The fruit was given over to their cow while her sister’s new born baby was smuggled in to be shown as the Brahman’s son called as Dhundhukari. Three months later, the cow gave birth to a human child with golden skin and eyes like lotus petals, but with cow ears. Hence his name, Gokarna (or Cow Ears). Both grow up together, but Dhundhukari turns out to be a devil in disguise, a disgusting sinner, while Gokarna is pure as the snow on Mount Kailash. The Brahman is at his wits end and Gokarna advices him to cultivate dispassion and renounce the world, which he does. Gokarna also leaves on a pilgrimage. Dhundhukari commits terrible crimes, beats up his own mother, steals, whores and lies and at the end, the whores decide to kill him and they do. Unfortunately, Dhundhukari remains behind on earth after death as a spirit. Gokarna senses Dhundhukari’s death and the fact that he is not truly dead, but is still a tortured spirit. Gokurna performs a shraddha at every holy spot, but it does not release Dhundhukari from the earth and finally he returns to his hometown. Dhundhukari begs him for help to be released and Gokurna then embarks on a deep dhyan (meditation) to Surya Deva (Sun God) to learn how to address this. The Sun God advices him to recite the BP as that is the only way Dhundhukari’s soul will be released. So Gokurna starts the recitation with many many people attending the week’s worth of recitation and when he ends, Dhundhukari is released from his earthly bounds.

The others who were listening, though, do not get their sins washed away. Gokurna is told by the sages that Dhundhukari fasted for seven days and he listened to Gokurna’s recitation with all his faculties and might. This is the reason why Dhundhukari was released and not the others. When the others learnt this, they begged Gokurna to recite the BP again which he did. This allowed all the listeners to also be washed free of their sins by Vishnu who appeared after a great conch shell boom in a blaze of light.

Thus ends the first book. I had to consciously lay aside my erupting cynicism. The first book tries hard to explain why the BP is so important and how it helps to wash away the sins. I thought about self praise? However, as I kept on reading, I realised that I was reading it as perhaps a professor wanting to write a book review and not as a worshipper or a person of faith wanting to learn. That switch was not easy and I found myself slipping back into the cynical, doubting persona many times. The apparent inconsistencies about the origins of the purana bothered me as well till I spoke to my father. He told me, if Vishnu is indeed the world, then how does it matter if one manifestation or another wrote or spoke what? What matters is the content. And that made perfect sense.

What was also a bit frightening for a grown man like me was the underlying concept of letting go. Letting go of everything and with tan, man and dhan (body, mind and wealth) and concentrate on the pursuit of Bhakti, devotion to God. I am not sure if I have achieved that and am very far away from the ideal. It felt quite strange reading about people who can be so dispassionate that they are able to walk away from everything that they hold dear (for me it would be my family, my iPhone, my books, etc.) and devote their all and everything to being in love with Krishna. I am not sure if I can ever do that and it was very humbling to find that I do not have the courage or guts to do so.

What a fascinating journey into a wonderful book which is raising more questions than answering them.

It Takes Intelligence to Review & Deliver Intelligence

Dr Bhaskar Dasgupta — Fri, 8 Jan 2010 21:20:21 EST

This is the most amazing and honest report I have read. This Major General (U.S. Major General Michael Flynn) has shown huge courage to be brutally honest about the intelligence failings in the Afghan campaign and typically the press reports and the Pentagon have dumped on him. This is one reason the USA and its allies will win, because they learn (at least I hope they do). I would also hope that his maverick behaviour does not end up harming him, but given the courage and intelligence shown by General Petraeus and General McChrystal, his two respective bosses, I think not. But let us get back to the report and what a report it is! It is brutally honest. It cuts across the fog of organisational chaos by the ton and homes in directly, in a few short pages, on exactly where the problem is, giving some examples of where they are going right now and what they need to do.

But first the background. This report was written by the Head of Military Intelligence of the US forces in Afghanistan as a review report on how intelligence gathering is happening, what the objectives are, what the drawbacks are, and how to improve the procedures so it benefits the senior military leaders and the political masters.

Reading this report will also help the generals and ministers of any other country currently facing an insurgency or dealing with a terrorist campaign. If you look at Thailand, India, Pakistan, China, etc., they all need to read this report.

However, it is not only a must read for those, but actually also for those who are also facing not just direct insurgency campaigns. Are the people in the United Kingdom who are being faced with a domestic British Muslim terrorist campaign reading this? Are they adapting the lessons learnt from Afghanistan in this intelligence evaluation report with respect to the Islamic societies in British Universities and the mosques in the UK? The quiet neighbourhood doctor or engineer who is secretly planning to blow up a building or nightclub? How are the links between the society, the mosques, the press, the NGOs, the charities, the police, MI5 & MI6 and the ministers being managed?

I don’t think this is only applicable to terrorism or the military. I think this is equally applicable to big firms and financial institutions. Here’s a question you can ask any grand poobah of strategy or CEO or head of planning. Do they have a strategy for collecting product, customer, market, country, regulator, and other types of information which is relevant to what head of the business needs to know? Have they ever run a review akin to what this report does? How do they know the mass of information being produced at the coalface (and believe you me, there is a whole load of information that is produced - ranging from product information, customer details, trading details, supply chain information, contact reports and emails, etc. )? How are they aggregated, distributed, sliced, fed up, sideways and down the chain? I quote from the report:

“Creating effective intelligence is an inherent and essential responsibility of command. Intelligence failures are failures of command – [just] as operations failures are command failures.”

In other words, if you as a senior manager are not getting sufficient information, then the responsibility of getting that information is yours, not somebody else’s and you need to take responsibility for this The execution, however, can be done by your head of MI, sales, COO, etc. etc.

There are absolute gems hidden in this report, which again have implications for both the military and civilian businesses. I am going to quote them and try to comment on them to clarify what I mean.

The second inescapable truth asserts that merely killing insurgents usually serves to multiply enemies rather than subtract them. This counterintuitive dynamic is common in many guerrilla conflicts and is especially relevant in the revenge-prone Pashtun communities whose cooperation military forces seek to earn and maintain. The Soviets experienced this reality in the 1980s, when despite killing hundreds of thousands of Afghans, they faced a larger insurgency near the end of the war than they did at the beginning.

This is far too common. Just measure the number of body bags (as was done in Vietnam), or the number of meetings held with customers or the revenue per customer, etc, these are often metrics that are used to judge progress or performance. But is that really what the military or corporate strategy is? No, that’s not it. The military strategy is to provide security and allow or support a fairly stable governance in Afghanistan so the Taliban’s bent of ideology and governance backed by their rage boys cannot take root. Yes, there are other requirements as well, but the objective is not to kill the Taliban, but to take the moral, civil, economic and military ground away from them. This might mean (and does mean) popping off the relevant commanders and does include having fire-fights, but you don’t measure by this metric. One needs intelligence and analysis to supports decision making. Similarly on the business front, far too often metrics drive management and strategy. We need to grab customer loyalty. No, we want customers to not only give us their business, but help us get more business by recommending us to other customers. That cannot be achieved, managed and delivered by measuring the number of calls you make to the customer, it needs a much broader sense of information. Otherwise, what you will end with is a huge body count or a huge list of contact reports, but lose the war or the business.

What are the barriers in getting this information?

“The barriers to maximizing available intelligence are surprisingly few. The deficit of data needed by high-level analysts does not arise from a lack of reporting in the field. There are literally terabytes of unclassified and classified information typed up at the grassroots level. Nor, remarkably, is the often-assumed unwillingness to share information the core of the problem. On the contrary, military officers and civilians working with ISAF allies, and even many NGOs, are eager to exchange information. True, there are severe technological hurdles, such as the lack of a common database and digital network available to all partners, but they are not insurmountable.

People often think that they need a giant new CRM system, network, or a database or that they have to establish big hairy governance bodies aligned with massive organisational transformation or dual / triple reporting lines. Not really, frankly that is rarely the problem. But it’s an easy solution, mind you, because it provides a concrete “something” that you can touch and deliver. Why do most of the business intelligence projects fail? They do because the fixation is on the damn system, database, network and not on the information or the culture or the strategy. An example where many of these issues have been resolved and fixed is the investment banking business, which is perhaps one of the most efficient legal sustainable moneymaking organisations known to man, with the exception of loan sharking or drug running or Ponzi trading. Data is always there, people LOVE to talk and give you information. But one needs to listen, read, review, pass up and down and sideways. See what the report says further:

The most salient problems are attitudinal, cultural, and human. The intelligence community’s standard mode of operation is surprisingly passive about aggregating information that is not enemy-related and relaying it to decision-makers or fellow analysts further up the chain. It is a culture that is strangely oblivious of how little its analytical products, as they now exist, actually influence commanders.
It is also a culture that is emphatic about secrecy but regrettably less concerned about mission effectiveness.1 To quote General McChrystal in a recent meeting, “Our senior leaders – the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the Secretary of Defense, Congress, the President of the United States – are not getting the right information to make decisions with. We must get this right. The media is driving the issues. We need to build a process from the sensor all the way to the political decision makers.”

I would add another factor when discussing the impact on commercial firms. We have lost layers of middle management in the previous few decades, which has had an impact on the organisational ability to aggregate. I have nothing much further to add to the points above. Pretty self explanatory, no?

Nowhere does our group suggest that there is not a significant role for intelligence to play in finding, fixing, and finishing off enemy leaders. What we conclude is there must be a concurrent effort under the ISAF commander’s strategy to acquire and provide knowledge about the population, the economy, the government, and other aspects of the dynamic environment we are trying to shape, secure, and successfully leave behind. Until now, intelligence efforts in this area have been token and ineffectual, particularly at the regional command level. Simply put, the stakes are too high for the stability of Afghanistan and Pakistan, for NATO’s credibility, and for U.S. national security for us to fail in our intelligence mission. The urgent task before us is to make our intelligence community not only stronger but, in a word, “relevant.”

We are now faced with a set of very challenging, complex economic, social and political conditions across the world. This will require intelligence, information and data to be provided to managers - up and down the chain - in a significantly different manner. The firms which manage to crack this will win. I don’t have to tell you the changes that we are going to face in the next 3-5 years, but how to react to them? Well, a good management information, business intelligence, strategy and planning function can assist in doing this much better. In other words, yes, deal with the tactical bits, but don’t forget the strategy and the broader basis for analysis.

