Artwork by a 6-year-old neice

O Korea Re...

Korean sitcoms are a hit in Manipur

I just came across this story in the magazine Caravan about Korean "invasion" of  Manipur. Published in the October issue, the story narrates how the vacuum created by a ban on Hindi-Bollywood TV/Cinema in Manipur is being filled by DVDs of Korean sitcoms and serials. Koreans—South Koreans, that is—are not really surprised about this. Korean popular culture has already made way into countries across Asia, from China to Iran. This success is because Korean movies, serials, etc., are able to combine entertainment with traditional values that are shared by many Asian societies. Now this is quite an intriguing piece in itself. But I perhaps wouldn't have blogged about it if I didn't have another Korea story ruffling in my mind.

We, the FORWARD Press magazine, have just gone to press with our November issue and in it we are carrying an article by Vishal Mangalwadi titled "Moving Forward: Korean Style". It is a short study of a village called Yong Am in South Korea and the spiritual-cultural forces that transformed this impoverished village "hidden in a mountain and covered by snow for more than three months in a year" into one of the richest rural communities where the average annual income of a small farmer is Rs 28 lakh! This Korea story also has an India connection, the people (and the NGO) that brought about this transformation in Yong Am, and many a Korean wasteland, are helping the people in Bihar improve their farming.

When it  comes to Asia, people world over are talking about China and India, but Korea might be the dark horse that will perhaps lead the way in this part of the world. The former two countries have the size and political clout. Korea seems to have the confidence and capability to more than compensate for these pluses its two continental cousins have.

And yes, Korea has been inspiring talented Indian musicians too. Take a look at this song.

Ten. X. 10

It has to be a perfect day. The eldest son of my eldest sister turns 11 on this 10th — the first of the third generation in our immediate family. And even though he is now living thousands of miles away, it didn't stop his nani to cook some gurh wale chawal. He is supposed to be getting some kind of a video game but I am sure he will miss this grandma special for the dessert.

I could not cook up something as original or delicious as this. But at the back of my mind were some verses by Nissim Ezekiel. He wrote 14 short "blessings" that I wanted this growing boy now living in England to read.

One my most favourites from among the 14 is this one:

III

Be drunk, occasionally,

but not with gin

or whiskey. May the Lord

use you up for ends

beyond your means,

so you know what drunkenness

really means. 

And it is also a Sunday. The day of rest. The day of meditating on being "drunk". The day of the dessert. It is 10/10/10.

Some Post-seminar Thoughts

The magnificent IIAS at Shimla. 

In a recently concluded seminar in the Indian Institute of Advanced Study (IIAS), Shimla, I caught on to two remarks that continue to resonate in my mind. The first remark was made almost unconsciously when AGR started reading her paper. As she read out her seminal thoughts, from the lectern, she could see that people were not really with her. In that moment, which could well be termed epiphanic, she said she could see people yawning at the postcolonial jargon that her paper doled out so generously. I said to myself, we are supposed to be a "postcolonial" society and the postcolonial theory has been with us for about three decades. Some of the best-known postcolonial critics and writers are Indians. Why do we still yawn at, and yet yearn for, the theorizing postcolonial. It seemed that a language that is fashioned in the academic-culture factories of Europe and America will not help us in a meaningful way to discuss our own problems. Is it possible that our critics, teachers, researchers are lost in academic navel-gazing without having much to say to people outside the universities and academic institutions? They make fine start, their awe-inspiring verbal acrobatics do give the impression of something profound being said and performed. But then why does a well-respected, and well-published scholar, end up saying what AGR said above?

The second comment was in some ways related to the one above. In the evening as we were winding up the seminar, participants and observers began sharing their thoughts. Professor GS said one thing very categorically  — along with theoretical work our researches should be based on empirical data. And, for me what was more important, was his later assertion that this balance, or amalgamation, of theory and factual data is what will lead to "social transformation". All fields of knowledge – natural sciences, social sciences, and arts and humanities – must be geared towards this. Not many people want to use this term social transformation. For that one has to make value judgements, seek fundamental changes and propose radical alternatives, and our current academic stances are ill equipped for this. And thus if our academic discussions only result in audience yawning should we not become suspect of our "scholarly" enterprises?

