GODAVARI DAYS AND AFTER (NEW BLOG)

A-32 DEATH OF GRAND FATHER---END OF AN ERA

2012-08-17T22:51:00.003-07:00

Our two younger uncles are very hard working and resourceful. One of our uncles stayed with a big Ayurvedic drug manufacturing company near Rajahmundry ( manufacturing traditional Indian medicine) and got a licence to practice as “Ayurvedic” doctor. Our youngest uncle similarly became an expert watch repairer and became a local dealer for a famed watch company. But they left these odd jobs when they were selected for junior clerk posts in the local revenue subdivision office at Polavaram.(They worked for twenty five years in Polavaram and and nearby towns in revenue department and got promoted as senior supervisors).

Grandfather’s anxieties were at last over. All his sons were settled in jobs and life was going on happily. Our two younger uncles stayed with their parents in the ancestral house .Many relations praised grandfather for giving modern education to his children even if much land was sold in the process.

Now there was question of marriage of his three sons.(The eldest son was already married).In next few years he celebrated the marriages one after another with much pomp. Some more land was disposed off. As mentioned above father worked for about three years in schools at Polavaram and in the vicinity and then went away to a distant town Bhadrachalam .

Now there was a new chapter in the families. Grandfather was getting tired. He was a very traditional religious man and was always immersed in his long worship ceremonies,fasting,pilgrimages and attending religious discourses. He commanded great respect .Everyone was in awe of him as he was a very reserved and contemplative person always immersed in his philosophy and mythology books and in his worship ceremonies in the prayer room.

He was clearly getting tired of the new urbanised industrial type culture creeping even to the little towns like Polavaram. People even in the family were changing in their ways and outlooks and responses. He could not adjust to the coming new world which must have looked ugly to him!

Though father and uncles treated grandfather and grandmother as their greatest treasures and feeling grateful to them for their present positions in their lives, grandfather and grandmother more and more withdrew to their spiritual universe dominated by religious rituals .Such break in cultures brought about by the industrial revolution and urbanisation has become common since about one hundred and fifty years in all countries of the world and in present times spread to every nook and corner of the world.

Around 1927 our grand father (the grand old man) passed away after a brief illness after returning from a long tiring pilgrimage. It was terrible shock to all the families. Grandmother was shattered and her sons were her only comfort

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A-31 SELLING AWAY LANDS

2012-08-17T22:48:00.003-07:00

Our grandfather had to sell some more land to meet the heavy expenditure relating to father’s college study for four years . But grandfather was very particular that father should complete his B.A and B.Ed degrees. We had a paternal aunt who was an younger sister of my father. In those times girls were prohibited from moving out of house and so she had only a formal education. But she was a voracious reader of religious books and educated herself in a traditional way. She soon could be considered a very literate person and like her mother read the Telugu language versions of Ramayana and Mahabharata from end to end. Like her mother she was an imperious and dictatorial person affectionately “controlling” the family.

Soon she was married to a teacher belonging to a rich Godavari delta town. It must have been a grand function attended by a large number of relations. Marriages in those days were grand functions celebrated for three days or more. Father and uncles were really overjoyed. In those days relations would stay for a week. The house was busy for days as never before. Grandfather sold some more land but it was unavoidable.

My father soon completed his graduation and the teacher’s training course. He was the first graduate in the family. Grandfather’s and grandmother’s joy knew no bounds as their son's illustrious teaching career was launched .All our uncles and near relatives felt happy. Father too was thankful to everybody in the family.

He was posted as a graduate teacher in the local middle school at Polavaram on probation. For about three years he worked in middle schools in Polavaram and in other towns in the vicinity. Then came the big chance when he was posted to the high school at Bhadrachalam a most famous temple town on banks of Godavari and about 70 or 80 kilometres upstream from Polavaram.

Time goes on and painful family partings are inevitable. Our father soon shifted to Bhadrachalam .Our eldest uncle too soon moved to schools in faraway towns and rarely visited Polavaram. As land was being sold frequently to meet the heavy family expenditures our uncles decided that they would not go to college. It was a very great sacrifice on their part and made both their elder brothers a little sad.

A-30 FATHER'S COLLEGE EDUCATION--THE FIRST GRADUATE

2012-08-17T22:38:00.000-07:00

My father was the second son and was very bookish and already seemed as a professor of English to everybody in the family. He was already reading fat books—the dramas of Shakespeare, English poetry anthologies and history and western philosophy books much beyond his age. He obtained old books from college students (studying at Rajahmundry) when they came to Polavaram for holidays. Grandfather was much pleased with this interest of father in English books.

Grandfather wanted to see him as a high school teacher or as a lawyer. At that time a distant relative of ours was working in Rajahmundry as a junior grade revenue officer ( a big post for Indians in those days). He was from the old family from which grandfather was adopted into our family decades earlier. The relative took a great fancy for my father seeing the latter's interest in English literature. He told grandfather to send father to Rajahmundry college to study for B.A. and for the “bachelor of education” degrees. He said that father would then most surely get a high school teacher's post. Grandfather was fully convinced.

Our elder uncle who already entered the teaching proffessio too insisted on sending father to Rajahmundry. It was for a few weeks an issue that dominated all discussions in the house. Thus it was that Father studied F.A.(a pre-degree course of those days for two years) and B.A.( of two year duration). He studied at the famed Arts College of Rajahmundry and was a student of Dr.Radhakrishnan (subsequently President of India) when the latter was a senior lecturer at that college. Mr.T.Prakasham a famous chief minister of our Telugu state was also a college mate! Father stayed for a time at the above said relative's house to adjust to the busy city routine and soon joined a hostel. In continuation he did the teacher training course.

A-29 MORE ABOUT OUR ELDER UNCLE

2012-08-17T22:36:00.001-07:00

He was the eldest son and had the foremost place in the affection of his parents. He it was who introduced the bicycle in the family. it was a "Raleigh-- made in Great Britain". There were later two or three cycles of that brand Remington typewriters in the ancestral house. In those days the foreign made bicycles, typewriters etc were easily available in Rajahmundry.

