Bad Science and Bad Economics of River Linking

The linking of the Godavari and the Krishna rivers in Andhra Pradesh, which was inaugurated last year, has started showing true colors. Fishermen of Tadepally village (Guntur district) on the banks of the Prakasam Barrage are complaining that a new species of fish, which was not seen in the river before, was damaging their nets and scaring away other fishes. Consequently, they say their catch, and earnings, have dropped. This fish has spike ridden body and is not edible. The Krishna fishermen who were expecting ‘pulasa’ fish, a delicacy of the people in Godavari district, to flow into the Krishna after the linking of two rivers, are disappointed.

'Rakashi', the Devil fish - Image source: scroll.in/ 

Last year I had posted an article in my blog ‘When Godavari Meets Krishna’ which drew criticisms from many.( http://lakshmividya.blogspot.in/2015/09/when-godavari-meets-krishna.html )They said people like me are against development. What is wrong in river linking if we can divert excess water which in any case flows into a sea? The very notion that rivers have ‘excess flood water which wastefully flows into sea’ is absolutely wrong. Interlinking of rivers will imbalance the pH levels of river which results in the destruction of aquatic flora and fauna. Not only the rivers, but the estuaries and the adjoining coastal zones too will get equally affected.

A year after the implementation of the much hyped Godavari- Krishna project, the fishermen, who hailed the government, are now complaining! They are catching a non-native carnivorous fish which is feeding on other fishes. They named it ‘Rakashi’ which in Telugu means ‘devil’. They also complain that the Rakashi’s fins get entangled in their nets, and it takes at least two hours to extricate it. If 10 such fish get entangled in one net, it can take the whole day to get them out. Fishermen say they are often forced to cut their nets to extricate these fish. This fish is neither a native of Krishna nor of Godavari. Fishermen claim that they are finding this fish only after the Pattiseema Lift Irrigation Project started. Fishermen say they had to dump their catch of almost 3 tons because of this fish.Now they are worried about their nets which costs thousands of rupees. Who will compensate and what is the future of their traditional profession? 

Now the government is waking up from slumber. The Department of Fisheries, Andhra Pradesh, says it is ‘investigating’ the causes for the appearance of Rakashi fish and experts are ‘studying’ the fish!

River is not just a certain volume of water that Pattiseema pumps can lift and throw!! And calling it ‘river linking’ is absolutely misleading. We have not understood the meaning of development. For us development is, construction of more and more dams, drying of water bodies so that we get more land space, construction of cement structures, establishing more industries- all this without properly studying the ecological impact. The suggestions of the experts in the field are either not sought or ignored, as lobbies behind such projects know very well that these scientists will say ‘NO’ to them.  

Bad science and good economics has tuned into bad science and bad economics!

Miss Adventure

I was born and raised in a tension free era. No running after school bus or gobbling breakfast; my morning musings were chirpings of birds, sounds of fluttering leaves, chanting of ‘karaagre vasate Lakshmi…’, the faint singing of the lady milking the cow- all rustic rhythms. I grew up in the calm and cool sleepy village- fearless, dare to experiment with new ideas, sometimes rebellious with never to give up attitude.

 When I was in school I didn’t have restrictions or objections playing with boys. We were a gang of three girls and five boys. I was the oldest of girls (I was in class 6) and Murthy was the oldest of the boys (he was in class 9). Soon after the school we were playing in the fields running along the path between the sugarcane fields, playing hide and seek in palm groves. There was a huge tamarind tree at the far back of our house. We were scared to go near the tree- there was an unusual aroma around during the day, the monstrous shades of its branches at late evenings scared us. But, truly, the swaying tree branches inspired me; it aroused the burning desire of the swing- going up till the sky, then come down to touch the ground only to push it higher. I had seen the film heroine doing this and wanted the same experience.

 We lived in a ‘vathara’ (cluster of small independent houses with common front and backyard). We had a jasmine plant right in front of my house. The jasmine creeper was quite grown up, the branches tangled and twined with each other to form a strong knitted flat swing. Every evening I and another girl used to climb on to the jasmine swing, pluck jasmine buds, sing, and sway. Wow!! What a wonderful experience it was!! My desire to swing high was on fire!!