A South Asian Taxi Driver in New York

I might add one more thing. There is this general tendency in human beings to blame the other for all their maladies, which, unfortunately, spills over into our academic enterprises too. Yes, there is inequality in this world and consequently oppression and dominance but should this make us communally paranoid? Does that absolve one from any kind of introspection? For example, there was a presentation on the behalf of a group that is spreading awareness about dangers of illegal emigration. Hundreds and thousands of Punjabi youth endanger their lives when they tie up with these emigration racketeers. Now the presentation was about how this group reaches out to the young and explain to them the dangers of such enterprises through lectures, songs, skits, etc. In the ensuing discussion one participant mentioned that the host countries leave certain loopholes in their immigration laws and thus encourage such practices because they want cheap labour from the so-called Third World. The idea was clear, it is "they" who are to be blamed. There would have been a consensus on this but for the interjection by RH. He immediately intervened and said that it is our own people there who are responsible for pitiable condition of many of the immigrant labourers. It is not the host country that exploits them. They have their adequate laws in place. They pay adequately. It's their fellow-countrymen who swindle the immigrants' hard-earned salary. Now this was an argument no one could challenge.

(Photos: http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/malariamonday/1/1277062587/tpod.html; http://thefacesisee.blogspot.com/2009/05/may-26-43rd-street-new-york-ny-usa.html)

Right to Education and the Privilege to Ignore!

After dwelling briefly on the achievements of institutes of higher education in India, especially the IITs and the IIMs, Amartya Sen had this to say in his essay, "The Indian Identity":

Yet the underdevelopment of Indian school systems, especially in socially backward regions of the country and particularly among disadvantaged groups, has been equally extraordinary. This is both deeply inefficient and amazingly unjust. The smart boy or clever girl who is deprived of the opportunity of schooling, or who goes to a school with dismal facilities (not to mention the high incidence of absentee teachers), not only loses the opportunities he or she could have had, but also adds to the massive waste of talent that is a characteristic of the life of our country. If we have not yet been able to seize the economic opportunities for the manufacture of simple products in a way that has happened in Japan, Korea, China and other countries in east Asia, not to mention the West, India's remarkable neglect of basic education has a decisive role in this handicap. (emphases added, excerpt from The Argumentative Indian: Writings on Indian History, Culture and Identity, New Delhi, Penguin/Allen Lane, 2005, p. 344.)

About ten days back, I was part of a group that came together to discuss the Right to Education Act that came into force on 1 April 2010. It was an initiative of a friend who is a strong believer in the transformative potential of this new fundamental right. There were some hopefuls and some cynics in the group. In any case, there were some interesting things to be learnt. The right not just seeks to empower the children in the age group of 6 to 14 but also gives a tool in the hands of the parents themselves to ensure that their children get free, compulsory and quality education. That tool is participation in the SMCs or school management committees. The government schools are now supposed to have an SMC, in which the proportion of parents will be 75% and 50% of members should be women. The medium of instruction will be the mother tongue. Teachers will not be burdened with non-academic work, except election duties (in best case scenario, once or twice in five years) and during instances of natural calamities. There are other liberating features: No child can be declined admission in case he or she cannot produce a birth certificate. For those who want to learn more, the "right" can be downloaded from here.

While there were some who pointed that there are flaws in this law, my believer friend was quick to point out that RTI and NREGA are also two such tools that are fraught with problems but they have also delivered. Even if limited, their gains are huge. Same can happen with this act! I think so. By the way, my concern is that we must have motivated young men and women, not just motivate but idealistic in that old-fashioned way, who are ready to dedicate themselves to teaching in such schools. Do we have that breed anymore? Or am I being a being a dreamer in a foolish way? Can't say.

We certainly need more awareness and discussion on this. This is quite a revolutionary act, but strangely no consistent follow-up is being done. There are no front-page stories. Nothing by way of urgent-sounding op-eds either. Since India's leap into big league of global economic powerhouses is dependent on the springboard of quality education, it is surprising to see that corporate India is not talking about it. Or have I missed something? Meanwhile, here's one article that discusses some core issues.