He now and then visited Rajahmundry and spent money a little lavishly visiting special literary meets of Telugu poets and the Telugu drama theatres. He was much loved by his younger brothers. He soon got married and went away on his job to distant villages. (This was all many decades before I was even born! All things I mentioned above about my elder uncle were very later learned from my other uncles when I myself entered government job in the far southern part of our Telugu state and visited Polavaram occasionally. I was much interested in our family history and its old secrets).

later after father became a high school teacher and worked at distant Bhadrachalam and Kunavaram for fifteen years or more. When father was at Kunavaram i.e. when I was just twelve years old our elder uncle took ill and became completely bed ridden and soon passed away. I did not know him much but remember vividly one occasion when during his long illness he called me towards him and talked most affectionately with kind and bright eyes. There was great kindness and spirituality in the face.

His wife (our revered elder aunt) predeceased him by many years. He had four daughters all at least 15 years elder to me. They were all married to rich land owners and went away when we were still little children. However I remember that when they visited the ancestral house with their little children for a few days there was great joy and much hustle and bustle. I remember my brothers in law also very well. Later when I entered job I met them during some marriage functions. They were purely agricultural people and dressed like farmers and smoked cigars. But they were such extremely nice people that we of the next generation could cut jokes about their rural manners . They would laugh aloud enjoying the jokes.

A-28 GRANDFATHER'S IMMENSE INTEREST IN ENGLISH EDUCATION

2012-08-17T22:31:00.000-07:00

GRANDFATHER’S TIME

To speak the simple truth I can say that all our families took to English education at the first opportunity with a hope to join at least as clerks in govt offices or as teachers in schools. But at home all families were very conservative.

In those far off days (i.e. about 90 years ago before the present times!) the only way to continue education after the middle school at Polavaram was to go to Rajahmundry or other big towns nearby and to stay and study there. It meant high expense for the family. Even for the education at middle school at Polavaram ,grandfather spent a lot of money and sold a few acres of land . He wanted all his sons to have the minimum of good modern education.

My elder uncle (the eldest son of our grandfather) always dreamed of becoming a teacher. He was a very gentle and philosophic person like my father and treated teaching as a most holy profession. He dreamed of inculcating a nationalist spirit among children of all sections of society by giving best of modern education . he believed that indians should come out of their ostrich like attitude. His aims were very sublime and he was a very committed person. Soon after his eighth class he went to Rajahmundry, completed the high school course and underwent a teacher training course there.

Immediately he got posted as a teacher in an elementary school in a nearby village. He was overjoyed for being able to fulfil his ambition. The entire family felt happy as the eldest son of the family got the first government job .From that time he became entirely immersed in his teaching work and became quite aloof and contemplative. He was perhaps himself researching on good teaching methods. All must have been amused at his extraordinary interest in teaching.

A-27 PREACHING AND PRACTICING OPPOSITE THINGS

2012-08-17T08:21:00.004-07:00

The moral fibre in people of India for last two or three millennia was because of the great moral training given by the mothers to their sons and daughters from childhood. There are numerous stories of great kings and emperors being trained by their mothers in high morality and spiritualism on the basis of stories from Ramayana and Mahabharata. The high morality and reckless courage of Indians for countless centuries and millennia is due to such training.

Both Gandhi and Nehru realized the existence of this high spirituality in the common folk of India. These common folk unbelievably became the raw material to create heroic and fearless freedom fighters to fight the mighty British. It is most wonderful to note that these spiritual minded freedom fighters used only a method of very nonviolent civil disobedience. Gandhi, the Mahatma (the great soul) fully succeeded in his efforts. It is unfortunate that young people of India are not only losing interest in Ramayana and Mahabharata but also mock at them and make fun of them.

However there is a reason for their big vexation and their great anger. Horrible inequalities had been existing in society for the last 3000 years in spite of all moralizing in the big books. In modern India in spite of people swearing day in and day out on Mahatma Gandhi the rich grow richer and poor become poorer. Good education is not available equitably to all. Modern health facilities are not within reach of poor and rural people. Women are horribly victimised.

Modern education has one great benefit. It completely liberated woman and created a determination in them to fight for their safety. It appears that in this male oriented, business oriented and money oriented world the weaker sex should take up arms and learn all types of self defence techniques .

A-26 WHAT DOES ANCIENT HINDU PHILOSOPHY SAY

2012-08-17T07:59:00.000-07:00

These books state that god comes flying from his realm of golden palaces to serve the poorest person. The books tell that if even the poorest man does his duty towards family and society in a most selfless way he is treated by the god almighty as his equal ! After death god almighty offers to such a selfless worker permanently a golden throne in his own heaven equal to his own throne.

Even the greatest devotees, emperors and professors who are in heaven have to wait in god’s antechamber till god almighty completes his ceremonies of honouring the poor selfless man. These books say that even the heaven where the minor gods live is far inferior to the glorious place where the omnipotent almighty lives! A human being or even a minor god has to pass through a million births and deaths to get purified and reach almighty’s own abode.

Such sublime truths are taught by every religion on earth. Ramayana and Mahabharata too taught for last three millenniums such sublime truths through beautiful stories. The mythological stories preach great optimism and provide aim for human birth in the style of a best management professor. This is perhaps the reason why we can perceive extremely artistic and spiritual manners in women of India because they almost daily read some section or the other of these two great books.

The women thus trained are intolerant of injustice, falsehood,cruelty etc. When they feel angered they become lionesses. They imagine the one invisible formless almighty god of the universe in a few extremely beautiful artistic, saintly gods and goddesses . They fully believe in these beautiful gods and goddesses and , in their imaginations, live for hours in the beautiful world of these gods . They in their hearts converse with these gods as if they are present in person before them.

A-25 WOMEN AT HOME ARE THE NATURAL TEACHERS

2012-08-17T07:51:00.002-07:00

Let us go to the main point of discussion i.e. dignity of women in society. We should not treat house bound woman anywhere on earth as unintelligent,dull and confused. They are only silent sufferers . they have great mental energy. They can think with composure and make great sacrifices for welfare of the family.

