Khadi : Gandhiji s Experiment with Social Justice

Transcription

1 R.B. Zala Associate Professor, Institute of English & CLS, Saurashtra University Rajkot (Gujarat) Contact: Khadi : Gandhiji s Experiment with Social Justice Gandhiji living and leading India through the colonial period, a decolonized mind, decolonized India. He moved the masses with political, social, economical, cultural movements grounded in spirituality. He was a karmayogi come up with the experiments that could put to practice the ideals he propagated for personal and public good. As against the violent means of the communist socialist view wherein there was no solution till taking over the political power, he advocated for social justice through non-violent movements asserting faith in converting individuals to his ideology. The very making of Mahatma from Mohan is due the racial injustice he personally faced being thrown out of the train in South Africa. Satyagrah, Swadeshi and end number of historical movements were the result of his ideas that he put into practice with pure means. Gandhiji's socialism or idea of social justice is distinct from the western liberal (capitalist) or socialistic (Marxist- Hegelian) model. He departs from the communist in violent revolution as the means and centralization of state power at the toll of individual. While unethical market competition and mass production through heavy machinery was at the coast of employment and reason for urbanization that saws the seed of unjust society. He also did not go by the views of John Stuart Mill the utilitarian, 'the

2 saint of libralism' (Parel xix), with the ethics in On Liberty; as he accepted the civilisational partition of `induatrialised' and non-industrialised or the 'civilised' and 'uncivilised' worlds. Gandhiji's claim to be a true socialist can be understood as: I have claimed that I was a socialist long before those in India had avowed its creed. But my socialism was natural to me and not adopted from any books. It came out of my unmistakable belief in non-violence. No man can be non-violent and not rise against the social injustice. No matter where it occurred... I have always held that social justice, even unto the last and the lowliest is impossible of attainment by force. I have further believed that it is possible by the proper training of the lowliest by non violence means to secure redress of the wrongs suffered by them. (CW 71: 424 as qtd. in Hay 263) Thus was the means Khadi (hand spun cloth) or Charkha (Spinning Wheel) as part of his experiment under Swadeshi Movement that had a potential to achieve social justice and transform the society. Gandhuui was addressing a highly polarized milieu, such as the eco-political and cultural: colonial, economical and racial injustice, Hindu Muslim communal divide, the urban rural divide, and the social hierarchies with the Hindu cast system. Khadi was the means to address these issues simultaneously to sought justice for all against multidimensional subjection. Swadeshi Movement was in sway in Bengal during the last decade of nineteenth century and was spreading through the nation along with the spurt of agitation against Bang-bhang in It was the entry of Gandhiji that created a movement by adding the handspun cloth Khadi that people could practice and experiment the mass movement at individual level. It was more of a sacred than an eco-political aspect that Gandhiji envisioned it. Taking note of the chapters pertaining to 1915s in An Autobiography 'The Birth of Khadi' (XXXIX,450) and the following chapter 'Found at Last' (XL,452) Gandhiji had '...never seen a handloom or a spinning wheel' in 1908 whene he described it in Hind Swaraj 'as panacea for the growing pauperism of India'. It initially seems to be an economical a solution for the poverty of

3 India but gradually a non violant weapon / symbol to replace machinery which was a symbol of capitalist modern civilization and a form of swadeshi. This can be further marked in a the following chapter 'An Instructive Dialogue' (XLI, 454) with the mill owner that 'I swear by this form of swadeshi, because through it I can provide work to the semi-starved, semi-employed women of India. My idea is to get these women to spin yarn, and to cloth the people of India with khadi woven out of it'(456) It is interesting to perceive how hand spun yarn (Sutar ki atti) becomes a sacred thread for Gandhiji. Gandhiji as categorized with Vivekanand, Gokhale, Ranade and Tagore conviced that the Indian civilization was 'spiritual rather than narrowly religious.., synthetic or pluralise(ramagundam, 143), an account of his visit to Kumbha Mela held at Haridwar in 1915 an later visiting Laxman Jula he gives his account of meeting a Sannyasi who was pained to see him without janoi (a sacred thread) and shikha (tuft of hair), the external symbol for any a believing Hindu. Gandhiji in reply spares a page and a half to narrate how he came to dispense the janoi and shikha. Of the two he willingly accepted to grow shikha is very clear about the sacred thread. He out rightly rejects the sacred thread: 'I will not wear the sacred thread, for I see no necessity for it, when countless Hindus can go without it and yet remain Hindus.[ I doubt whether in present state of Hinduism and of India, Hindus can vindicate the right right to wear the symbol charged with such a meaning(spiritual regeneration).the right can come only after Hinduism has purged itself of untouchability, has removed all distinctions of superiority and inferiority... `(My Experiments, 361) The sacred thread that was on the body of the Brahmins and the Bunyas was for Gandhiji a social injustice tied to religion. He rejected it in his individual case as part of experiment with truth on the other hand he accepted the hand spun thread/ yarn as sacred which initially was the product of the labor of weavers who belonged to the untouchable class. He not just embraced it but advocated for Charkha and Khadi to be adopted by all prostitutes in Bengal to his 'heir' Nehru.