(Photo: http://advocacynet.org/wordpress-mu/tmathys/blog/tag/nizamuddin/)

Ram Manohar Lohia's 100th Birthday

One of my colleagues had his birthday on 23 March. I walked up to him as soon as he came in and wished him a Happy Birthday. As I shook his hand, I said to him, 'Do you know you share your birthday with...' Before I could finish, he quipped, 'Yes, the martyrdom of Baghat Singh and ...' 'No, no, I am talking about Ram Manohar Lohia.' And as I said this, another colleague, who loves a friendly bantering said, 'No wonder, there is something of Amar Singh in the birthday boy..." And we had a a little laugh about it.

This two-minute episode is quite instructive of our political sensibilities at this point of time. Politics for us is either a dead ideal or a living, though sick, cunning. In the middle of these two perceptions, the insights are lost. In contemporary Punjabi folklore Bhagat Singh is an icon of Sikh and not just Marxist pride. There are movies about Bhagat Singh, one of them has 23 March 1931 as part of the title. This has kept his memory alive. The other figure, that of Amar Singh, is as theatrical as any Bollywood film. He epitomises, in public eye, political opportunism at its worst and to the critics, this is what ultimately happens to the political heirs of Lohiaism.

But I want to know the man first hand. I have recently been reading about Ram Manohar Lohia. The trouble is that his books are just not available out there. So I've taken printouts of his few writings, which are scattered on various blogs, and read them off and on. On the 23rd, it was his birth centenary. It is generally a big deal when a political leader of such stature complete 100 years. But apart from one article in Deccan Herald and a report of a seminar in Goa there wasn't much that was available to me online on that day. I picked up a copy of the Hindu to see if there's any editorial or op-ed. Zilch.

I am not a socialist. But to me it was a bit sad to see this amnesia about an important person in our recent history. So I wrote a quick piece for the Herald of India, which the editor was very kind to publish and give a headline too.

One reader responded to the write-up with a very interesting anecdote.

The timely and informative piece, 'Deafening silence on Lohia', took me back to mid- sixties when I heard Lohia for the first time at an open rally in Chandigarh's Sector 15. It still is etched on my mind how he attributed most of our failures to our inherent indecisiveness. I remember even the fine example he gave to prove his point. On visiting a friend, if he offers us a choice between having tea and coffee we fail even to tell him our personal preference or choice. "Kuch bhi chaleyga", Lohia rightly lamented the attitude. He continued by lampooning Lal Bhadur Shastri, the then PM, saying that he too remains indecisive on many issues and he often sees two instead of one face of Shastri in Parliament, yeh bhi theek hai, woh bhi theek hai. -Balvinder

I love such personal memories and anecdotes but this was a particularly intriguing comment because I lived in Sector 15 of Chandigarh for most part of my life. That little connection warmed me up.

Later that day, I got to read the news that Kanu Sanyal committed suicide by hanging himself. Did somebody notice that he chose 23 March as the day of his death? And also, that three other revolutionaries died that way in 1931. Here are a few of links of some remembrances. Rediff, Times of India, DNA, The Hindu.

Converting footnotes to endnotes

Here's the editor at work.

In one MS Word document I was working on this afternoon, I had to change footnotes at the bottom of each page to endnotes, which would appear at the end of the document. It's not difficult at all to do that in Word, but there was one glitch, the endnote numbers changed to Roman (i, ii, iii...) from Arabic (1, 2, 3...). So there was an additional set of steps to ensure the numbers remain the same.

1. Right click on any footnote anywhere in the document.
2. Select Note Options… from the drop-down list.
3. In the dialogue box, click on Convert… button.
4. A small dialogue box will appear with one of the three options highlighted. For our purpose, it will be Convert all footnotes to endnotes. Click OK.
5. Click Close.

That's it! But, in case you want Arabic and not Roman numerals for your endnotes,

1. Right click on any of the endnotes.
2. Select Note Options… from the drop-down list
3. In the dialogue box, change Number format: to 1, 2, 3… Click Apply

Documenting my great rediscovery for posterity.

