Podcasts about Sabarimala

Embark on a transformative journey through the sacred forests of Sabarimala, a place where nature and spirituality intertwine. This podcast captures the awe-inspiring experiences of traversing dense greenery, walking barefoot on ancient trails, and immersing oneself in the devotion and discipline of this revered pilgrimage. From the chants of "Swamiye Saranam Ayyappa" echoing through the hills to the profound sense of connection with the divine, each episode delves into the physical, emotional, and spiritual dimensions of the Sabarimala experience. Whether you're a pilgrim or a seeker, this podcast offers a glimpse into the magic of the sacred grove.

The Battle for Sabarimala: Religion, Law, and Gender in Contemporary India (Oxford UP, 2024) tells the story of one of contemporary India's most contentious disputes: a long-running struggle over women's access to the Hindu temple at Sabarimala. In 2018, the Indian Supreme Court ruled that the temple, which had traditionally been forbidden to women aged ten to fifty because their presence offended the presiding deity, was required to open its doors to all Hindus. The decision in Indian Younger Lawyers Association rocked the nation: protests were launched around India and throughout the diaspora, a record-setting human chain called the ‘Women's Wall' was coordinated, and dozens of petitions were filed asking the Supreme Court to review, and potentially reverse, its landmark opinion.  Perhaps most significantly, IYLA led the Court to openly reconsider the Essential Practices Doctrine that has been a mainstay of Indian religious freedom jurisprudence since 1954. In this first monograph-length study of the dispute, legal anthropologist Deepa Das Acevedo draws on ethnographic fieldwork, legal analysis, and media archives to tell a multifaceted narrative about the ‘ban on women'. Reaching as far back as the eighteenth century, when the relationship between temple deities and the government was transformed by an ambitious precolonial ruler, and coming up to the litigation delays caused by the coronavirus pandemic, Das Acevedo reveals the complexities of the dispute and the constitutional framework that defines it. That framework, Das Acevedo argues, reflects two distinct conceptions of religion-state relations, both of which have emerged at various stages in the—still unresolved—battle for Sabarimala. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/new-books-network

The Battle for Sabarimala: Religion, Law, and Gender in Contemporary India (Oxford UP, 2024) tells the story of one of contemporary India's most contentious disputes: a long-running struggle over women's access to the Hindu temple at Sabarimala. In 2018, the Indian Supreme Court ruled that the temple, which had traditionally been forbidden to women aged ten to fifty because their presence offended the presiding deity, was required to open its doors to all Hindus. The decision in Indian Younger Lawyers Association rocked the nation: protests were launched around India and throughout the diaspora, a record-setting human chain called the ‘Women's Wall' was coordinated, and dozens of petitions were filed asking the Supreme Court to review, and potentially reverse, its landmark opinion.  Perhaps most significantly, IYLA led the Court to openly reconsider the Essential Practices Doctrine that has been a mainstay of Indian religious freedom jurisprudence since 1954. In this first monograph-length study of the dispute, legal anthropologist Deepa Das Acevedo draws on ethnographic fieldwork, legal analysis, and media archives to tell a multifaceted narrative about the ‘ban on women'. Reaching as far back as the eighteenth century, when the relationship between temple deities and the government was transformed by an ambitious precolonial ruler, and coming up to the litigation delays caused by the coronavirus pandemic, Das Acevedo reveals the complexities of the dispute and the constitutional framework that defines it. That framework, Das Acevedo argues, reflects two distinct conceptions of religion-state relations, both of which have emerged at various stages in the—still unresolved—battle for Sabarimala. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/gender-studies

The Battle for Sabarimala: Religion, Law, and Gender in Contemporary India (Oxford UP, 2024) tells the story of one of contemporary India's most contentious disputes: a long-running struggle over women's access to the Hindu temple at Sabarimala. In 2018, the Indian Supreme Court ruled that the temple, which had traditionally been forbidden to women aged ten to fifty because their presence offended the presiding deity, was required to open its doors to all Hindus. The decision in Indian Younger Lawyers Association rocked the nation: protests were launched around India and throughout the diaspora, a record-setting human chain called the ‘Women's Wall' was coordinated, and dozens of petitions were filed asking the Supreme Court to review, and potentially reverse, its landmark opinion.  Perhaps most significantly, IYLA led the Court to openly reconsider the Essential Practices Doctrine that has been a mainstay of Indian religious freedom jurisprudence since 1954. In this first monograph-length study of the dispute, legal anthropologist Deepa Das Acevedo draws on ethnographic fieldwork, legal analysis, and media archives to tell a multifaceted narrative about the ‘ban on women'. Reaching as far back as the eighteenth century, when the relationship between temple deities and the government was transformed by an ambitious precolonial ruler, and coming up to the litigation delays caused by the coronavirus pandemic, Das Acevedo reveals the complexities of the dispute and the constitutional framework that defines it. That framework, Das Acevedo argues, reflects two distinct conceptions of religion-state relations, both of which have emerged at various stages in the—still unresolved—battle for Sabarimala. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/south-asian-studies

The Battle for Sabarimala: Religion, Law, and Gender in Contemporary India (Oxford UP, 2024) tells the story of one of contemporary India's most contentious disputes: a long-running struggle over women's access to the Hindu temple at Sabarimala. In 2018, the Indian Supreme Court ruled that the temple, which had traditionally been forbidden to women aged ten to fifty because their presence offended the presiding deity, was required to open its doors to all Hindus. The decision in Indian Younger Lawyers Association rocked the nation: protests were launched around India and throughout the diaspora, a record-setting human chain called the ‘Women's Wall' was coordinated, and dozens of petitions were filed asking the Supreme Court to review, and potentially reverse, its landmark opinion.  Perhaps most significantly, IYLA led the Court to openly reconsider the Essential Practices Doctrine that has been a mainstay of Indian religious freedom jurisprudence since 1954. In this first monograph-length study of the dispute, legal anthropologist Deepa Das Acevedo draws on ethnographic fieldwork, legal analysis, and media archives to tell a multifaceted narrative about the ‘ban on women'. Reaching as far back as the eighteenth century, when the relationship between temple deities and the government was transformed by an ambitious precolonial ruler, and coming up to the litigation delays caused by the coronavirus pandemic, Das Acevedo reveals the complexities of the dispute and the constitutional framework that defines it. That framework, Das Acevedo argues, reflects two distinct conceptions of religion-state relations, both of which have emerged at various stages in the—still unresolved—battle for Sabarimala. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The Battle for Sabarimala: Religion, Law, and Gender in Contemporary India (Oxford UP, 2024) tells the story of one of contemporary India's most contentious disputes: a long-running struggle over women's access to the Hindu temple at Sabarimala. In 2018, the Indian Supreme Court ruled that the temple, which had traditionally been forbidden to women aged ten to fifty because their presence offended the presiding deity, was required to open its doors to all Hindus. The decision in Indian Younger Lawyers Association rocked the nation: protests were launched around India and throughout the diaspora, a record-setting human chain called the ‘Women's Wall' was coordinated, and dozens of petitions were filed asking the Supreme Court to review, and potentially reverse, its landmark opinion.  Perhaps most significantly, IYLA led the Court to openly reconsider the Essential Practices Doctrine that has been a mainstay of Indian religious freedom jurisprudence since 1954. In this first monograph-length study of the dispute, legal anthropologist Deepa Das Acevedo draws on ethnographic fieldwork, legal analysis, and media archives to tell a multifaceted narrative about the ‘ban on women'. Reaching as far back as the eighteenth century, when the relationship between temple deities and the government was transformed by an ambitious precolonial ruler, and coming up to the litigation delays caused by the coronavirus pandemic, Das Acevedo reveals the complexities of the dispute and the constitutional framework that defines it. That framework, Das Acevedo argues, reflects two distinct conceptions of religion-state relations, both of which have emerged at various stages in the—still unresolved—battle for Sabarimala. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/indian-religions

The Battle for Sabarimala: Religion, Law, and Gender in Contemporary India (Oxford UP, 2024) tells the story of one of contemporary India's most contentious disputes: a long-running struggle over women's access to the Hindu temple at Sabarimala. In 2018, the Indian Supreme Court ruled that the temple, which had traditionally been forbidden to women aged ten to fifty because their presence offended the presiding deity, was required to open its doors to all Hindus. The decision in Indian Younger Lawyers Association rocked the nation: protests were launched around India and throughout the diaspora, a record-setting human chain called the ‘Women's Wall' was coordinated, and dozens of petitions were filed asking the Supreme Court to review, and potentially reverse, its landmark opinion.  Perhaps most significantly, IYLA led the Court to openly reconsider the Essential Practices Doctrine that has been a mainstay of Indian religious freedom jurisprudence since 1954. In this first monograph-length study of the dispute, legal anthropologist Deepa Das Acevedo draws on ethnographic fieldwork, legal analysis, and media archives to tell a multifaceted narrative about the ‘ban on women'. Reaching as far back as the eighteenth century, when the relationship between temple deities and the government was transformed by an ambitious precolonial ruler, and coming up to the litigation delays caused by the coronavirus pandemic, Das Acevedo reveals the complexities of the dispute and the constitutional framework that defines it. That framework, Das Acevedo argues, reflects two distinct conceptions of religion-state relations, both of which have emerged at various stages in the—still unresolved—battle for Sabarimala. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/religion

The Battle for Sabarimala: Religion, Law, and Gender in Contemporary India (Oxford UP, 2024) tells the story of one of contemporary India's most contentious disputes: a long-running struggle over women's access to the Hindu temple at Sabarimala. In 2018, the Indian Supreme Court ruled that the temple, which had traditionally been forbidden to women aged ten to fifty because their presence offended the presiding deity, was required to open its doors to all Hindus. The decision in Indian Younger Lawyers Association rocked the nation: protests were launched around India and throughout the diaspora, a record-setting human chain called the ‘Women's Wall' was coordinated, and dozens of petitions were filed asking the Supreme Court to review, and potentially reverse, its landmark opinion.  Perhaps most significantly, IYLA led the Court to openly reconsider the Essential Practices Doctrine that has been a mainstay of Indian religious freedom jurisprudence since 1954. In this first monograph-length study of the dispute, legal anthropologist Deepa Das Acevedo draws on ethnographic fieldwork, legal analysis, and media archives to tell a multifaceted narrative about the ‘ban on women'. Reaching as far back as the eighteenth century, when the relationship between temple deities and the government was transformed by an ambitious precolonial ruler, and coming up to the litigation delays caused by the coronavirus pandemic, Das Acevedo reveals the complexities of the dispute and the constitutional framework that defines it. That framework, Das Acevedo argues, reflects two distinct conceptions of religion-state relations, both of which have emerged at various stages in the—still unresolved—battle for Sabarimala. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/law

The Battle for Sabarimala: Religion, Law, and Gender in Contemporary India (Oxford UP, 2024) tells the story of one of contemporary India's most contentious disputes: a long-running struggle over women's access to the Hindu temple at Sabarimala. In 2018, the Indian Supreme Court ruled that the temple, which had traditionally been forbidden to women aged ten to fifty because their presence offended the presiding deity, was required to open its doors to all Hindus. The decision in Indian Younger Lawyers Association rocked the nation: protests were launched around India and throughout the diaspora, a record-setting human chain called the ‘Women's Wall' was coordinated, and dozens of petitions were filed asking the Supreme Court to review, and potentially reverse, its landmark opinion.  Perhaps most significantly, IYLA led the Court to openly reconsider the Essential Practices Doctrine that has been a mainstay of Indian religious freedom jurisprudence since 1954. In this first monograph-length study of the dispute, legal anthropologist Deepa Das Acevedo draws on ethnographic fieldwork, legal analysis, and media archives to tell a multifaceted narrative about the ‘ban on women'. Reaching as far back as the eighteenth century, when the relationship between temple deities and the government was transformed by an ambitious precolonial ruler, and coming up to the litigation delays caused by the coronavirus pandemic, Das Acevedo reveals the complexities of the dispute and the constitutional framework that defines it. That framework, Das Acevedo argues, reflects two distinct conceptions of religion-state relations, both of which have emerged at various stages in the—still unresolved—battle for Sabarimala.

In this episode, hosts Josh Hutchinson and Sarah Jack explore the complex relationships between religion, politics, and harmful practices in India. Joined by experts Arjun Philip George and Giresh Kumar J, they discuss: 1. The persistence of caste-based discrimination across religious lines in India 2. The role of religious texts and traditions in perpetuating gender inequality 3. Challenges in reforming deeply ingrained cultural and religious practices 4. The impact of political leaders and parties on reinforcing or challenging harmful practices 5. The tension between constitutional values and religious beliefs in Indian society 6. The struggle for women's rights in religious contexts, including the Sabarimala temple controversy 7. The use of religion in politics and its effects on India's democratic fabric 8. The difficulty of separating harmful practices from mainstream religious beliefs 9. The need for progressive education and individual choice in religious matters Key topics: - Caste system - Gender discrimination - Secularism in India - Religious reform - Constitutional rights vs. religious practices - Political use of religion Guests: - Arjun Philip George: Legal scholar with expertise in violence against women on social media platforms - Giresh Kumar J: Professor of international human rights and social justice - Samantha Spence: Associate Professor of International Human Rights and Social Justice This episode provides a thought-provoking look at how witch hunt mentalities persist in modern forms, particularly through the lens of religious and cultural practices in India. Donate: End Witch Hunts UK Advocacy Trip Fund End Witch Hunts Connecticut Witch Trial Exoneration Project Massachusetts Witch-Hunt Justice Project Witch Hunt Website Salem Witch-Hunt Education Project Learn more about Spiritual and Ritual Abuse --- Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/witchhunt/support

Ayyappa, also known as Dharma Sastha, is the upholder of Dharma, truth, and righteousness. Born of the Divine union of Shiva and Vishnu, he, who has taken abode in the Sacred Mount of Sabarimala, embodies purity, compassion, and spiritual bliss. Maha Sastha Ayyappa Anugruha Kavacham is the hymn of Armor of Sastha Ayyappa's Protection and Blessings. Its chanting with devotion can bestow Ayyappa's grace, cure illnesses, mitigate adverse karmic effects, promote health and longevity, fulfill wishes, give power of attraction, grant wisdom, a sense of detachment, and Divine peace.   If you would like to find out more about your chart or have a question about astrology you would love the answer to, please do connect with us at www.astroved.com Follow AstroVed on IG, Twitter, and FB @AstroVed 

Dharma Sastha is the upholder of Dharma, the righteous order. Popularly known as Ayyappa, he was the Divine son of Shiva and Vishnu, who stands for piety, empathy, devotion and spiritual bliss. Millions of devotees flock to his mountainous abode of Sabarimala every Year after observing severe austerities. Sri Dharma Sastha Stuti Dasakam is a devotional hymn of 10 verses in praise of Dharma Sastha, his attributes, and greatness. Reciting this Dasakam with faith can protect against diseases, and help realize desires and cross the ocean of eternal birth and death.   If you would like to find out more about your chart or have a question about astrology you would love the answer to, please do connect with us at www.astroved.com Follow AstroVed on IG, Twitter, and FB @AstroVed 

Hello, this is your daily dose of news from Onmanorama. Tune in to get updated about the major news stories of the day.

Hello, this is your daily dose of news from Onmanorama. Tune in to get updated about the major news stories of the day.

Hello, this is your daily dose of news from Onmanorama. Tune in to get updated about the major news stories of the day.