 I had a secret meeting with Murthy to plan a big swing. I explained the complete plan- a wooden swing tied to a branch of the tree!! I graphically described how we tie the swing to the branch, make others sit in the center of the swing and each of us stand on either side of the swing facing each other, hold the rope in both hands and push the swing with feet. He was little scared. ‘Nooo…’, he said. I told him to be brave as he was a boy! We needed a long and little wide wooden plank and a thick rope. Where to get? When I told him ‘where and how’, he screamed. Again I had to remind him that he was a boy, as brave as me!! He teased me, ‘Oho! You are Jhansi Rani!’

 Those days well water was the only source of fresh water for us. We had not seen taps at all. Women of our ‘vathara’ drew water from a nearby well off the backyard. Every house had a rope. The rope used to be on the pulley of the well from morning six to evening six. I knew this. There was a carpentry workshop a little away from my house. Murthy knew this. We decided to steal rope and wooden plank!! I was thrilled!!! Daytime theft!! I decided to take a trustworthy girl from our gang to assist me. We waited for the women to leave the place with their filled metal pots. “What are you doing here Lakshmi?” Nanjamma, Murthy’s mom, yelled at me. ‘Playing hide and seek, atthe’, I grinned. (‘Atthe’ in Kannada means aunt; we used to fondly call neighboring ladies ‘atthe’ and men ‘maava’.  No uncle-aunty business!).  She didn’t appear convinced by my reply. She was turning back and watching us with spying eyes. ‘What hiding and what seeking she doesn’t know’, the girl with me smiled with a wink in her eye.

 Finally the much awaited moment came. Quickly I ran towards the well, released the rope from the pulley, clumsily folded it and rushed to the tree without forgetting to take the one that I had taken from my home and hid near the bush. Murthy was waiting with the wooden plank. He had brought another boy of his class to help him. We tied the ropes on both the sides of the plank and the edges on to the tree branch. Swing was ready. Every evening we enjoyed the swing. My joy knew no bounds. This went on for a month or so. One fine day the already worn out rope gave in. Murthy fell down and was hurt badly, the plank tilted the children slid and fell; I held the edge of the plank for some time and fell down. Thank god!!!

 The dry paddy and sugarcane grass spread below saved us from injury. Nanjammatthe blamed me for everything; told that Murthy couldn’t do all that and advised my mom to have an eye on her daughter.

 Don’t know where Murthy is today. But I remember our adventure and laugh, miss those days. My sympathies with today’s children. Their childhood is lost somewhere, minds are conditioned, and their thinking is narrowed down only to their studies. If left free to think independently, children fantasize and imagine. Children these days are hooked by mass media at an early age. Their fantasies are ready-made fantasies of TV, sold fantasies and fake ones, not their own. There is a close connection between childhood imagination and adult passion. A happy child grows into a happy adult, sees beauty everywhere, and respects life as a gift of God.  

Valluvarkottam: A Monument for a Poet

Steaming weather, roaring traffic, infectiously enthusiastic people, and tradition layered with 
cosmopolitan glamour, diverse neighborhood, friendly people – this is Chennai. It is my passion and ever burning desire to visit places of historical interest. It is an indispensible part of all my tours.

During my recent short visit to Chennai for some personal work, I had an opportunity to visit a very interesting place. After finishing our work we were left with a few hours to spare. We thought of visiting Huddleston Gardens of Theosophical Society in Adyar, which houses an oriental library and a small museum. But we had to drop the idea due to the distance from our place of stay to Adyar and also the heavy traffic in that route. While exploring the nearby interesting places, we came to know about Valluvarkottam. Quickly we took a cab and reached in 15 minutes.

Valluvarkottam is a historical monument built in 1976 in the honour of the well-known Tamil poet Tiruvalluvar who composed Thirukkural more than 2000 years ago. Historians believe that Kural was composed by Valluvar during 3rd Sangam period and is anterior to the Tamil epics, Shilappadigaram and Manimekhalai as they have references to a few couplets from Kural in them.