Disclaimer: I work with MS Office 2003, so it might be useless for those working on advanced versions.

The Digression Teacher

I am sorry! I am not terribly excited about this bright idea of yours Honourable Education Minister. Is it a cover-up for the repeated failure of your ministry in providing a decent education facilities to children in your state? Your teachers are up in arms against you. Students are not coming to schools. The list of failures goes on and on.

Now the best way to divert attention, for her as for other Punjab MLAs, is to rake up the two most emotional issues the state has frequently exploited since Independence, Punjabi Language and Chandigarh.

I just hope there are no agitations in next few days! So tired of traffic snarls already! There are no digressions left for the commuters.

Ambani/Mittal and Lohia: A Tentative Remark

One of the news that most Indian news portals flashed persistently throughout today was about Mukesh Ambani and Laxmi Narayan Mittal being the richest Indians. We, the Indian readers, are supposed to be waiting for one of these men to become THE richest man in the world. Because that will strengthen our tentative hopes that India is indeed becoming a developed nation. We are in a hurry to overtake America and other Western societies. We want to be rich like them. We want to be like them in all aspects. And in all this we forget that one of the reasons, besides others, for them becoming rich was colonialism. They were able to find a way to boost their economies at the cost of other nations.* Ram Manohar Lohia (on whom I am sipping lately) had an interesting insight about this. He said that we can't be advanced like West unless we ourselves become colonizers.** Either we find colonies on other planets or "colonize" the people within our own country. The latter is indeed happening. Singurs and Nandigrams are examaples of this internal colonialism. We can stretch it further to Kazakhstan where Mittal was accused of slave labour. Mukesh Ambani did not want to think beyond his profit in last year's gas crisis, completely overlooking public interest. Of course, the issue also exposed the inaptness of the petroleum ministry. It's ironical that these men have become mascots of our national pride.

We want more and more to look like Westerners in the way we do our business and the way we evaluate it's benefit to our society and our people. Is that the only way? The recent global recession and, closer home, the Satyam fiasco, should propel us to look for alternatives.

(16 March 2010: Apparently that insight came to Lohia via Gandhi, who expressed similar thoughts in his journal Young India on 7 October 1926 [cited by Kishan Pattnayak in his Vikalphin Nahin Hai Duniya, New Delhi:Rajkamal, 2000, p 87.])

______________________________

* One can counterbalance this with Max Weber's idea of puritan ethics and developement of capitalism in Western Europe but that's for some other time.

** Lohia also recognizes the fact that the 'greatness' of modern Western civilization owes to spiritual dynamics of faith, which has been ultimately undermined by an unbridled cult of 'industrialism'.

Women's Day: Little Poetry, Little Pondering

It's Women's Day today. Women colleagues at the office were cajoled to treat us with some dhokla and gulab jamuns. But there must be more to this day of the feminine. Wife is away, so the second-best thing is to celebrate it with poetry. Maya Angelou's "Phenomenal Women" is a hit with most women. I am immediately drawn to few poems of my own liking. I think of Nissim Ezekiel's "Poet, Lover and Birdwatcher" in which the "woman slowly turns around" as "myths of light/With darkness at core" or twists frantically in pain as the mother in the "Night of the Scorpion", who is grateful even after having been bitten by the scorpion when she says "Thank God the scorpion picked on me/And spared my children". The sensuousness of the former, in particular, has transfixed me every time I read it. This to me is one of the ultimate "woman" poems, besides some Neruda.

But then, also follow lines from Jayanta Mahapatra's "The Lost Children of America" (the text once available online is now only found in fragments), in which the poet makes a reference to a horrific event:

In the Hanuman Temple last night

the priest’s pomaded jean-clad son

raped the squint-eyed fourteen-year fisher girl

on the cracked stone platform behind the shrine

and this morning

her father found her at the police station

assaulted over and over again by four policemen

dripping of darkness and of scarlet death.