Welcome to the Interactions podcast — brought to you by the Center for the Study of Law and Religion at Emory University. Now in its 40th year, our Center explores the interactions of law and religion through research and scholarship, teaching and training, and public programs. This season of the podcast explores recent scholarship in law and religion from members of the Center community. This podcast is produced by the Center for the Study of Law and Religion at Emory University and in collaboration with canopyforum.org.Today's guest is Deepa Das Acevedo, Associate Professor of Law at Emory University. In this episode, we talk about her forthcoming book from Oxford University Press, “The Battle for Sabarimala: Religion, Law, and Gender in Contemporary India.” The book tells the complex and ongoing story of the Sabarimala Temple in Kerala, India —–a site of heated dispute over gender equality, religious freedom, and religion-state relations. Drawing on more than a decade's worth of research, the book delves into the intersection of anthropology and law, providing innovative solutions that effectively navigate the intricate legal landscape of the temple, while also contextualizing it within the larger framework of Indian and constitutional law.In this conversation, we cover a lot of ground, including the background and historical importance of the Sabarimala Temple, why recent disputes can be considered a turning point for the Indian judiciary, and the relationship between anthropology and law.

Story of Sabarimala temple from famous Aithehyamala

Over the past decade, India's top courts have presided over numerous landmark cases, including those related to Aadhar, Sabarimala, the Hijab row, anti-defection laws, privacy, Section 377, and the UAPA. While each of these cases holds significant importance individually, does a different narrative emerge when considering them collectively? In this episode, host Sandip Roy speaks to lawyer and constitutional scholar Gautam Bhatia regarding his latest book, 'Unsealed Covers,' and what the past decade of India's top court decisions reveals about the country's trajectory.Produced by Shashank BhargavaEdited and mixed by Suresh Pawar

This question has two parts – First, did God create injustice and suffering. If yes, then how to accept it? Looks like Ishvara has crafted an awe-inspiring multi-dimensional, multi-world manifestation that we call life just like the video game developer has developed a video game. By looking at 5 similarities between Ishvara and the video game creator, we find clear answers to our question. The podcast transcript - https://discoveratma.com/236-how-to-accept-that-god-has-created-injustice-and-suffering/ Please check out our July 2023 Aarsha Vidya Bharati newsletter - Guru Purnima l Happiness Course l Vedanta Camp - Aug 2023 l Talks at World yoga Festival UK l Yatra to Sabarimala l Responses after Bhakti course and much more! - Our monthly newsletter will bring you more happiness, more wisdom and more freedom. To subscribe to Aarsha Vidya Bharati - https://mailchi.mp/cea95b9ad987/aarsha-vidya-bharati Vedanta - the river of wisdom is a weekly podcast by Swamini B (Brahmaprajnananda), a Vedanta teacher, writer and Hindu monk. Please follow, learn and enjoy Youtube - https://www.youtube.com/@DiscoverAtma Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/discoveratma Twitter - https://twitter.com/discoveratma To connect and learn Vedanta - www.discoveratma.com --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/the-river-of-wisdom/message

The devotee wants bhakti, devotion and not mukti, freedom from a sense of bondage. An interesting dialogue ensues between her and Bhagavan Krishna. For podcast transcript - https://discoveratma.com/235-what-happens-when-the-devotee-prays-to-bhagavan-krishna-for-bhakti-and-he-appears/ Please check out our July 2023 Aarsha Vidya Bharati newsletter - https://mailchi.mp/49f324cb76c1/aarsha-vidya-bharati-jul2023 Our monthly newsletter will bring you more happiness, more wisdom and more freedom. To subscribe to Aarsha Vidya Bharati - Guru Purnima l Happiness Course l Vedanta Camp - Aug 2023 l Talks at World yoga Festival UK l Yatra to Sabarimala l Responses after Bhakti course and much more! - https://mailchi.mp/cea95b9ad987/aarsha-vidya-bharati Vedanta - the river of wisdom is a weekly podcast by Swamini B (Brahmaprajnananda), a Vedanta teacher, writer and Hindu monk. Please follow, learn and enjoy Youtube - https://www.youtube.com/@DiscoverAtma Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/discoveratma Twitter - https://twitter.com/discoveratma To connect and learn Vedanta - www.discoveratma.com --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/the-river-of-wisdom/message

‘I get hurt easily because I am very sensitive. Wish I was not so sensitive. ‘ complain many people.  What is sensitivity? Can we do without it? Sensitivity is the ability to be keenly attuned to our surroundings, emotions, and the experiences of others. Sensitivity is actually a gift of this human condition from Bhagavan. What are those 7 ways in which it enriches our lives? Do read the podcast transcript/ article- https://discoveratma.com/234-why-your-sensitivity-is-a-strength-not-a-weakness/ For the four part video course called Bhaava - the dance of emotion in Vedanta - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3dJyqUyoftw&list=PL5vNI4hvD69p-VPfHM8Jn6AXjye-5csXp Please check out our July 2023 Aarsha Vidya Bharati newsletter - https://mailchi.mp/49f324cb76c1/aarsha-vidya-bharati-jul2023 Our monthly newsletter will bring you more happiness, more wisdom and more freedom. To subscribe to Aarsha Vidya Bharati - Guru Purnima l Happiness Course l Vedanta Camp - Aug 2023 l Talks at World yoga Festival UK l Yatra to Sabarimala l Responses after Bhakti course and much more! - https://mailchi.mp/cea95b9ad987/aarsha-vidya-bharati Vedanta - the river of wisdom is a weekly podcast by Swamini B (Brahmaprajnananda), a Vedanta teacher, writer and Hindu monk. Please follow, learn and enjoy Youtube - https://www.youtube.com/@DiscoverAtma Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/discoveratma Twitter - https://twitter.com/discoveratma To connect and learn Vedanta - www.discoveratma.com

What happened when a dialogue unfolded between Identity and Consciousness? New 3 month course starting 9th July 2023 - Self knowledge and the quest for happiness course - https://www.hua.edu/product/self-knowledge-and-the-quest-for-happiness/ Do read the podcast transcript/ article- https://discoveratma.com/233-dialogue-between-identity-and-consciousness/ Please check out our July 2023 Aarsha Vidya Bharati newsletter - https://mailchi.mp/49f324cb76c1/aarsha-vidya-bharati-jul2023 Our monthly newsletter will bring you more happiness, more wisdom and more freedom. To subscribe to Aarsha Vidya Bharati - Guru Purnima l Happiness Course l Vedanta Camp - Aug 2023 l Talks at World yoga Festival UK l Yatra to Sabarimala l Responses after Bhakti course and much more! - https://mailchi.mp/cea95b9ad987/aarsha-vidya-bharati Vedanta - the river of wisdom is a weekly podcast by Swamini B (Brahmaprajnananda), a Vedanta teacher, writer and Hindu monk. Please follow, learn and enjoy Youtube - https://www.youtube.com/@DiscoverAtma Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/discoveratma Twitter - https://twitter.com/discoveratma To connect and learn Vedanta - www.discoveratma.com

In this second episode with Narayanan anna we go into the subtler aspects of his spiritual journey. He shares with us incidents which have occurred with him where he had to question his own logical mind. But like he says when you are with a live Guru he is the path. Listen to the first episode here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yIJTcZdvYfk Narayanan anna Instagram : https://www.instagram.com/21century_yogi/ 0:00 Part 2 begins with Fast X review 4:10 How we can help with proper delivery of Rudraksha diksha 10:38 The mystical experience with Sadhguru during Rudraksha diksha 17:00 If you allow the Guru can access you in more ways than imaginable 22:06 A Sadhguru Sri Brahma story 25:06 What is the difference between slavery and surrendering to a Guru 29:31 How to cultivate the quality of Devotion 32:30 Devi 36:42 Special Devi Gudi from Sadhguru 44:19 Devi Procession - Devi gives you the privilege and Responsibility of carrying her 51:11 If you don't nurture Devi she will walk away 54:45 Feeling Devis presence 59:45 Naryanan anna embraces his feminine side 1:03:11 How as men we can embrace the feminine side within them 1:09:59 If you are genuine on your path then slowly others will understand and support you 1:11:25 How Rudraksha packaging transformed Youngsters from wayward and alcoholic lifestyle to visit Sabarimala temple 1:17:31 The village women who help with the Rudraksha diksha 1:24:40 Shambhavi is enough to shake you 1:25:28 Conclusion of Part 2 Episode with  @SushantDivgikarRaniKohenur  : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=teQ7BBs5Y5c&t=225s Connect with me and an awesome community on Discord: https://discord.gg/quazmzdf87 Email: vaisakhsabu90@gmail.com Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/vaisu90/ Snapchat: @vaisu1990 Linkedin: vaisakh sabu Twitter: @vaisakhsabu90

In this episode, historian Dr. Janaki Nair discusses why religious scriptures formed the basis for colonial law in India, how women fought against child marriage in the 20th century, and why Indu Malhotra's dissenting judgement in the Sabarimala verdict is significant.‘In Perspective' is The Swaddle's podcast series where academics reveal little-known facts about Indian history, society and culture.Notes: 00:01:00:20- How and why did religious texts and traditions become central to determining women's position in colonial legal frameworks? 00:04:58:03- What are the difficulties with deciding when religious custom becomes law? 00:07:08:01- What was the Madras case on the question of ‘can women inherit under Mitakshara law?'00:09:24:02- What were the problems with interpreting scriptures, especially with norms pertaining to sati and child marriage?00:12:27:09- How did the notion of not interfering in social customs define the attitude towards child marriage laws in colonial India? Do we see a continuity in that till today, or did something change in the 1920s? Was there an active pushback then? 00:27:06:19- What was the significance of Indu Malhotra's dissenting judgment in the Sabarimala verdict?