4 Gandhiji, an anti-capitalist/ modernist, had the vision to give the means of productions in the hands of the people rather than the state. The charkha and khadi were the means to empower the people. I G Patel in his account of the Play Mahadevbhai' refers to the metaphor of 'hand' that gandhiji used to communicate to the people on Mondays the day of Gandhiji's observed moun (silence). Wherein Gandhiji used his five fingers to symbolize Hidu Muslim unity, abolition of untouchability, equality of women, elimination of excess like drunkenness or addiction to opium and finally charkha and all fingers held together as a fist stood for non violence. Enlarging this metaphor Patel aptly remarks on charkha as: The same applies to the charkha. It would be a travesty to reduce it to reduce it to khadi. The charlcha stood for self help, dignity of labour. Decentralization of economic activity, narrowing of the gap between cities and villages- and above all, for ending the enslavement and joylessness of ordinary people without property or skills, who had only their hard physical labour to sell as a means of meager livelihood.( Re-Imagining India 194) Gandhiji's symbol of charka and Khadi is multidimensional that refers to social, political, economical, humanitarian and spiritual aspects. Centrally it is to lead us to think of Gandhiji's utopia i.e. Ramarajya. Hind Swaraj is regarded as a utopian a text and according to Parel who accounts it as a fundamental work emphasizes its importance as, 'Hind Swaraj is the seed from which the tree of Gandhian thought has grown to its full structure.[ ] and for those who wish to study his thoughts more methodically, it remains the norm by which to access the theoretical significance of other writings including the Autobiography. '(xiii) Hind Swaraj a seemingly simple booklet according to Gandhiji was not to go back to dark ages an attempt 'to see beauty in voluntary simplicity, poverty and slowness'. (as qtd. Pare! xvi ) This is as

5 against the complicity, competition and hasty modern life with industries and urbanisation. Charkha symbolizes the voluntary acceptance of simplicity, poverty and slowness. It is also a practical solution to avoid the effects of industrialization and urbanization. As Gandhiji put forward his utopian ideal with faith in village life as, 'You cannot build non-violence on factory civilization, but it can be built on selfcontained villages. (as qtd. Parel xvi ) and in this practical philosophy based on dharma what one has to learn is 'desire for the welfare of others'. Gandhiji's attachment to Khadi as a part of swadeshi/ nationalistic movement and practical programme is well defined in the 'Constructive Programme : Its meaning and Place', an address to the members of INC to work out the concrete programme for civil disobedience. Here Gandhiji discusses `khadi' along with other important programmes as communal Unity, prohibition, Removal of Untouchability, Village Industries, New or Basic Education, Adult Education, Women, Kisans, Economics etc. wherein he states that, 'It connotes the beginning of economical freedom and equality of all in the country.' And further the implications that symbol of khadi takes as: It means a wholesale of swadeshi mentality, a determination to find all the necessities of life in and that too through the laboour and intellect of the villages. That means the reversal of the existing process. That means that instead of half a dozen cities of India, the latter will be largely self-contained, and will voluntarily serve the cities of India and even the outside world in so far as benefits both the parties.(cw 75: 147) Thus khadi for Gandhiji was symbol of 'unity of Indian humanity, its economical freedom and equality', and moreover it meant 'decentralisation of production and distribution of necessities' as against the centralisation with socialist and monopoly with liberal mentality. To speak of the advice that Gandhiji gave through the example of charkha is that in the conclusion to the above mentioned address, speaks of the importance he gave to charkha as,'... the charkha in the hands of poor widow brings a paltry price, in the hands of Jawaharlal it is an instrument of Indian freedom.

6 Jawaharlal Nehru had to reminded of the wrong way the world was going through a letter written by Gandhiji on 5 Oct wherein stresses on system of Government that he envisaged in Hind Swaraj. He writes: I am convinced that if India is to attain true freedom and through India the world also, then sooner or later the fact must be recognized that people will have to live in villages, not in towns, in huts, not in palaces. Crores of people will never be able to live at peace with each other in towns and palaces. They will have no recourse to but violence and untruth. I hold that without truth and non- violence there can be nothing but destruction for humanity. We can realize truth and non violence only in the simplicity of village life and this simplicity can be found in charkha and all charkha connotes. (Parel 150) It is Gandhiji's ideal of Sarvodaya (The upliftment of all) on the lines of Ruskin's Unto This Last from which Gandhi admits to have been highly influenced by his mention of Ruskin's Unto This Last in the appendices to Hind Swaraj hew drew the humanistic ideals as: 1. That the good of the individual is contained in the good of all. 2. That a lawyer's work has the same value as the barber's in as much as all have the same right of earning livelihood from their work. 3. That life of labour, i.e., the life of the tiller of the soil and the handicraftsman is the life worth living. The three principles of 'good of all', equal value/ honour to all types of work, and life of labour can practically be implemented and envisaged from through charka and khadi.