Where does this mental energy in woman come from? Let us think for a while only about the traditional women who lived in india’s villages and towns for thousands of years. Perhaps because they stay at house for long periods ,they have the advantage of calmly contemplating on family’s problems both from practical/financial view. Far more importantly they also think of all problems from a spiritual view . Perhaps they have the capacity to think delicately and in a noble manner. They can be contemplative while simultaneously attending to the house chores. What they want is only security of a home.

Every culture on earth has undiminishing “spiritual capital” that helps in ensuring very high morality and building up character of citizens. In India also Hinduism has such undiminishing spiritual capital. Every Hindu woman whether rich or poor, literate or illiterate ,rural or urban is trained from childhood by the wonderful mythological stories of Ramayana and Mahabharata .The stories provide pictures of ideal men and women who led extremely beautiful,artistic, ethical and spiritual lives. The stories also help people keep the mystic view and philosophic view of life foremost in their minds.

This had been happening in Indian society since last three millenniums or more. Such great books preaching high morality and spirituality exist in every country and every society.Jawaharlal Nehru said that for last three millenniums building of the moral character of Indians (i.e. Hindu section) was taken care of by Ramayana and Mahabharata.

Let us examine whether his remark is correct. These books stress that the real life of man is the life of “hereafter” and that after death there is a real heaven there, that man is actually a spark of the great god almighty, and that earth is laboratory for spiritual advancement of man. These books stress only the spiritual and beautiful afterlife and optimistically declare that there is an extremely kind all powerful god almighty who looks after the welfare of even the poorest man,woman and child.

A-24 MISUSE OF SCIENCE IN THE MODERN WORLD

2012-08-17T07:49:00.000-07:00

In this modern globalized world some people under influence of modern industrial culture (or anti-culture) are losing equilibrium of mind and losing sight of spiritual value of human life. only spiritual values can bring art and beauty to life. This anti-culture is not western culture but only a misconception of science .Some modern developments in science are leading to a cynical approach both in men and women towards life. The aim of science is to bring a golden age of prosperity, racial equality and racial friendship.

Instead of using science in the right way to remove the social ,cultural and economic imbalances in society which existed for last 5000 or 6000 or more years and to create a golden age of equality, friendship and a noble global spirituality ,it is being used in wrong way to amass wealth at breakneck speed .The misuse of science has spread to the individual level. An example .some people misuse cell phone to commit frauds.

Education,religion,art,spirituality and philosophy are fast loosing attraction. Politics has become one more business. Most unfortunately women are treated as pure articles of pleasure. The entire idea of marriage and spirituality is being laughed at. There is urgent need for reducing poverty in poor people on the one hand and to lessen the attraction for material riches and to create interest in art and spirituality on the other.

It appears there is need for a sustained intellectual movement for re-establishing dignity of women. It cannot be achieved by one speech,one book,one film or one TV serial. The issue it is the most serious one on earth now notwithstanding all propaganda. The problem should be analysed through debates in schools,colleges and universities.

Along with every other subject of study in schools,colleges and university (whether physics or chemistry, engineering or medicine, economics or English literature etc) a subject “the problem of ensuring a respectful position to women in this industrial age” should be studied. One of the greatest duties of men as taught by all religions is to protect and respect women and let them live their domestic life peacefully. There is a saying in Sanskrit language that if smiles dance on the innocent women faces even the gods feel happy. We should not forget that in inculcating good qualities in children woman plays the major part.

A-23 TRADITIONAL INDIAN WOMEN

2012-08-17T06:10:00.001-07:00

TRADITIONAL LIFE

I heard some years ago a speaker at a college debate haughtily declare that the traditional Indian rural woman without education is like a plant growing in shade away from sunlight and that the English educated modern Indian woman is like a plant growing under bright sun. This is no doubt utterly wrong.

Women everywhere on the planet have great capacity for hard work and are courageous, tolerant and have a contemplative mentality. They possess great common sense and can realize earlier than their men what is good for their families. The traditional women of India are not different. Rural /urban women of India whether literate or illiterate do not lag behind women of other countries in any way.

They are expert moral teachers and very philosophic, selfless and otherworldly and are the real builders of India in ancient or modern times. They train children in high morality and heroism from childhood just like women anywhere on earth. They are intelligent, brave and sacrificing in spite of poverty .They worship their most beautiful and artistic and heroic gods fervently and innocently(as fervently and innocently as children) not for their own personal benefit but only to ask for welfare of their family members.

The traditional women of the old generation who still form the majority are very calm and have great strength of mind because they strictly train their minds by self controlling exercises like fasts, reading great philosophic and religious books etc. They are calm and strong in mind unlike some of the men folk who lose capacity to think clearly and cannot distinguish what is good or bad.

A-22 THE OLD STYLES ARE FAST DISAPPEARING

2012-08-17T06:05:00.003-07:00

In Polavaram of our days (fifty years ago) there were hundreds of thatched huts big and small some as sturdy as the tiled houses with good stone foundations and strong brick walls while some were very delicate. Huts of people of poorer sections were grouped together in one locality as per their occupation. There was a very busy main road with big cloth shops, grocery stores, bicycle repair shops etc.

One or two storeyed houses of rich people were seen on the side roads in between the houses of poorer sections. There were also small sized cloth shops, grocery stores, tea stalls etc . There was lot of greenery everywhere. There were coconuts trees and fruit trees in front yard of almost every house. Such greenery is very much lacking in houses in modern cities. Instead there are heaps of filth and the city lanes are no different from slums. Life goes on at breakneck speed in modern times . There is no proper appreciation of the spiritual and mystic significance of nature. As the British poet W.H.Davies said

"What is this life if, full of care,
We have no time to stand and stare.
No time to stand beneath the boughs
And stare as long as sheep or cows.
No time to see, when woods we pass,
Where squirrels hide their nuts in grass.
No time to see, in broad daylight,
Streams full of stars, like skies at night.

No time to turn at Beauty's glance,
And watch her feet, how they can dance.
No time to wait till her mouth can
Enrich that smile her eyes began.
A poor life this if, full of care,
We have no time to stand and stare".