In the 2nd part of our Holi episode, we talk about the colours, issues, the images and the misconceptions with our guest Neha who is the founder of Shaktitva.org.General InformationSubscribers are requested to look for The Hindu Parenting notification emails for new podcasts/posts in their email promotions/spam tab and personally move these into the main inbox. Thereafter all posts will be delivered to their main inbox. Thank you!For questions that you'd like us to address, please use the form below:Hindu Parenting QuestionsFor comments and suggestions, please use the comments tab or write to us at contact@hinduparenting.orgPlease note that questions will not be answered on email.Do subscribe to our substack and follow us on our social media handlesTwitter: hinduparentingInstagram: hinduparentingTelegram: t.me/hinduparentingFacebook: facebook.com/groups/hinduparentingTranscriptRekha: Namaste! Welcome to the Hindu Parenting Podcast, Part 2 of the Holi Episode. Please join us as we continue the fascinating discussion about the Festival of Holi with some more stories from Neha ji, founder of Shaktitva and a Devi Upasaka.Neha: So, just to complete the story, eventually when all of these attempts to, you know, to kill Prahlad fail, and Hiranyakashipu decides to take the matters into his own hands and he finds this unarmed child. In a fit of rage, he tries to strike a sword with. So, he, you know, the child ducks and the sword hits a pillar. And from that pillar, Narsimha Avatar appears. And now Narsimha Avatar is the half-man, half-animal. So, it's not either, the boon was either animal or man. But this avatar is half-man, half-animal. And this is the most, you know, interesting element of the story.So, this Narsimha Avatar, Sri Vishnu takes him to the, at the, what we call dehleez , like the corner of the house. Yeah, the threshold of the house, exactly. He stands on the threshold of the house, takes this demon, puts him on his thigh, so that he's not on the ground or on the sky. He's on Sri Vishnu's thigh. And then he claws his heart out with his claws. So, it's not a known weapon. Yeah. And he does this at exactly a dusk when it is neither morning, day or night. Shalini: Sandhyakaal!Neha: Yeah, sandhyakaal, like the mixing when it's neither day nor night. So, he finds that exact combination that will defeat that very ingenious boon. And that's how, you know, Hiranyakashipu is defeated. Finally, Prahlad gets to witness his Ishta in the raw form, and he is blessed. And then Prahlad takes over the throne and continues the lineage of Sage Kashyap going forward. So, that Holika moment. Shalini: You said the story so beautifully.Neha: Awww! Thank you!Rekha: Nehaji, I love the part where the puzzle gets solved. I can see how kids can get absolutely fascinated by this, you know, if parents can just tell their kids, you give this puzzle; even if your kid doesn't know the story but tries to solve this puzzle.“Neither during the day nor night”. I mean, it's just too beautiful.Neha: It's ingenious. Yeah, absolutely. And see, the moral of the story is right, like you can, first of all, like I always wonder these people, they put hundreds of years of sadhana or many lifetimes of sadhana to get a boon from their Ishta, right? Like imagine, you're sitting in extreme penance, like Ravana's penance and then Hiranyakashipu's penance is not ordinary. This is like almost hundreds of years of extreme penance, even thousands of years by some accounts. They sit and you ask for such a stupid thing. I mean, your Ishta is standing in front of you deviate and you ask that you should not be killed. Why is that? I think that shows the nature of who we call demon is not by birth or lineage, you know, these are Kashyap rishi's sons, like these are the most exalted lineage you can find in all of Bharat Varsha. And that is evident because they have the capability to do this penance for eons. This is not ordinary feat in itself and the lineage is definitely blessed. So it's not by birth or by previous or whatever is the other ways of people understanding it. It's not about descent, it's not about race, it's not about caste, it's not about all of these things. It's about what you do with your abilities, right? What are your desires? Shalini:Yeah, absolutely. That is true.Neha: Yeah, as a Devi upasaka, when Ma comes to me and I ask something so stupid, I think like, you know, I should be banned from sadhana… do that if somebody does things like this. But you know, devatas are when they're happy, they're happy, they will give you what they want as long as it's within - as long as it doesn't defy the laws of nature. And so you can find several stories where Brahma is giving boons or Ma is giving boons or you know, Shiva is giving boons and these, depending on who is getting the boons, people do different things.Rekha: I'd like to bring up one point here. You live in the US. And I know that about three years ago, just pre-COVID, there was this thing in US universities about Holi against Hindutva, where Holika was painted as a Dalit woman. And you know, many people tried to spread this rumor in colleges that there's something very bad going on when Holika is burnt because she is an oppressed woman and she's a Dalit. And so I know that a lot of Indian children got swayed by this. I'd like you to weigh in on this because..Neha: yeah, absolutely. So actually, with the exact incident you're talking about, led me to write a two-part article on Holi on Shaktitva blog. The part where I explain what Holi is and the many colors of Holi is one article. And then there is a second article called “Let the Subaltern Speak”, in which I kind of explore exactly this point. So first of all, like logically speaking, you know, a lot of these claims are absurd to the point of ignorance. Like they, they rely on the fact that a lot of people don't know about these stories and the legends or all the meanings behind what we do as a culture. And that's part of colonialism, you know, just detaching us from our roots is definitely part of the colonial projects.So that now that, you know, the urban audience has already detached very few know the story of Holika or why we do this, you can twist the argument in your favor.So there are two main articles that led to this Equality Labs protest that were challenged by it. So basically this Equality Labs organization cited two main articles in their write up for Holi against Hindutva. One of them was from Pradnya Waghule, which said ‘Reading caste in Holi- the burning of Holika, a Bahujan woman'. And the second one is the Equality Labs, its own article, ‘why do we say no to Holi' In both of them, you know, I am not going to critique the whole blog, because it's ridiculous. But you can see a very clear indication that this is nothing but Hinduphobia. So Waghule herself says that she's only only ever lived in cities all her life. Right. So the what I'm trying the reason I'm trying to highlight that is because she has no in-first person knowledge of these traditions. Right. Whereas, you know, most of our families are just two generations ago, we were living in villages. So that's number one. Now this reading of Bahujan woman of Holika - Holika's existence comes from this story that I told you about. She is Hiranyakashipu's sister. Hiranya Kashyapu and Hiranyaksha are very clearly Kashyap Rishi's sons. So Kashyap Rishi is like, you know, one of the Saptarishis. So obviously he's the ultra ultra Brahmin, not even ordinary normal Shukla chukla or, you know, Pandya Brahmin is the ultra Brahmin, like he has an entire Gotra named after him.And he these are the first one, not first one, but he is like, yeah, these two are sons from Kashyap Rishi. So by caste, essentially, because it's a paternalistic tradition, it happens, they have become Brahmin. And so Holika is a sister. So that means she's a Brahmin woman, you know, by legend, which is where she's mentioned. Now, what the reality is, these people when they're mentioning these instances of Holika being worshipped in tribal areas, they are confusing Holika and Holi Mata. Now, Holi Mata is indeed worshipped in many parts of the country in many, many tribal traditions, including my hometown. Now, Holi Mata has nothing to do with Holika.What happens is many of us, many of our tribes are traditionally like the Kula Devi is a Devi, right? The Kula devatha is a Devi. And so usually anything auspicious, Devi has to be worshipped. So when you do that, and usually what the tradition goes that in specific instances, for example, if you're doing the Gauri Pooja, a specific form of Ma is being worshipped, that's why it's called Gauri Pooja. So in the same way, during Holi Mata, a specific form of Ma is being worshipped and a specific type of worship is being done, that ritual only happens around Holi. And that includes your offering, the same colors are offered, new clothes are offered, when the dahan is done, that bonfire is done, a part of that bonfire, ashes are brought to the Mata and so on. So like in the Prasad, this Naivedyam is first created. So that's why we make gujiya after the dahan, and then gujiya is first offered to the god. So if we were in the villages, we would offer it to the Kula Devi. And then eventually it will be distributed. So for that particular purpose, a Murti or a makeshift clay idol is created. And all of the village will gather around and offer the blessings over there, like they'll put the offerings in that on the clay idol.So that is that clay idol is called Holi Mata. So now confusing Holimata with Holika is silly because the same people also do the bonfire. So why would they do the bonfire if they were worshipping Holika later? Then why would you celebrate her death? Just two minutes before! They are not related. Now in other parts of India, you can actually see that Holimata, that makeshift idol, is also taken on a Yatra like Ganesh Chaturthi. So they also, the Visarjan happens and so on, like the same process, which is typical for us, like whenever we have a makeshift idol like in Ganesh Chaturthi or in Durga Puja, once the process is completed, it is done - Visarjan into some form of water body. So that also happens. So those processions will chant Holi Mata Ki Jai or something like that. And that's what these urbanites who actually want to speak for the subaltern without getting to know them, without getting to live their lives or understanding their tradition and faith systems, this is how they confuse people. So in this imagination, because she is the goddess of the tribal people, she becomes a tribal deity because they've already confused it and they're not familiar with these ideas of how Holi Mata is constructed, like on a makeshift thing and all of those nuances are not known. And so they will do this confusion and then they will suddenly Holika, the daughter of Kashyap rishi becomes the Dalit woman all of a sudden. And now nobody from the Bahujan parts of India is coming to read this English language article meant to be circulated in USA to correct it, right? Nobody's going to do that. And so and the rest of you are saying we hardly know anything about why things are happening. So we are not also correcting it. So that's how you get to circulate these, you know, false narratives. And it was actually very offensive, because targeting Holi like that. And here is the thing, you know, if you are, let's say, even if I were to imagine this concept of Brahminical Hinduism versus non-Brahminical, Brahminical tribal Hinduism, Holi is the least Brahminical of all, you know, celebrations of Hindus. Like, you know, if you see the typical hallmarks of what is what, how these people define Brahminism is - at least a Brahmin needs to be present, no? Usually all some festivals you require a priest to come and do some puja, but Holi requires the presence of no priest. Right. As I mentioned, in fact, it's a challenging of social norms and mores.Then the tradition inquires, like it requires no particular, like you usually offer it to your own gods, your own deities and a Kula Devi. But it does not require any elaborate temple visit or anything like that. Right. So how, why would, you know, if this were to be confused, check, if we were to put it in these two arbitrary criteria of Brahminical versus non-Brahminical, this is very fundamentally indigenous tribal and adivasi in origins. Right. So, so the entire basis of attacking an indigenous authentic tribal festival, which is like, in fact, one of the biggest festival for many tribes in India as a, you know, fascist thing and trying to disparage it this way and especially targeting American universities is insidious to say the least.Now, are we saying that Vedic traditions are not uninhibited? They are not, you know, connected to Mata or they are not connected to Kula Devi? No, it's a beautiful spectrum. Right.How, what happens now in a traditional, let's say, let's find a simple example in a traditional homa. Right. If you're doing Rudrabhishekam in your home and you are the Yajman and pundits have come and they're conducting it for you. What happens? Right. The starting is you'll do the cleaning of your hands. You'll remember Sri Vishnu for that. Right. Then you will start by remembering your Guru, your ancestors, your Kula Devi and Sri Ganesha. Right. Not, I messed up the order, but basically this is the, like, start with Sri Ganesha, then your Kula Devi, then your ancestors, your Guru. This is the beginning of every homa, every puja, everywhere.Right. Now, if you had, if you were in living in a place where you had access to your Kula Devi's murti, maybe you put it in your temple or maybe you are living in a place where your Kula Devi temple is nearby and that's where you're conducting it. When you are remembering them, it will involve an offering to them immediately. And this will be guided to you by the priest himself. Right. So he's not, there is no distinction between vedic gods and these gods, right.It's a beautiful spectrum. One cannot exist without the other. So the, now, whether you're reading it from the Shastras or the Puranas or you're telling folk stories, it does not matter. Right. That's just the ritual or how should I say levels of ritualism. If you were to do it at your home by yourself, you probably don't know all the Sanskrit verses. So you do it in your mind. Right. You remember the deity and you have, maybe you have a mantra or maybe you don't have a mantra. Maybe you have a Chalisa. For example, in North India, we have these avadhi verses, which serve as the mantras. So Chalisa is our collection of 40 verses or you have sometimes, you know, these, these arathis, for example, these songs that we have constructed for the singing the legends of our gods, Om Jai Jagdish hare being the most prominent one. So we have all of these different levels and ways of worship. Now, some people do it in a very elaborate way where sometimes you need a priest because it's actually too elaborate and it's not possible for some unless somebody is trained in that ritual for tens of years, which is what often priests do. It's hard for a normal householder to start doing it without training. And also it's not recommended to do it without training either. So depending on the level you're doing, for example, in Shivaratri that just passed, most people will do it in their homes. Right. If they have a lingam at home, they will do a simple Abhishekam at home. If they have, if they're going to a temple, then they'll, you know, put money for a Rudrabhishekam for the temple priests to conduct it. Or sometimes people will arrange for a priest to come and do a homa at their home. It's different levels of the same festival. All of them are valid. All of them are common.Rekha: So Neha Ji, you brought up this very, very important point of two traditions coexisting harmoniously. The universal story, the Pauranic story of Holika dahan, the Hiranyakashipu story, and also the Holi Mata Kuladevi local traditions, which are typically known as the Desi and the Margi traditions within Sanatana Dharma. So the interesting thing is that there is really no conflict. And this thing happens over and over again in our tradition, right, with the festivals, with customs, dance, music, and so many things. And I'd like to say here that I think this is not a bug, but a feature of Sanatana Dharma. Any thoughts on this?Neha: Thank you for that software engineering reference. And you're absolutely right. No, so exactly right. So I think, you know, sometimes I find myself browsing through an article that some colonial, you know, neo-colonial Indologist wrote, and they seem so confused, right? If you read the research papers that get published in Indology journals, they are just, you know, it's like it's impossible for them to parse the continuity of this tradition. So sometimes they will be looking at, you know, let's say they'll go to a rural Kuladevi Mandir, right? And they'll see, let's take for an extreme example, let's say they'll see a Bali ritual, right? And then a few, even in Tamil Nadu, let's just take the example of Tamil Nadu. If you go to the rural villages, there are still like some Kuladevi Kuladevata temples where Bali happens, you know, now with the colonial government banning it and then our modern government continuing colonial traditions, you know, officially it's banned, but still happens. Then you cross- Shalini: I think there is a temple in Kerala also, no? The Muthappan temple. Neha: Not just one, not just one temple. Shalini: Yeah, many, many temples.Neha: A lot of places where you have to secretly do this because, you know, our own government has turned against our traditions or, you know, some places where it's relatively open, but it happens. And then you cross a few kilometers and you come to the heart of, you know, say Chennai and you go to a Vaishnava temple or a Shaiva temple, like, you know, Iyengar temple or an Iyer temple and you're suddenly like, this is like very organized, you know, we have a lot of learned gurus who have given like volumes and volumes of very detailed documentary, like documented evidence of everything that they found. And, you know, somehow for these people who come from the West, it looks like these two traditions cannot coexist each other with each other. And the reason they think that is because they're bound with this Christian mentality, where paganism, which was a pre-Christian tradition of their lands, was considered or labeled as backward and, you know, not civilized by the Christians who came to dominate the space later on. So they see, you know, nature worship as uncouth, uncivilized or, you know, the thing that uneducated people do. And this has also been indoctrinated to us in our education, right? Because our education is also colonial. So every time like you have, I'm sure you have read somewhere that, you know, even in our own books that the people, ancient people worshiped Sun because they did not understand its power, right? And so the idea is that the only reason you worship something is because you don't understand it. And so it becomes a myth. And so therefore science becomes a way to dispelling that myth. And, you know, Christianity brought us to the light. And so the old gods lost the power. This is all very, very standard European Christian commentary. This is how they understand their own past. And their present, which is Christian and then eventually post-Christian. So now they use that same..Shalini: So they project that on our system.Neha: Exactly, exactly. So they project that on our system. Because for them, when they look at, say, Kanchi matham, right, it looks very organized. It looks a little bit centralized. The priests over there are learned. They talk in, you know, high philosophy. And so on, and they can, you know, hold themselves up to any debate. They are, you know, they're experts in science, math, whatever you want them to be. And so this is like, you know, high philosophy is revered, revered as, exalted culture, more civil. And so they see reflections of their Orthodox church in this. And then they look, few villages down, they look at the common villager, who is, you know, just showing pure Bhakti to the Devi. He is also following Tantra. Here is the thing, right, even these temples, the Kula Devi temples are also established as per Agama Tantra. So these, these are still very much rituals that have been told to us, passed down generations of generations through sadhakas, through practical, practical knowledge, right? But because in, in these, to these external observers, it does not appear connected, you know, because unless you are completely disconnected and you're doing some high-falutin philosophy, you're not like, you know, learned enough. So you have to talk in abstract. Suddenly, when you translate that to actual rituals, it becomes old and childish and, and, you know, superstitious and what not. So this dichotomy from their own society, they project on ours. And that's exactly what happens when they look at these traditions.So when they look at the grama traditions, and here is the thing, Dharma clearly says there are many, many acharams, right? There is Vedachar and there is Lokachar, right? And there is not, it is not like a hierarchy. It is not like Vedachar is better than Lokachar. Both are absolutely important. And it is the context that defines which, you know, acharam has to be used and in which circumstance. And so this is, you know, these, all of these interconnectedness is only understood, a lot of this, like even you and I, a lot of us understand this implicitly because we've grown up in this tradition. And, you know, one basic requirement of Indology is that if you've grown up in the tradition, then you're not qualified to speak on it. Because that's the, again, the colonial lens, right? Like, if you're a brown person, you can't possibly be objective in to look at your tradition correctly. Of course, white people can look at white, white culture correctly, but brown people, you know, we have some racial defect. And that's why we can never be objective about our culture unless we prove it to them by proving our atheism first.So all of this, you know, this is a very clever structure created so that their lens remains dominant. So even when a brown person enters these, you know, these academic institutions, you have to prove that your way of thinking has been whitened enough. And that is why they are completely unable to understand these traditions and the beauty of this, this continuity of this tradition, right? Like tantra, whether it's Agama Tantra or Dakshinacharya Tantra or whatever kind of Tantra is learned knowledge. It's practical learned knowledge, like some, you know, great upasaka did years and years and decades of sadhana, found like a point where equally in fact, it is said that there are many Tantric upasakas who have reached a stage where they can access their past lives upasana also. So all of the things that they learned in their past lives, they can collect, remember all of those memories, right? And then they have a bigger picture. And then they try to bring that bigger picture and they try to give you the rules of how to do that for yourself, right? Like they can't just disseminate the secret, you won't understand. So you have to kind of just, they can only show you a path that doing these things in this particular order through this method will lead you somewhere where you can see the truth for yourself.That's Tantra, right? So that's the marg, that's the path that has been given to you. Now it may or may not, Tantra basically distills all of this down to a process. Whereas the Vedanta and other Darshanas, they are more focused on the philosophical end goal. So there is a little bit more philosophy associated with these other paths and less with Tantra, but that does not make these local understanding that we have learned over and built up over generations and generations less valuable, right? And that is exactly how every Indigenous culture has it, right? There is a reason why North American Indigenous people and even Africans, they had so much importance to the elders, right? To the ancient ones, the wisdom of the elders.Why was it valued? It wasn't just a quality of age, that wisdom followed from generation to generation. It was imparted by the ancestors to their future generations when the people felt ready.Rekha: Now this dichotomy, maybe you can analyze the visuals of Holi using this dichotomy too, right? Because Holi being so colorful and so visually appealing, I do know that a lot of photographers converge on Vrindavan just to take photographs of this spectacle and then publish it across the world. But I think a lot of this dichotomy comes into play there also and it has been commercialized quite a bit is what I hear. Neha: Oh absolutely. So you know, the dominant image in the mind of the West is when you are civilized, when you are wise, you are not, you behave a certain way, right? Like, you know, how British were, you were all stuck up and then you know, you behave like you have to act proper and whatever. And so if you're not doing that, right? If you're literally just having fun, that's lack of civilization, right? Lack of civility. And we've learned that even in our minds, we have at some point integrated that.So if somebody is behaving like they're just very, you know, acting very demure and very, you know, quiet and not letting their emotions out, all of that is a mark of manners or civility. And every time you let your hair down and like if you're angry, you're yelling, if you're, you know, happy, you're laughing boldly, all of that is, is, you know, lack of, you know, decorum. So we've learned those behaviors. Rekha: Nehaji, we often see pictures from Mathura and Vrindavan for Holi. Yeah. So is this like the center where it all started and what kind of celebrations are usually done in these places? Neha: Oh, actually, I mean, I don't know if it started there, but it's definitely a very important focal point of the Holi traditions in North India. And the part of the reason is because all of when you, when you listen to Shri Krishna's Rasleela stories, Holi actually plays a very interesting part there. In fact, it comes, the reference comes from his Balakanda to the time he is doing the Rasleela. Yeah. So in fact, because Krishna's birthplace and place where he grew up, are so central to the areas around Mathura, so Mathura, Vrindavan and NandGaon and all of these, they are very, you know, they celebrate the Krishna connection also during those Holi celebrations. So, in fact, when Vrindavan Holi is so very, very famous, in fact, if you just Google it as a most, you know, the most of the Westerners are fascinated by this particular Holi celebration. And I even know of people who try to visit Mathura specifically just to witness the Holi. And so it's actually fairly elaborate. And one of the, this is actually worth mentioning, Vrindavan's Holi lasts for seven days. And just the color playing part. So like the playing part lasts seven days. Everywhere else, we have one day of Holika Dahan, which is the bonfire ritual, and the next day is the playing colors part. But Vrindavan, the thing goes on for a week. And the first Holi in that day is called Laatmaar Holi, right, and translates to being beaten by a stick Holi. And there is, there is actually a legend behind it. So what happened is, it's part of Rasleela stories of Sri Krishna. So Sri Krishna, who hailed it from Nandgaon, he was visiting Radha in Barsana, which is where she used to live. So he was visiting her. Radha and her friends in Barsana on Holi. And he teased Radha and the other gopis so much, right, that they got really annoyed and they started hitting him, him and his friends with a stick and they chased him out of the city. So it's part of the whole like the Rasleela, the play, and he used to be like a notorious prankster, right. So you would run away with the clothes and whatnot. So he was here teasing them and playing pranks on them a lot. And so they got very annoyed. And so they chased him out of the city. So in sync with that legend, now men from Nandgaon will visit Barsana every year, you know, being acting like their Krishna story. And then the Barsana women will basically beat them up with lathis.Shalini: It happens to this day? It happens to this day?Neha: Exactly. So in fact, now this tradition has spread outside Barsana also, in many places they do this. But that is the, that is the role play that's happening, right. So they are Krishna's friends, the men act like Krishna's friends visiting the gopis and the women act like the women of Barsana act like they are the gopis. And so they basically, you know, reenact that scene. And this especially happens outside the Radharani temple in Barsana, like that's the specific part. And this is one of the most famous temples dedicated to Radha Ma in India. And then obviously you sing and dance and you know, we are very happy people. We drink thandai and all sorts of sweets are eaten and nuts and all of that fun stuff happens. But then one of the other days is Phoolon wali Holi where you play with flowers. Then there is another day where the people play with mud. It's not pleasant but it happens. And then the actual colors Holi. And in fact, Shalini: That makes it for three more. Three, four, one is flowers, one is the mud. Neha: Yeah. And one is colors four and I think the three more. Yeah, I don't remember exactly.Shalini: But these are very interesting, very interesting. Rekha: But but at the same time, there is a lot of shock value or, you know, some kind of an intrinsic value in all these visuals, right? You do see international media using a lot of the Holi and then, you know, coming to something like the widows of Vrindavan. You see that every year the media puts these very nice colorful pictures which I believe are actually sold by the international media. INeha: In fact, it's big, it's big money. Like a right picture can the copyrights can be translated throughout the world and it can actually make like quite a decent sum. So photographers from around the world gather around and then the, you know, they will just take captionless photos. And then the caption is added by the whoever is looking at the picture. So actually, you brought the brought up widows of Vrindavan. I actually have a Twitter thread where I analyze this! Ever since I joined Twitter. This was 2009. I've been noticing these headlines, right? “Widows of Vrindavan break taboo, break tradition and celebrate Holi!”. Now I actually did an analysis. I just take this phrase “widows of Vrindavan play Holi” and I append a year to it, right? And you can see these stories coming back from all the way up to 2012. So it's been 10 years and every year apparently, those widows break tradition and celebrate Holi and, you know, they break taboo and celebrate Holi. Every year they will announce it as if it's a new thing. So that just makes you question, was that ever a taboo in the first place or is just a myth that media has created that they just like to break because it's a catchy headline? Well, so this is absolutely like it makes a lot of money and from you can find those articles from, you know, they get sent through those news agencies like ANI and then they republished internationally. It's big money. Some of those photos can actually fetch you a very pretty penny, especially like there's so many aerial shots of those of Vrindavan Holi too these days, a lot of them like so. In fact, if you go to during Holi time, if you go to Vrindavan, you'll see a flock of international photographers over there just trying to get those pictures. Rekha: No concerns of privacy? I mean, I'm just wondering for the western world is so big on privacy, but is there no compunction in you know, preying on somebody's personal space. Neha: I very much doubt that they get these contracts like the privacy waiver signed. Exactly.Rekha: You know, let's talk a little bit about the colors. So these colors, there are some typical colors that are used predominantly. I see most of the people using a kind of a magenta color. Neha: So yes, so that pink is very common. The most common probably is pink. And then yellow is very common. Then nowadays, so almost every color on the spectrum, you can find you can find like light blue, powder blues. And even these days, pastels have come into fad. Also organic colors are appearing nowadays. This is interesting.Rekha: This is an interesting variation. So initially, I think we didn't need an organic color because because obviously all color was organic. Flowers and herbs is what I hear. And that specific bright colors that were made from the powder of certain dried flowers. Is that right?Neha: Yes, exactly. So the yellow was actually a mix of turmeric and marigold. And I don't remember the pink came also from a flower. But these days, so they could become a much brighter pink, at least that's what my nani used to say. But yeah, the definitely some colors are more predominant. Although nowadays, again, most of it is made being manufactured in factories. So you get pretty much every color there is. Shalini: Yeah, there's so much of talk about these being chemical colors and not very good for the skin and all. How much truth is there in that?Neha: growing up, I did have at least some like at least for a couple of years, there definitely was some sort of adulterated color coming into the market that was harsh on the skin. But these days, people are like too aware and especially depending on, but here is the thing, you can't control what color gets put on you. You can buy good colors. But then if somebody else buys whatever colors, then you're at the mercy of that person. But again, I think like cheaper colors as usual, you'll find some adulteration there. But mostly nowadays, there are big companies, just like the fireworks for Diwali, there are big companies dedicated to doing this. So if you buy like those brands or if you make at home, sometimes I've seen people starting to make themselves by grinding flowers. So those options are also there. But you find like very easy to find safe colors, to be honest.Shalini: Okay, so now you play with these colors, what do you do to take them off?Neha: That is this mystery thing called Ubtan. Yeah, I'm glad that you asked about removing the colors. So that's a whole entire exercise in itself. So basically, we make this very gooey paste made of all organic elements found at home. So you take either besan, which is ground chickpea flour, or you take wheat flour, your regular aata, and you mix haldi in it. And you put like turmeric, and you put oil, and you put water. Now, it should be a little bit more on the watery side, because you want it to be sticky. But the oil is there so that it removes well also, like when it comes up, all of it should come off. But if you have less oil, then it won't stick long enough. So the point is that you stick, and it's also used during the wedding ceremonies, by the way, after Haldi. So when you do the Haldi ceremony, it's actually Haldi and oil ceremony. So one round is done with Haldi, one round is done with oil, and then Ubtan is applied. And so the Haldi is, etc., is taken off by the Ubtan. And the idea is that obviously, it's very good for your skin, because putting turmeric is very, very nourishing for the skin. But also that consistency of the Ubtan, it brings out all the impurities of the skin. So in this case, that being colors. So colors come off very nicely with Ubtan, for the most part, unless you're, I'm talking about those my naughty cousins who actually pour that nasty chemical thing on my head, those ones don't come out easily. But the powder ones come off very easily, like with Ubtan, you know, between Ubtan and shower are fully covered, like you won't even, people won't even realize that you played Holi. Shalini: Okay, so I was just going to ask about that, you know, does it go in one day or it takes a few days to get rid of these colors? Again, powder? I can work with remnants of the color, you know, at the next day, it's not all good. Rekha: I call it a post-Holi glow, you know, you can always pick that on people. Neha: 100% there is a post-Holi glow, because you're so tired and you're so happy and you're so well fed by the end of this all, that you know, there's a post-Holi glow. But, but jokes aside, honestly, if you're playing only with powder or even with like, you know, diluted colors mixed in water, all of it comes out in one day for the most part. Unless you've been pranked with the thing on your head, then it will take a while. But I actually remember one of my best friends in school, she had like, you know, normal brown hair, but it's a slightly lighter color than the complete black hair that we usually have. So her hair was slightly brownish. And one time she came back after playing Holi and I kid you not, when she stood in the sunlight, her hair looked pink. This when we were not allowed to color our hair, because we were young children back then. So I think you got like a free hair color when there's not a lot of costs involved. But just things like that happen. Again, it completely depends on like the kind of Holi you play and you know, the type of people that, you know, come to your place to play with you. But for the most part, like, powder color 100% comes off with Ubtan. And it's also very good for your skin. So any kind of this harsh chemical or whatever, right? Like if you do the Ubtan treatment afterwards, it also kind of takes care of that. Like, and as I said early on, you have to be careful and put oil before you go out. And that way it will stain on your skin less if you have oil on your skin. Yeah, so for the most part, it comes out. Rekha: This is insider information.Neha: Absolutely. Shalini: So what a rollicking time we've had, you know, but I think now, I think you should speak about your foundation, Nehaji. What prompted you to start the foundation? What do you do? What are your projects, please? Neha: Yeah, absolutely. You know, that's a Shaktitva Foundation is a labor of love. It started around 2018, had to slow it down a couple for the last couple of years because of COVID and, you know, bereavement and family. But essentially, the original idea behind it, it's a decolonial, indigenous, feminist organization. And what I mean by that and this decoloniality and indigeneity approach from a Hindu perspective. So what essentially that means is this actually started around the same time when Shalini Ji you and I met for the first time. This was like the aftermath of Sabarimala. And, you know, we, I'm sure like all three of us were part of it in some way or the other. But one thing that became very obvious in the aftermath or during the Sabarimala protest for all of us Hindu women was that somehow our voice was being erased, right? This entire war was being fought in our name, right? Suddenly it was a Hindus versus women, you know, and the Hindu women were the least heard of all people. If you remember, like we were not allowed on TV debate, we were not, our opinions were considered, you know, fringe by some exactly some miracle, like, you know, majority of women were suddenly fringe. Anybody who basically did not agree with the five feminists of Delhi was fringe, right? So that that erasure is what led to the frustration that eventually led to the inspiration from my calling this Shaktitva Foundation. So the idea was that, you know, our voices need to have a place and not just the voice of a Hindu woman in India, but also this, the immigrant Hindu woman in growing up in America, right, or living in America. And the same thing that you know, because what happens is if we don't speak up, somebody else takes the mic and starts speaking for us, right? Whether we are the subaltern and whether we are an unrepresented group, if people don't speak up for their own groups, their names are misused and, you know, activists kind of take up that mantle of speaking on behalf of us, even if that is not the majority opinion, or even they forget the majority opinion, even if it is not even a minority opinion, then this will happen. And so we wanted to kind of set up a space where we can bring forth the lived experiences of a Hindu woman from the point of view of what we just did, right? Like we were talking about Holi from the lived experience of a person who has participated in it. And not just that, it's not just isolated to my personal experience, but also I try to kind of dive into the, when we do the research. If you see, a lot of people actually write for us, the articles and the work that we do focuses on bringing forth the original, authentic, indigenous meaning behind the things. And the reason is India and by extension, the South Asian activism circles is full of people who almost are kind of like the people who have been left behind by the colonialists, right? It's almost that they wanted to be taken with them, you know, ‘why did you leave us behind' sort of frustration that you see in these activists. And so they look at every time they sort of create this, you know, unnecessary rift in the society, it's because they're looking at things from a colonial lens, whether it is they're getting angry at Sabarimala tradition or it's not a concern for women that led to the creation of that controversy, right? It was that, you know, it is a colonial view. We must so that the colonial white man saviourism has appointed these brown saviours. And so they're now going to save Hinduism from Hindus, essentially. That's what's happening. So they're taking up for that, that colonial mantle of reform, and they're imposing all of these ideas on us in order to get some name and fame and they become those these heroes of who saved the women from oppressive Hinduism and so on. So whether it's the Sabarimala question, whether it is the Jallikattu again, no concern for actual animals or anything like that, whether it's the elephant controversy or whether it's in North India, the Kavadia controversy. Now they'll say these are rowdy men. Kavadiya men in Kavadia is the same when they become rowdy. 10 minutes later when farm laws happened, the same men who were actually doing Kavadia minutes before these are the oppressed category of farmers.So there is no rhyme or reason to it. So exactly that the point was that, you know, we wanted to create a space where Hindu women could find their voice and essentially take up that narrative and clear it up from their side. So we do a whole host of things. There's one is very important aspect is research driven articles like this one on Holi. I've done another one on Rakshabandhan and there's many more that are coming, not just on festivals, we also do on general issues and so on. And there is the other aspect of on-the-ground activism where we sort of try to help groups. So for example, we did a workshop with Bhutanese Hindu refugees who are living in America, especially the kids. And we did a workshop there about Dharma and specifically with the girls, about menstruation because menstruation is - like the menstrual restrictions are very strictly followed in Nepali and Bhutanese communities. And that becomes a very important propaganda point for missionaries to try to convert these kids. So we wanted to present the honest truth of why these rituals exist, like why are these menstrual restrictions are at all present in the culture and what are the significance, not prescribing them or, you know, or denying them, just presenting the truth of it. After that, it's up to you. Like as is always the case in Dharma. And similarly, we also did a project for to focus on the domestic violence survivors, Indian origin domestic violence survivors in America.That so we're trying to sort of create a space where we can dispel the fake issues and focus on the real issues and essentially, you know, move forward with that mindset.Shalini: So is this an initiative only driven only by you or is are you a team of a few people?Neha: No, we are a team of we're a team of a few people. We have few directors and after that, there is an advisory board. So the details can be found that also volunteers that work at different levels. Some of them are, for example, interested in conducting those workshops that I spoke about in their areas for a specific group. So we sort of arm them with the content and we help them and train those volunteers for those spaces. There's also like several other projects that are in the works just COVID kind of, you know, through a wrench and all of them. But but we're trying to sort of bring it up again. Hopefully this year, you should see a lot more action.Shalini: Sure. This sounds very empowering and well, such a misused word, but for lack of a better word, empowering our own women, you know, Neha: So we'll actually, I'll actually end with the quote. somehow it dawned on me while I was sitting in Sadhana. You know, I said, Hindu women are embodiments of Shakti and you do not empower Shakti, you bow before it. So that's why the name is Shaktitva, which is the essence of being Shakti. Now, this is not to be construed with this modern new agey idea of, you know, I am princess, I am a goddess type, you know, the wrong notions. No, we are talking about like a very sacred channeling of the divine energy that can happen when you are you know, when you are really devoted to your gods and your faith and to your culture and the indigeneity of it all. Like it's not, these terms almost seem to have become like negative terms, honestly, in the western space. But for, you know, as an indigenous person, it's all the same. It's a spectrum. These words are not disconnected at all. Rekha: Nehaji, I'm looking at your website. And there is a scheme, there is something called the Gayatri grants. Is that still operational? Is that something that can be used to encourage young people to write for you?Neha: Oh, absolutely. Yes. So Gayatri grants are not just even for writing. Even if there was a proposal that like that somebody wants to take up like a more elaborate research project towards anything, you know, towards something that brings together that aligns with the mission of Shaktitva. We are more than happy to sort of sponsor that activity because research itself, you know, is expensive. And, you know, so we want to encourage through this grant system, we want to encourage people to apply for, you know, proposals and come up with ideas because, as I said, like it's very difficult for one person to or a few people to cover the breadth of this issue. So if there is even if there's something very simple as you notice that there is a tradition that is unexplored, and it aligns with our mission, and you want to research it, you know, please submit a grant to us, grant proposal to us, the template is provided on the website. So you just have to fill that template up and send us a proposal and we'll evaluate it. And hopefully, like we can come up with a collaboration.Rekha: Can you tell us the name of the website for all the listeners? We will also be providing links to the website on our transcript. But can you just mention the name please?Neha: Yeah, it's Shaktitva.org. S-H-A-K-T-I, Shakti. And then, Shaktitva.org.Shalini: Great. Yeah, so I think we've had a one hell of a ride with you, Nehaji. It's been absolutely exhilarating, I would say. And I think this episode will not stay at 35, 40 minutes, but that's okay. But I think even our listeners will find it extremely engaging and beautiful too. So I think I'm absolutely floored by your quote. I would like you to end once more with the quote that you just mentioned and then we'll call it wraps. Neha: Absolutely. So the way we mentioned it is that Hindu women are embodiments of Shakti. You do not empower Shakti, you bow before it.Shalini: And with that, I think we come to the end of this edition of our podcast, and we will connect with our listeners in a fortnight's time. Thank you. Thank you, Nehaji. Thank you very much for spending so much time with us and giving us one grand experience of Holi. Thank you so much and thank you, Rekha, and we will meet with our listeners soon. Namaste. Get full access to Hindu Parenting at hinduparenting.substack.com/subscribe