Tirukkural consists of 1330 couplets arranged in 133 chapters, each chapter having 10 couplets. Each couplet (in Kannada Dwipadi- two line poetry) has four words in the 1st line and three words in the second line.133 chapters are divided into three cantos (sections into which a long poem is divided). Scholars are of the view that these divisions are based on four Purusharthas (Dharma, Artha, Kama and Moksha).  Valluvar focuses on only the first three purusharthas in Kural- Virtue, Wealth and Passion. This reminded me of Bhatrhari’s trishatakas - Sringara, Neeti and, Vairagya shatakas which are related to personal life, social life and spirituality.

Valluvarkottam temple is dedicated to Tiruvalluvar and is built in the shape of a stone chariot (39 m high), the octagonal sanctum is located at the height of 30 ft and consists of the life size image of Valluvar. There is a huge auditorium in front of the chariot temple. One has to climb a few steps from the auditorium to reach the terrace that connects the sanctum of Tiruvalluvar. The stone chariot has four magnificently carved wheels- 2 big at the ends and 2 small in the middle. The auditorium is very unique. It is very spacious to accommodate 4000 people at a time and is constructed without any supporting pillars or columns. When we visited, the new interior work was going on.

The most interesting and unique feature of Valluvarkottam is 1330 verses of the epic

Thirukkural that are engraved on the granite columns in the facade hall corridors, enclosing the vast auditorium called Kural Balcony. Interestingly three different colored granite stones have been used to represent three cantos of Kural. The first section (Chapter 1-38, 380 couplets) dealing with dharma is engraved on black granite, the second section (Chapter 39-108, 700 couplets) dealing with Artha inscribed on grey granite and the third section (Chapter 109-133, 250 couplets) dealing with love and passion are inscribed on red granite. The design of granite slab is also unique- it appears like the leaf of an open book.

Here is a photo of Thirukkural couplet displayed in French in a train in France. It also mentions the name of Thiruvalluvar. 

 http://outshine-ga-ga.blogspot.in/2012/08/thirukural-displayed-in-french-in.html 

Gandhiji said that he had learnt Tamil only to enable him to study Thiruvalluvar’s Kural through his mother tongue itself. He also said, there is none who has given such a treasure of wisdom like him.  It is interesting to note that Gandhiji came to know of Thirukkural, through Leo Tolstoy, the Russian Philosopher and writer. In 1908 Tolstoy wrote a letter titled “A letter to a Hindu”. The letter was later translated and published by Mahatma Gandhiji with an introduction.

http://www.online-literature.com/tolstoy/2733/ 

This great monumental tribute to the poet will be more meaningful, if the auditorium is used for literary activities instead of using for exhibitions. While going around the granite columns, we were taken aback and were disappointed to see pan stains on them. It was horrifying to see people indiscriminately spitting on the inscribed holy Kural verses, which is nothing but a disrespect to the great sage. The corridors are very badly maintained and are public facilities stinking. The security arrangement is made only to look after the temple chariot and the sanctum. When asked the security and others, they told that people go there only to see the chariot and the statue, hardly anybody enquires the inscribed stones. We had to literally search for the entry point to reach the Kural Balcony.

Kural has been translated into almost all languages of the world. L.Gundappa who was a professor of Kannada in Mysore University has translated Kural into Kannada in 1960 (not the first person to translate though).

The most important features of Thirukkural are: it is secular in nature- Valluvar has not mentioned the name of any religion, it is universal and everlasting and its messages transcend time. Right from the first and till the end of Thirukkural, Thiruvalluvar has avoided a regional approach – he has never used the word Tamil or Tamilnadu. Thiruvalluvar belonged to a world two thousand years ago, which was divided into many kingdoms who were into many battles and conflicts. But Thiruvalluvar has dreamt of an ideal world and his suggestions and advices are a boon to our age to guide us to shape a wonderful new world.

At the end of the day we felt so blessed that our hearts filled with satisfaction of spending our time usefully.