7 References: Gandhi, M.K. Hind Swaraj. Ahmedabad: Navjivan Trust.2004 print. _.Hind Swaraj. Ahmedabad: Navjivan Trust Print. _.The Story of My Experiments with Truth Ahmedabad: Navjivan Trust Print. Hay Stephen. Sources of Indian Tradition. Second Ed. Vol. II New Delhi: Penguin Books, 1991.Print. Pare!, Anthony J. Ed. Gandhiji: Hind Swaraj and other Writings. New Delhi: Cambridge University Press Print. Ramagundam, Rahul. Gandhi 'S Khadi: A History of Contention and Conciliation. New Delhi:Orient Blackswan print. Re-Imagining India and Other Essays. New Delhi: Institute of Social Sciences and Orient Blackswan.2012.Print Sharma, Suresh and Tridip Suhrud. Eds. M K Gandhiji's Hind Swaraj: a Critical Edition. New Delhi: Orient Blackswan Print. The paper was presented at 2nd International Conference on 'Social Justice and Comparative literature' organized by: Department of Hindi, Andhra University, Vishakhapattanam Jan 2013.

8 R.B.Zala 1 Paper for National Seminar on Contemporary Indian Drama: Themes and Forms organized by Department of English, Veer Narmad South Gujarat University (14-15 February 2012) R.B.Zala Associate Professor, Department of English & CLS, Saurashtra University Rajkot (Gujarat) Vishvamanavi: UmashankarJoshi: An Experiment in Gujarati Drama. What Umashankar Joshi in his editorial Sanskruti Takes Your Leave ( Sankruti Viday Mange che ) addressing the readers in the last issue of Sankruti: October-December,1984,which he edited continuously for thirty eight years envisaged that comes true in the age of technology where e-books and e- journals are in the palmtops and notepads. A visionary born in the times and local that relied on oral tradition by the end of his life had come to visualize the new advancements as: We are on the threshold of a new age. Before ages literature was presented in the oral form. After the revolutionary invention of script, paper and printing press the publication of periodicals is possible today. Now it is possible that we might accept the poet reciting with the help of electronic media, a dramatic piece being performed,and likewise journals published in video form(the young readers of these words probably might envisage that in their lifetime) after being used to it. (Tran. mine) The same is realized by Vishvamanavi: UmashankarJoshi an unpublished Gujarati two act play, presented by Nem Arts: Rajkot and Manish Parekh Production s venture/ adventure, written and

9 R.B.Zala 2 directed by Manish Parekh with the premier show in March, 2011 in the inaugural of NCP, Mumbai, keeping with centenary calibrations of Umashankar Joshi followed by ten more performance during the last year. The play is a well-researched production of the writer, director, actor and above all a researcher to draw his sources from the biography and literary Magnus of the poet. Manish Parekh s Vishvamanavi: Umashankar Joshi is a recent experimentation of staging a life of a Gujarati literary legend who shaped the creative, critical and academic circles during A challenge that lies in projecting and presenting, the versatile and multifaceted personality of a writer who experimented with varied modern western literary forms and criticism (literary as well as social),through stage experimentations is taken up in Vishvamanavi: UmashankarJosh.. The play documents these multiphaseted of Umashankar Joshi s which by no mean is a documentary drama but comes alive with performance by going close to poor theatre of Polish Director Jerzy Cosotoruske, in the recent times and from the Indian/ Gujarat folk tradition of Bhavai and Akhiyan To begin with it would not be out of place to speak of the vulnerability of such an experiment that is rightly drawn to by Kenneth Pickering in his Concepts note on documentary drama wherein he ends his concept note as: however the most effective documentary drama has not only documented events, and thereby become a valid document in itself, but has often been based on careful research using the documentary sources such as diaries, letters, contemporary accounts, court records and transcripts.the debate arises when this ceases to be a drama and becomes mere imitation.(134)

10 R.B.Zala 3 Secondly the play can also in some sense be termed as predictable theatre as the Gujarati audience world be familiar with the life and works of Umashankar Joshi for whom the events stated would be expected. But to draw from Mark Woolgar as, The whole point of predictable theatre is that audiences attend and see and enjoy how the production operates as a familiar re-telling rather than what the work may have to say that might be new or challenging. it is the execution of the work that holds the fescinnation.(pikering and Woolgar 82) The challenge that such a production faces is the sustain it professionally as modern demands a lavish setting and high levels of spectacles, as the contemporary spectators have not just been evolving from audience to spectator through cinema and television screens but are visitors on virtual sites as Google s, Facebook s and Utube as against the imagenative folk audience or readers. The execution of Umashankars literary works and non-literary achievements are documents that Vishwamanvi: Umashankar Joshi comes with us to meet these challenges.the best example is the opening that employs the folk and modern conventions of song and visual display on screen to set the stage for the display of a great personality that is quit forgotten, distanced to the new generation and yet can be a meeting ground as a part of culture and human expirations. The play opens before the curtain rises with Umashankar Joshi s song Ame Gashu Geet Gaganana (we will sing) to set the tone to sing of the sky and earth.technically the recorded song is (not sung live) presented with a group of female dancers in the traditional Gujarati dress who emerge from the audience and take the stage by the end the song. It is an attempt to set the stage for the musical play for the spectator and merge the border between the stage and the