In this episode, feminist historian and social critic Dr. Jayakumari Devika speaks with us  about the Channar rebellion in the 19th century, women's writing, and changing gender relations in Kerala.‘In Perspective' is The Swaddle's podcast series where academics reveal little-known facts about Indian history, society and culture. Notes: 00:00:56:06- What led to Malayali women gaining access to public life in the late 19th and early 20th century in Kerala? What effect did this have on women's liberation? 00:17:20:11- In what ways was the work of women writing in 20th century Kerala oppositional? And how was it received in literary circles at the time, and by the general public?00:29:53:10- Where did Nadar women's impetus to resist and fight for their right to wear an upper garment come from? What was the significance of it? 00:51:56:05- The targets of family planning in Kerala have invariably been women. Did a lot of the women understand what was happening? Did they resist this?00:57:15:13- What impact did liberalization and the opening up of the global labor market have on gender relations and the nature of the nuclear family in Kerala? 01:07:33:23- Can you contextualize the opposition from neo-savarna and sangh-parivar organizations and campaigns after the 2018 verdict on women's entry in the Sabarimala temple? How does discourse from campaigns like the ‘Ready to Wait' campaign complicate the idea of women's agency? 01:13:36:00- Did we anticipate the kind of public discourse that arose around the issue of women's entry to the Sabarimala temple in 2018?  Have there been precedents to this?