The example of Nawa was brilliant. Within the British area of operations, they were getting killed day in and day out. And the British thought the Americans knew nothing about COIN. Now look at what the Americans did. This might well be conflicting information and may be counted as national chest thumping, but by heck, the 1st Btn, 5th Marines gave an example of how to wage broad war. He quotes an example of how they avoided the issue of logistical problems.

The battalion intelligence officers refused to allow the absence of a data network to impede the flow of information. Each night, the deputy intelligence officer hosted what he called “fireside chats,” during which each analyst radioed in from his remote position at a designated time and read aloud everything learned over the last 24 hours. Using this approach, daily reports incorporated a wide variety of sources: unclassified patrol debriefs; the notes of officers who had met with local leaders; the observations of civil affairs officers; and classified HUMINT reports. The deputy intelligence officer typed up a master report of everything called in by analysts and closed each “chat session” by providing them with an updated list of questions – called “intelligence requirements” – for the companies to attempt to answer.
In the earliest days of the operation, many of these questions dealt with basic logistical matters, such as the location and conditions of roads, bridges, mosques, markets, wells, and other key terrain. Once these were answered, however, the focus shifted to local residents and their perceptions. What do locals think about the insurgents? Do they feel safer or less safe with us around? What disputes exist between villages or tribes? As the picture sharpened, the focus honed in on identifying what the battalion called “anchor points” – local personalities and local grievances that, if skillfully exploited, could drive a wedge between insurgents and the greater population. In other words, anchor points represented the enemy’s critical vulnerabilities.

Please note the second paragraph above. This shows that a smart intelligence officer (or a BI person in a corporation) understand the value of time. The same questions will not be asked all the time, there is an element of time, and things move on, questions change, the environment changes, you build on what you have got, evolve your strategy and questions. This means that it’s a learning organisation. It’s an important point which is often forgotten, that just when you have found the answer to the question, somebody goes and changes the question. Your organisation should have the ability to understand this, crack this an be able to handle these changes and then evolve to answer the changed question.

The report then moves into a detailed discussion of how the recommendations will work out in the Afghan theatre, which is very much unique to Afghanistan, presuming he knows more than I on the situation on the ground and will not comment more on this part. However, the organisation that he is suggesting is eerily similar to how commercial organisations are also setup. It might be an idea for commercial analysts to check back or back-test their MI or BI organisation and operating model against this. It might give them some ideas.

Like the NGO’s mentioned on page 20, the investor relations department and the corporate communications department could benefit from these organisational and operating model recommendations. They frequently need this information for the analysts, the shareholders, the regulators, press, etc. etc. Good information like this will almost certainly have a definite impact on the stock price and on the reputational risk of the firm.

So what do you do? I loved this quote:

Doing so will require important cultural changes. Analysts must absorb information with the thoroughness of historians, organize it with the skill of librarians, and disseminate it with the zeal of journalists.

Brilliant! This is an absolutely stonking formulation. It’s pretty straightforward and you know immediately what you need to do. We know what historians, librarians and journalists do and we can relate to that function.

There’s another great comment:

The format of intelligence products matters. Commanders who think PowerPoint storyboards and colour-coded spreadsheets are satisfactory for describing the Afghan conflict and its complexities have some soul-searching to do. Sufficient knowledge will not come from slides with little more text than a comic strip. Commanders must demand substantive written narratives and analyses from their intel shops and make the time to read them. There are no shortcuts. Microsoft Word, rather than PowerPoint, should be the tool of choice for intelligence professionals in a counterinsurgency

I was perhaps one of the worst offenders for PowerPoint use, but over the past 4-5 years, I have realised the value of a word document. It forces people to think about what they are writing and arguing about, especially for senior management. People spend hours and days mucking around with graphics and fancy animation when a short summary of one-page distils things down. This forces people to think about what are they trying to achieve, what decision they want their audience to take and whether the information they are providing is enough to help them take that decision?

Here’s another interesting point:

Historical lessons run the risk of sounding portentous, but disregarding them comes at a high price. History is replete with examples of powerful military forces that lost wars to much weaker opponents because they were inattentive to nuances in their environment. A Russian general who fought for years in Afghanistan cited this as a primary reason for the Soviet Union’s failures in the 1980s

History is indeed a vast early warning system and people who forget the lessons of history are condemned to repeat them. I know, I know, you are going to tell me that nobody has ever won in Afghanistan, not in any war, at any time, but hey, guess what? They didn't do the nuances either. Think about how the Mughal Empire managed to rule over Afghanistan for such a long time. They were not locals, they were invaders as well, so if pointing to the British and Soviets as a reason for saying that NATO will lose in Afghanistan, one should realise that the Mughals did win.

While we are not adopting the Mughal way of conquest and rule, the reason I think we will win is because we have Generals who have the courage to write reports like this, others who have the patience to read it, the confidence to realise that we are going down a wrong route and the humility to make changes. As it so happens, the US Secretary of Defence has now stated that he loves the report and would like to see the recommendations implemented. Sometimes being a maverick helps.

All this to be taken with a grain of salt.

The Tree of Wishes

Dr Bhaskar Dasgupta — Tue, 5 Jan 2010 07:59:37 EST

A long time ago, in the dim and distant past, 1984, while I was very near pushing up daisies, my mum went off to the Chisti tomb and tied a thread to the marble window, like many other pilgrims, to beg for my life. Well, as you can see it worked and since then, this idea of asking for a wish to be granted from a saint has been resonating with me for obvious reasons. So when I read in the book I got as a Christmas gift, called "The Blue Manuscript" by Sabiha Al Khemir, that there was a tree of wishes, where people would tie a ribbon torn off from their clothes when asking for a wish. This tree of wishes was on top of a saint’s tomb. When the ribbon springs free and flies off with the wind, then the supplicant would know that his/her wish has been granted.

Coming from India and being a Sufi myself, that spoke to me, very loudly even. But I am jumping ahead, let's get back to the book.. There are two separate stories that are linked together through a blue manuscript, written and illustrated by the Court Calligrapher, ironically called Ibn Warraq, to the court of the Fatimid Caliph al Muizz in Egypt. He dreams and thinks about how best to write his masterpiece. He looks up into the sky and prays and begs for divine guidance and at the end, he feels that God speaks to him in his heart and guides his pen and he sees what the manuscript should look like in a vision.The manuscript is a copy of the Quran commissioned for the Caliph’s mother, in two volumes. It is the calligraphers crowning glory, his best and last work. He lavishly writes it in letters of gold, using a feather pen on vellum dyed with Lapis Lazuli brought all the way from Afghanistan. He becomes one with the letters, having taken a vow of silence for 6 years, during which he slaves over the creation of this masterpiece. One volume is buried with the mother of the Caliph and the other volume is to be buried with him, as a reward for his excellence and ultimately is lost.

The first volume is found sometime in the 20th century and the dealer divides it and sells individual pages of it for the horrendous sum £100,000 per page, thereby putting a very high value on whoever can find the undamaged second volume.

Some dealers get together and fund an academic international archaeological dig in a tiny village near Cairo in Lower Egypt to find this second manuscript. Some scholars join the dig for other purposes, related to exquisite rare Fatimid pottery and other reasons that I do not want to divulge, so as not to give away the plot. The second story is primarily of this dig, the archaeologists and their interaction with the villagers, with some flashbacks to the first story at the time of the Fatimid Caliph, which details the work of the calligrapher, the Caliph's mother interwoven with some history.

In the village there is a blind mysterious man who remains in the shadow of the book, emerging once in a while to tell a story to the Tree of Wishes, because the villagers have long ago ceased to listen to him. His stories are lovely, like stories out of the 1001 Nights. He speaks to the tree and the tree is listening. I loved that imagery.

Do you remember the story behind the shrieking tree? The idea that you go and embrace a tree and then shriek out your sorrows and pains into its rough gnarled bark and trunk. The tree absorbs your pains and leaves you limp, but happier an d relieved. I envisioned the Tree of Wishes to have a trunk like this one below, a big thick solid tree which has been on this earth for centuries, burrowing deep into mother earth, having seen hundreds of thousands or even millions of pilgrims move underneath its leaves, going on tiptoe to tie a ribbon, sometimes touching the bark and wishing from their hearts.

So this tree of wishes reminded me of a tree that I had seen in Sanchi with prayer flags. Here is a picture that I took then and it is the same concept like the one in the book.

But this is far too much like India. Here are two pictures which sort of show the dusty rather barren nature of the area.

The dry dusty stony land, almost exactly like the area where the excavation is being held. Instead of Saqqara, imagine an earthen mound with a small shrine on top.

Ignore the fat bloke in the middle (damn fella keeps on popping up in the strangest of places), but imagine another view of a rather barren stony, sandy land, interspersed with isolated hardy trees, in the middle of a very poor village and then you are there, where the story is set.

The author describes the heat, the relationships between the villagers and the scientific team, the bureaucracy, the permits to dig, and even the cook and his apprentice, the bumpy dusty ride daily to and from from their camp in the half finished school to the dig. She also talks about onions, about mangy dogs, the dishdiba, smoking, the oligeneous eyes of the Egyptians, the religious element, the slow going nature of the village combined with blind unreasoning violent action.

The tree of wishes is planted on the mound with the grave of a woman. As the blind story teller tells it, a man accompanied by his heavily pregnant wife were travelling the desert in this location many many moons ago. The wife then suddenly goes into labour and the man finds a small cave in which she gives birth to his son ,but dies in childbirth shortly after. Knowing that his son will also die, as there is no way of feeding him till he reaches the next civilised outpost, he puts the baby at his dead wife’s right breast, and with a heavy heart walls up the cave to protect them from the animals and leaves weeping bitterly. Several years later, he happens to return to the area with a caravan and notices with great surprise that the wall he had built has been broken open and the ground was covered with the footprints of a child. He finds his son and the dried desiccated body of his wife. Th eamazing thing however is that her right breast is still weeping breast milk. He rescues his son and gives his wife a proper burial. This becomes the shrine, for the miracle provides the saint and since then, people have been coming to the grave of the mother and asking for wishes to be fulfilled, wombs to be quickened, marriages to be held and so on and so forth.