It is likely that the gigantic Polavaram-Indirasagar dam may come up as a single giant dam or a series of lower level dams. There is much activity and heavy machinery on wheels frequently rolls through the middle of the little town and creating lot of din. But the river front is as beautiful and calm as ever. Our brother sold away his house and settled in Rajahmundry. All of us ,the other members of our family, shifted to Warangal near the city of Hyderabad . We entirely lost connection with Polavaram. Our two uncles passed away while at Polavaram. All our cousin brothers (sons and daughters of our two uncles) also left the place due to government employment and settled in other places. In olden days after the British left the administrative importance of Polavaram was reduced. The Indian government does not seem to have properly recognised its importance as a place through which all development activity of the forest area and tribal area could be controlled. This is because it is out of the main train and road routes. It was just a minor riverside town having a rich agriculture. But the situation has entirely changed now with initiating action to build dam/dams across Godavari in the vicinity. Polavaram now figures on the international map

We migrated from that place fifty years ago. However the beautiful nature and the heavenly river Godavari are the unbreakable link and perennial attraction for a few persons of our generation like me. My attraction towards the riverside nature has only increased and it is purely spiritual . The lines of Wordsworth about the field of dancing yellow daffodils come to mind.

“For oft, when on my couch I lie
In vacant or in pensive mood,
They flash upon that inward eye
Which is the bliss of solitude;
And then my heart with pleasure fills,
And dances with the daffodils.”

A-21 THE RADIO AND CINEMA (CONTD)

2012-08-17T05:50:00.001-07:00

Only after we shifted to Warangal city near Hyderabad we came under the coverage of the powerful Hyderabad radio transmitter. Since there were no microwave transmissions (signals of TV) in those days, the talking and singing from the radio came to us in a most perfect way except during the stormy weather. After coming to Hyderabad I came under the magical spell of Hindi film songs and Hindustani classical music mainly through radio. The radio developed in everybody a taste for good music.

The spell cast by “Radio Ceylon Hindi service” was very powerful and unbeatable. Only through it I heard for the first time the wonderful silken voices of Md Rafi, Lata Mangeshkar and Mukhesh. Soon came the “Vividh Bharathi” bringing longer sessions of most beautiful Hindi film music throughout the day. Hindustani ragas,bhajan music,ghazals,qawwalis ,Meera bhajans,rural songs etc which are the fountains from which the Hindi film songs came were broadcast by “Vividh Bharathi”. VB competed with Radio Ceylon Hindi service in entertaining Indian people of all states. But none can forget the high standards set by the radio Ceylon in music broadcasting in the earlier days. The transistor radio played a most central part. The small audio casette tape players came only decades later. Forty years ago we luckily had radio broadcasts without commercial advertisements!

After I joined government job and got my own earning I purchased a high quality Philips brand transistor radio, not a tiny pocket sized one but one could be kept on the table like the big radio or can be easily carried from room to room.

I immediately started tuning the foreign English stations. I first “discovered” the existence of these foreign stations many years ago in my brother’s house when I tuned the shortwave section of the big valve radio and news readers of two or three English stations came loud and clear . I was simply dumbfounded then after knowing that so much knowledge equal to a modern English college hid in the radio. The shortwave was free of any disturbance from storm and lightning. My wonder and joy at being able to hear international news on BBC and VOA(Voice of America) was very great.

They had many science and technology programmes, history and politics programmes and beautiful western music both classical and modern that were greatly pleasing to the ear. I found that whenever I switched on the transistor even in middle of night there were up to the minute international news and reports from some foreign English station.

My big table transistor could catch foreign broadcasts easily -- broadcasts from national radios of Switzerland, France, Japan, Germany, Australia, Canada, Philippines etc and also the radio of United Nations. I could get Radio Moscow and “Radio Peking”. I greatly enjoyed the ringing sounds of the Big Ben and the signature tune of BBC. The signature tunes of the Indian radio and the Voice of America radio were also majestic and very attractive. Is the planet so small I began to wonder.

In a few months I could distinguish between different national styles of music –the African.South American,Chinese,Iranian,Pakistani etc .I could distinguish between different foreign languages and different north Indian languages . For me in those days searching for English language stations became an obsession and was like today’s hobby of mine to glance on the Internet through the electronic versions of English language newspapers from all continents.

I consider hearing over the radio about the moon lading by the great Neil Armstrong as a high point in my radio listening hobby. One night around 11pm I heard over BBC the great announcement of the moon landing. I do not remember whether I heard the great words spoken by Neil Armstrong on the moon’s surface-- about the “great step for mankind” etc. When I wrote a letter to the VOA they sent me a photo of the three astronauts and an annual time table about the VOA science programmes both of which I preserved for a long time . I was introduced to the western music by BBC and VOA and since then I became a great admirer of western pop music.

The power of the “old gold”( the old black and white Hindi films of Raj Kapoor-Dilipkumar-DevAnand era and the golden music of Md Rafi-Lata Mageshkar-Mukhesh era) can never be underestimated. They have now become a perfect readymade “celluloid and electronic literature” for protecting and projecting traditional Indian culture and teaching it to future generations . This Hindustani music and cinema stood up boldly to the challenges of the all devouring western culture.

Everybody saw those old films two or three times and some saw ten times. Now I have a library of CDs and DVDs of more than fifty Hindi and Telugu films of the “old gold” category. How lucky I am I feel! I saw each film ten or fifteen times but they are still as sweet as ever. A few hundred films of the later eras (after the Raj Kapoor era) are also great. These old films have become great protectors of our tradition- based Indian culture.

It was possible in those days for the entire family to go to see a Telugu film. The films were so neat and tidy without obscenities. Those old Telugu films can also be called as “golden films”.Entire family,young and old , parents and children all could see them together and feel relaxed. The films portrayed traditional values. The songs were melodious as they mostly imitated the evergreen rural tunes sung by the farming communities and had great poetry in them. Very nice mythological films were also made and they were enjoyed by one and all.