11 R.B.Zala 4 spectator. This is a usual convention in folk performance, where a prayer or song is sung; mostly as a part of ritual, to set to the atmosphere and tone where in the audience is a direct participant in the prayer and the ritual of lighting the lamp and the lamp circulated in the public for dhoop. To incorporate the folk conventions of bhavai or akhyan that permit the multiple forms of performance as ritual, music, songs, dance, role-plays, narration, action ect. has also been the source of influence on the western theater as is the case of Rechard Wagner with the idea of one total art form of future, the Gesamptkunstwerk or the total theatre to integrate all theatrical elements. The contemporary modem theatre as poor theatre has experimented with the techniques of using space where the possibilities that we have is promenade where studio theatre is regarded as ideal a space/ situation for production to create a level of audience participation of event, or theatre in-the -round which is going back to folk or ancient practice, transverse stage as in fashion show Cat-walk situation, the open stage etc. the evolution in using space been seen as by the Italian director Eugenio Barbra Keeping as ; a fusion of art and culture create a unique form to in a way evolving and progressing towards the recent concept where the audience centrality is accepted, rather than the actor and the play, after the emergence of communication studies. The curtain opens as the dancers slowly climb the stage to project the white screen where the Google search page with search in progress is in view in centre back of the stage and the visuals change in accordance with the commentator mediating between the past and the present. The

12 R.B.Zala 5 juxtaposition of pre-independence rustic times of travelling on foot and carts with technologically advanced twenty-first century with search engines. The very opening commentary with the screening the miracle of search engines to reach the audience to Himalayas or Ganges with a click is a marker of engulfing the audience from the virtual to the real life. The commentary needs to be quoted extendedly here to realize the artistic element of the play: Today it has become very easy for anyone if one wants to see any place or find anything from the depth of the earth with the help of search engine. Type Himalaya and the scene of real Himalaya is before you. Type Ganga and the mighty flowing holy Ganga appears on your computer screen with a click of the mouse. But there was a person who before years had seen the world with his eyes without any search engine. Without a guide.(trans/ emphasis mine.)(parekh 1) The dramatic opening takes the contemporary audience to the wilderness that the writer is projected to fathom the mountains on foot through the clipping on the screen. It is the epic theatre innovative setting and techniques employed to give a swift sweep to the audience with a romantic strain of Umashankar Joshi s poem Bhomia Vina to logging out of virtual world of internet to at once shift/connect to the times of the script of the poem along with character Umashankar Joshi projected on the screen to live an imprint of the much celebrated song and its writer. The play the literary genius and public life (personal life is least projected) of a writer very naturally lands to episodic scenes which too is characteristic of epic theatre to document the select episode. The writer plots keeping with the chronology but uses flash back to introduce the aged writer as a narrator to take us to the childhood days spoken as a Gold mine for a writer.

13 R.B.Zala 6 Poem Chachar Anne to introduce the lively child Umashankar Joshi giving a comic relief and glimpse of the rustic upbringing incorporating the popular myth based poem vrishabh Avatar (enacted) that is part of the memory of the audience connects them to the play with the children rhymes audio playing in background that merge in the scene. Childhood comic scene fade out with the light to give way to spot young Umashankar Joshi to self-introduce the school days to college and from the freedom struggle in 1929 the first attempt at poetry that is close to monodrama. The making and shaping of the poet and the man responding to his times is again presented the poem Vishvashanti (World peace) unaware of brutal reality of atomic bomb the poet sings of world peace under the Gandhian influence. The recitation along with the screen projection, of the barbarity of the World War and the real scenes with the headlines of those days and the freedom moment, connect the audience to the times and the work simultaneously. The experimentation with forms by the writer, Umashankar Joshi, also gives a scope to the playwright to employ varied experimentation as play-within-the-play. It s the way a glimpse of Umashankar Joshi the playwright is presented through actually staging of his one act play Saapna Bhara in Act-I and Udancharkaidi act II. Actual staging of the plays is so well integrated that it does not come as imposed presentation but one more form experimented by the writer. At the end of performance of Saapna Bhara the dialogue transports audience back from the realistic issue based performance to his poetic works as Geet meto gotyu with performance. The playwithin-the play is well used to bring alive the aspects and reformist/feminist concerns of the playwright so comprehensively and also take up the challenge of plays of writer which are fossilized to be part of archives in Gujarati theatre. Umashankar in his Statement for First Edition states with reference to his collected one-act play :

14 R.B.Zala 7 The outer form of the writings is of drama. But the experts of the field would only know how stage able they are the keeping with the theatre today. And I should accept that while writing the experience (of theatre) that I had was as good as of a common Gujarati youth.(joshi 18) This speaks of the challenge that the playwright must have faced to stage a play that the original writer was suspicious about and comments in the same statement that he had infect read the play before the audience with the concerns of local specific language he employed but in case of Vishvamanavi: UmashankarJoshi it has been presented with all the artistic knowhow of the director on left centre stage with minimum properties and the fore ground mud house entrance give authentic set and superb direction. The multifaceted personality of Umashankar Joshi who pronounced in his speech while accepting the SahityaAkademy in 1985, Fellowship Must confess that it would not have been possible for me to be a writer in the absence of my getting intimately involved in public affair now and again-almost in spite of myself The glimpses through well researched personal, literary, and public life administrator is well in quick fade in and fade outs that can be seen as employing the nuance that are from the predictable theatre where the subject may be very familiar to the audience and their interest is in how the production operates rather than what it conveys. Thus the writer as well as director (here one) intends to make the presentation that is familiar as spectacular through innovative experience as possible. Staging these episodes, engagements and achievements so swiftly is made possible by employing the stage craft of setting where the space on the stage is divided in to tree parts where in the