The author treats each character with their national characteristics, the difficult to understand Irishman, the inscrutable Japanese, the reserved Englishman, the exuberant Italian, the secretive but open Egyptian, the confused mixed race British Tunisian translator, the organised German, the natives and so on and so forth. She writes very well. You can almost taste the dust, feel the oily roll of the riverside waves, hear the biting insects flit about in the dark heavy almost oppressing hot night under the mosquito nets, feel the thud of the pickaxe in the archaeological trenches and the susurration of the sieves which are checking the dust and mud for any piece of archaeological value.

But while the above bits spoke to me, I found some of the passages of writing too abrupt, almost like staccato. To me it felt wrong. This is Egypt she is writing about and there nothing happens abruptly. Everything takes its time, there, where millennia have passed slowly and gently like the flow of the Nile.

In some of the passages her writing is also very dark, and there is no brightness to it. I like some of the nobility of the spirit to show, like for example in The Sunbird by Wilbur Smith. That showed nobility of spirit, despite the protagonist being a hunchback. He had a soaring vision and ideas. This book also had a similar soaring vision, but instead of going up in the sky as a glorious huge condor or a giant eagle, it became like a furtive magpie, skittering around in the shadows.

I was also bit disappointed at the rather limited historical information provided. She talks a bit about the Caliph’s court, some very basic archaeological techniques, some bits about pottery but nothing much there. It was like layman historical writing about. If you are writing historical fiction, I would have liked to have felt that you have more command over that period and more details to make the experience of the flight of fantasy deeper. I dwhidn't get that feeling. Finalile ly, not giving away the end, but I found it to be a very limp ending. Here I was hoping that the end would be akin to flying Pegasus to the skies and instead I ended up with being savaged by a dyspeptic sheep.

I was a bit disappointed and not very impressed, but I suppose it's alright. To her credit I have to say that she handles language very well. SHe definitely has a flair for using words and she describes the translator's work with a passion. To the translator in the book, words are alive and build bridges or walls, and change with the development of the plot, but I don't want to give away too much. Wait for the next essay where I review another book which is a bit similar but boy-oh-boy did that one knock my socks off....

All this to be taken with a grain of salt!

Sniping in the Crosshairs

Dr Bhaskar Dasgupta — Sun, 31 May 2009 13:10:16 EDT

Hunting is an atavistic human activity which is now falling into disfavour. One can understand why it is so, because one cannot hunt animals that have been over-hunted, food does not need to be hunted any more. The view, that the only reason why one would hunt an animal is because it is posing a danger to humans, is increasing now. However, there is still one animal which is hunted these days and that is man. You might very well ask why I talk about hunting men? Well, in a particular case, hunting men is no different from hunting animals. I refer to the art of sniping. Let us take a look!

First the usual disclaimer! I love hunting although I haven’t done so for a long time now. It goes back to those old halcyon pre-teenage and teenage days of hunting with a slingshot and pebbles/marbles and then graduating to a pop air gun and then to a rifle and the very rare shotgun/high powered rifle. Mainly I went after large birds, squirrels, rabbits and the rare boar or antelope. Quite a lot of the shooting was to do with target shooting and practice. I have even managed to shoot couple of humans as well, but with a dinky air rifle. The chances of actually doing big damage with that are fairly well limited. I got one in the calf, which was an accident and one was by design and I got the boy in the patootie. But I have had experience of shooting off the big rifles as well and using scopes. Those are big men’s toys and you can see a man being brought down. Not that I have bought a man down, mind you, but I can see the similarities.

This brings me to sniping. If my memory serves me right, the first time I read about sniping was when I read ‘Dogs of War’ by Fredrik Forsyth. In that book, the hero talks about how it would have been so much easier to get a mercenary with a sniper rifle to expend a bullet costing ½ a shilling to take out Adolph Hitler rather than go through the whole headache that was World War II. That piqued my interest and it has become more and more of an interest since then. I read with deep concentration how Navy SEAL snipers took out three Somali pirates with three shots. Now those were absolutely great shots. Can you imagine taking a pot shot from the pitching and unstable USS Bainbridge’s stern at a tiny target, where only the head and shoulders were exposed, and that also rather hazy and wavering in the dark, at least 300 meters away, in a pitching lifeboat? Not touching the captive at all - but just pops – pop-pop-pop, and the captive was free. And totally coordinated, all three pirates had to be brought down at the same time; otherwise the captive’s life was in danger. I simply cannot imagine the skill and ability of the snipers and I suspect that a vast majority of people on this planet cannot get that done either. I hope the SEAL’s get due recognition for totalling those pirates. Down through the ages starting from Julius Caesar and Cicero all the way to now, that has unfortunately been the only way to deal with pirates.

By and large, people are very uncomfortable about sniping as a weapon of war. The main objection seems to be that it offends the rules of fair play. I suppose it’s the same feeling that the samurai or the Red Indians were faced with in the 17th century when being confronted with rifles and guns. These would smell, stink and kill without honour. But killing is killing, I guess. That said the feeling that if you do want to kill and fight, then you do it face to face. We still use terms such as “back stabber” or “sneak up behind”, all sounding very bad and dishonourable. We do not like anonymous strangers and we think it’s a sign of courage and morality that fighting should be like fencing, one to one. So the idea that somebody can be a kilometre away and using a high powered rifle to kill a target, who does not even have a chance to react, is sort of anathema to normal folks. You don’t give a warning, you don’t allow any chance of defence, you don’t provide any retreat clause, and you just kill. But life is brutal and sniping is a way of life. When humans would sneak up on animals to kill them, hundreds of thousands of years ago, they were doing the same. But then, it was for food, now it’s for “war”. I can understand this, I still do not have a good explanation why this would be so, but I can see the military need for it.

If you can, from long distance, avoid the need to engage with the enemy and just quietly and safely take out an enemy leader who is directing his men to fight against you, why wouldn’t you do that? Take for example this book ‘Sniper One: The Blistering True Story of a British Battle Group Under Siege’ (ISBN-10: 0141029013) by Sergeant Dan Mills of the 1st Battalion, Princess of Wales Royal Regiment. Sergeant Dan Mills lead a group of British Army Snipers deployed in the field in Al Amarah, Iraq with Lance Corporal Johnson Beharry, the first Victoria Cross holder in the Iraq War. But the book is not about Lance Corporal Beharry, it’s about the group of men whom Sergeant Mills lead for months. They were snipers, based on the top of a low building, for months on end.

And what they would be doing is taking out suicide bombers, jihadis, various Shia militiamen, assorted RPG and mortar holders, men planting IEDs on the road side, and so on and so forth. All of them were using their British Army sniper rifles and in some instances a 50 calibre rifle. By safely dispatching these assorted fundos out from a kilometre or more distance, they literally saved their fellow soldiers’ lives - hundreds if not thousands of times. They fired over 33,000 rounds and are credited with 200 kills (that they know of, very difficult to confirm kills in urban conditions). It is a very good book, highly recommended. The author was mentioned in dispatches even. Very brave man and very brave soldiers. It feels pretty good to read about it as well. Yeah, I know, I am being childish now!

What about counter sniper operations? This is something that people engaged in urban warfare face all the time and it was and is currently happening in large areas in Iraq. What do you do with enemy snipers who are going to pick your tank, APC or other commanders off while they are on patrol? (Please keep in mind that this isn’t the place to talk about whether or not they should be in Iraq in the first place!) Then rules of engagement come in. Rules of engagement are in place to define how, where, why and when etc. of how soldiers should fight. The rules differ from place to place, time to time, regiment to regiment, commander to commander, etc. Basically, the bottom line is, that it depends upon how risky you want the battle to be. If you are very risk averse, then you will have stringent rules of engagement. So in this case you will say to your counter sniper teams, you cannot shoot an enemy sniper till the enemy sniper has actually fired.

Now as you can imagine, that means that you can only fire in self defence or fire after a fellow soldier has already been killed, wounded or targeted. What if the enemy soldier is just doing reconnaissance? Can you still kill him? How about a commander or a Colonel? What about an unarmed, not in uniform mullah who is ordering his men to commit suicide attacks? What about a sniper nest up in the minaret of a mosque? Can you fire at the sniper nest in a minaret? You know that if you fire at the minaret, the uglies and the idiots will come out boiling and create more problems. What if the shot is worth it?

What about you having just observed a group of men triggering a roadside bomb in a heavily built up area and then suddenly you have a whole bunch of people running away from the explosion? The perpetrators aren’t nicely sign posted, you have dust, blood, smoke, debris and body parts flying all over the place resulting from the explosion and you hear the screams of the wounded all around you. Then you are asked to take out the chap who triggered the explosion, despite the fact that there are usually two men in each sniper team, you are both still looking through a very narrow telescope or binoculars. How do you decide whom to kill and whom to spare? It is such a difficult decision, but you know that you better take the chaps out because they are also carrying the triggering device which will trigger additional IEDs to take out the follow up ambulances or APCs which are going to come to check on the first ambulance. What a tough decision to make!

What about you taking out a man you know is an insurgent leader, has been seen and known to be a master bomber? You have now found out where he lives and have been informed that he is plotting an attack. You also know that there is no court in Afghanistan or Iraq which will ever convict him or any prosecutor brave enough to prosecute him and no policeman brave enough to arrest him? But you know he is alive and he is directing operations which are killing your men and other innocent civilians. Well, a real life case such as that has happened when Green Beret Master Sgt. Troy Anderson took out Nawab Buntangyar and was prosecuted for unlawful killing. He was acquitted of the charges on the grounds that it was justifiable homicide, which is a good thing in my humble opinion. But now you see the problem for snipers. They have to be very careful. You don’t have hotheads in the sniper teams, at least not in the professional armies. You cannot say much about this for the snipers in militant and terrorist groups.

Sniping is more of an art than a science. The entire exercise of getting to a place, settling down there for ages, having almost inhuman patience to stalk, to keep zillions of things in mind, and then, phut, the target is pushing up daisies. The ingress and egress from the ultimate shooting position would be nerve wracking. You will need to be very careful; you cannot just stand anywhere and shoot. You need to think about getting in, taking the shot and then getting safely out. And once you are in situ, can you imagine the patience it requires? You cannot move, cannot just take a break at any time, cannot eat properly, cannot do the bodily functions easily And all that for hours and in some cases, days on end, where the sniper team just sits there and waits.

All that can end up only for one chance which might exist for 10 seconds. In those 10 seconds you have to make a judgement call on whether or not it is legal or ethical, whether the situation is under the rules of engagement and then worry about the physical act of taking the shot. Just one shot from hundreds of meters away, relying on a controlled explosion inside your barrel which will propel the bullet over hundreds of meters, battling smoke, wind, heat waves and then hitting the head or a vital part of the body for a proper kill. Bloody hell, that’s one hell of a difficult way to top somebody.