How horrible are present films showing fraudulent cynical people. But even such films have their value. Even in these bad days there are simple men and women who believe that the world is good and is protected by good people. But we see daily many reports about fraud, murder, violence etc .So ordinary people should be educated about corrupt leaders, wily lawyers , insincere teachers ,habituated criminals etc by showing such characters on the silver screen.

There is cut throat competition and social conflicts and the people of this jet age should be alert about the cruel,cynical and lawless people pretending outwardly as gentle souls. In spite of hurting our sensitivities the modern films portray the typical bad man and thus help instruct each one of the millions and millions of ordinary Indians to be careful in dealing with people.

(A-20) THE RADIO AND CINEMA 50 YEARS AGO

2012-08-16T23:00:00.004-07:00

The big valve radio cast as much spell as the colour television of today. The morning news in Telugu and English and the long classical music broadcasts were heard daily .The two hour long broadcasts starting at four-o’clock in afternoon from Radio Ceylon ( owned by the government of Sri Lanka then called Ceylon) which broadcast film songs in all the major Indian languages in mornings and evenings in fixed hours was the greatest entertainment channel . Finest Telugu and Tamil film songs broadcast over it for two long hours under the guidance of stylish and highly professional announcers cast a spell on the young people as thoroughly as modern television .The evening broadcasts for our area were from the major Telugu radio station Vijayawada starting from six pm and going upto 11 pm . It broadcast great programmes about Telugu culture,customs,festivals etc .Every minute of the broadcast was interesting and heard by entire family.

I remember how in evenings all would sit in the big hall to hear the radio and talk and gossip when brother was away.There were many chairs and a big sofa. Big white translucent globes containing bright electric lamps were fixed to the ceiling and filled the room with soft light. Our cousin brothers too would come and there was lot of loud conversation, arguing and laughter.

The Hyderabad station was very distant and the broadcasts were weak compared to Vijayawada. There was no radio station at Visakhapatnam. It was a great era without the boring artless commercial advertisements. But there were nice and famous advertisements from the radio Ceylon and they were as popular with children as the TV advertisements of today.

(A-19) OLD DAYS IN POLAVARAM

2012-08-16T22:51:00.002-07:00

I lived for nearly 12 years outside before coming to polavaram for high school studies. So I could become familiar with ancestral house and my cousin brothers and our two uncles’ families only after father’s retirement. All my senior cousin brothers married and went away to far away cities. My two uncles were nearing their retirement after serving in the local revenue sub divisional office for twenty five years or more. At the first look the old ancestral house was only like any other old house but soon it cast its spell as it was associated with our families of three generations.

My brother who was an engineer at Rajahmundry purchased a big house at Polavaram. It was a few years before we came from Bhadrachalam. It was a spacious beautiful house with ten rooms with a big central hall. They were times when the property prices were not high. Perhaps only during pre-independence days the town had any importance with many offices of the British rulers to control and modernize the adjoining tribal area. Only during that period it gained some importance. The “zamindar” too left for the city and then to other foreign lands. Polavaram faced a steady decline.

The giant Polavaram project which is now materializing before our eyes did not figure even in the dreams in those days. The town was small and far away from the main rail and road routes. My brother’s house was modified and partly reconstructed. It was a very strong building. I saw several large scale modifications going on like laying of concrete slabs over the doors and windows and even suggested some abstract designs decorative panels of the main entrance. I still remember the grand religious ceremony sanctifying the new house and how we all did not have sleep in the previous night.

There were perhaps a hundred educated families of the powerful castes and rich agricultural castes. But the educated sons and daughters in most families were in those times already deserting the town in large numbers. They were acquiring big qualifications and joined big jobs and were migrating permanently to the major city of India like Delhi,Mumbai and Chennai and also Hyderabad.

Even in my time very big and spacious tiled houses lay half ruined. Seeing such buildings during my occasional visits greatly saddened me. Perhaps some of the owners were in faraway countries like Germany, US and UK and did not care about these properties. But now after start of the Polavaram project works started and the prices skyrocketed some may be busy in search of their neglected properties.

The hall in brother’s house before it was remodelled had very smooth black cement flooring .In hot summer months in the high roofed hall it was pleasantly cool. There would be no trace of heat. The aged people enjoyed sleeping in that central hall on very hot summer afternoons.

The house had many fruit trees and coconut trees in the vast front and sides open areas. Father had a great interest in gardening and after retirement planted many vegetable and flower plants in the open spaces and used to tend them carefully. Lots of vegetable were grown. Basketfuls of vegetables were produced and were distributed freely to neighbours.

The big table radio, ,the “petromax” gas light, the gramophone, etc were great sensations in those days (just like the i-pod, lap top ,3-G phone of today) Brother purchased all those things.

( A-18 )THE TIMES WHEN I STUDIED AT POLAVARAM

2012-08-16T10:40:00.000-07:00

HURRICANE LANTERNS AND RADIOS

A-18 THE TIMES WHEN I STUDIED AT POLAVARAMN

I shall briefly describe those days of fifty years ago in our native village of Polavaram when I was a student there. It is a rich agricultural village no doubt but was out of the main business routes. A few rich families not more than four or five lived in mansions widely dispersed in different areas of the village. Well to do middle class families lived in big tiled houses which were as good as these mansions. Our ancestral house was also one such tiled house.

In these houses generally there lived large happy families and there was much laughter and noise. Each house had many spacious rooms, ornamentally decorated entrances and many doors and windows made of best quality wood. The houses had furniture items of high artistic quality and of current fashion.

In those days there was no electricity even in big villages like Polavaram. Electric connection to our brother’s family came when I was in final year. Gas cylinders, gas stoves and such things belong only to the new age and not to those ancient times! Even in rich houses only firewood was used for cooking purposes. The wood charcoal was also available in plenty in every house and bags of coal were sold by firewood shops. Kerosene lamps were in much use. Some houses for a few hours used the “Petromax” mark gas lamps giving white light. Our brother too bought one such light. Only he could light it and it was used only for a few hours because lots of insects would gather around it.. There were many types of ornamental kerosene lamps with beautiful long glass chimneys and translucent porcelain lamp shades.