Oh! I wanted to concentrate on the positives. But tragedy is quite inextricably woven in the acts of reflection on contemporary times. How I wanted to identify with Ezekiel the aesthete but am not able to shake off the crude reality of violence that's so much a part of men's psyche. Wait! Why only men's psyche? Sujata Bhatt interrogates the revered figure of mother in "Voice of the Unwanted Girl". Extracts from the poem follow:

Mother, I am the one

you sent away

when the doctor told you

I would be

a girl – In the end they had to

give me an injection to kill me.

Before I died I heard

the traffic rushing outside, the monsoon

slush, the wind sulking through

your beloved Mumbai –

I could have clutched the neon blue

.....................................no one wanted –

No one wanted

to touch me – except later in the autopsy room

when they knew my mouth would not search

for anything – and my head could be measured

and bent and cut apart.

I looked like a sliced pomegranate.

The fruit you never touched.

Mother, I am the one you sent away

when the doctor told you

I would be a girl – your second girl.

These are the first two paragraphs; the actual poem is slightly longer. It is from Sujata Bhatt's anthology My Mother's Way of Wearing a Sari (New Delhi: Penguin, 2000).

As I had a baby, a son, recently I can in a strange way relate with this poem. The instinctive actions and reactions of a child (my mouth would not search for anything) are so vivid in my mind that it breaks my heart to read this poem. I am also aware of unspoken yet tremendous pressure created by family, society and part of our inner selves to bring forth a son, that I think I will always feel tender for a girl child.

Confession of a selfish father

Tomorrow is Holi. Sonny will spend the festival of colours with his mother's side of the family. He will be there for a couple of months or so. Wife was looking forward to this period as this is her first really extended stay with her native family, especially her mum, after our marriage. It was amazing to see the way she and mum-in-law confabulated about so many things, from the correct posture and position to feeding the child to number of layers of clothes to wrap him in, to decide how hot the water should be before bathing him. Mum-in-law was here for all these 17 days, besides my own sister who had come down with her two kids for spending winter vacations with us. It was great to have them here, as well as my own parents. Though I did change and wash nappies occasionally, it would have been too much for me to do that sometimes as frequently as thrice in five minutes and that too at about 3.30 in the morning.

But these days were busy for me in so many other ways and to be honest, I don't quite mind this break.

Tomorrow may be a different story, though!

Effective Fixation

Psychologists shouldn't get involved with their patients. Teachers shouldn't fall for their students. Editors shouldn't get obsessed with the books they are supposed to be only making ready to go to print. In the last case, there's nothing overtly ethically dubious, or so I think, hence, I'll continue to read after lunch, Chapter 3 Learning, Motivation, and Performance from P. Nick Blanchard and James W. Thacker's Effective Training: Systems, Strategies, and Practices, 4th ed, (Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall, 2010). Why am I so hooked to this chapter is perhaps because of some contextual reasons. It is that time of the year when we get to know the result of our yearly performance assessment as reflected in the increment letter we get. That of course makes one nervous, excited, disappointed, elated, but on the whole, I think, this gives us a time to self-evaluate honestly without being influenced by any external seduction of a raise or a bonus. Also, as I start a new year and new projects come my way, I want to be more deliberate about all that I do this year and, thus, find myself interested in theories of motivation, learning, etc.

No, there must be another reason too. As I read this, I also recall my years in teaching, both in formal and informal settings. I was eligible to teach after my MA, but except the fact that I cleared an exam, I didn't have any formal training in how to teach. It is interesting that those of us who teach undergraduate or postgraduate students did not have to bother with teaching methodology or theories of learning. We did it with a gut feeling. I think why I am enjoying this chapter is beacause I an subconsciously comparing how I taught and how teaching/training should be done. I am thinking of things I did right and things I didn't.

Anyway, can't spend too much time pondering over this. Lunch time is over. I need to get back to business.