But I have rambled on long enough and the best way to close this essay is to write four quotes which encapsulate this secretive and strange world of sniping.

Reporter to sniper in Iraq. "What do you feel when you shoot an insurgent?" Sniper to reporter, "Just a little recoil."

Another one is, I am a whisper, a shadow, I don't exist. By the time you realize I'm there it's already too late and by then I'm long gone.

Then you have the "one man’s fate comes from another man’s wait" and the final rather gallows humour one, "a sniper is the worst romancer, they never make the first move."

All this to be taken with a grain of salt!

Book Review: Hyperion

Dr Bhaskar Dasgupta — Sat, 9 May 2009 21:55:15 EDT

I believe that one of the most poignant emotions that are evoked inside of one is when one reads or hears about a parent facing the death of his/her child. Whether it is burying his child, or lighting the funeral pyre or laying the child out for a vigil or wrapping the child in a shroud, the feeling is perhaps much more powerful than any other death. Compared to the deaths of any of other relatives and family members, the death of your child might be the most heart wrenching one. But why on earth am I talking about this? This topic came from a strange source and made me think about it, so as usual I jotted down some thoughts on this.

First, I have to explain that I am a bit of a science-fiction geek and have been reading this particular genre for the best part of 30 years now, starting way back when I got my little hands on HG Wells' books, like The Invisible Man, The Time Machine, Island of Doctor Moreau, War of the Worlds, God The Invisible King, Wheels of Chance, Research Magnificent, etc. Second, I usually haunt charity shops, flea markets and websites such as abebooks, Alibris, eBay and other places where secondhand books are sold. The idea being, just because it’s a secondhand book that doesn’t mean that the book is bad. Words are amazing things whose worth does not diminish with frequent use. Just because it’s a bit yellowing or has a broken spine, that doesn’t mean that it cannot be read again or anymore. But more importantly, second hand books come with an idea already built in that somebody found it good enough to put it back into circulation. Generally, you always win that way.

So now we get back to the topic. It was surprising that I have not come across this book anywhere else before, other than when I saw it in one of those charity shops I mentioned. This book, Hyperion by Dan Simmons, was originally published in 1990 and won a whole bunch of awards, like the Hugo and Locus Awards for the best science fiction novel). Naturally, I scooped it up and finally got to reading it and found its basic premise to be quite interesting. The story deals with a group of seven travelers, who have joined to go together on a pilgrimage to another planet, which seems to have a God like creature in residence called as Shrike. The pilgrimage is embarked on to beg for Shrike’s assistance to save mankind’s galactic civilization. The overall structure of this galactic civilization under threat is rather popular, but not what I want to get into in this essay. What made this book very interesting is the fact that the story is actually not just one story, but it comprises the individual stories of the seven pilgrims.

I am not going to say much about the other six sub-stories except to say that each of them was fascinatingly imaginative and amazingly creative and uniquely different. But it was one of those seven stories which really tugged my heartstrings and made me want to write about it. It is the story of one of the pilgrims mentioned above, who is carrying a baby of about 6 months of age. That bewildered me at the beginning. What on earth is this? Did you ever hear of a hero going off on a galactic quest carting a baby around along with the essential nappies and vital baby formula milk, favourite blanket and other assorted vital accessories?

The story of that baby is amazing. As it so happens, a young woman was trained as a scientist and went off to research Shrike. But then something happens to her that is not really explained very well (nor am I going to try to explain it here), but the effect of that event or happening is that she starts regressing in age rather than growing older. Every day, she loses one day’s worth of life and memory attached to it or knowledge gained during it. The doctors cannot figure out neither the illness, nor a cure for it and so she finally ends up with her parents. Physically she is doing just fine, but she grows younger and younger every single day instead of growing old.

You might say that this sounds brilliant, to grow young again! But I don’t think we have really thought this through properly. In popular fiction, you would have somebody who is old and then grows younger for some reason till they reach an ideal age and then they stick to that age. This ideal age is say around 25 or so, when people are at the prime of their lives. Shades of She by Haggard, no? But you don’t really believe that this is good, do you? The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, has a similar theme, but that still doesn’t talk to me the way this particular story does.

I refer, obviously (or perhaps it is still not that obvious) to the feelings of the parent, in this case here the father, which is precisely what I was thinking about and what pulled so violently on my heart strings. As somebody once said, the worst experience in human life is to have a father bury his child. In other words, no parent should have to outlive his children.

I have a young daughter of my own and while I obviously cannot (and hope to hell not) imagine to ever go through this, but reading about how this father managed to go through each day shook me. Every single day that father was teaching his daughter everything all over again starting from zero or square one, knowing that tomorrow, they will still have to do everything all over again, because she would have forgotten all that she had learnt the previous day.

Still, going back from an age of 25 to 24 is bearable, despite it being 365 days of utter pain and enormous loss. From 24 to 23 is also OK, and perhaps it’s acceptable untill you reach say 12 or 10 years of age. 15 long years of seeing your child shrink, lose maturity and knowing that the end is inexorably coming. Yet still rushing about, trying everything and anything to get her cured and failing miserably.

Then childhood comes, where some of the basic human functions start failing. And then finally the dreaded day comes, when your daughter forgets language and the ability to speak and she also can no longer walk, but moves into helpless babyhood again, which is where the story ends. It was a frightening read for me and Scared the bejesus out of me. It sort of gave me a better appreciation of what your children really are. Emotional? Too crazy? Allowing what is science-fiction to become kind of real in my mind? You bet your bottom dollar On all of the above!

It did impact me and despite it being just a story, I was ended up putting myself in that father’s shoes. I am not sure if I would have the discipline and courage it definitely would take to live my life all over again, but this time in reverse. What do I do with the photographs that I had taken? The toys that she played with? How about the sleepless nights I spent walking up and down in the hallway with her in my arms trying to get her to sleep? Or the days I spent out in the garden with her, playing with her dolls or on the trampoline? Or reading a book with her? I can do it now, because we have a bright future in front of us together. It’s a joyful time. But would I be able to do the exact same thing knowing that there is no real future for her, because she is not progressing but is actually regressing and heading inevitably towards her death?

I know I will have to do it, but can I? I do not know, so I thought of asking you who also have children about what you think. Could you?

P.S.: This book was brilliant, a good read and comes highly recommended. There is a second part to the book also, but more on that one perhaps later…

All this to be taken with a grain of salt!

Technorati Tags: Personal, Bibliophilia

The British National Party - Not British, National, Certainly Not a Party

Dr Bhaskar Dasgupta — Sat, 25 Apr 2009 22:56:34 EDT

The BNP (British National Party) is a curious old animal in the British political landscape. It is an out and out racist party, associating with some very dubious characters across Europe. Its fascination with fascism is also well known. I do not have to say much about why it is so reprehensible. My basic problem with them is not that they are racist but that they are stupid. Any political party which bases its policies on the amount / type of melanin in the skin HAS to be, by its very definition, stupid.

But this party is slowly gaining ground because of the existing Labour party’s policies.

Immigration. The open mass immigration allowed under the Labour government causes angst. When you have an open door policy and others are just faffing around makes it very difficult. Take a look at this think tank, which keeps track of migrations to know that it is a serious issue. And constantly, the Labour government has done sweet sod about it all, despite the warnings all over the political spectrum and down the ages. Consequently, the worry has not been managed and by and large, it is now a bona fide political problem.

The rabid 1984 type of centralisation of all powers into Whitehall means that local democracy has been eviscerated. So when there are no local powers, then it is but natural that extremist wings see a chink in the local dissatisfaction with politics.

The Scottish Mafia which is running the UK despite having given local government of a kind to Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. This leaves England as the only nation within the United Kingdom without local representative bodies. So if there is a local highly nationalistic party which bangs on about being English, then it will get support.

Ignoring English needs such as having its own national day. (St. George’s Day is not considered to be a national holiday unlike in Scotland or Wales.)

The open trade policy and the resultant losses due to globalisation is hurting the libertarians and the free traders. People get upset when their jobs go or are taken over by migrants. It does not even have to be true, it just needs to be thought or said that it is so. When the government fights to keep the trade borders open, then it provides an open door to protectionist economic illiterates such as the BNP to enter from.

Be that as it may, because it does not allow non-white people as members, it creates some major political issues. How can a member of a political party elected to government and then required to support everybody be exclusive? So the first problem I have is that the British State is being stupid in allowing this party to go ahead and allowing its people to stand for public office. If you are secular and non discriminatory, you have to stand by that principle - very hard!

Which brought it home to me because of a certain candidate for public office that I have crossed words with on a public mailing list. For some extremely bizarre reason, this lady seems to think that Islam (to be precise, the Qur'an) provides all that you need to create and run a modern state. The state of the actual intellectual discussion and knowledge is abysmal. Anyway, that’s not the problem (well, it is in a small way, but read on).

This lady seems to have ended up on a Jury Team initial MEP candidate list. The idea being that people need to vote for her via sms and the person with the greatest votes goes forward to the proper ballot. So far so good. She was asked to sign up to this agreement which clearly states right at the beginning that:

I agree not to support any policies discriminating on the basis of race, colour, gender, sexual orientation, disability or religious or other belief.

And guess what? she says in public that she wants to horse trade with the BNP and vote for it. So she got chucked out of the Jury Team. This is what I found bewildering (especially considering that the lady concerned is a Malaysian Chinese legal immigrant:

Why would you vote for a party that will not allow you to join it?
Why would you vote for a party that would, if it can, send you right back to your original country?
Why would you vote for a party that would, if it could, chuck your UK born children (don't know if she has any but I think she does) back to your original domicile which they have never seen?
Why would you complain that a party that DID let you in now throws you out for violating the basic agreement?
Why would Muslims like her ideas about Islam being the good system (based only on the Quran mind you) specially after knowing that she supported and voted for the BNP which wants to eradicate at worst and expel at best from the country?
And finally, why on earth would a BNP MEP candidate support you when all his support is based upon not supporting people like you?

Inconsistencies galore, but do you see what is happening to the country? This is causing even ordinary politics to get distorted simply because of the presence of this party. But why did I describe this situation? The reason is that the presence of the BNP causes normal politics to have major issues as they tend to redefine what the political centre is.