A version of this essay has been published by firstpost.com at https://www.firstpost.com/opinion/shadow-warrior-sarpam-thullal-naga-dance-of-kerala-12175812.htmlKerala has a long tradition of Naga (sarpa, serpent) worship, as has also been the case in some parts of the Northeast. There are sarpa kavu or untouched patches of virgin forest, where serpent deities reside. There are large temples, for example Mannarsala, where childless couples make offerings to gain the boon of a baby: Nagas are believed to grant fertility. The Theyyams of Malabar, as well as the bhoota kola of neighboring Tulunadu, celebrate the autochthonic deities of the region. As in the superb film Kantara and to a lesser extent in the film Malikappuram about a girl-child who is an ardent devotee of Swami Ayyappan of Sabarimala, the deities of the land are a powerful presence in the daily lives of the faithful.In Kantara the traditions are presented with neither explanation nor apology: they just are. In Malaikappuram, which is a very good film as well, there is a bit of a tendency to ‘explain' away mystical and spiritual experiences in ‘modern, scientific' terms (which Kantara wisely refrains from, and that is a major part of its charm). There are traditions where the deities physically inhabit the faithful who have been chosen and undergone the required purification rituals, and the faithful have experiences that are not necessarily amenable to rational, scientific explanation: which probably just means that science hasn't caught up with tradition. The oracle-like velichapads of Kerala, the oracular vestal virgins of ancient Greece, and the spirit dancers of the bhoota kola are examples.So are the Nagaraja, Naga Yakshi, Sarpa Yakshi, Mani Nagam, Kari Nagam, Kuzhi Nagam and Kanyavu of the sarpam thullal that I attended at the family temple of some relatives in Alappuzha district in Kerala. They are chosen from among the matrilineal descendants of the family. Apart from the Nagaraja who is a male, the others are all female, and the Kanyavu is a pre-pubescent girl-child. In passing, matriliny/Devi worship and Naga worship appear to go hand in hand.  I had seen videos of and listened to the hypnotic music of the sarpam thullal before: it is easy to imagine being induced into a trance while listening to it. But this was the first time I was fortunate enough to see it.The ‘penitents' stay in the temple for a week or so. (I am reluctant to use that term because they are not sinners, but rather the chosen few who are fortunate enough to experience the rituals first hand. But that seems to be the closest term in English. I think I'll instead use the neutral term ‘Naga dancers' for them.) They undergo purification rites (kappu kettu), perform ritual vrtam, and are put on a special sattvic diet that excludes salt or spice. In addition, there are piniyal (literally minions), other family members who are not part of the thullal itself, but whose duty it is to protect the vulnerable Naga dancers who do enter into a trance-like state and are unaware of their surroundings as they sway to the music. The piniyal do not have to stay in the temple but do undergo the same vratam.This particular sarpam thullal is conducted once every three years, and it goes on for three days at the temple, which was cleaned up, the surroundings cleared of vegetation, and lit up with bright lights. There are several thullals a day: late morning and/or late afternoon and late night. I attended the second day's events, afternoon and night: it went on till two in the morning. The entire function is orchestrated by a Pulluva chief, a tribal man who has a traditionally strong connection with Naga deities. In most temples in Kerala, there is a subsidiary shrine for the Naga deities, and on auspicious days, especially the ayilyam (ashlesha) nakshatra which is associated with Nagas, a Pulluva singer will sing an invocation for you, playing his violin-like instrument that is the basis of the thullal music, which also includes a deft chenda drum orchestra and nadaswaram pipes.A major part of the thullal is the creation of the kalam or the drawing on which the naga dancers perform their dance, swaying to music. This is done in a custom-built pandal (covered temporary structure decorated with young coconut leaves). Using vegetable dyes, the Pulluva can quite amazingly create a beautiful and complex drawing in a couple of hours, with a Naga theme. Sadly, it is ephemeral, because the dancers will destroy it shortly thereafter. These photos are of a kalam in the shape of a serpent coiled around a black palm tree (karimpana), with various Naga dancers in the foreground, getting ready for the thullal. The dancers are brought to the kalam after an invocation ceremony and obeisance to the deities. They do a circumambulation of the kalam, and then they are given a bunch of tender florets of the arecanut tree, which they hold to their faces. Apparently the fragrance of the florets helps induce the trance state, and then they move to the kalam and start swaying rhythmically to the music, which waxes and wanes in a sinuous manner in a metaphor for a serpent's motion.As they move around, the dancers appear to become more and more detached from their normal, daily selves, and more and more involved in the trance state. Their movements become more uncontrolled, and their eyes and expressions take on an other-worldly hue. They are liable to hurt themselves by hitting the pillars of the pandal, or falling into the audience crowding around. So their piniyal form a protective cordon, linking arms, so that the dancers are safe.They are given tender coconuts to refresh them while they dance. Sometimes they seem to be searching for someone in the audience. They may choose a person, and summon them to give them a tender coconut, in what is considered a blessing. Indeed, the dancers look mesmerized. I was told by a niece that a few years ago, she was watching the dance, and suddenly she felt the uncontrollable urge to join the dancers herself, and so she did. After dancing the kalam to dust, the dancers then run to the sarpa kavu (sacred grove) and the nearby temple pond, where they immerse themselves, again with the piniyal joining them to ensure they don't harm themselves. I watched the young Nagaraja run with astonishing speed to the kavu, so fast that his piniyal couldn't keep up. He crashed into a tree and I was afraid he might have suffered a concussion. But doctors examined him, and he was fine. In our case, the Naga dancers included several young women, a middle-aged woman who had come all the way from the US, the teenaged Nagaraja, and the 9 year-old girl Kanyavu. I noticed that the Kanyavu was reluctant to participate. She stood aside, looking confused. But on the final day, she suddenly danced with full enthusiasm. After their visits to the kavu and the pond, the Nagas, now soaking wet, come back to the kalam pandal, and after some further ceremonies, that thullal is over, and they go back to their temporary accommodation in the temple. There are two or three thullals a day, and it obviously physically taxing for the Nagas, as well as for piniyal. The most elaborate one is at night and it goes on well into the early morning, say 2am. I was present for the afternoon and night thullal on the second day. I should have been there for the third and concluding day, but I had to leave. So I was watching the live broadcast of the event around 11pm, and then there was a commotion among the ladies sitting on mats on the ground next to the kalam. It was because a small serpent was sinuously wending its way towards the main temple steps. This was astonishing. It was a finger-sized serpent about 3 feet in length, with a silvery spotted body. It went as far as the steps to the main Mahadeva shrine, in front of which the kalam pandal was, and remained there for a while. Then it slithered up the back of a plastic chair, coiled itself around it, and remained there for the rest of the thullal until the final ceremony.Someone brought the serpent a little nurum palum on a banana leaf: this is the mixture of milk, turmeric etc that is the main offering at Naga ceremonies. The serpent appeared to take a few sips of this. Let us remember that all this happened in a place where the entire vegetation had been removed using a JCB backhoe just a week or two prior. There were a couple of hundred people sitting or milling around the pandal. There was deafening amplified music from the chenda orchestra. None of this seemed to deter the serpent. After the final ceremony where the Naga dancers return to their normal lives (kapp-azhippu), it disappeared below the roots of one of the nandyar-vattam medicinal plants around the temple, without any fuss.I had heard from a relative that a few years prior, three serpents had come to this thullal. To be honest, I was skeptical: why would serpents, which try to avoid humans, come to such a loud ceremony? Then I saw a video of a recent thullal in another temple in Alappuzha, where again a finger-width (but this time golden-colored) serpent had arrived, stayed, and then disappeared.But the fact that I was seeing this in real time (albeit on video feed) was staggering. None of my rational, scientific beliefs could explain what had happened: why on earth did this serpent appear and seem to be unperturbed, and even enjoy the ceremony? I have no answer. The only thing I can think of is Kantara's premise: there are spirits and demi-gods all around us, if only we learn to look. There is the belief that the real Nagas (such as the slender silver- and gold-colored ones I saw in videos) are not the same as the usual snakes one encounters. These are special, with semi-divine attributes, and they are the ones that accept our offerings.One of my favorite writers, the brilliant Malayalam fabulist O V Vijayan, once explained to me his short story The Little Ones, about benign ancestral spirits that appeared as points of light in the sky when the family was going through troubles. It's the same idea: unseen, unknown and often benign (presumably there are malign ones too) powers that we are only dimly aware of. I had wanted for years to see a sarpam thullal, because of the hypnotic quality of its music that I had heard, and because of the connection between matriliny, Devi worship and Naga worship that were all hallmarks of Hindu Kerala society for long. It is my theory that these, along with ample monsoon rains and the rice and spice trade, had enabled Kerala, especially Travancore, to be a fairly prosperous tropical paradise. Now that I have seen the thullal, I am even more in awe of my ancestors, who knew a thing or two: they had some of the most accurate calendars in the world; in the 14th century CE, Kerala mathematician Madhava of Sangamagrama discovered rapidly converging infinite series for trigonometric functions (the basis of calculus and of navigation across the open ocean). As early as the 2nd century BCE, Pliny the Younger was complaining that Roman coffers were being emptied for the spices of Kerala, especially pepper. We must try to understand why our long-standing traditions have survived. Lindy, as Nassim Taleb would say: they survived because they have meaning, and value.1950 words, 13 Feb 2023 This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit rajeevsrinivasan.substack.com

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This essay was published by firstpost.com.The Hero's Journey is a common metaphor used by storytellers from the Ramayana to the Iliad, and in innumerable modern works. You have the hero rising, then facing odds that are so overwhelming that he is on the verge of failure, but he often wins in the end, and is transformed or redeemed in the process. And indeed, for each of us, our own lives are heroes' journeys, as the mythologist Joseph Campbell elucidated in a series of excellent documentaries.Both the recent films Kantara and Rocketry: The Nambi Effect, in my opinion, fall into this broad categorization; but what's notable and different is that they are about very Hindu heroes, quite a departure from the standard Indian film (especially of the Urduwood variety) where overt Hindus are usually depicted with contempt or disgust. The two films are very different from each other, of course, but it is telling that they both resonate with audiences, in a visible departure from the conventional wisdom that holds that neither a Hindu nor a nationalist should be depicted with sympathy, and especially not a Hindu nationalist. There is another Hindu meme: the local and the national are not meaningfully distinct, just as the Atman and Brahman are not. Kantara, set in the Tulu-land of Dakshina Kannada district, Karnataka, is instantly understandable to Hindus anywhere; and Rocketry, the story of a patriot of Tamil origin living Thiruvananthapuram, who is attacked and to whom tejovadham is done by mysterious, malign forces, is understandable to any Hindu, we whose face hostility in India and elsewhere.When I saw Kantara, I was surprised by how normal the story was to me: of course, obviously, there are spirits, or demi-gods/daivas all around. This is something that I grew up with. I remember as a small boy being taken by my grandfather to the bharani festival of the village Devi temple in central Travancore: there were wondrous, magical things there then. Much later, I watched theyyams in Malabar, which is adjacent to Tulunadu, and the wonderful costumes are almost identical to those in the Bhoota kola depicted in the film; some of most impressive were thee-pothi (the fire-goddess) and the gulikan (the fierce deity identical to guliga in the film), especially as they performed at dusk. The belief in possession by spirits, as in the hypnotic sarpam-thullals (serpent-dances) of Travancore or of velichapads (oracles) in many parts of Kerala, holds no surprises for me. It is easy for a practicing Hindu to believe in them. It is not hard to imagine benign (and malign) spirits all around, for example as in O V Vijayan's story The Little Ones, luminous ancestral spirits that help in times of trouble. I had a personal experience of the Divine, on my first trip to Sabarimala when I was a teenager. It was an incredible religious experience: for a moment, a glimpse of something extraordinary, a powerful vision of the Infinity of Grace. My friend, a doctor, tells me of medical miracles that can only be attributed to the power of prayer and Divine Grace.In Kantara, the protagonist Siva consistently and carefully avoids the bhoota kola, as he was traumatized by the unexplained disappearance of his father, the oracular dancer of the village. He tries to lead the life of a carefree youth, drinking, hunting wild boar and getting into fights; but the panjurli daiva calls to him in his dreams. Spoiler alert: his hero's journey culminates in a spectacular finale.In Rocketry, the fictionalized story of the real-life Nambi Narayanan, the hero's journey is even more evident. After early and brilliant success as a rocket engineer, his life and career were ruined in what was apparently a sordid combination of commercial sabotage by a three-letter acronym spy agency, and a power struggle among Congress politicians in Kerala, with some corrupt policemen in the mix.Even if it is a little exaggerated for rhetorical purposes, Nambi Narayanan's efforts to convince Rolls-Royce's head (a Scot), the French Ariane rocket program, and the Soviet cryogenic labs to transfer technology and know-how to ISRO are amazing stories that I too had not heard, even though I live in Thiruvananthapuram, where Narayanan and Abdul Kalam did their work on solid and liquid-propelled rockets. Despite Narayanan's value to the Indian space program, and the evident holes in the 1994 Maldivian spy story (see my Rediff column Who killed India's cryogenic engine?) it took a court saga of 24 years to clear his name, and to get the redemption he deserved (a Padma Bhushan in 2019). In the meantime, India's cryogenic engine was delayed by 19 years. What is remarkable in the film -- and it is disturbing that this should even have to be highlighted -- is that Narayanan is shown as an unapologetic Hindu. There is nothing whatsoever that prevents an observant and pious Hindu from also being an engineer and scientist: no dogma. But the prevailing filmi wisdom, which has become “truth by repeated assertion” is that Hindu rituals are superstition, but Abrahamic superstition is somehow ‘scientific'. The very fact that such films are being made, and are becoming blockbusters, shows that the narrative is shifting (the so-called Overton window). There is pushback, though: a little-known band in Kerala is suing Kantara over the song ‘Varaha-roopam', which has Sanskrit lyrics and traditional tribal music. Because traditional knowledge cannot be copyrighted, it is likely that their intellectual property claim is not sustainable.There were also people grumbling that Narayanan was lionized and that he wasn't as key to ISRO's success as the film makes him out to be. Maybe, but even if it was 50% exaggerated, he is still an amazing engineer and manager, and in any case it was unconscionable by any measure to torture him for 50 days, defame him, and destroy his career. Those who ordered the hit have never been named. My heroes have long been those among us who fight for Dharma and righteousness: Professor Eachara Warrier, Major Shaitan Singh. I am happy to now add Dr Nambi Narayanan to that list, and perhaps Siva, who brings to life the forest deities.1020 words, 3 Nov 2022 This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit rajeevsrinivasan.substack.com