In our house too we had such ornamental lamps with wide wicks that gave out light like 15 candle power electric bulbs .The lamps were like one and half feet high metal pillars and were fashionable like modern ornamental electric lights. There were also “hurricane lanterns” and still smaller lights with glass chimneys. The big and small hurricane lanterns were very popular and it was a common sight to see school children sitting near hurricane lamps in their houses and reciting lessons aloud in the nights. In every house somebody took charge of the work of filling the lamps with kerosene oil and cleaning the glass chimneys with smooth chalk powder. In hamlets even kerosene lamps were scarce. They used castor oil lamps which had a thick wick burning in a small earthen bowl of castor oil.

The street lights in villages were also of kerosene type! There were wooden lamp posts in the main street just like the electric street lights of today. But they were different. At top of a ten feet high sturdy wooden post an iron rimmed cubical glass box of one foot cube was fixed .The lighted hurricane lantern was kept inside the gas box . A special village worker daily came with a small wooden ladder and lighted the lamps. There was an air outlet, metallic chimney and metallic protective cap at top of the cubical gas box on the pole.

(A-17) THE UNEXPLAINED AFFINITIES

2012-08-16T10:15:00.000-07:00

A-17 THE UNEXPLAINED AFFINITIES

In our childhood days a relative’s family lived in the “other ancestral house” belonging to the family from which our paternal grandfather came on adoption into our family . the big tiled house was in a lane near the big ancestral house. there were comings and goings between the houses. Especially the children from the two houses met frequently. We only thought they were some distant relatives. I learnt latter that our eldest brother lived in a portion of that house on rent before he purchased a house .

During the time when I studied in school a man from that house who was of our eldest brother’s age i.e about 40 years old who had a very courteous and nice temperament would visit our house now and then .he would frequently spend some time talking to our brother as if they were friends. He had well cropped white hair and military style moustache and sometimes would bring chubby little children with round faces, pink cheeks and big eyes .Since he worked for decades in a north Indian city the children spoke fluent Hindi.

Only recently I learned to my utter surprise that he belonged to the family from which our revered grand father came on adoption to our family long time ago ! it was indeed a great revealation to me who wanted to delve into family history,So he is a close relation , a person related by blood! He was a cousin brother to us. our eldest brother and sisters and our cousin brothers and cousin sisters knew this family bond and that is why they showed an unusual respect and affection to him as to an own brother.

We children always addressed him as “Krishna annayya garu” meaning “respected elder brother Krisna”. I should say he too reciprocated our respect and affection. One of his sons was my high school mate and of same age as me. We both considered each other only as friends and at best some far removed relations. Both of us were treated in class as fast and intelligent, each competing with the other !But it appeared there was an invisible bond . He always stayed at the topmost rank in the class. I entirely lost touch with him for forty years. Recently I learnt through other relations that he recently retired as a professor of commerce in a city in our Telugu state.

( A-16 ) ANCESTRAL HOUSE AND ANCIENT TIMES

2012-08-16T09:49:00.004-07:00

A-16 ANSECTRAL HOUSE AND ANCIENT TIMES.

This is the story of a hundred years back ! My grandfather after staying for about thirty years in Rajanagaram with his adopted parents decided to shift again to Polavaram . He constructed a big house at polavaram and settled down at polavaram.He still owned fertile lands in Rajanagaram .There appear to be some good reasons for shifting to Polavaram. The town was the entrance to a big tribal area besides being head quarters of a revenue subdivision. During colonial days the area received special attention from the British rulers perhaps to control the vast forested tribal area and to bring modern education to that interior place. It seems that our town had even hundred years ago schools imparting English education. Grandfather was particular that his children should get the “new education” in addition to the traditional Sanskrit based education.

The fact that our revered grandmother hailed from Polavaram was also there. People of both families wanted that grandfather should settle in that town to avail the good educational facilities. So after much deliberation grandfather sold some of the lands at Rajanagaram and purchased land at Polavaram besides constructing a house there .

A hundred years ago the house was a brand new one. It was a place ringing with laughter,loud cries of children and loud conversations. It must have been visited by people of grand father's pre-adoption family (who lived only in a house a few hundred yards away). That ancestral house of the pre-adoption family (i.e. the family from which our grand father came on adoption into our family) also existed when I studied in Polavaram high school and children from that family visited our houses frequently. People from our grand mother's ancestral family (who also lived in another distant part of the town) also visited. The house must have been full of children’s laughter and soft voices of women. Father and uncles were children! What faraway times they were! Strangely I learnt this “great secret” (that our grandmother hailed from polavaram itself) only before I retired from government service six years back !

The ancestral house must have must have been a place of much activity. My father and uncles and our paternal aunt spent their childhood days and student days there! The boys with whom they played perhaps grew up as respected gentlemen of the town.But some of the boys might have also ended up as poor artisans also! In india the centuries long social and economic backwardness made it very difficult for people of some sections to advance .The strict “reservation rules” of modern India protect all such poorer sections of people in educational and employment matters. India had been a hopelessly stratified society for centuries and millenniums but no more now.

Two younger brothers of my father worked for more than twenty five years as senior clerks in the government revenue office at Polavaram and lived in the ancestral house. In those British times the clerical jobs in government offices carried respect in the family and society . Thus the great ancestral house was very dear to all of us as it carried memories of three generations.

I feel amused that even our eldest brother, elder sisters and elder cousins played in that old charmed house as children ! Some of them passed away and others are now old people. In those far off times they treated some of us far younger to them as silly children and nonentities.

Only after father's retirement we shifted to Polavaram to live in our elder brother’s spacious house. He was then an engineer at Rajahmundry. At that time the ancestral house was already old. It looked like any other old house in the town. But soon the charm it cast on us children was irresistible because it was the house where we could do any amount of mischief. After school I invariably proceeded there to exchange news with our cousin brothers or to start for the banks of Godavari for a swim .It was the house where my two aged uncles lived. At that time all my senior cousin brothers were married and lived in far away cities. My two uncles were nearing their retirement after serving in the local revenue sub divisional office for twenty or more!

