Essays exploring the vast repository of the Hindu Cultural ethos
The first and greatest thing about Deewaar is the fact that it truly is a fantastic piece of cinema. It is also why it has endured as a classic. The storytelling is simply compelling, a big reason for its repeat value. Indeed, there is truth in the near-universal consensus
Let’s look at two representative instances[i] from the post-independence history of India drawn at random. Both concern the same people, both are related to each other and both provide a good framework of reference to understand much of the seventy-year-long national economic woe that followed.
By the time Girish Karnad wrote Agni Mattu Male (The Fire and The Rain) in the early 1990s, he had already pocketed the Sangeet Natak Akademi Award, the Padmashri, the Padmabhushan, and the Karnataka Sahitya Parishad Award…all of which he had amassed on the wreckage of Indian culture and
One of the distinctive features of the protracted Muslim rule in medieval India was the heartless manner in which it comprehensively impoverished Hindus—physically, spiritually, morally, culturally, and economically. This impoverishment was by design, and it was largely faithful to the tenets of Islamic statecraft and polity, which mandated zimmi
Yayati is Girish Karnad’s first play, written in Kannada when he was twenty-three years old. It is also his seminal work of cultural vandalism, his first attempt at massacring everything that the Indian tradition and culture holds sacred, sublime, elevating, and valuable. Published in 1961, the instant success
In my memoriam essay on Girish Karnad’s death, I had remarked that Girish Karnad was a mediocre director and a terrible playwright. Starting with this piece, we will examine a few prominent plays and cinema of Girish Karnad if only to puncture the hot-air balloon of unearned fame
Nobody—including me—perhaps knows who Baba Madhavdas was. Suffice to say that he was akin to the countless millions of Sadhus and Babas who dot the sacred geography of Bharatavarsha who do no “productive” work but without who Bharatavarsha will lapse and descend into India. I first read about
This is the concluding part of the series contrasting the helplessness of Europe against Islamic migrants and the resilience of Bharatavarsha
सन्ति सिद्धरसप्रख्या ये च रामायणादयः । कथाश्रया न तैर्योज्या स्वेच्छा रसविरोधिनी ॥ The Ramayana, Mahabharata, and other classics of their calibre provide us all the material we need to deliver Rasa (emotion,
In this Series The Notre Dame Fire and the Hindu Civilisational Resilience: Europe on the Brink The Christian Darkness of the West and the Atman of Hindu Civilisation Let’s consider three random but eminently representative episodes from Dr. S.L. Bhyrappa’s three different novels. In a fine and