Happy Independence Day!- Pranay Kotasthane and RSJThis newsletter can often seem pessimistic about India. That isn’t true, though. Every year, on Independence Day, we remind ourselves and our readers why we write this newsletter. This is how we ended the Independence Day edition of 2020:“What we have achieved so far is precious. That’s worth reminding ourselves today. We will go back to writing future editions lamenting our state of affairs.We will do so because we know it’s worth it.”  This year we thought it would be fun (?) to run through every year since 1947 and ask ourselves what happened in the year that had long-term repercussions for our nation. This kind of thing runs a serious risk. It can get tedious and all too familiar. Most of us know the landmark events of recent history and what they meant for the nation. Maybe. Maybe not. We’ve given an honest try (of over 8000 words) to see if there’s a different way of looking at these familiar events and their impact on us. Here we go.1947 - 1960: Sense Of A Beginning 1947Perhaps the most significant “What, if?” question for independent India surfaced on 17th August 1947 when the Radcliffe Line was announced. The partition of the Indian subcontinent has cast a long shadow. What if it had never happened? What if Nehru-Jinnah-Gandhi were able to strike a modus vivendi within a one-federation framework? These questions surface every year around independence.The indelible human tragedy of the partition aside, would an Akhand Bharat have served its citizens better? We don’t think so. We agree with Ambedkar’s assessment of this question. In Pakistan or the Partition of India, he approaches the question with detachment and realism, concluding that the forces of “communal malaise” had progressed to such an extent that resisting a political division would have led to a civil war, making everyone worse off. The partition must have been handled better without the accompanying humanitarian disaster. But on the whole, the partition was inevitable by 1947.“That the Muslim case for Pakistan is founded on sentiment is far from being a matter of weakness; it is really its strong point. It does not need deep understanding of politics to know that the workability of a constitution is not a matter of theory. It is a matter of sentiment. A constitution, like clothes, must suit as well as please. If a constitution does not please, then however perfect it may be, it will not work. To have a constitution which runs counter to the strong sentiments of a determined section is to court disaster if not to invite rebellion.” [Read the entire book here]1948What if Mahatma Gandhi wasn’t killed that year? How would the course of our history change? Gandhi spoke like an idealist and worked like a realist. He was possibly the most aware of the gap between the lofty ideals of our constitution and the reality of the Indian minds then. He knew the adoption of the constitution was only half the work done. He’d likely have devoted the rest of his life to building a liberal India at the grassroots level. His death pushed a particular stream of right-wing Hindu consciousness underground. We still carry the burden of that unfinished work.1949The Constituent Assembly met for the first time in December 1946. By November 26th 1949, this assembly adopted a constitution for India. Even a half-constructed flyover in Koramangala has taken us five years. For more context, Pakistan’s Constituent Assembly began work on 10th August 1947, and their first constitution came into force in March 1956, only to be abrogated two years later. India’s founding fathers and mothers were acutely aware that they were elite, unelected, and unrepresentative of the median Indian. They dared to imagine a new nation-state while grappling with that period's harsh economic, social, and political realities. Their work should inspire us to strengthen, improve, and rebuild—but never to give up on—the Republic of India.For more, check out the miracle that is India’s Constitution in our Republic Day 2021 special edition.1950We have written about our Constitution a number of times. It is an inspiring and audacious document in its ambition to shape a modern nation. It has its flaws. Some consider it too liberal; others think it makes the State overbearing. Some find it too long; others feel it comes up short. This may all be true. However, there is no doubt our constitution has strengthened our democracy, protected the weak and continues to act as a tool for social change. It is our North Star. And a damn good one at that. 1951Few post-independence institutions have stood the test of time as the Finance Commission (FC), first established in 1951. In federal systems, horizontal and vertical imbalances in revenue generation and expenditure functions are commonplace. Closing the gap requires an impartial institution that is well-regarded by various levels of government and the people. The Finance Commission is that institution.It’s not as if it didn’t face any challenges. As a constitutional body established under article 280 of the Constitution, it was sidelined by an extra-constitutional and powerful Planning Commission until 2014. But we have had 15 FCs in total, and each key tax revenue-sharing recommendation has become government policy.1952Our Constitution adopted a universal adult franchise as the basis for elections. Every citizen was to be part of the democratic project. There was to be no bar on age, sex, caste or education. And this was to be done in one of the most unequal societies in the world. The ambition was breathtaking. To put this in context, women were allowed to vote in Switzerland only in 1971. Not only did we aim for this, but we also moved heaven and earth to achieve it in 1952. In his book India After Gandhi, Ram Guha describes the efforts of the government officials led by the first Election Commissioner, Sukumar Sen, to reach the last man or woman for their ballot. The elites may lament vote bank politics or cash for votes scams and question the wisdom of universal franchise. But we shouldn’t have had it any other way. And, for the record, our people have voted with remarkable sophistication in our short independent history. 1953 For a new nation-state, the Republic of India punched above its weight in bringing hostilities on the Korean peninsula to an end. Not only did the Indian government’s work shape the Armistice Agreement, but it also chaired a Neutral Nations Repatriation Commission (NNRC) that was set up to decide the future of nearly 20,000 prisoners of war from both sides. This experience during the Cold War strengthened India’s advocacy of the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM).  1954Article 25 guaranteed the freedom of conscience and the freedom to profess, practice, and propagate religion to all citizens. But how does one define a religious practice? And can a practice under the garb of religion breach the boundary of individual rights or public morality? This is a familiar conflict zone in secular States and would inevitably show up in India because everything in India can be construed as a religious practice. Like Ambedkar said during the constituent assembly debates:“The religious conceptions in this country are so vast that they cover every aspect of life from birth to death…there is nothing extraordinary in saying that we ought to strive hereafter to limit the definition of religion in such a manner that we shall not extend it beyond beliefs and such rituals as may be connected with ceremonials which are essentially religious..."In 1954, the Supreme Court gave a landmark judgment on what constitutes a religious practice in what’s known as the Shirur Math case. It held that the term religion would cover all practices integral to that religion. Further, the Court will determine what practice will be deemed essential with reference to doctrines within that religion itself.This test of ‘essentiality’ in religion has kept the public, the legislature and the courts busy since (entry of women in Sabarimala, headscarf in Islam, to name two). The outcome has bent towards individual liberty in most contexts, but the ambiguity in the definition of essential means it could go the other way too.1955Another wild "What, if” moment that we like to recall relates to Milton Friedman’s visit to the Indian finance ministry in 1955. What shape would India’s economy have taken had his seminal document “A Memorandum to the Government of India 1955” been heeded?In this note, Friedman gets to the root of India’s macroeconomic problems—an overburdened investment policy, restrictive policies towards the private sector, erratic monetary policy, and a counterproductive exchange control regime. Being bullish about India’s prospects was courageous when most observers wrote epitaphs about the grand Indian experiment. But Friedman was hopeful and critical both.The Indian government, for its part, was humble enough to seek the advice of foreigners from opposing schools of thought. At the same time, it was too enamoured by the Soviet command and control model. In fact, many items from Friedman’s note can be repurposed as economic reforms even today.Here’re our points from Friedman’s note.1956The idea of One Nation, One ‘X’ (language, election, song, tax, choose any other) is both powerful and seductive. It is not new, however. Back in the 50s, there was a view that we must not strengthen any identity that divides us. So when the question of reorganisation of the colonial provinces into new states came up, an argument was made that it must be done on factors other than language. Nehru, ever the modernist, thought the creation of language-based states would lead us down the path of ethnic strife. The example of nation-states in Europe built on language in the 19th century and the two devastating world wars thereafter were too recent then. So, he demurred.Agitation, hunger strikes and deaths followed before we chose language as the primary basis for reorganising the states. It was perhaps the best decision taken by us in the 50s. As the years since have shown, only a polity assured of its heritage and identity will voluntarily accept diversity. The melding of our diversity into a single identity cannot be a top-down imposition. We should never forget this.1957India’s economic strategy of state-led industrialisation through deficit financing in pursuit of import substitution took off with the Second Five-Year Plan. Heavy industries needed imported machinery, inflating India’s import bill. Since the exchange rate was pegged to the British pound, it meant that Indian exports became pricier. This imbalance between rising imports and flagging exports was financed by running down the foreign exchange reserves. By 1957, India witnessed its first foreign exchange crisis. This event had a significant effect on India’s economy. Instead of devaluing the rupee, the government opted for foreign exchange budgeting - every investment in a project needed government approval for the foreign exchange required to buy foreign inputs. The immediate crisis in 1957 led to controls that worsened India’s economic prospects over the next 35 years.1958The government nationalised all insurance companies a couple of years earlier. India hadn’t gotten into a socialist hell yet, so this was a bit of a surprise. The proximate cause was a fraud that few private life insurers had committed by misusing the policyholders’ funds to help their industrialist friends. A run-of-the-mill white-collar crime that should have been dealt with by the criminal justice system. But the government viewed it as a market failure and moved to nationalise the entire industry. It would take another 45 years for private players to come back to insurance. Insurance penetration in India meanwhile remained among the lowest in the world.  Also, in 1958, Feroze Gandhi took to the floor of Lok Sabha to expose how LIC, the state insurer, had diverted its funds to help Haridas Mundhra, a Calcutta-based businessman. The same crime that private insurers had done.The government would repeat this pattern of getting involved where there was no market failure. The outcomes would inevitably turn out to be worse. Seven decades later, we remain instinctively socialist and wary of capital. Our first reaction to something as trifling as a surge price by Ola or a service charge levied by restaurants is to ask the State to interfere.1959“The longest guest of the Indian government”, the 14th Dalai Lama pre-empted the Chinese government’s plans for his arrest and escaped to India. Not only did India provide asylum, but it also became home to more than a hundred thousand Tibetans. Because of the bold move by the Indian government in 1959, the Central Tibetan Administration continues its struggle as a Nation and a State in search of regaining control over their Country to this day. This event also changed India-China relations for the decades to come.1960Search as hard as we might; we hardly got anything worth discussing for this year. Maybe we were all sitting smugly waiting for an avalanche of crisis to come our way. Steel plants, dams and other heavy industries were being opened. The budget outlay for agriculture was reduced. We were talking big on the international stage about peace and non-alignment. But if you had looked closer, things were turning pear-shaped. The many dreams of our independence were turning sour.The 60s: Souring Of The Dream1961The Indian Army marched into Goa in December 1961. The 450-year Portuguese colonial rule ended, and the last colonial vestige in India was eliminated. It took this long because Portugal’s dictator Antonio Salazar stuck to his guns on controlling Portuguese colonies in the subcontinent, unlike the British and the French. Portugal’s membership in NATO further made it difficult for the Indian government to repeat the operations in Hyderabad and Junagadh. Nevertheless, that moment eventually arrived in 1961. This was also the year when India’s first indigenous aircraft, the HAL HF-24 Marut, took its first flight. Made in Bengaluru by German designer Kurt Tank, the aircraft was one of the first fighter jets made outside the developed world. The aircraft served well in the war that came a decade later. It never lived up to its promises, but it became a matter of immense pride and confidence for a young nation-state.1962Among the lowest points in the history of independent India. We’ve written about our relationship with China many times in the past editions. The 1962 war left a deep impact on our psyche. We didn’t recover for the rest of the decade. The only good thing out of it was the tempering of idealism in our approach to international relations. That we take a more realist stance these days owes its origins to the ‘betrayal’ of 1962.1963ISRO launched the first sounding rocket in November 1963. Over the years, this modest beginning blossomed into a programme with multiple launch vehicles. The satellite programmes also took off a few years later, making India a mighty player in the space sector. 1964If you told anyone alive in 1964 that less than 60 years later, Nehru would be blamed for all that was wrong with India by a substantial segment of its population, they would have laughed you out of the room. But here we are in 2022, and there’s never a day that passes without a WhatsApp forward that talks about Nehru’s faults. It seems inevitable that by the time we celebrate the centenary of our independence, he would be a borderline reviled figure in our history. But that would be an aberration. In the long arc of history, he will find his due as a flawed idealist who laid the foundation of modern India. 1964 was the end of an era.1965As the day when Hindi would become the sole official language of the Indian Union approached, the anti-Hindi agitation in the Madras presidency morphed into riots. Many people died in the protests, and it led to the current equilibrium on language policy. The “one State, one language” project moved to the back burner, even as Hindi became an important link language across the country. The lesson was the same as in the case of the 1956 states reorganisation: melding our diversity into a single identity cannot be a top-down imposition.1966The two wars in the decade's first half, the inefficient allocation of capital driven by the second and third five-year plans, and the consecutive monsoon failure meant India was on the brink in 1966. The overnight devaluation of the Rupee by over 50 per cent, the timely help with food grains from the US and some providence pulled us back from it. The green revolution followed, and we have remained self-sufficient in food since.The experience of being on the brink taught us nothing. We still believe in the Pigouvian theory of market failure, where government policies are expected to deliver optimality.  Strangely, the idea that we reform only in crisis has only strengthened. There cannot be worse ways to change oneself than under the shadow of a crisis. But we have made a virtue out of it.1967This was the year when the Green Revolution took baby steps, and the Ehlrichian prediction about India’s impending doom was put to rest. But it was also the year when the Indian government made a self-goal by adopting a policy called items reserved for manufacture exclusively by the small-scale sector. By reserving whole product lines for manufacturing by small industries, this policy kept Indian firms small and uncompetitive. And like all bad ideas, it had a long life. The last 20 items on this list were removed only in April 2015. We wrote about this policy here. 1968In the past 75 years, we have reserved some of our worst public policies for the education sector. We have an inverted pyramid. A handful of tertiary educational institutions produce world-class graduates at the top. On the other end, we have a total failure to provide quality primary education to the masses. It is not because of a lack of intent. The National Education Policy (NEP) that first came up in 1968 is full of ideas, philosophy and a desire to take a long-term view about education in India. But it was unmoored from the economic or social reality of the nation. We often say here that we shouldn’t judge a policy based on its intentions. That there’s no such thing as a good policy but bad implementation because thinking about what can work is part of policy itself. NEP is Exhibit A in favour of this argument.1969 The nationalisation of 14 private-sector banks was a terrible assault on economic freedom under the garb of serving the public interest. The sudden announcement of a change in ownership of these banks was challenged in the courts, but the government managed to thwart it with an ordinance. Fifty years later, we still have low credit uptake even as governments continue to recapitalise loss-making banks with taxpayer money.1970The dominant economic thinking at the beginning of the 70s in India placed the State at the centre of everything. But that wasn’t how the world was moving. There was a serious re-examination of the relationship between the State and the market happening elsewhere. The eventual shift to a deregulated, small government economic model would happen by the decade's end. This shift mostly passed India by. But there were a few voices who questioned the state orthodoxy and, in some ways, sowed the intellectual seeds for liberalisation in future. In 1970, Jagdish Bhagwati and Padma Desai published their monograph, India: Planning for Industrialisation, which argued that our economic policies since independence had crippled us. It showed with data how central planning, import substitution, public sector-led industrial policy and license raj have failed. But it found no takers. In fact, we doubled down on these failed policies for the rest of the decade. It was a tragedy foretold. What if someone had gone against the consensus and paid attention to that paper? That dissent could perhaps have been the greatest service to the nation. It is useful to remember this today when any scepticism about government policies is met with scorn. Dissent is good. The feeblest of the voice might just be right.The 70s: Losing The Plot1971Kissinger visited China in July 1971 via Pakistan. Responding to the changing world order, India and the USSR signed an Indo–Soviet Treaty of Peace, Friendship and Cooperation in August of that year. India had become an ally of the USSR. Four months later, the India-Pakistan war pitted India and the USSR against Pakistan, China, and the US. The Indian strategic community came to internalise USSR as a super-reliable partner and the West as a supporter of India’s foes. It took another three decades, and the collapse of the USSR, for a change in this thinking. Even today, Russia finds massive support in the Indian strategic establishment. We had problematised this love for Russia here. 1972India won the 1972 war with Pakistan and liberated Bangladesh. India’s unilateral action stopped a humanitarian disaster. The victory was decisive, and the two parties met in Simla to agree on the way forward. This should have been a slam dunk for India in resolving festering issues on the international boundary, Kashmir and the role of the third parties. But international diplomacy is a two-level game, and Bhutto played that to his advantage. We explained this in edition 30. We paid a high price for giving away that win to Bhutto.1973The Kesavananda Bharti verdict of the Supreme Court rescued the Republic of India from a rampaging authoritarian. The basic structure doctrine found a nice balance to resolve the tension between constitutional immutability and legislative authority to amend the constitution. Bibhu Pani discussed this case in more detail here. 1974You are the State. Here are your crimes. You force import substitution, you regulate the currency, you misallocate capital, you let the public sector and a handful of licensed private players produce inferior quality products at a high cost, you raise the marginal tax rate at the highest level to 97 per cent, you run a large current account deficit, and you cannot control Rupee depreciation.Result?People find illegal ways to bring in foreign goods, currency and gold. And so was born the villain of every urban Bollywood film of the 70s. And a career option for a capitalist-minded kid like me. The Smuggler.But the State isn’t the criminal here. The smuggler is. And the State responded with a draconian law to beat all others. An act the knowledge of whose expanded form would serve kids well in those school quizzes of the 80s. COFEPOSA — The Conservation of Foreign Exchange and Prevention of Smuggling Act. A predatory state's defining feature is how it forces ordinary citizens to do unlawful activities. COFEPOSA was the mother of such laws. It has spawned many children. 1975This blank editorial by the Indian Express says it all. 1976We view our population as a core problem. The politicians, the public servants and the ordinary citizens share this view. We don’t want to acknowledge our governance deficit. Calling population a problem allows us to shirk the responsibility of running a functioning State. We have written about the flaw in thinking about the population as a problem on many occasions.How far could we go to control the population? Well, in 1976, during the peak of the Emergency, the State decided to sterilise male citizens against their wishes. This madness ended when the Emergency was lifted. But even today calls for population control keep coming back. 1977The first non-Congress union government was an important milestone for the Indian Republic. While Morarji Desai’s government did reverse the worst excesses of the Emergency rule, its economic policies were less successful. This period went on to witness a demonetisation in search of black money (2016 from the future says Hi!), and the same old counter-productive policies in search of self-reliance.1978Despite all available evidence that statist socialism was an abject failure, the Janata government that came to power decided to double down on it. One of the great ideas of the time was to force MNCs to reduce their stake in their Indian subsidiaries to below 40 per cent. A handful agreed, but the large corporations quit India. One of those who left was IBM in 1978. The many existing installations of IBM computers needed services and maintenance. In a delightful case of unintended consequences, this led to the nationalisation of IBM’s services division (later called CMC). Domestic companies started to serve this niche. Soon there were the likes of Infosys, Wipro and HCL building a business on this. CMC provided a good training ground for young engineers. And so, the Indian IT services industry got underway. It would change the lives of educated Indians forever.1979In a classic case of violating the Tinbergen rule, the Mandal Commission recommended that the reservation policy should be used to address relative deprivation. While the earlier reservations for oppressed castes stood on firm ground as a means for addressing unconscionable historical wrongs, the Mandal Commission stretched the logic too far. Its recommendation would eventually make reservation policy the go-to solution for any group that could flex its political muscles. We wrote about it here. 1980After ditching the Janata experiment and running out of ideas to keep Jan Sangh going, the BJP was formed. It wasn’t a momentous political occasion of any sort then. A party constitution that aimed for Gandhian socialism and offered vague promises of a uniform civil code and nationalism didn’t excite many. Everything else that would propel the party in later years was to be opportunistic add-ons to the ideology. The founding leaders, Advani and Vajpayee, would have been shocked if you told them what the party would be like, four decades later.The 80s: A Million Mutinies Now1981This year witnessed a gradual shift away from doctrinaire socialism in economic policymaking. “The Indira Gandhi government lifted restrictions on the expansion of production, permitted new private borrowing abroad, and continued the liberalisation of import controls,” wrote Walter Anderson. The government also “allowed” some price rises, leading to increased production of key input materials. The government also permitted foreign companies to compete in drilling rights in India. All in all, a year that witnessed changes for the better. 1982The great textile strike of Bombay in 1982 was inevitable. The trade unions had gotten so powerful that there was a competitive race to the bottom on who could be more militant. Datta Samant emerged intent on breaking the monopoly of RMMS on the city's workers. And he did this with ever spiralling demands from mill owners in a sector that was already bloated with overheads and facing competition from far eastern economies. There was no way to meet these demands. The owners locked the mills and left. Never to come back. The old, abandoned mills remained. The workers remained. Without jobs, without prospects and with kids who grew up angry and unemployed. The rise of Shiv Sena, political goondaism and a malevolent form of underworld followed. Bombay changed forever. It was all inevitable.1983The Nellie massacre in Assam and the Dhilwan bus massacre in Punjab represent the year 1983. Things seemed really dark back then. It seemed that the doomsayers would be proved right about India. Eventually, though, the Indian Republic prevailed. 1984Her Sikh bodyguards assassinated India Gandhi. The botched Punjab policy of the previous five years came a full circle with it. An unforgivable backlash against innocent Sikhs followed. A month later, deadly gas leaked out of a Union Carbide factory in Bhopal, killing and paralysing thousands. 1984 will rank among the worst years of our republic. There were two silver linings in retrospect. One, we would learn to manage secessionist movements better from the harrowing Punjab experience. Two, had Indira continued, would we have had 1991? Our guess is no.1985This was an eventful year in retrospect. Texas Instruments set up shop in Bangalore. It was to begin one of modern India’s true success stories on the world stage. This was also the year when the Anti-defection law transformed the relationship between the voter and her representative. Political parties became all-powerful, and people’s representatives were reduced to political party agents. We have written about this changing dynamic here. This was also the year when the then commerce minister, VP Singh, visited Malaysia. The visit was significant for India because it served as a reference point for Singh when he visited that country again in 1990, now as the Prime minister. Surprised by Malaysia’s transformation in five years, he asked his team to prepare a strategy paper for economic reforms. This culminated in the “M” document, which became a blueprint for reforms when the time for the idea eventually came in 1991.1986Who is a citizen of India?  This vexing question roiled Assam in the early 80s. The student union protests against the widespread immigration of Bangladeshis turned violent, and things had turned ugly by 1985. The Assam accord of 1985 sought to settle the state's outstanding issues,, including deporting those who arrived after 1971 and a promise to amend the Citizenship Act. The amended Citizenship Act of 1986 restricted the citizenship of India to those born before 1987 only if either of their parents were born in India. That meant children of couples who were illegal immigrants couldn’t be citizens of India simply by virtue of their birth in India. That was that, or so we thought.But once you’ve amended the definition of who can be a citizen of India, you have let the genie out. The events of 2019 will attest to that.1987Rajiv Gandhi’s ill-fated attempt to replicate Indira Gandhi’s success through military intervention in another country began in 1987. In contrast to the 1971 involvement, where Indian forces had the mass support of the local populace, the Indian Peacekeeping Force (IPKF) got itself embroiled in a bitter Sri Lankan civil war. Not only did this involvement end in a failure, it eventually led to Rajiv Gandhi’s brutal murder in a terrorist attack. The policy lesson internalised by the strategic community was that India must stay far away from developing and deploying forces overseas.1988Most government communication is propaganda in disguise. However, there are those rare occasions when government messaging transcends the ordinary. In 1988, we saw that rare bird during the peak era of a single government channel running on millions of black and white TV sets across India. A government ad that meant something to all of us and that would remain with us forever. Mile Sur Mera Tumhara got everything right - the song, the singers, the storyline and that ineffable thing called the idea of India. No jingoism, no chest beating about being the best country in the world and no soppy sentimentalism. Just a simple message - we might all sing our own tunes, but we are better together. This is a timeless truth. No nation in history has become better by muting the voice of a section of their own people. Mile Sur Mera Tumhara, Toh Sur Bane Hamara, indeed.  19891989 will be remembered as the year when the Indian government capitulated to the demands of Kashmiri terrorists in the Rubaiya Sayeed abduction case. It would spark off a series of kidnappings and act as a shot in the arm of radicals. 1990VP Singh dusted off the decade-long copy of the Mandal Commission report and decided to implement it. This wasn’t an ideological revolution. It was naked political opportunism. However, three decades later, the dual impact of economic reforms and social engineering has increased social mobility than ever before. Merit is still a matter of debate in India. But two generations of affirmative action in many of the progressive states have shown the fears of merit being compromised were overblown. The task is far from finished, but Mandal showed that sometimes you need a big bang to get things going, even if your intentions were flawed.1990 also saw the exodus of Kashmiri Pandits (KPs) from the valley. A tragedy that would bookend a decade of strife and violence in India. The only lesson one should draw from the sad plight of KPs is that the State and the people must protect minority rights. We’re not sure that’s what we have taken away from it. And that’s sad.The 90s: Correcting The Course1991With the benefit of hindsight, the 1991 economic reforms seem inevitable. But things could well have been different. In the minority government, powerful voices advocated in favour of debt restructuring instead of wholesale reforms. In the end, the narrative that these changes were merely a continuation—and not abandonment—of Nehru and Indira Gandhi’s vision for India carried the day. This political chicanery deserves some credit for transforming the life of a billion Indians. 1992Harshad Mehta scammed the stock markets. It wasn’t a huge scam. Nor did it hurt the ordinary Indians. Fewer than 1% invested in markets back then. Yet, the scam did something important. It set in motion a series of reforms that made our capital markets stronger and safer for ordinary investors. Notably, over the years, Mehta came to be seen as some kind of robber baron figure. Capitalism needed an anti-hero to catch the imagination of people. Someone who could reprise in the 90s the Bachchan-esque angry young man roles of the 70s. Mehta might not have been that figure exactly, but he helped a generation transition to the idea that greed could indeed be good.Also, Babri Masjid was brought down by a mob of kar sevaks in 1992. It will remain a watershed moment in our history. The Supreme Court judgement of 2019 might be the final judicial word on it. But we will carry the scars for a long time.1993The tremors of the demolition of the Babri Masjid were felt in 1993. Twelve bombs went off in Bombay on one fateful day. The involvement of the city’s mafia groups was established. The tragic event finally led to the government rescuing the city from the underworld. Not to forget, the Bombay underworld directly resulted from government policies such as prohibition and gold controls. 1994One of the great acts of perversion in our democracy was the blatant abuse of Section 356 of the constitution that allowed the union to dismiss a state government at the slightest pretext. Indira Gandhi turned this into an art form. S. R. Bommai, whose government in Karnataka was dismissed in this manner in 1988, took his case up to the Supreme Court. In 1994, the court delivered a verdict that laid out the guidelines to prevent the abuse of Section 356. It is one of the landmark judgments of the court and restored some parity in Union and state relationship.Article 356 has been used sparingly since. We are a better democracy because of it.1995India joined the WTO, and the first-ever mobile phone call was made this year. But 1995 will forever be remembered as the year when Ganesha idols started drinking milk. This event was a precursor to the many memes, information cascades, and social proofs that have become routine in the information age. 1996Union budgets in India are occasions for dramatic policy announcements. It is a mystery why a regular exercise of presenting the government's accounts should become a policy event. But that’s the way we roll. In 1996 and 1997, P. Chidambaram presented them as the FM of a weak ragtag coalition called the United Front. But he presented two budgets for the ages. The rationalisation of income tax slabs and the deregulation of interest rates created a credit culture that led to the eventual consumption boom in the next decade. We still carry that consumption momentum.1997The creation of the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) is an important public policy milestone for India. By no means perfect, the setting up of TRAI helped overturn a norm where government departments were both players and umpires. TRAI made the separation of “steering” and “rowing” functions a new normal. That template has been copied in several sectors thereafter, most recently in the liberalisation of the space sector. 1998India did Pokhran 2, which gave it the capability to build thermonuclear weapons. We faced sanctions and global condemnation. But the growing economy and a sizeable middle class meant those were soon forgotten. Economic might can let you get away with a lot. We have seen it happen to us, but it is a lesson we don’t understand fully.Also, in 1998, Sonia Gandhi jumped into active politics. The Congress that was ambling towards some sort of internal democracy decided to jettison it all and threw its weight behind the dynasty. It worked out for them for a decade or so. But where are they now? Here’s a question. What if Sonia didn’t join politics then? Congress might have split. But who knows, maybe those splinters might have coalesced in the future with a leader chosen by the workers. And we would have had a proper opposition today with a credible leader.1999This was a landmark year for public policy. For the first time, a union government-run company was privatised wholly. We wrote about the three narratives of disinvestment here. 2000We have a weak, extended and over-centralised state. And to go with it, we have large, unwieldy states and districts that make the devolution of power difficult. In 2000, we created three new states to facilitate administrative convenience. On balance, it has worked well. Despite the evidence, we have managed to create only one more state since. The formation of Telangana was such a political disaster that it will take a long time before we make the right policy move of having smaller states. It is a pity.The 2000s: The Best Of Times2001Not only was the Agra Summit between Musharraf and Vajpayee a dud, but it was followed by a terrorist attack on the Indian parliament. It confirmed a pattern: PM-level bilateral meetings made the Pakistani military-jihadi complex jittery, and it invariably managed to spike such moves with terrorist attacks. 2002There was Godhra and the riots that followed. What else is there to say?2003The Fiscal Responsibility and Budget Management (FRBM) Act and the Civil Services Pension Reform are two policy successes with many lessons for future policymakers. We have discussed these on many occasions. 2004The NDA government called for an early election, confident about its prospects. India Shining, its campaign about how good things were, wasn’t too far from the truth. It is how many of us felt during that time. The NDA government had sustained the reform momentum of the 90s with some of the best minds running the key departments. Its loss was unexpected. Chandrababu Naidu, a politician who fashioned himself like a CEO, was taken to the cleaners in Andhra Pradesh. Apparently, economic reforms didn’t get you votes. The real India living in villages was angry at being left out. That was the lesson for politicians from 2004. Or, so we were told.Such broad narratives with minimal factual analysis backing them have flourished in the public policy space. There is no basis for them. The loss of NDA in 2004 came down to two states. Anti-incumbency in Andhra Pradesh where a resurgent Congress under YS Reddy beat TDP, a constituent of NDA. TDP lost by similar margins (in vote share %) across the state in all demographics in both rural and urban areas. There was no rural uprising against Naidu because of his tech-savvy, urban reformist image. Naidu lost because the other party ran a better campaign. Nothing else. The other mistake of the NDA was in choosing to partner with the ruling AIADMK in Tamil Nadu (TN) over DMK. TN was famous for not giving split verdicts. It swung to extremes between these two parties in every election. And that’s what happened as AIADMK drew a blank.Yet, the false lesson of 2004 has played on the minds of politicians since. We haven’t gotten back on track on reforms in the true sense. 2005The Right to Information Act and the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act came into force in 2005. The “right to X” model of governance took root.2006In March 2006, George W Bush visited India and signed the Civil Nuclear Cooperation Agreement with Manmohan Singh. From facing sanctions in 1998 for Pokhran 2 to the 123 Agreement, this was a victory for Indian diplomacy and its rising status in the world. You would think this would have had bipartisan support among the political class in India. Well, the Left that was part of UPA and the BJP that worked on the deal when it was in power, opposed it. Many shenanigans later, the deal was passed in the parliament in 2008. It is often said there’s no real ideological divide among parties in India. This view can be contested on various grounds. But events like the opposition to the nuclear deal make you wonder if there are genuine ideological positions on key policy issues in India. Many sound policy decisions are opposed merely for the sake of it. Ideology doesn’t figure anywhere. 2007It was the year when the Left parties were out-lefted. In Singur and Nandigram, protests erupted over land acquisition for industrial projects. The crucible of the resulting violence created a new political force. As for the investment, the capital took a flight to other places. The tax on capital ended up being a tax on labour. Businesses stayed away from West Bengal. The citadel of Left turned into its mausoleum.2008Puja Mehra in her book The Lost Decade traces the origin of India losing its way following the global financial crisis to the Mumbai terror attack of 2008. Shivraj Patil, the home minister, quit following the attack and Chidambaram was shifted from finance to fill in. For reasons unknown, Pranab Mukherjee, a politician steeped in the 70s-style-Indira-Gandhi socialism, was made the FM. Mehra makes a compelling case of how that one decision stalled reforms, increased deficit and led to runaway inflation over the next three years. Till Chidambaram was brought back to get the house in order, it was too late, and we were halfway into a lost decade. It is remarkable how bad policies always seem easy to implement while good policies take ages to get off the blocks.2009The Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI) was established in January 2009 to architect a unique digital identity for persons in a country where low rates of death and birth registrations made fake and duplicate identities a means for corruption and denial of service. Under the Modi government, the digital identity — Aadhaar — became the fulcrum of several government services. This project also set the stage for later projects such as the Unified Payments Interface (UPI) and Abha (Health ID).2010There’s petty corruption everywhere in India. It is pervasive. Not surprisingly, it is one political issue leading to mass movements in India. The anti-corruption mood gripped India in 2010 on the back of the 2G spectrum scam, where the chief accountant of the government claimed a notional loss of about Rs. 1.8 trillion to the exchequer. Auctioning of natural resources wasn’t exactly a transparent process then. It was evident there was a scam in the allotment of the 2G spectrum. But the 1.8 trillion number was a wild exaggeration that anyone with a semblance of business understanding could see through. It didn’t matter. That number caught the imagination. UPA 2 never recovered from it. More importantly, the auction policy for resources was distorted forever. We still suffer the consequences.The 2010s: Missed Opportunity2011India’s last case of wild poliovirus was detected in 2011. Until about the early 1990s, an average of 500 to 1000 children got paralysed daily in India. The original target for eradication was the year 2000. Nevertheless, we got there eleven years later. India’s pulse polio campaign has since become a source of confidence for public policy execution in India. We internalised the lesson that the Indian government can sometimes deliver through mission mode projects. 2012If you cannot solve a vexing public policy issue, turn it into a Right. It won’t work, but it will seem like you’ve done everything. After years of trying to get the national education policy right, the government decided it was best to make education a fundamental right in the Constitution. Maybe that will make the problem go away. A decade later, nothing has changed, but we have an additional right to feel good about.2013This year saw the emergence of AAP as a political force via the anti-corruption movement. AAP combines the classic elements of what makes a political party successful in India - statist instincts, focus on aam aadmi issues, populism and ideological flexibility. Importantly, it is good at telling its own version of some future utopia rather than questioning the utopia of others. 2014The BJP came to power with many promises; the most alluring of them was ‘minimum government, maximum governance’. Over the past eight years it has claimed success in meeting many of its promises, but even its ardent supporters won’t claim any success on minimum government. In fact, it has gone the other way. That a party with an immensely popular PM, election machinery that rivals the best in the world, and virtually no opposition cannot shake us off our instinctive belief in the State's power never ceases to surprise us.2015The murder of a person by a mob on the charges of eating beef was the first clear indication of the upsurge of a new violent, majoritarian polity. It was also one of the early incidents in India of radically networked communities using social media for self-organisation. Meanwhile, 2015 also witnessed the signing of a landmark boundary agreement between India and Bangladesh, which ended the abomination called the third-order enclave. The two States exchanged land peacefully, upholding the principle that citizen well-being trumps hardline interpretations of territorial integrity. 2016There will be many case studies written in future about demonetisation. Each one of them will end with a single conclusion. Public policy requires discussion and consensus, not stealth and surprise. We hope we have learnt our lesson from it.2017Until 2017, many in India still held the hope of a modus vivendi with China. Some others were enamoured by the Chinese model of governance. However, the Doklam crisis in 2017, and the Galwan clashes in 2020, changed all that. Through this miscalculation, China alienated a full generation of Indians, led to better India-US relations, and energised India to shift focus away from merely managing a weak Pakistan, and toward raising its game for competing with a stronger adversary. For this reason, we wrote a thank you note to Xi Jinping here. 2018It took years of efforts by the LGBTQ community to get Section 377 scrapped. In 2018, they partially won when the Supreme Court diluted Section 377 to exclude all kinds of adult consensual sexual behaviour. The community could now claim equal constitutional status as others. There’s still some distance to go for the State to acknowledge non-heterosexual unions and provide for other civil rights to the community. But the gradual acceptance of the community because of decriminalisation is a sign that our society doesn’t need moral policing or lectures to judge what’s good for it.2019The J&K Reorganisation Act changed the long-standing political status quo in Kashmir. Three years on, the return to political normalcy and full statehood still awaits. While a response by Pakistan was expected, it was China that fomented trouble in Ladakh, leading to the border clashes in 2020. 2020We have written multiple pieces on farm laws in the past year. The repeal of these laws, which were fundamentally sound because of a vocal minority, is the story of public policy in India. Good policies are scuttled because of the absence of consultation, an unclear narrative, opportunistic politicking or plain old hubris. We write this newsletter in the hope of changing this. 2021The second wave of the COVID-19 pandemic left behind many bereaved families. People are still trying to pick up the pieces. The sadness was also interrupted by frustration because of the delays in getting the vaccination programme going. India benefited immensely from domestic vaccine manufacturing capability in the private sector. Despite many twists and turns in vaccine pricing and procurements, the year ended with over 1 billion administered doses. In challenging times, the Indian State, markets, and society did come together to fight the pandemic. So, here we are. In the 75th independent year of this beautiful, fascinating and often exasperating nation. We are a work in progress. We might walk slowly, but we must not walk backwards. May we all live in a happy, prosperous and equal society. Thanks for reading Anticipating the Unintended! Subscribe for free to receive new posts and support our work. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit publicpolicy.substack.com