15 R.B.Zala 8 centre left is the symbolic set for the writing desk of writer which is elevated a step with its back that is a pen in the symbol. The writing recited by the character of the writer is usually from that set with a writing table and a chair. While centre right is the realistic set of a mud house in a rural area to stage the plays of the writer. The centre stage is with the action and songs performances and screen projection to keep the pace up for series of episodes. All the forms of literature from poetry (recorded or recited by the actor along with relevant poetry), drama (staged), letters (read), speeches (enacted and read in original, even if it is in English), select episodes of life (enacted by sweeping reference to life achievements and thoughts (screen) interview (enacted and edited as monologues). If we study the interesting presentation of a single aspect as presenting Umashankar Joshi as a poet and we have recorded versions, recitation,script projection on screen, songs accompanied by music and dance, also the enactment. (eg. Vansaliwala and then children poetry, translation ( Pahranan Geet and the original the song of the shirt ) thus this pay which is predictable doesn t remain a documentary due to the director writer at work. To add to the challenge is the presenting Umashankar Joshi as the editor of Sanskruti. It is once again not reduce to monodrama but in the most dramatic way presented through the scene where Umashankar Joshi released the first issue of Sanskruti on stage along with the distribution of the replica of the first issue of sanskruti in the audience become the part takers or part and partial of the informal release of Sanskruti -among the closer circle of the writer. (as was the case in real life) Once again the poor or epic theatre is at work to blur the divide between the performance and the audience. The above episode of release of Sanskruti is followed by a dancesong to end act I.

16 R.B.Zala 9 Similarly Act II again is full with experimentations and use of conventions of monodrama, play within the play, dance, songs, speeches (Gyanpith Award presentedin English as originally delivered) radio interview and finally the last scene to speak of the magazine Sanskruti being closed after 35 years of publication seeking permission to end the toil, a farewell. Both the acts end with sanskruti in the second last scene to give a structure to the play. The last scene of the play is again in continuity with first screen projection where the wanderer goes ahead to merge with infinite. Avoiding the birth and death scenes, It is symbolic representation in the circularity of the play, unending quest for peace and humanity with individuals great and common in general and Umashankar Joshi the Vishwamanav in particular. Parekh as an artist has made several alterations in his consequent presentations where his script has evolved and is not yet a final one to be published. This probably speaks of the endless possibilities that lie in the form and challenge for the true artist as stated by Satyajit Ray in his Bengali film criticism: The artist must come before art. Where there is no artist no art can be created (as quoted in Ray vii).

17 R.B.Zala 10 References: Parekh Manish. Vishvamanavi: UmashankarJoshi (Script) Joshi Umashankar.Saapna Bhara. Ahmedabad : Gurjar Ratna Bhandar,1967 Pickering Kenneth. Key Concepts in Drama and performance. Hampshire: Palgrave Macmilan, 2005 Pickering Kenneth and Mark Woolgar. Theatre Studies. Hampshire: Palgrave Macmilan, 2009 Ray Sandip and Aditi Nath Sarkar. Ed. Satyajit Ray: Origional English Film Scripts. New Delhi:Cronical Books, 2011

18 Zala 1 R.B.Zala Senior Associate Professor, Department of English & CLS, Saurashtra University Rajkot (Gujarat) Dhruv Bhatta s Modern Aranyaks: Theorising Indian Ecocriticism ॐ प र णमद प र णममदम प र णत प र णम दच यत प र णस य प र णमणदणय प र णम वणवम ष यत ॐ णन त णन त णन त oṃ pūrṇamadaḥ pūrṇamidam pūrṇāt pūrṇamudacyate pūrṇasya pūrṇamādāya pūrṇamevāvaśiṣyate oṃ śāntiḥ śāntiḥ śāntiḥ Om! That (Brahman) is infinite, and this (universe) is infinite. The infinite proceeds from the infinite. (Then) taking the infinitude of the infinite (universe), It remains as the infinite (Brahman) alone. Dhruv Bhatt is an established contemporary Gujarati writer, who is engaged in fictionalizing the basic environment issues, since last three decades, of ecology and traditional wisdom of the people dwelling in and around wilderness that present the environment issues discussed locally as well as globally. His first hand real experience of the life is well merged with the seemingly fantastic mythical narration in abode natural habitats of endangered species and human life in locales of Gujarat. His works are more than travelogues in creating a fictional word out of his real life wanderings in rapidly erasing Eco system to interweave the environmental issues that are raised at the global forums to confront with the solutions at local level in the most natural and coherent way. The issues as save whales and lions incorporated from two different terrains of thorny forest of Gir and the western coastal region Ghed are interwoven without being slightest