Because there is a small but significant population (In the 2004 European elections, the BNP polled 4.9 % of the vote, and 4.3 % in the 2005 general election, or roughly 1 in 20 supports / votes for this party) which supports the BNP, politics are getting dirtied. Some time back, a list of BNP members was leaked to the press. Here’s a graphical representation of where all these racists live:

Here’s a zoomed in version of the map in London and the South East.

The BNP obviously went into a huge tizzy and tried to stop the publication of the list, but once its out on the internet, its out there. In case you want to see that, here is the link to it. The sheer banality of the names, occupations and locations is frightening. You could very well imagine living on these pretty streets or bumping into them in the local supermarket.

But what exactly are the BNP doing to make themselves into a force that even so called level headed people want to vote for them? (as explained above?)

An interesting paper came my way. The abstract states the following:

Since the turn of the twenty-first century, the far right in Britain, under the auspices of the British National Party (BNP), has made noteworthy electoral gains. Under the leadership of Nick Griffin, the party has placed great emphasis on modernization. The concentration of BNP electoral gains within specific areas such as Burnley, Barking and Dagenham, Epping Forest, and Stoke-on-Trent has meant that academic enquiries into the party's activities have a more localized emphasis.

As well as examining the ideological shifts within the BNP, an emergent body of literature has sought to focus on the means by which the party has been able to assume greater levels of legitimacy within particular locales. This focus on the party apparatus has yielded some interesting insights into the way in which the BNP has sought to embed itself within particular communities. Great stock has been placed on traditional forms of community-based politics. By tapping into everyday concerns and by selecting local residents as candidates, it appears that the BNP has been able to deflect charges of racism and extremism.

Drawing on qualitative interviews with BNP voters and ex-candidates in Burnley, Rhodes suggests that it is the banality of the party, its discourses and its candidates at a local level that has enabled the BNP to acquire a degree of 'respectability'. The party and its supporters have seemingly been able to exploit traditional conceptions of racism and nationalism as something out of the ordinary or 'other'. There appears to have been a recognition that it is everyday articulations and representations of white racism that seem able to escape the label of extremism, appearing as more 'legitimate' forms of expression. Similarly, the way in which BNP voters, as well as the party itself, have been able to locate powerful tales of identity and entitlement within routine narratives will be explored in relation to the reconfiguration of the 'local' and the 'global' in the contemporary period.

This research paper is quite interesting and illustrates some worrying themes. For example, in Burnley, the BNP voters are

Factory workers, healthcare workers, retired accountants, self-employed tradesman. In fact, research on the profile of BNP supporters suggests that the majority are drawn from the lower middle classes and the upper working classes

That’s the core body of support for the Labour Party actually. So what are they doing voting for a racist party such as the BNP? The reason is that the BNP adopt a policy of actually having people who are banal, normal, common, unremarkable, not the loutish, skin head thugs. People like you and I (well besides the skin colour that is) and concentrate on hyper local issues. So how do they manage to link global and national issues and aims to hyper local issues?

See how they link through? And they are severely Islamophobic in nature and the UK terrorist attacks are not helping either. The BNP are becoming respectable, because their candidates are now respectable, ordinary folks. There is nothing wrong with normal folks, and you give them respect as much as you would give to any other fellow law abiding citizen.

It is this respectability that people have to attack. The very idea that a party which has clear directions to be a white only party and hates minorities cannot simply be allowed to function in a secular non-discriminatory country. So why isn’t the Government acting against it? It is acting in some ways against individual members, such as this case. But why not against the entire party? Because it is now respectable. And also because the Labour government will be acting against its own supporters. This is what happens when governments become too controlling and centrist, they lose sight of the peripheries and all kinds of uglies start emerging. As it so happens, I just got pointed to an interesting story by my friend Larry Schwartz. If you don't clamp down on these neo-Nazi racists, then you have a very strong possibility that another Holocaust might take place. I quote the director of the Holocaust Museum:

“In many cases, locals played a key role in the murders, probably by a ratio of 10 locals to every one German. We are trying to understand the man who played soccer with his Jewish neighbour one day and turned to kill him the next. This provides material for research on genocide elsewhere, like in Africa.”

These locals are the people who enthusiastically assisted the Germans in killing Jews. These locals were what I would call as respectable, banal people. Just like the BNP voters and candidates. And to paraphrase Voltaire who said that the Holy Roman Empire was not Holy, it wasn’t Roman and it certainly isn’t an Empire, the British National Party is not British (Its English, another example of the geographic illiteracy of the party heads), its not National (the British aren’t a nation, nor is the BNP anywhere near having any presence in other parts of Britain) and finally I wouldn’t call it a party to be anywhere near it. Can you imagine being with illiterate incoherent racists? If you are known by the company you keep, I would strongly advice all to stay away from them.

United Kingdom, BNP, Britain, British National Party

The Challenge of Suicide

Dr Bhaskar Dasgupta — Sun, 19 Apr 2009 02:28:37 EDT

Suicide is a strange human phenomenon. After all, given our physiological imperatives to live, the whole push to live longer, the desire to cling to life, our resource allocations to making life safer, more risk free and allocate more funding to medical research, chasing after immortality, one would have expected that people would actually like to live rather than explicitly die. So ignoring the admittedly rare phenomena such as suicide terrorism, what explains the bog standard suicide phenomena? So off I trotted to see what gets caught on a wide net.

As by now usual, several things came together for this essay. The first was watching the movie 300 again. Then I was listening to Dharmendra threatening to commit suicide from top of the water tower in the cult Indian film Sholay, and after that reading about the current trial of the British airline bottled drink suicide bombers and their martyrdom videos. This was followed by watching some clips on YouTube showing old kamikaze attacks on American carriers in WW2 and the USS Cole attack, the recent British case over the MS sufferer and her request for assisted suicide. I also read an interesting study on suicide in Hong Kong and finally found a rather interesting econometric study on OECD suicide rates with a particular inquiry about why Japanese rates are the highest.

But first things first! 300 was an excellent film. It had sufficient blood, gore, splattering guts, muscles and the lot for me, and even if you ignore the rather startling historical inaccuracies, what becomes clear, is that king Leonidas was on a suicide mission. Pure and simple! That's almost equivalent to the chaps who blew up the airliners, they were on a suicide mission as well. Just like the Kamikaze pilots or the guy who drove a zodiac boat filled with explosives into the USS Cole. I am sure there will be outraged protests and I will be asked to understand the difference between the motives, but I am just talking about suicide. That's the bottom line; the perpetrators willingly went into a situation where the loss of their lives was clearly forfeit on a preordained basis.

You might consider that suicide is a human phenomenon, but take the tiny Aphid. As it so happens, a particular Aphid species has soldiers who willingly die in the process of repairing damage to their plant hosts. They create holes and then by forcing themselves into the hole, create a fluid comprised of their own body mass and mix it into a scab which covers the hole. Interestingly enough, once the hole in the plant is plugged, the plant survived, but plants which did not have the aphid treatment died. How about the spider family? The death of the black widow male spider after mating or the fact that female spiders of certain species willingly allow their bodies to be eaten by their young to give them a headstart? But I digress.

Now for the motives and believe you me, there is a huge variety of them. One can kill one’s self over a loved one, this can be over the presence or the absence of one. One can do one’s self in for the motherland or fatherland. one can blow one’s self up or proselytise to become a martyr to please one’s God. One is very ill and cannot take the pain. One is facing financial ruin. One is stuck in a room with the TV permanently tuned to Big Brother. So on and so forth.

But take a look at Japan. In this study titled “How is Suicide different in Japan”, by Joe Chen, Yun Jeong Choi, Yasuyuki Sawada published in the ‘Japan and the World Economy Journal’ in 2009, the authors investigate suicide rates in OECD countries to find out why Japan is indeed so different. The authors come up with some interesting insights on suicide rates across the OECD countries. First, one cannot easily generalise across various socio-economic variables as applied to ages and genders, as each have different impacts and statistical significance. In other words, if you are a female in your 20s, then the potential reasons for your death will be significantly different from that of a male in his 50s. That’s understandable as different age/gender groupings have different pressures which could lead to suicide.

The second finding was that better economic conditions, higher incomes and higher economic growth reduce suicide rates, but if income inequality increases, then suicide rates shoot up as well. Again, it’s logical and coherent to understand the former, but not so much the latter. Inequality seems to drive suicide, but is that because we do not like others doing well or better than us? Is jealousy and envy driving us so much, that we commit suicide? This is assuming that the inequality is not as bad as to cause one to have medical problems. After all, the study was done in OECD countries, where there is a welfare state and starvation is not an occurrence. There is much to think about on that, and I must admit it is not in a good way either.

The next finding is an interesting one. It seems like economic factors (GDP per capita, growth rate of GDP per capita and Gini index) are more important than social factors (such as divorce rate, birth rate, female labour force participation rate and alcohol consumption). I am quietly satisfied in a way. Humans are some kind of economic animals, but I am a bit surprised as well. I would have thought that the social factors would drive humans to commit suicide much more than economic factors. The last common OECD factor is that female and elderly suicides are not as easy to statistically analyse or even get information on compared to the young and male suicides. The authors do not give much information unfortunately to back this assertion up, nor do the statistical tables show much guidance on this.

Japan is a puzzling place, an advanced country which has the world’s longest life expectancy, but also one of the highest rates of suicide. What gives? We know of kamikaze pilots who willingly went to their deaths by crashing their flying bombs into USN ships in World War II but civilian deaths now? Japan is significantly different to rest of the OECD countries with rates being consistently at the top, but converging towards the weighted OECD average. The researchers find that the suicide rates in Japan are much more sensitive to economic factors. Also, female labour participation seems to be statistical significant (positively correlated) to suicide rates, the birth date is significantly negative, the divorce rate is positively associated with suicide only for middle aged men, alcohol consumption only for males - mainly elderly males.

The answers tell me that it shows Japan as being in the thrall of wrenching economic and social changes with women participation in the workforce increasing rapidly, birth rates falling and that in some way shows that men are unable to cope, thus leading to higher suicide rates. The lack of a proper bankruptcy law or the relative shabbiness of the welfare state in Japan seems to be further driving more men to suicide. It’s obvious that improving the economic base will assist in reducing suicide values, but not if your society is going through severe socio-economic wrenching change.