Our father had an elder brother who was also a teacher. I have only a hazy remembrance of him. About six months before we returned to Polavaram after our father’s retirement he fell seriously ill and died. I knew grandmother only as an 80 year old woman with her back bent with age. She was an imperious woman and had a fair radiant complexion, philosophic, intense looks and a very expressive calm smiling face. She died about a few months after our elder uncle died. She was ruler of the house and our father and uncles showed great respect towards her .I remembers that she died in the very hot days of May during our summer holidays. I vividly remember how her mortal remains were respectfully carried to the banks of Godavari for cremation. There was great silence and sorrow in the house. She was held in such great respect and affection by the entire family. The ancestral house was recently dismantled by a cousin brother who lived in it and a new house was built there. The house was still strong till the day when it was dismantled.

(A-15) A FARAWAY TIME IN OUR FAMILY

2012-08-16T08:41:00.001-07:00

I write the following few lines only for my own pleasure to recreate in my imagination some old scenes relating to the old generations in our highly religious family, particularly about the people who lived in our ancestral house at Polavaram that was constructed a hundred years back .Our great grandfather(paternal side)was a prosperous land owner of Rajanagaram ,a small town near Rajahmundry . We heard that in those far off days the family possessed one hundred acres of land . Rajahmundry,the leading city of the area is a famous historic town and was capital for entire Telugu country a thousand years ago .There was great literary activity and a burst of poetry in old classical Telugu language in Rajahmundry in those distant prosperous times. Telugu is our mother tongue and at present is spoken by a hundred million people.

It is said that our ancestors on both sides originally came from "Konaseema" a part of Godavari delta. It is a green heaven of millions of coconut trees and endless rice and sugarcane fields and fruit orchards. Many of our most revered ancestors were learned persons never moving away from their extremely religious,intellectual and philosophic moorings.The Ramayana- Mahabharatha religion was the basis of their lives.

I now come to the story of our own very learned grandfather. in his days the family was comparatively rich but at the same time the family was also very traditional. He had no sons and had only three daughters. A friend of the family suggested that one of the boys of a family of Polavaram town ,twenty miles away from Rajanagaram,be adopted into the family.My great grandfather with his family members visited the place and the second boy who was a bright lad of ten was selected. Soon on an auspicious day after big ceremony and big celebration the boy was adopted into the new family. Our great-grand father gifted some land to his married daughters because of his great affection for them .This adopted boy was our most revered grandfather.

When he grew up he earned a name for himself as a tough negotiator and settled many land disputes.He was a very learned and straightforward man . Our uncles told that he fought any injustice to anybody like a lion whenever he noticed. He personally managed the family properties . I heard from uncles that he was a very energetic jolly type person famous for his loud laughter. Our grandmother was from a traditional and religious family of Polavaram it self. Her family was famous for traditional learning .Our grandmother was herself very learned and could authoritatively comment on ancient Hindu philosophic texts . She could recite beautiful poems from the Telugu versions of Ramayana and Mahabharatha. These two epics which are the life blood of Hinduism were translated in to Telugu language in sections during the last one thousand years . The Telugu versions are written in a few thousand poems which are highly loaded with Sanskrit words. The Telugu poems sound as majestic as the original Sanskrit poems.

( A-14 ) THE TRIBAL PEOPLE IN OLD TIMES

2012-08-14T19:58:00.003-07:00

In olden days the tribal people came down in to our town from their hamlets in the deeply forested hills ten kilometres away .Every day they sold bundles of firewood and other forest produce in our town and purchased cooking oil,soaps,match boxes,kerosene,sugar etc. I still vaguely remember that the tribal people in little groups descended from a high hill via a much used foot path at the end of our town ,then walked on the flood bank a small distance and then came to the main road .It was the spot where the twenty kilometer long flood bank, starting at faraway Kovvur ended . The end portion of the high flood bank ended here on the first hill of the forested hill range at the end of our town. This high flood bank( perhaps like the ancient high earthen bank restricting the shallow “zuider zee” of Holland )is a great engineering wonder of British times in our area..

What it is like in the tribal hamlets in the deep forests in the present “cell phone age” we cannot imagine. But one can be sure that the tribal people of Godavari districts too must have progressed a lot and must be on their way to entering the main stream society just as in case of people of the hill states of north east India etc. But in those olden days 50 years ago they still carried bows,arrows and spears during their hours long journey through the forest paths by foot for protection against wild animals . Newspapers even now carry stories that some groups of tribal people living in “Papi hills” ( thirty miles upstream of Polavaram) are still very backward and stick to their old ways.

On festival days in the old times they came down from hills in huge groups wearing colourful headgear with peacock feathers and bison horns. Beating long drums they would dance before houses of rich people. While dancing they would form into huge circles along with their woman folk dressed in gaudy colored clothes and bright flowers. They join hands at shoulder level and swing right and left in rhythm with the drum beats .But basically the tribal folks are a gentle and shy people. They appear to require gentle help and support for moving into the modern age. They appear to be still suspicious of the encroaching and all-devouvering modern industrial culture.

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(A-13 ) THE HIGH SCHOOL AND THE BIG GUEST HOUSE

2012-08-14T19:35:00.000-07:00

-13 THE HIGH SCHOOL AND THE BIG GUEST HOUSER

I have a great admiration for our science teacher, a very short fair complexioned person always busy tucking his shirt into his trousers. I recollect with amusement how he introduced the students to the wonders of science, to the worlds of “acids,bases and salts”, “work power and energy”, “red blood cells and white blood cells” etc. He taught us most interestingly about the parts of human body, about enzymes etc.The school had painted porcelain models of lungs,heart,liver ,brain etc of human body. The models could be opened like boxes and contained still smaller parts inside. All the parts were painted in red and appeared to be oozing with blood. He created tremendous interest in every branch of science . His lessons about enzymes and hormones were absolutely absorbing. I remember how he demonstrated on one Sunday at his house the process to “wash” photo films in a perfectly darkened room. The other teachers too were very devoted to teaching and held the students spell bound with their lectures.