19 Zala 2 burden to the narrative is the focus of my study of Samudrantike(1993), Tatvamasi (1998), and Akoopar. (2010) Greg Garrard s Ecocriticism (2004) is the text for reference to speak of western ecocriticism to extend the theoretical perspective in Indian context through the contemporary Gujarati fictions by Dhruv Bhatt based on a quest for fine balance between a traditional, non-scientific, faith driven society and cynical, profit driven economy. (Meghani) Dhruv Bhatt draws on the Brihad Aranyak Upnishad to contextualize the Indian ecocritical perspective to appreciate the newly emerging discourse of Ecology and Literature. In Introduction to The Ecocriticism Reader, Cheryl Glotfelty and Harold Fromm, define "ecocriticism as the study of the relationship between literature and the physical environment.takes an earth-centered approach to literary studies The ecocritics have moved on to Ecocriticism that takes as its subject the interconnections between nature and culture, specifically the cultural artifacts of languages and literature, As a critical stance, it has one foot in literature and the other on land; as a theoretical discourse, it negotiates between the human and the non-human. But here the western notion of seeing diversity or binary opposition human and the non-human while India can contribute to the wisdom of oneness to evaluate and study the writers as Dhruv Bhatt to speak of the interdisciplinary study that ecocriticism envisages to take in the cultural and environmental engagements in literature. Greg Garrard to elucidate the term ecocriticism in Ecocriticism commence with Begings: Pollution the reference to Carson s Silent Sping(1962) to take a lead from scientific material that may well be amable to more literary or cultural analysis. Sighting Glotfelty with the fundamental question, What is ecocriticism? :

20 Zala 3 What then is ecocriticism? Simply put, ecocriticism is the study is the study of the relationship between literature and the physical environment. Just as feminist criticism examins language and literature from the gender-conscious perspective, and Maxist criticism brings an awareness of modes of production and economic class to its reading of texts, ecocriticism takes an earth-centered approachto literary studies.(3) Approaching ahead from study of nature or wilderness from romantics in the early phase AND environmental crisis Garrald broadly defines ecocriticism as, Indeed, wider definition of the ecocriticism is the study of relationship of the human and non-human, throughout human cultural history and entailing critical analysis of the term human itself. (5)The theorisation proceed to look into the Positions as cornucopia (exaggerated threats),environmentalism(concerned about environment issues but are not for radical change), Deep Ecology ( flourishing of human- non human life has value but with smaller human population /Duality of human and nature), ecofeminism(association of woman with nature) social ecology and eco-marxism(rational-political) and (Difference between mere material existence and revelation of being/ extraordinary in ordinary). He goes on to elaborate on the key concerns/ trops for ecocritics i.e. pastorals, wilderness(uncontaminated state of nature by civilisation) apocalypse narratives(prophetic) and troubles with apocalypse narratives, dwelling, Animals(relation with human) to conclude with Future direction The Earth - earth/ dying image from space-monoculturing minds with homogenization through globalization and simulations by VR programmes (Biosphere 2 (1991) AND Thd EadenProject: cornwell (2000) )and Gaia (the ancient Greek Earth-goddess) to discuss the future challenges that ecocriticism of relation between globalization and ecocriticism end with a final futuristic comment as, It ought not to be too pious or too implausible, to associate with ecocriticism of the future with Eden s inflection of the Earth: attuned to environment justice, but not

21 Zala 4 dismissive of claims of commerce and technology; shaped by knowledge of long-term environment problems, ecological insight; and commitment to preservation of biological diversity of the planet for all its habitants. It is a long way from the pastoral we started with, and it is a great-souled vision with its feet planted solidly on the ground.(garrard 182) Expending the argument with the western vision with the wisdom to Indian vision we shift to Dhruv Bhatt and his drawing from the Upnishad to contextualize the Indian ecocritical perspective to appreciate the newly emerging discourse of Ecology and Literature. The title themselves clearly are suggestive of his drawing from the tradition of the past and assimilating the present through the living spaces that that survive eternally in the abode of nature as Gir, Ghed, river banks and sea shores. The shift to the discourse of ecocriticism is in realistic presentation of the topology as a living text as Gir or Ghed as ground zero ( feet planted on the ground )against the mythical and prophetic tools that the western mind strive to bank on. Gaia to Gir is the striking difference between the sources of context that speaks of dead and alive respectively. The spaces narrated are not utopian nor pastoral nostalgia. Neither pastoral nor wilderness. It is no virtual or artificial simulater that is manmade reality based on sophisticated technology. Today if final solution is sought in unmeditated earth it is in these text that represent the surviving unmapped scapes in the mindscapes of people and landscapes of Gir and Ghed. To speak of theory to practice of acoustics and activists against homogenizing the indigenous ways of life is highly under the takeover of the project globalization which is run by the economically and politically powerful corporate houses and global brands. The global events by global forums are directionless and powerless to toil against the so called progress and developments that are compulsions for poverty-stricken nations of third world.