Its not just in OECD countries that one observes this behaviour. For example, take India. Hundreds if not thousands of farmers have committed suicide after their crops have failed or they have been unable to get credit or something economic in nature hurt them badly. You think this is only for the barely literate agricultural farmers only? I am afraid not, given the downturn and the consequently hideous drop in demand for diamonds, the highly qualified diamond polishers in Gujarat are committing suicide left right and centre because they are being made redundant from their jobs and they cannot see a future. So many people have committed suicide because their portfolios have tanked.

While I was digging deeper into this, I came across quite a lot of research on suicide notes. Did you know that only 4% of people who commit suicide on (or rather under) London tubes write suicide notes? The percentage is about 30% in Japan and goes up to 43% for elderly people in rural Cheshire, in England? Whether or not you leave a suicide note is not dependent upon the fact that you are going to commit suicide, but rather on your education level and whether or not you are actually able to read/write. Curious, no? Nothing to comment on here, but I found it rather interesting, because I would have thought that writing a note would be done irrespective of education.

I also thought that the way of committing suicide (decapitation, gas, poisoning, shooting, etc.) would have something to do with the suicide notes, but no, it doesn’t. As it so happens, in West Berlin, 45% of those who die by overdosing on medication will leave suicide notes, 40% of people who choose to ingest gas will, but only 13% of those who jump off some high building or bridge etc will do so and only 10% of those who decide on committing suicide under a train will leave a note. So the more immediate the method, the less the chance of writing some kind of final epistle.

Did you know that there is a dedicated academic journal to death? It is called ‘Death Studies’ and in that journal, an interesting paper caught my eye. It’s by Paul W. C. Wong, April W. M. Yeung; Wincy S. C. Chan; Paul S. F. Yip and Arthur K. H. Tang and is titled “Suicide Notes in Hong Kong in 2000” and was published in 2009. This study differs from the other studies, where the method of dying actually has a relationship with writing suicide notes. The method usually chosen is to die by charcoal fire burning in a closed room. As this requires quite a lot of preparation, the poor souls preparing to die get a chance to write notes. And second, it seems like more women than men prefer this gentler way of committing suicide. Comments by the researchers show a fascinating dichotomy. People prefer painless non-violent ways to die over violent ways to carry out the ultimate violence of removing one’s own life.

Once I completed writing this essay, I sat back and felt a bit strange for the first time in all these years of writing these essays. It felt strange in many ways. First it was almost like I was being a dirty old voyeur, delving into extremely private aspects of other people’s lives, rather other people’s deaths. It was almost like I was scolding myself saying: these people are dead, why are you mucking about with them? But I guess the idea was to write about this research so that one can celebrate life. At the end of this essay, I still went and hugged the children and celebrated life by dancing with them to a nice bopping song.

All this to be taken with a grain of piquant salt!

Technorati Tags: Japan, India

The Cryptic Doctor

Dr Bhaskar Dasgupta — Tue, 7 Apr 2009 08:32:56 EDT

1812 AD, somewhere near the Battle of New Orleans

I am sitting at this rickety wooden table with a guttering tallow candle for company writing in this diary. All I can hear around me are the moans of the suffering, the bubbling torturous breaths of the lung shot and the screams of the shocked and mentally distressed men. My nose is enduring the all pervasive smell of rotten flesh and carbolic soap. There are hundreds of men lying on the ground and the demons of typhus, dysentery, measles, small pox and yellow fever are gleefully feasting on their flesh and here I am sitting here in this freezing weather trying to fight the demons off.

The carnage has reached a barely imaginable scale. It is difficult to describe without monotony, for it varies so little. The graves on the little plain and on the hillsides are marked with small plank crosses if lucky and if not, with a hastily thrust in rifle. There is no symmetry to the graves, no neat lines of preparation. They are scattered across the landscape as if by a demented evil spirit, one of death. The howling wet wind makes an eerie sound as it whistles across that forest of rifles and crosses. The trees are leafless, shattered by cannon shots and burnt, all standing in a moonscape of filthy water filled shell-holes, dead horse and mule bodies and deep gun carriage tracks.

Now, I am a bitter man, damning myself for being a doctor and looking over the rotting stinky detritus of the battlefield without being able to help. A far cry from the day the militia came to Carthage, Tennessee in those halcyon days of 1814. I was overwhelmed by the patriotic feeling and signed up leaving Nancy, my darling wife, behind. My dearest wife, whom I miss so much, has by now given birth to our twin daughters. I have never seen them, but what is the point of bringing them into this devastated dirty rotten world?

There is nothing much to say about the Battle of New Orleans of January 8, 1815. Surgeons like me, rarely if ever, see the cannon firing. We just hear the battle cries invading our tent, the makeshift hospital. All we see are shattered arms and legs, voiding bowels, faceless creatures bubbling cries of mercy, men bawling in pain and a lucky few who are beyond needing any of our services. The front-line trenches, wherever they lie, are only gashes in the earth, fenced by wire, beside a greenish strip of ground, pitted with shell-holes. At night, from every part around, one saw a lightning winking over the high ground from the ever-ceasing flashes of guns and shells. There was no quiet moment, but roaring, crashing, hissing and screaming from guns, shells bursting or passing in the air. And now the battles have ended, the treaties have been signed and the grand brass clad men are off to their mansions, leaving me, a poor disillusioned doctor, behind to look after these thousands of men abandoned by their leaders. Extraordinary men and incompetent tyrants served on both sides. Their power to fascinate, inspire, or exasperate, remains undimmed.

I remember reading the story of Emperor Ashoka in Ancient India, looking over the detritus of the Battle of Kalinga. He was horrified with the devastation he had wrought and was so overcome with grief and horror that he became one of the foremost disciples of Buddha and took up non-violence as a creed with a vengeance. That took courage and is the reason why he is considered to be one of the greatest men who have ever walked the earth. But the commanders and generals in our armies are far lesser men. And those men led these lions who now lie diseased, ill and injured in the tents. Lions led by donkeys indeed.

How I wish I was back home, eating hot food, clasping Nancy in my arms at night, playing with my two little angles. How I wish I had a warm surgery to look after my patients in, medicines to dull their pain and the time to tend to them properly. How I wish I was back in Carthage - that lovely city, those wonderful autumn woods and those lovely long walks. I am a big man with big appetites and big opinions, but here I have to be careful. Yet I have to speak out my mind; and say what I feel out loud otherwise I will go mad. But perforce some items have to remain hidden.

Today was a bad day. There are no medical supplies whatsoever. I simply have no more medicines, no pain relievers, no syrups - nothing. I have no clean bandages left at all. The water is filthy for miles around, because of the corpses and rotting animals who have fallen into the wells and streams. The ground is foul with excrement, due to the lack of privies. I do not have sufficient nurses to care for the wounded. I watch helplessly as men just die where they lie. And the brave lions that they are, most - who are conscious - do not complain.

There is that great tyrant, Napoleon Bonaparte. Remember what he did on the great retreat from Moscow? What was left of his Grand Armée, over 500,000 men strong, withdrew from Russia with its tail between its legs. Napoleon had lost about 80,000 men altogether from diseases alone. While he was nicely ensconced inside his carriage during the retreat and only suffered a mild flu, he kept on leaving thousands of men behind at every stop, men who were injured, diseased, hungry, frostbitten suffering from typhus, diarrhoea and dysentery. The road from Moscow to Paris was signposted by the frozen bodies of hundreds of thousands of Frenchmen. What curses did the widows and children of those dead Frenchmen rain down on Bonaparte?

But what rips my heart out are the cries of the young delirious men. They came to fight with dreams of glory and battle cries of patriotism ringing in their ears. They are left with shattered legs or arms, never ending pain, lying in their own filth, with nobody to listen to them and before slipping into blessed death, they cry out for their mothers. Who is responsible for this? I am tired; I have been operating for three days and have barely managed to grab two hours of sleep. There isn't much I can do anyway, all I can do is to operate the saw to hack off the injured limbs or use the needle and thread to sew the injuries together. My hands are shaking now. My fury is more powerful than my fatigue, but still tempered by the need to be careful. I pick up the quill and pen my first cryptic note.

123dwfkdsfa asd asdlkj asldase09qwelk aq saqlidsjqpowue09q3 qsd asldksaldj asidq qwe109283 qwdea alsdj asd9aqew098qwe aqdsi alskdj alskdj alkdj alskdj q

Yet another day

Why is it that when one is depressed and tired, one's dreams are as bad if not worse? Surely dreamland is where you go to dream wonderful things and see magnificent instances? Somewhere you can escape to from this horrible stinking diseased battlefield? I look at these young men, almost children, who are lying all around me moaning in pain. What kind of a world are we creating? I just had twin daughters. What am I bringing them into? One day they will be mothers, or wives of men like those I see in front of me. They will be crying and screaming, pained at the loss of their men. How I wish I could wrap my little girls in my arms and protect them from every hurt, but I cannot even fulfil my duty as a doctor here. How can I protect them as a father? I am crushed under the sheer hopelessness of it all, the depressing reality of the cold winter and the constant cries of pain and terror which have surrounded me for the past three months.

I fell asleep on my chair last night and woke up with a nightmare going in full flight through my mind. Typically, the day and night before were a blur of ice-covered ground, men dying with their steaming entrails exposed in the icy air, the blood flaking off on my hands, frozen fingers unable to clench around my surgical instruments. No firewood available or corpsmen to go far to get wood to heat water so we are forced to operate and wash men using the filthy rainwater.

When I first arrived at the battlefield, I used to keep myself going with the thoughts of my Nancy and the twins in my mind. That would sustain me for the first few days of the war. And I would think about the day I would return home after weeks and months of being in the middle of the war. The carriage would stop on the road in front of our white wooden house in the evening. I could see the windows softly lit by the warm inviting light of the fires burning in the fireplaces of the two front rooms. And then the door would open with my darling showing her lovely face to me. I would stand there and drink her beautiful face in. I miss her so much. She would be wearing a dark blue wraparound tiny white polka dotted dress with white leather high heeled sandals. Her lovely little toes, coloured red, would be peeking out from the white leather sandals. She must have picked that up from the Indian mehendi night she was invited to once and has grown to like since. Her long tresses would be piled up high on her head and combined with her long neck, it would make her look like one of the lithographs I saw of a statue of Athena, the Greek goddess. I would simply gaze at her and then rush up the drive way to embrace her.