Acknowledged Christ, Unacknowledged Disciples

I had always wanted to read this book and this evening as I met a friend at his house and shared a bit about my trip to UTC, Bangalore, haunted by spectres of Bangalore theologians, I asked him if he had a copy of M. M. Thomas's The Acknowledged Christ of the Indian Renaissance. He immediately pulled out a copy. I was pleasantly surprised to see the original 1970 edition published by The Christian Literature Society, Madras. I expected some kind of photocopy, originals of such books being rather rare, more so in my city, which is very far from Bangalore, in terms of distance as well as in nurturing theological reflection (I, in fact, remember once glancing through a photocopy of this title long time back).

The blurb of the book reads as follows:

A good deal has been written in recent years on the 'hidden' or 'unknown' Christ of traditional Hinduism. Mr. M.M. Thomas deals here with 'acknowledged' Christ of renascent Hinduism which was integral to the total Indian awakening. He surveys how some of the great spiritual leaders of the Indian renascence—leaders like Raja Rammohan Roy, Swami Vivekananda and Mahatma Gandhi—sought to understand the meaning of Christ and Christianity for the new India that was emerging. And he studies, as part of his theological evaluation, the salient features of the dialogue that went on between these men and some of the Christian spokesmen in India.

In the preface, Thomas lays out his thoughts behind writing this book:

..I am deeply concerned with men's reflections on the truth of Jesus Christ in the context of their grappling with the meaning of life in concrete situations of history ... The theological fragments of this book relate to one historical situation, namely the awakening of Indian nationalism in the nineteenth and the early part of the twentieth century.

What I have done in this study is to survey how some of the foremost spiritual leaders of the Indian renaissance, especially of Neo-Hinduism, sought to understand the meaning of Jesus Christ and Christianity for religion and society in renascent India...As part of the survey, I have also tried to study how the Indian Church, in the thought of some of its theologically-minded representatives, has attempted to enter into dialogue with the ideas of these leaders and to formulate its own faith in Christ and the meaning of Indian nationalism.

This must be the most important book to be rediscovered by both Hindus and Christians of India, and of Karnatka in particular, a state that has witnessed some of the ugliest expressions of communal and cultural bigotry. I wish more people read and discussed this book and its author.

It's going to be a slow read. I am a slow reader. And given the battered condition the book is in (it's a 40-year-old paperback) it needs to be carefully handled. It needs to be carefully handled because it belongs to a friend and in a strange way the book belongs to the history of my city. It originally was part of Mr J. S. Dethe's library. On the full-title page there is rubber-stamp mark, upside down, that gives the particulars of its first owner, his name, designation, address and a three-digit phone number. Mr Dethe was one of the senior architects in the team that planned and developed the city of Chandigarh. I am intrigued to know that an architect was interested in matters theological. One wishes one could meet and talk to late Mr Dethe about his ideas about developing structures for human habitation and also his notions about developing a framework for biblical theology in India. Mr Dethe was also a member of a small group that got the church built in Sector 18. It would have been interesting to know what he felt about this book and how much did Thomas, who himself wasn't a trained theologian, influenced his efforts in community building. That church today is called Christ Church and is part of the Church of North India's (CNI) Diocese of Chandigarh. I have been told that Pratap SinghKairon, the then chief minister of Punjab, wanted only one church, one temple, one gurudwara and possibly one mosque in the newly built capital city of Chandigarh. For that reason Dethe and others had aimed to build this one church as an interdenominational/non-denominational church, where Christians from all doctrinal backgrounds may come and worship. Ravi Kalia, the author of Chandigarh: The Making of an Indian City, mentions the fact that Maxwell Fry had a 'Quaker background' and Le Corbusier had a 'Calvinistic upbringing' and these affected the work of these two architects of Chandigarh। In this context too, it would too be interesting to know Dethe's church background.

(I am grateful to the publishers of The Herald of India for accommodating this write-up on their news portal. The editor's little note adds a great value to it. I am humbled)

Krishen Khanna reminisces

(I found this IANS piece on the Yahoo! Web site this morning. There are not so many stories out there on Indian painters and on modern Indian art in general. So wanted to save this one here. By the way, that he is a Punjabi and painted Jesus is not incidental to this act of preservation. The original story is found at http://in.news.yahoo.com/43/20100111/812/tnl-i-ve-gone-back-to-childhood-in-lahor.html. The image above is a painting by Khanna titled "Christ Carrying His Cross" found at www.artnet.com)

I've gone back to childhood in Lahore: Artist Krishen Khanna

Mon, Jan 11 08:45 AM
New Delhi, Jan 11 (IANS) In his new series of works, leading Indian contemporary artist Krishen Khanna has travelled back in time to his days in pre-partition Lahore, which today lies in Pakistan.