22 Zala 5 The global ecological concerns can be viewed with the theme of 2010 Earth Day One Planet. One Future'. It celebrated the incredible diversity of life on Earth as part of the 2010 International Year of Biodiversity. This year's global host, Rwanda a country of exceptional biodiversity that has made huge strides on environmental protection leaded the celebrations with three days of keynote events. Thousands of activities were organized worldwide, with beach clean-ups, concerts, exhibits, film festivals, community events and much more. Pittsburgh, was selected as the North American host city by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) to join World Environment Day " Highlighting theme "Biodiversity- Ecosystem Management and the Green Economy". Slogans as Save Whales/Panda/Tigers/ Trees with national and international organizations and activists speak of the damage done to the environment in order to put forward the issues that have to a greater extent brought about an awareness towards the devastating effects of over use of natural resources by human population to lead us on the edge of dooms day. The reasons for the catastrophe need no further study but the solutions seem to be out of reach due to non commitment to resolve the crises at local as well as global level. Global worming to the issues of the local tribes are worsening as the clock ticks on. Dhruv Bhatts works are modern Arayanks which he has written through his wanderings and dwelling in the forests or by the sea shores and river sides. It unfolds the secret knowledge of the age old seers to communicate in the modern language and novel form to the contemporary world. The canvass he uses is painted with the background distorted landscapes of the surviving natural habitats to speak of the physical environmental problems. He speaks out the mindscapes through

23 Zala 6 the surviving wisdom with the people and their culture in these spaces. The intervention of the writer through usually an anonymous narrator is the understanding one can reach if the knowledge of decoded with self affiliation to the environment. The exoteric actions reveal the mind that contemplating on esoteric as Sri Swami Krishnananda in his introduction to Brihad Aranyak Upanishad as, The Upaniṣhad is a revelation of the inner principles of life as manifest in actions of a variegated nature. The ritual of the is contemplated in the Upaniṣhads. The Vedic sacrifice, or, for the matter of that, any kind of religious performance, is a symbol, ultimately, which is the point of departure in all esoteric approaches to religion. External religion is symbolic of an internal principle which is true religion, towards which the Upaniṣhad drives our minds. This departure is to be found in every religion in the world. The symbolic character of human activity and religious performance is brought out in a study of esoteric principles, which is the philosophy of life. The activities of human life are symbolic in the sense that they are not representative of the whole Truth, but manifest only certain aspects of Truth. Every action is involved in cosmic relations of which very few are brought to the surface of one s notice when the action is really performed. We always think that an action is motivated by an individual or a group of individuals towards a particular relative end which is visible to the eye and conceivable by the mind, but never do we imagine for a moment that there can be farther reaches of the tentacles of this action, beyond the reach of the human eye and mind and our little action can really be a cosmic deed, that God can see what we do, and the whole universe can vibrate with the little word that difficult thing for us to understand; and the Upaniṣhad explains it to bring to the purview of our consciousness these inward secrets of outward action, telling us that the outward sacrifice is symbolic of an inward contemplation of Universal Reality. (13) Dhruv Bhatt fictionalizes the life of people dwelling in and around the natural abodes of Gujarat to incorporate the issues and solutions at hand. His realistic presentation of life and locals in Samudrantike (southern most coast of Saurashtra), Tatvamasi (on/along the banks of river

24 Zala 7 Narmada) and Akoopar (Gir forest) are result of his wanderings and dwelling with the people as a seeker of knowledge with faith in the deep rooted culture that survives withs age old living vedic tradition. I would focus on Akoopar that unfolds not just the geographic space that is the wild life sanctuary of the few surviving Asiatic lions that are under the threat of extinction but the surviving tradition of the people that can be a solution to all our anxiety at the local, national and the global level. To begin with, the writer s explanatory note: About the Title - Akoopar, states that he decided to write on Gir and Ghed (a coastal region north to Gir ) regions rather than any characters or theme. The characters evolve as it were in a given space. He further refers to the word Akoopar (Tortoise), suggested as the title by a friend with its meaning, was referred to Bhagavat Gomandal and the myth of Akoopar from Mahabharat was kown to the writer but it was confusing to connect it to what he was planning to write and what would ultimately be written. The connection is drawn from the two incidences of his meeting of an old man whose utterance while narrating the calamity of the cyclone in 1882 and the half flat forest I thought that it was the end of the lifespan of Gir. But when I look at it today my dear has started to laugh. Now I can beat my breast (undoubtedly) and say that what the forefathers were saying is not wrong. Gir is my mother, eternal. And another incident in Ghed someone during the discussions on sky watching and revolution of Earth they spoke of the early belief that the earth is balanced on the hood of Shesh Nag and the back of the tortoise at that time someone commented that, if that was the case then the point on which the support was would be exactly under Gir. This speaks of the centrality of the thorny Gir forest in the text and faith of the writer in the continuing tradition of wisdom for which he employs the title metaphorically to present the text as the witness to eternal ethos of life just as the mythical Akoopar of Mahabharat. The writers