She would shed tears while we kiss deeply. I would just bury my face in her neck and sniff and inhale and breathe in her absolutely bewitching perfume. She has an absolutely unique fragrance around her, a deep mystical and dreamlike combination of coconut, ivory, silk, mother of pearl, chocolate covered dates, Hibiscus flowers and Amarula. So many times I had wished for a tiny Nancy whom I could keep around my neck and go around my day surrounded by her fragrance. She would laugh and complain about my bushy beard reddening her skin and that all the neighbours would know that her husband has now come home. For the past many months, her silky skin was unblemished but now she will have these red splotches. How on earth will she ever explain it, she would laugh while nuzzling into my beard.

And then she would draw me into the drawing room where I would finally look at my two tiny little angels in their bassinets, their shining wispy curls cradling two angelic sleepy faces. I look at my hands, which confidently destroy and exorcise demons of disease deep inside delicate bodies and organs, my hands which can wield a scalpel with consummate ease and delicacy, and they look like giant shovels compared to these two tiny perfect angels in their bassinets. I would reach down and Nancy would gasp in horror, exclaiming that she has just about managed to get the twins to sleep and for me not to disturb them. She then would wrinkle her fine patrician nose at my odorous smell (not surprising, I have been unable to take a hot bath for the past two months) and then would threaten me with dire curses if I touch the twins with my dirty hands.

She would take me to the warm kitchen where I would get a hair cut, a beard trim, my nails cut, all while I would be gorging on this thick stew and warm bread. What a difference food makes. I could spend hours in the kitchen just watching Nancy cook her wonderful meals. She has this amazing ability to pinch, sniff, grab, spin and then out pops an amazing meal. It is like she is handling a philharmonic orchestra of gastronomic delights. Absolutely wonderful! And then, barbered, fed, bathed and cleaned, we would repair to somewhere else to finally be close as two people can be and let our passions take us over.

But those are dreams or perhaps memories of the good and early days if one could say that. Those days, I was flush with motivation and patriotism. I was like a tiger after every wounded soldier, not letting them die. I was doing it for my country first and for my commanders second. I trusted them and still believed in the flag. But now? After months of loneliness and surrounded by constant pain, tears, blood, death and cries of dying men, my vision has been taken away and some evil spirit has taken over even my dreams.

“I dreamt consistant that I will record it. . . . I went home and was met by Nancy who appeared very serious and I think cried. I look’d for the little

Twin Girls she told me the oldest was dead and that it died of the same footsore she wrote about. The other babe she showed to me it was very small. Though three months old, I thought – I thought no so very small so small as I expected Its features more expressively course {sic} and I think it was the ugliest face I ever saw – I did not like it and did not take it in my arms, I had Nancy a little while of evening in my arms”

I see what I have written in my diary and give a twisted smile at the page. It obviously came from the time that we lost our other baby. Our first baby was conceived when we were visiting Charleston to see the sights of that lovely city. It was a lovely trip and we left the city with memories enough to last our lifetimes. A city full of lovely buildings, cemeteries, churches, the first museum in America and beautiful promenades. Little did we know that our happiness will be doubled immediately as soon as we got home when Nancy announced that she was with child. We were giddily happy - but then it was not to happen, because God unmercifully tore our baby away from Nancy. She suffered a bad miscarriage and other than tears; I could not do anything to help. It must have been that memory of Nancy losing her baby which lodged inside my mind and caused me to relive those horrible days.

But that was then, now I am in a different mood. I have not been with Nancy for months on end. I look around and see savagery, blood, wounds, rotten flesh and all surrounded with a miasma of corruption bathed in disgusting smells. And this is perfect the breeding ground for demons of bad memories and lust. All elements of tenderness, love, adoration and softness have been driven out by lust and desire. Me, who was well known to be a gentleman have become a barbarian, but I cannot explain what I saw myself doing in my dream. I pick up my pen and code

123dwfkdsfa asd asdlkj asldase09qwelk aq saqlidsjqpowue09q3 qsd asldksaldj asidq qwe109283 qwdea alsdj asd9aqew098qwe aqdsi alskdj alskdj alkdj alskdj q

and then finish by:

Behold it was a dream and well it was as I was, and was as she would not do . . . I do not know what evil Genius should Thus excite my fancy my waking thoughts . . ..

I slam the diary shut and throw the book inside my trunk, reach for the rum bottle and then let the mists of time and sleep take me….

2007 AD, City University of New York

Dr. Kent Boklan peered closely at the photocopies of the four pages of the diary of Dr. William Pitt sent over to him by the Tennessee State Library and tried to make out the writing. He raised his eyes and thought back on his long career in cryptography. He had never seen something so personal yet evocative in his life. He started doodling to try to understand the coding that Dr. Pitt had used.

Many days of complex calculations later.

Dr. Boklan looked with pleasure and also profound sadness at the decoded text. Pleasure because he had managed to decode a very complex cryptographic code and sadness because of what was revealed. He looked at the first block of decoded text which he had written on a clean sheet of paper:

O, I WISH I WAS AT HOME. I AM TIRD OF SEEING WRETCHEDNESS. CAROLL, AS GREAT TYRANT AS {Bonaparte}. {He}’S TO ANSWER {for 500} LIVES. HE MUST BE {great} ONLY {with} BARBARIANS. {No Literature. No erudition. The Lord have mercy on liturg(illegible) subject to nigh a} [CIPHER]. {The} CRIES {of the} WIDOW AND ORPHAN {will} PERSUE {him to his} GRAVE. {History a knowledge of and Literature are indispensably necessary to constitute a commanding Officer.}.

And the second one

IN BED, I EAGERLY URGED [NANCY] [spectacles symbol] [FROM] [SEX]. NANCY WAS ICY COLD, UNWILLING, I [WITH] FORCE HELD HER [spectacles], PRESSD [double box] INTO [NANCY’S] GROTTO, PAST AND EXQUISITE PORTAL, AND ABOUT [WITH] TASTE AND EXTACY AND DIE [WITH] BLISS WHEN SHE TORE HERSELF [FROM] ME, I TURND [FROM] HER WITH DISGUST AND, IN EXECRATING, AWOKE AND.

He slipped the two pages into an envelope along with the four photocopied ones of Dr. Pitt’s diary, sealed it and sat back in his chair staring at the envelope but thinking about a desolate man in a medical tent two centuries ago.

Note: This story has been inspired by the paper in which Dr. Kent Boklan describes how he broke a complex code (“How I Broke an Encrypted Diary from the War of 1812” published in the journal Cryptologia, 32:4,299 — 310, not available online)

=========

Technorati Tags: War, USA , History, Cryptography

The God Who Was Lost!

Dr Bhaskar Dasgupta — Tue, 3 Mar 2009 01:00:24 EST

Buddhism and I have a strange relationship. I grew up listening to the stories of Emperor Ashok and later on when I could, reading about Gautam Buddha in the old Amar Chitra Katha books. Reading about Ambedkar’s conversion to Buddhism and how Buddha was actually considered to be part of the Hindu Gods' pantheon, because the 'Enlightened One' was considered to be a reincarnation of Vishnu. Growing up in Bhopal, I was also exposed to Buddhist artifacts in various tourist locations, as our local area has an ancient history of Buddhist kingdoms and pilgrimage sites (more on this later). But this was a strange journey for me and this essay is another weird combination of a book review, a photo essay and some thoughts about Buddhist history.

But typically, history in India is not taught from the perspective of the historians, the archaeologists, numismatics, the linguistic experts and so on and so forth. There are many reasons for this. For one, for most of India’s history, history has been a battle ground (if you excuse the pun). What the war of independence is for somebody, is the great mutiny for another (a previous essay on this). Then the fact that for a very long period of time, India was ruled by foreigners and history is usually written by the rulers, for the rulers. So if you wanted to know about Buddhism, it was a bit difficult.

But some aspects have rekindled the interest I have in Buddhism. The Dalai Lama is obviously somebody who is the apostle of non-violence and a hero to me (not least for his enchanting giggle) which obviously has emerged out of Buddhism. Second was another hero, namely Ambedkar.Ffor all his faults, he was a brilliant man who created a constitution which all Indians can be proud of. We do not give sufficient credit to that document. In my opinion, it is much more important than all the religious books. He obviously converted to Buddhism as a reaction against the Hindu Caste System (a previous essay here). But there is now a strand of Dalitism. This is not the place to go into the rights or wrongs of this, but it primarily is against Hinduism and its caste system (don't worry, it is seriously incoherent and I have never read anything that makes any less logical sense). But for example, many Dalit intellectuals have relied on colonial historians such as Arnold Toynbee to make their argument that Hinduism is bad (see here, here and here).

This concept that Hinduism is a civilization and is doomed to failure is wrong on both counts. The concept of civilization as a social identity construct is seriously flawed. Man draws his identity based upon several strands (see Amartya Sen's argument here), gender, language, religion, region, country, sports club, and so on and so forth. So for somebody to even think that there is something called as a Hindu civilization is seriously one dimensional. Second, think about the 5000 odd years of history of this religion, one of the oldest religions. It has evolved so much that one would be hard pressed to identify today’s Hinduism with what was there in say 2000 BC or 1000 BC. And finally, even if you do consider that it is one and the same, the fact that Hinduism has survived for 5000 years tells you that its actually in no danger of collapse, so this basic intellectual framework of Toynbee is not really advisable for the Buddhists to rely on.

But there were a bunch of other British and Colonial historians, linguists, archeologists, military personnel and the like, who from the 1700’s, have been poking around in India to determine where and how Buddhism emerged. For a very long period of time, the west and India as it so happens (with the incorporation of Buddha into the pantheon of Hindu Gods) there was no distinction between Buddhism and Hinduism. On the western front, the great Buddhist Kingdoms of Afghanistan were overpowered by the arrival of Islam and now its rubble (remember the dynamiting of the Bamiyan Buddha’s by the Taliban and the persecution of the Hazaras who were reputed to be Buddhists before converting to Shia Islam?)

Anyway, between the Muslim invasions and the Hindu resurgence, nothing was heard or known about Buddhism in the west. Charles Allen, in his lovely book, The Buddha and the Sahibs, describes how a band of often lonely white men (and a couple of females), over 250 odd years, started to dig, decipher, investigate and uncover the history of Buddism lost in the mists of time. From Afghanistan to Sri Lanka, to Burma to Nepal to Tibet and all inside, Charles Allen writes a fascinating story about these orientalists, their associations (The Asiatic Society and the Theosophical Society) and how their struggles gave the world so much information about Buddha and Buddhism. Taking a well deserved potshot at that incomprehensible tome, Orientalism, it has seriously rejuvenated a body of work which is currently very popular. Mind you, the large sections of corpus of western scholarship in this area is totally aghast. The very idea of somebody actually claiming that it took orientalists to actually study and bring forth knowledge of the orient is shocking to them. Hence this book is not reviewed to that extent nor referred to that much.