'They are mostly a recollection of events that I have seen in my early childhood - when tension between the British rulers and Indian freedom fighters was escalating,' Delhi-based Khanna told IANS in an interview.

The 84-year-old artist is preparing for a retrospective exhibition at the Lalit Kala Akademi Jan 23 to be organised by the Mumbai-based online gallery Saffronart.

Khanna has completed five large format oil compositions in monochrome, which he says are an extension of his memories of Maclagan Road in Lahore, where he lived in a cosmopolitan neighbourhood 'with Parsis, Sikhs, Christians and Muslims'.

'The series begins with an oil drawing of Gurbaksh Rai, an old homeopathic doctor saying goodbye to his family after being arrested by police. He was an ardent Congressman. I have used monochrome because if there is something I want to say, it is best to avoid the dynamics of colour. Then you are not dealing with the man - the subject matter - any more,' Khanna said.
The artist then moves on to terrorists 'trying to find a target in the way Bhagat Singh scouted for one' and also 'reminisces about an English lady who taught his mother how to read and speak the language'.

'One of my canvases depicts my uncle going to Pakpattan, a neighbouring town, with his family. He is stopped by the police, who threaten to shoot him. Fortunately, they don't.

'Another composition is about the ethnic cleansing that took place soon after partition where a woman finds herself at the bottom of a horse cart during the ethnic cleansing and a former Parsi armyman turned dentist in Lahore,' the artist said, describing his new body of works.

The retrospective spans six of Khanna's works from 1943.

'One had to be choosy about the art works, but several of my compositions - especially the black and white series - are abroad in the US and Europe. There are a lot of holes in the chronology,' Khanna said.

Walking down memory lane, the artist said he enjoyed working on his black and white series of ink sketches that he started on while in Honolulu.

'I worked in a bath tub because I feared messing up the room. Most of them were shapes that I saw at the bottom of the tub. I used to pour water through the sides of the papers in rivulets to smudge the colours on the surface for a blurred look. It was a convenient method. I took most of my black-and-white works for an exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art in New York and at the Charles Egan Gallery,' Khanna recalled.

'You can see five of them at the National Gallery of Modern Art in the capital, which is also planning another retrospective,' the artist said.

Khanna lamented that 'his friend Tyeb Mehta, who grew up with him Lahore, could not manage a retrospective'.

'I am lucky that I did,' he said.

Born in 1925 at Faislabad in Pakistan, Khanna grew up in Lahore. He studied art after graduating from the Mayo School of Fine Arts. In 1947, his family moved to Shimla after partition. It found a way into his early works.

Most of Khanna's works are figurative. 'I used to do abstractions earlier, but now I have moved to human forms,' he said.

Khanna has always 'loved connecting to the masses through his art'.

'In the 1970s and the 80s, I painted a series of trucks ferrying workers - and coloured them with the shades of people and goods the vehicles were carrying. They were mostly monochromatic pictures,' he said.

Around the same time, the artist started working on Christ as a subject. 'I was looking at Jesus Christ as a holy and otherworldly person striving and going through existence. He was a carpenter's son and the state rose against him,' Khanna said.

'I know the Bible,' he added.

'If you look at my series on the Bandwallahs - whom I remember from my days in Lahore where the sahibs and the memsahibs used to listen to them - there is something sad about those people despite the colourful compostions. I have always tried to capture human emotions in my compositions - not make life studies,' Khanna said.

The artist, who has exhibited all over the world in his career spanning more than six decades, has been bestowed several honours, including the Lalit Kala Ratna from the president of India in 2004 and the Padma Shri in 1990.

(Madhusree Chatterjee can be contacted at madhu.c@ians.in)
Madhusree Chatterjee