Nirvana!

One reads few books for entertainment, some to know about subjects we are interested in, few to understand the world, and some to understand others. There are few books which when read enable you to know more about oneself, one's identity and heritage without which we are lost. One such book I have read in recent times is 'Ram & Ayodhya' by Meenakshi Jain.  Yes, this work is about the Ram Janmabhoomi dispute and the temple. But the underlying theme is about what defines us, how we are a 'single culture', attributes which unite us as a civilization and how we as a people have reclaimed it repeatedly over millenniums. It also educates us about the machinations both external and internal that time and again attempted to destroy and separate us from our roots and the methods they employed. Faith in Rama - Attribute of Bharatiya civilization   Meenakshi Jain's research shows how Bhagwan Ram and his story 'Ramayana' is not an epic whi...

Ramayana is not just a part of our ‘itihasa’ but a part of our civilizational conscience. Though it is said that there are numerous versions of Valmiki’s Ramayan, people in different regions of this land have broadly accepted one of the three versions viz., Original Valmiki’s epic, Kamban’s version and Tulsidas’s retelling. Despite these numerous versions having differences in sub-plots and interpretation of incidents, none of them alter the purport of the epic or tweak around with what Valmiki conveyed in the original. Scion of Ikshvaku by Amish Tripathi is one such retelling which interprets the Ramayana through the lens of the present worldview and without harming the base intent of the original. One of the problems parents and elders today face in narrating our ‘itihasa’ to children is that, the children would have heard or seen a version through various mediums which reduces their interest or hearing or reading it again. The challenge remains to retain the interest of th...

Translated from the Kannada Prabha article by Shri. Shatavadhani R Ganesh   Lately the debate over A.K.Ramanujan's essay titled '300 Ramayanas' has been going on in the media. This is not new to the scholars of Ramayana. There have been debates over Ramayana in our history and Puranas for thousands of years. However, all the versions of Ramayana deem Valmiki's thought as the original, without accusations, and drew inspiration from it and NOT from sources outside of our Indian tradition. Few contend that Buddhist and Jain versions of the Ramayana are very different and older to Valmiki's Ramayana. But this argument is misplaced. Everyone is aware that the present form of the Tripitakas took shape during the Third Buddhist Council (during 1st century CE) organised by Kanishka. Experts opine that, The Jataka Tales, which are not a part of the Tripitakas were written even later. If contending that one of the Jatakas, the 'Dasharata' Jataka, as the origin ...