25 Zala 8 design of the text speaks of his design to blend the temporal with eternal. Akoopar gives the geographical map of the region just before it opens and gives space to the original myth of Akoopar after the narration ends. Symbolically the fiction is presented/held/planted by two palms with all the consciousness of real concrete geographical space and the long past. In between is the unfolding of living wisdom that links the two. Title Tatvamasi need no explaination nor does Samudrantike (translated as Oceanside Blues Mahendra Meghani) where the recurring revelation/ epiphany through the calls of legendry river Narmada and the earth respectively as: I could hear an unknown voice beckoning me, now I belived that the earth indeed called out The communion between nature and man was an established phenomenon that had stood the taste of time. Beyond doubt there exist in the universe a secret code by which the animate and the inanimate are able to interact.(meghani 183) The writer keeping with the tradition creates a narrator who is an unnamed painter on a assignment to paint the element of earth among five basic elements for the interior decoration under a big project. The artist is the outsider who gradually unfolds the inner world of Gir. The wide range of characters from Maldharis (cattle rearers)who live within the forest, to forest officers and guards, villagers, wildlife activist, fishermen, characters dead and alive present the life of Gir and Ghed regions. It is a modern Aranyak Upnishad where the narrator sits at the feet of the Gir dwellers to attain wisdom. The painting of the Earth element for a modern artist is more of an imagination while for the traditional artist as Iemma. The environment concerns interwoven in the text are numerable to take account of them exhaustively. To take note of a few are, human-wildlife conflict, lion poaching, encroachment on

26 Zala 9 forest lands, stakeholders of forestry management, livelihood concerns in forest areas, recognizing access to forest resources for survival, fears of extinction of lion among wildlife conservationists, relocate some of the lions from Gir national park, illegal mining, biodiversity, coastal regulations, soil erosion, afforestation, hill ecology, endangered species, ecological balance and many more. The solutions lie in immunity that the characters inherit from traditional way of life and the values they live with. Iieyma, Sansai and her forefather Ravaata along with other characters reveal the secret wisdom of the local people that is spellbinding. The opening of the novel with a colloquial expression Khamma by Iema (Akoopar), Appi dele(give take )(Tatvamasi) or is so gudh that the meaning unfolds suspendedly in the very end to resolve all the conflicts environmental as well as of life as a whole to end the work with the same blessing address. The contemplative urben artist narrator reveals the knowledge from usage khamma used by Iema the local traditional artist. In her reply to a question during her painting exhibition in Ahmedabad that, Do you like to stay there in jungle more than here in Amdavad? And some one else also spoke, To go outing is fine;but to stay!without facilities, among the lions and leopards, fear of being killed or will be killed.what to live where there no safety of life? My boys, all of you understand that no one is going to livefor ever staying in this pakka house. I have never heard that lion-leopard or scorpions ever killed the number people killed by the cars and trucks and motorcycles on the roads would be.

27 Zala 10 We read daily in papers that don t people die in quarreling for nothing? And yet does anyone have the time to say khamma to the earth? The exposition on the part if the narrator that almost merges with the writer is that She does sorrow not just say khamma to the departed soul. To her pain of passing away of one soul is the of the whole universe. And that is why in her khamma the life on this beautiful planet has the strength to bear the shock and bloom on with the blessings and confidence that is heard. (135) Just as incase of usages the recognition of lions by names as well as regarding them handsome ( rupalo ) not just the beast but also, as in case the forest guide Mustaffa points at various hills by their names and speaking of one among them as the most handsome speaks of the mutualism in the true sense. The doha (a folk metrical composition in oral tradition) Ghantalo paene ghantaline, ne anvar vahadhor Hiran, Meghal Janadiu ne gyerma jakamjol (33) The couplet comes up with a long story to tell of blind and legendary Ravaata that bring together the threads of the complex mosaic plot to speak of interconnected whole and realization that, and that invisible voice that said, Gir, our land one time. I accept it too. Neither is it ghost nor illution. It is the one within me lac, crore or more years old.me. yes myself. (284) Ravaata on whom the doha is written speaks of a seemingly fantastic a ceremonial marriage of two hills Ghantla and Ghantly celebrated by Ravaata in order to give a feast to people as he being blind had wowed not to marry but promised to feed the people and he did this by adopting Ghantala

28 Zala 11 while Ghantli was adopted by the Divan of Junagadh Nawab! This is unbelievable and unimaginable that a person could think of marrying the hills but the reality is that the legend is alive with third generation to capture their imagination for whom there is Iema to paint the scenes of the story and according to her she paints what she believes in. Sansai as is the returning fact with all his works is all powerful female character. She mistorically moves around the scene to present the essence of Gir, She is at once an enchanting Charan Kanya, a Jogmaya, the life soul, a devi,shakti incarnated, Shakti the power herself. She is Gir, a lioness with the trait of courage and concerns that she has inherited from Rawaata her great grand-father. She is omnipresent to carry forward and give unity to the plot. She is projected as self confident and out spoken and one who can not tolerate unjust word or action in the space. In the begning she might read as a new bold and rustic woman portrayal but as and when we come to know the legendary success of Rawaata to stop the English Lords hunting of lions by walking all the way to Junagadh and persude the Lordsahib. This results in Nawabs order to ban hunting lions. Rawaata s commitment and large-heartedness that Sansai inheritsshe is her own master like the lions. She cannot tolerate interference in her life and the life of Gir. and is very straightforward to say for instance when she asks for lift on the motorcycle from the narrator and Vikram they pull her leg by asking whether she knew where they were going for which she replies, Why are you asking me whether where you are going? I should ask myself where I want to go. (271) Her intervention in the discussion of students and forest officer on the wildlife issues of new home for lions to save lion king in Madhya Pradesh arouses Sansai to speak out to herself as a crude joke when she mutters: Where the lion should live and where not should be decided by us or by the lions? (152).