Lost and Found - Chinthavishtayaya Shyamala - Episode 60Welcome to OTTplay Lost and Found , one podcast that talks about critically acclaimed films and shows but lesser - known , i'm your host NikhilToday's Lost and Found is an underrated gem from the 90s, the Malayalam film Chinthavishtayaya Shyamala. Released to critical acclaim in 1998, the film stars Sreenivasan and Sangeetha in lead roles, with an excellent supporting cast of Thilakan. Innocent, Nedumudi Venu, Sudheesh, and Siddique. Written and directed by Sreenivasan, the plot revolves around Vijayan, played by Sreenivasan, an irresponsible husband who refuses to go to his day job as a teacher. Instead, he is deluded into thinking that he can be successful with minimum effort in more glamorous professions such as a businessman or even a film director. As one would expect he soon becomes debt-ridden, forcing an intervention from his wife, Shyamala, as well as their parents. They convince him to make the pilgrimage to Sabarimala. However, Shyamala's dreams of a more level headed husband are shattered when Vijayan returns home from the trip a completely different man, but not the one she envisioned. He informs his family that he is devoting his life to prayer and will lead a frugal lifestyle, devoid of any earthly pleasures. He soon abandons his family and leaves for an ashram. A deflated Shyamala decides to take matters into her own hands and decides to work hard for her two children by starting a tailoring business.The story continues to highlight Shyamala's struggles as a single mother, and a remorseful Vijayan's attempts to regain her trust and affection. This satirical comedy-drama critiqued and challenged several socio-economic conventions prevalent in Kerala at the time. If you haven't watched this yet then do so streaming exclusively on Manorama MaxWell that's the OTTplay Lost and Found for today, until the next episode it's your host Nikhil signing out.Aaj kya dekhoge OTTplay se poocho