Anyway, not that important, because besides arcane corners of the academic world, these worshipers of Edward Said are ignored. For anybody who wants to break out of that stultifying cult, you can't do better than to read this book. For one, it supports my argument that all history, science and knowledge is open to all, without worrying about the age, sex, religion, race of the researcher. Moaning about Orientalism is about as stupid as moaning about Jewish Intelligence or the fact that Hindus had invented Zero or it was a Christian who first noticed gravity.

Now returning to the book/ It is very good. It talks about how these white men struggled to piece together this giant multi-dimensional mystery, taking clues from old sanskrit books, talking to religious leaders in various temples and monasteries, deciphering and then translating old sanskrit and pali books to make them available to the wider public. They decoded and cracked the variants of the Brahmi language, one of the oldest languages in India, dating back to the 6th century BC. Don't get me wrong, this is not about Buddhism the religion, but its about the men who investigated the history of its birthplace. While I found his assertion that the Gita was part of the Ramayana rather than the Mahabharat a bit confusing, the book has lots of wonderful photographs and descriptions to make those little issues immaterial.

But reading it finally gave me another view of how widespread Emperor Ashok’s empire was. Absolutely massive and wide ranging. In some ways, it was even bigger than the Mughal Empire.

Can you see the bottom-most text called as Sanchi? That’s just next to my hometown of Bhopal. A couple of years back, we were enjoying a winter vacation there. As you would appreciate, if you are in your hometown, you end up visiting the local attractions hundreds of times and you never end up appreciate them. It's like my mother in law, she grew up in Agra and for her, the Taj Mahal is very commonplace, as she has visited it literally hundreds of times. It was the same for me with Sanchi.

It's perhaps when you get older, that you get a chance to appreciate those local attractions more. I whined and moaned till the family decided to humour me and we all piled into two cars and off we went. It's about a 50 km drive on a pretty good road actually. Quite surprising as it happens. On the way, we crossed the Tropic of Cancer which is signposted.

On the way, one of the main north-south railway lines are crossed and the railway crossing was closed. So we were forced to wait. And one of the most typical Indian sights was on the left. Here’s a gentleman, having a nice nap on one of the Milestones on the State Highway. I just find this image so evocative. Welcome to India!

The actual stupas are up on a hillock. At the bottom between the town and the hillock, there is a neat little museum with a nice small park. Here’s a pipal tree with a sign in front, called as Creation in time wheel. Obviously, the connection is that Gautam Buddha attained enlightenment while meditating under a pipal tree. We were not allowed to take photographs of the museum artefacts so that was a bit of a shame. Also, it was disappointing, why on earth can't the Museum authorities put in more explanation of the various sculptures, ornaments and other nice pieces?

But as you come out of the museum, you can see the tip of the stupa in the background in the middle.

Also, on the side of the road, guess what I found? spicy chanas. Before anybody could tell me off, my hand was inside my pocket, money exchanged hands and I quaffed a rather large quantity of chana. Ah! Heaven! Beyond this is a papad seller and across the road was a guava seller. Needless to say, I checked out ALL of them. (oink oink). There is something just brilliant about eating road side food, it's the awesome combination of dust, dirty oil, smoke and spices. Nowhere else, does it taste anything like it, I tell you. Anyway, we piled back inside the cars and drove up the hillock and parked.

Right outside, you can see a memorial temple made by pilgrims from Colombo and on the right, you can see another pipal tree, surrounded with the typical Buddhist railings and with prayer flags fluttering in the wind. Did you know that the prayer flags are not meant to carry prayers up to the Gods? But they are meant to use the wind horses to scatter the printed mantras and prayers for goodwill and compassion across the surrounding place. Interesting, no? And as it so happens, this concept of prayer flags is very Tibetan, not Indian nor Sri Lankan at all.

Below are some photographs of the very intricately carved gates. The Great Stupa, the big one, was made by the great Emperor Ashoka way back in 250 BCE (approximately). This amazing emperor is supposed to have built about 86,000 temples and stupas across the country. One of the greatest men of India indeed. Somebody was joking when I said that India owns Afghanistan. As it so happens, Ashoka ruled over a kingdom which extended up from Afghanistan down to deep Deccan and as far east as Bangladesh. But anyway, the carvings show the history of Buddha and lots of carved jataka tales

If you observe the central pillar closely, you will see an inscription on it in a strange language, Ashoka Brahmi. Most of the horizontal or vertical pillars have these inscriptions. They are nothing profound, but are in fact donor cards. Just state who gifted that bit. And check out the sculptures on the right, they resemble me - rather my potbelly.

The above and below photographs show the intricate carvings. One has to remember that these are well over 2 millenea old and are still crisp and clear. They have been restored a bit, but still. Amazing work!

Here’s a story of the tree (the tree stands for Buddha) and even monkeys worshipping the sacred tree. Remember the monkey tale from the Jatakas? I was not able to take a photograph, but here’s the story with another photograph of the particular panel.

On the left, one can see the second Stupa with its solitary gate (the Great Stupa has 4) and on the right, a load of smaller stupas.

But this completely bewildered me. It was the first time I ever heard about Buddhists worshiping the Naga Gods. Can you see the statue of the Naga God in the left photograph? The temple itself is of Buddha, as can be seen from the right hand side photograph. So what’s the connection between Nagas and Buddhists? That too in the middle of the country? As it so happens, Nagas were considered to be the guarantors of adequate rainfall and agricultural productivity. Hence, the Buddhists would go about merrily worshiping them. Here’s a good reference site if you wanted to check out dams, irrigation, Nagas and the rest in Sanchi

Two more temple ruins, faintly Grecian in nature, but I did not find sufficient background to really investigate.

As you enter any gate, you are faced with a statue, well a headless one. Somebody got very upset sometime in history and lopped off all the heads. Bloody vandals.

And finally, you have the middle corridor and one of the staircases to climb up to the middle corridor which encircles the stupa.

Then you move up the hillock where there is a monastery which is practically in ruins. They have stacked up the stone work columns in rows. Can you see the checkerboard pattern on the right? Pretty impressive, no?

There is a temple up in the monastery, also pretty much a ruin, but one can still see some exquisite carvings on the doorways and columns.

Can you see the notches on the flagstones? Those were for iron staples which would lock the flagstones together to make it into a pucca floor. On the right, you can see a stone work window and a narrow passageway which would allow one to circum-perambulate the temple. There is also a little imp trying to hide from Baba.

There were two statues of Buddha, an outside statue, which had lost its head and the second one inside the sanctum which was better preserved. Unlike the first statue, which was made out of sandstone, the second one was made out of granite.

I am not sure if you can see the carvings on one of the flagstones but it's supposed to be ancient graffiti. Apparently this part of the monastery was for the trainee monks and they, the little rascals, would spend their time carving into the stone floors. Glad to see that things do not change, eh?

Here is an example of a doorway to one of the side shrines. The guide told us that those two figurines at the bottom were of Ganga and Jamuna, the two sacred rivers of Hinduism. When I gave him a skeptical look and asked, why on earth would you have river goddesses from Hinduism being depicted in a Buddhist temple? I did not get a good answer. Also, I have to admit that the smaller carvings were quite risqué. The guide said that they were offering and accepting votive offerings, but hey, I can identify a couple in love and flirting when I see one. Anyway, we headed back down to the mid layer.

Here’s the Great Stupa. The archaeological department has done a good piece of work to maintain the surroundings, I must admit. It is well maintained with a broad pavement around the stupa. Here’s grandpa the engineer who suddenly decided to calculate the amount of materials required to construct the Stupa with his grand-daughter assistant.

Heading down to the Stupa 3, you can see a rock hewn water tank on the left and another monastery in the distance. Also one of the monastery cells on the right hand side.

Heading down, there is a strange boulder on the way. It is cut in half and hollowed out. Apparently, with a very straight face, the guide said that this was Buddha’s cup. Some cup and some lips, eh? Anyway, belting down a rocky path, we soon spotted the third stupa.

And here’s the famous Ashoka insignia. Can you recognise the images shown? The circle on the top with the 24 spokes is the Ashoka Chakra. While the Ashok Pillar below it is topped by the Emblem of India. That is how well India respects one of its most illustrious ancestors. This stupa is not as richly decorated as the previous two, mind you. It also does not have any gates.

There is a modern Buddhist temple just outside the fence which surrounds the Stupas. I found it deeply ironical. The temple architecture, its detailing, the scupltures, the paintings were like comparing chalk and cheese. The modern architecture was simply unsuitable for the surroundings. It felt awkward, as it was shabby, manky, and really very disappointing. To consider that this Chetiyagiri Vihara actually contains the remains of Buddha’s two disciples, Sariputra and Mahamoggallana, is rather shocking. But as a factoid, do you know that certain elements of Buddhism believe that Sariputra was reborn as Laxman to Buddha’s rebirth as Ram? Now that’s an interesting turn for the books. So the next time, a Buddhist complains that the Bhagwat Purana is claiming Buddha as an incarnation of Vishnu, you can comment mildly that it is difficult to keep track of incarnations and you are simply following Buddhist tradition :)

Anyway, looking back across the valley, its a very peaceful place. You can see a train haring down to Bhopal. One can really imagine to be actually back in Ashoka’s time, sitting on the blocks and meditating, while overseeing the peaceful work of God. It is indeed a beautiful place.

But all good things come to an end and just like the birds in the sky, we were following the power lines back home in the evening. And that’s where the rumination started. What a wonderful place this is. I could sit back and think of the white men digging through the dirt to uncover our history. The hundreds of thousands of men who built the tens of thousands of Buddhist monuments across this country. How ideological battles have been fought between Hinduism and Buddhism, between Orientalism and Occidentalism, between Dalitism and (not sure what…). In the end, you end up with such wonders in front of your eyes. If you can, do visit Sanchi and read Charles Allen’s book. Gives you such peace of mind.

Full slide show here.

Technorati Tags: India,History,Buddhism