The Genesis Of The Sabarimala Case | C Surendranath | Supreme Court & Hindu Festivels | Jallikattu SrijanTalks

Sabarimala And The Relevance Of The Agamas | Anand Prasad | Supreme Court Judgment | Swami Ayyappan SrijanTalks

[Q/A] Sabarimala: Rationalising Skewed Perspectives | Anand Prasad | Swami Ayyappan SrijanTalks

Sabarimala Is No Regular Temple | Anand Prasad | Swami Ayyappan | Mandala Pooja SrijanTalks

Sabarimala: What Is Vratam Compliance? | Anand Prasad | Swami Ayyappan | Makar Sankranti SrijanTalks

Sabarimala: Court Recognizes Consecration | Anand Prasad | Young Women Entry | Travancore Devaswom SrijanTalks

Sabarimala: Understanding Hinduism | Anand Prasad | Travancore Devaswom Board | Tatvamasi SrijanTalks

Sabarimala: Secularism Or Monotheism? | Anand Prasad | Young Women Entry | Mandala Pooja SrijanTalks

Sabarimala: Vratam And Exclusion Not Anti Women | Anand Prasad | Swami Ayyappan | Mandala Pooja SrijanTalks

Sabarimala: Rationalising Skewed Perspectives | Anand Prasad | Swami Ayyappan SrijanTalks

Sabarimala Hindu Resistance : A Psychological Perspective | Rajat Mitra | SangamTalks SrijanTalks

ST_20170904_Sabarimala_-_What_you_don_t_know_about_it_J_Sai_De.mp3

ST_20161121_Sabarimala_-_What_you_don_t_know_about_it_J_Sai_De.mp3

For a tenure that coincided with the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic, Justice SA Bobde's term as CJI may not have been a remarkable one, but it was most certainly eventful. Migrants, Sabarimala, Habeus Corpus petitions, and constitutional matters were not heard but a Prashant Bhushan's tweet was adjudged with alacrity...We take the temperature on the tenure of the 47th Chief Justice of India

It hit 41.5 degrees Celsius in Palakkad this week. In the blistering heat, there is an 89-year old man campaigning for the post of MLA from this storied town that sits in a gap in the Western Ghats between Tamil Nadu and Kerala. He is the legendary Dr Elattuvalappil Sreedharan, India’s most accomplished engineer.At his age, he has no need to prove anything to anybody. He has been awarded India’s second-highest civilian honor, the Padma Vibhushan, as well as the French Legion d’Honneur. I have suggested that he should be made President of India, because he would be a fantastic role model, and an inspiration to youth.Dr Sreedharan has frequently faced long odds in his engineering career spanning seven decades, and defeated them. There are very good reasons to honor him with a Bharat Ratna, the highest civilian award, as well, as argued delightfully by kaipullai who recounts the herculean tasks that Dr Sreedharan set himself. To take just three: the Pamban sea bridge, the monumental Konkan Railway and the Delhi Metro — all bhagiratha prayatnams.At the age of almost 90, when most people prefer to take it easy, he has taken on another huge challenge: he is on a mission to revive the BJP’s chances in Kerala. In 2016, after a fine campaign, the BJP had to be content with just one seat in the legislature. Conventional wisdom is that it will not get much more in 2021.There are several reasons for this grim forecast. One is the entrenched nature of the two fronts (LDF led by the CPI(M) and the UDF led by the INC) which have alternated in power for a long time. Another is the highly polarized nature of the electorate, where ideological metastasis has set in. The third is demography: Abrahamics, who tend to form vote-banks, make up more than half the voters.The Hindu vote has been fragmented. The numerically largest group, the OBC Ezhavas, have long been the backbone of the Communists. The next largest group, the FC Nairs, have been Congress supporters, but have moved somewhat to the BJP. Other groups, including SC, have been wooed by the BJP with little effect.In 2016, the BJP made an explicit call for Hindu unity by headlining their campaign around Sri Narayana Guru, Chattampi Swamikal, and Mahatma Ayyankali, who were respectively from the three groups mentioned above. However, groupism and internecine warfare especially among the Ezhavas and Nairs, along with tactical voting by both LDF and UDF, buried its chances.Several things have changed since then, though. See articles in the Indian Express and the Hindu about a consolidation of Hindu votes (although the articles may also represent the respective biases of the two newspapers).One big difference is that the Indian National Congress seems to be running a lackluster campaign. So much so that typical alternation every five years between the Communists and the Congress (much as between the DMK and the ADMK in neighboring Tamil Nadu) may not happen this time.The second is the changes in the previously monolithic Abrahamic vote. Christians of all stripes have viewed the Congress (and allies) as their own party. But now some of them, especially some Eastern Orthodox groups (as compared to the dominant Vatican-affiliated groups) seem to be vacillating a bit.The Muslim League has been a Congress ally, but this time they are being challenged by the more radical SDPI, which has made a strong alliance with the CPI(M). So the Congress, despite their safe Parliamentary seat in Wayanad for the current Nehru dynasty scion, can no longer count on the Muslim vote.There are also allegations that there are lakhs of illegal alien Bangladeshis and Rohingyas in the Kerala voters’ list. There are many lakhs of them working in Kerala doing everything from construction to plucking coconuts. It is not hard to believe that ruling parties (both LDF and UDF) have stuffed the rolls with them.There are regional differences too: Northern Kerala is Marxist and Muslim dominated; Central Kerala is Christian and Congress dominated; Southern Kerala is where Hindus may have a chance: and indeed the one seat the BJP captured in 2016 is Nemom, south of Trivandrum.The state has also been wracked with stories and rumors of large-scale corruption, including gold and dollar smuggling, scams in construction, deep-sea fishing boats, the sale of coronavirus patient data, and a whole lot more. Whether these have an impact on the ruling LDF’s chances remains to be seen.There are interesting twists. It is said that in 2016, the BJP spent 64 crore rupees, while the LDF spent only 14 crores, and the UDF somewhere in between. But there appear to be other, hidden factors. On March 25th, three boats with alleged Pakistan links were captured off Minicoy. So there could be unaccounted sources of money and muscle in the fray.There was also a tweet from Kanchan Gupta about what has happened in his native West Bengal, and, well, much of the same is applicable to Kerala as well.The only difference in Kerala is that there has not been a TMC here. However, the explicitly anti-Hindu nature of those in power is exactly the same. We saw this in the Sabarimala agitation, which brought tens of thousands of apolitical Hindu women on to the streets with lamps, to protest the desecration of their temple. People4Dharma (led by Shilpa Nair, Padma Pillai, and Anjali George) and Indic Collective (led by Adv J Sai Deepak) were able to arouse the silent majority out of their lethargy.There is also the fact that two of the most striking modern Hindu artifacts in the country are in southern Kerala: the Gangadhareswar murti at Aazhimala, and the Jatayu sculpture at Chadayamangalam, both in the suburbs of Trivandrum.This possibly means that if the NDA is able to energize injured Hindu sentiment, based on the continuous hostility of the LDF (e.g. contemptuous statements about Hindus by their leaders) and the UDF (e.g. an ostentatious slaughter of a calf and a beef fest conducted by their leaders), there is a possibility that the BJP may yet do better in Kerala than we think.If that happens, Dr Sreedharan may have pulled off yet another impossible dream. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit rajeevsrinivasan.substack.com

In this episode, Murali Krishnan @legaljournalist discusses the ‘Vishaka vs State of Rajasthan' & the 'Sabarimala' judgment which struck down the executive regulations which had prohibited entry of menstruating women into the temple in Kerala. Tune in to know more!

Ishkaran Singh Bhandari is a Supreme Court Advocate who works closely with Dr. Subramanian Swami. Ishkaran explains the historic Ayodhya Verdict, and how it opens the door to other civilizational battles through the legal route, i.e, Uniform Civil Code, Sabarimala, freeing temples from Government control.