There were big grounds for volley ball, basket ball and foot ball etc.There was a patch of ploughed- up land filled with sand for the use of wrestlers! There was also a military type initiation training for students through the " National Cadet Corps ( NCC) ".Even 60,70 years back the school was famous for a hundred miles around as an institution maintaining high educational standards. The school play ground had a big compound wall like the Great China Wall. Even in our days there were big modern stone fronted buildings for government hospital, forest office, veterinary hospital etc along the main road in the new township adjoining our high school.

Next to our high school in a huge compound amid a grove of trees there was a fine spacious "Traveler's Bungalow" i.e. rest house for high officers on tour. I remember it had thick curtains of dark green cloth on all sides and also big screens made perhaps from thin bamboo strips and painted green. There were narrow verandas on all sides. The green curtains were rolled up when it was cool in evenings but were drawn down in afternoon hours to keep out heat. It had perhaps three or four spacious halls with fine furniture and tables .It was constructed mainly for use of high British officers who often visited the tribal areas. This building had very high tiled roof to make the interior cool. The building was a good symbol of British power and prosperity. I remember seeing a white van in the vicinity of this majestic building. There were some European academics or researchers and it had the words “University de Roma” painted on its sides.( Our country gained independence from British rule just fifteen years before!) Beyond this mansion there was a large colony of white walled houses with asbestos roofs for use of lower government staff coming on transfer.

( A-12 ) THE TEMPLES

2012-08-14T19:31:00.001-07:00

There were two big temples in the town. Both the temples are devoted to god Rama. One of the names by which the god almighty is called by Hindus is Rama. One of the temples was called “pedda gudi” i.e. the bigger temple to distinguish it from the second temple. It was situated by the side of the main road and was quite near to our ancestral house. It had a huge tiled front building built on a wide and high rectangular platform. At the middle of the platform was fixed a huge bronze plated hollow decorated pillar 30 feet high and with two or three feet diameter at the base and slightly narrowing towards the top. The pillar protruded out of the roof towards the sky. Such huge bronze plated pillars are built in front of every temple.

Behind the front building was the big compound where the beautiful temple existed. Inside the compound were coconut and other trees and many flowering bushes .The front building was used to deliver religious lectures continuing into late nights. The lectures full of stories of gods were immensely enjoyed by people and time was forgotten. Many people would gather there to hear the religious stories and philosophic discourses. Now the front building is gone as it must have become very old. All the big trees are gone and the temple acquired a very old and faded look. Perhaps this is due to heavy dust raised by frequent movement of large number of heavy machinery and vehicles on the main road. The main road is only a few feet away.

There was a similar temple of god Rama at the other end of the town at a very busy road turn. It is near the entrance of the town near the bus stand. It is fully protected with a high compound wall all around. The compound also had coconut trees and many flowering bushes. There also a decorated high brass pillar indicates that the premises contain a big temple. There was another temple, a small and beautiful temple of the beautiful god Krishna (Panduranga) a little high up on a high bare hill .Krishna is another name with which Hindus call the universal god almighty. The lower part of the hill has wide flat reddish stone formations which are natural. Surprisingly this portion of hill is reddish bare rock.

The gigantic hill is the first of an endless hill range with far bigger hills leading into the blue distance .all the hills except this front one are thickly forested .The first hill has lot of bare rock and a number of roughly built stony steps leading to the temple. It is a small temple. Every day the priest comes punctually in morning and lights a lamp. The temple is not too far away from the town. In the cool evenings dozens of people visit this beautiful temple climbing the rough stone stairs. The hill offers a grand view of the town with hundreds of tiled and thatched roofs half hidden among the large number of trees with the serene and majestic Godavari in the distance.

(A-11 ) THE FORGOTTEN ZAMINDAR

2012-08-14T10:26:00.001-07:00

A-11 THE FORGOTTEN “ZAMINDAR”

Polavaram was also feudal "zamindar’s" town. The British rulers nominated a big local landowner in each revenue earning unit of their Indian territories as the "zamindar" i.e. the representative of british government to collect land revenue on their behalf . He credited a fixed share of the revenue to the British government and was permitted to retain the remaining amount. His "realm" was also protected by the security forces of the British government. For all purposes people treated him like the local king.

The "zamindar" of Polavaram had a big palatial residence with in a fort. His estate saw great days a hundred years back. But by the time I was a student at the highschool i.e. fifty years ago the palaces were in utter ruins and partially fallen .The zamindar's family long ago left for a metro city where he perhaps owned big businesses. But the fort walls remained for many more years.

The “zamindar's” fort is surrounded by a thirty feet high and four feet thick mud wall . It had huge watch towers at regular intervals. There were long tube like holes with rectangular cross section to enable shooting while hidden inside. The zamindar maintained liveried staff. There was a 20 feet high doorway with gigantic wooden doors faced with iron cones to withstand enemy attacks. Inside the fort even the partially ruined palaces looked beautiful with colored glass windows. How beautiful should life have been when the palaces were in good state. How many young men and women in their silks and wearing lots of gold jewellery must have lived there moving in the palace gardens. Just like people of rich families of English countryside, of whom we read in classic English novels of nineteenth century, the youngsters of these “zamindar” families too might have gone out sightseeing in big stately horse carriages with big retinues. I saw such royal carriages in other zamindari towns..

I remember still the white haired big moustached guard who would daily sit for an hour at the huge entrance with huge wooden doors. He would keep the door open for a few hours and then close it in the evening as if it was a ceremony. On the outskirts of the town there were huge high roofed sheds with thick stone walls for keeping the king’s elephants! They existed fifty years ago. The elephant shelters subsequently became the market sheds for the big weekly market where the plains people and tribal people came in large numbers .

(A-10) THE FLOOD BANK

2012-08-14T08:49:00.002-07:00

A-10 THE FLOOD BANK

The new town is on the far side of the "flood bank". The towns and villages lying along the river ( a distance of twenty miles )from Kovvur to Polavaram are cut lengthwise by this 30-feet high “flood bank”. It starts at Dowleswaram dam near Kovvur (opposite the city of Rajahmundry ) and ends at a hill forming part of the thickly forested hill ranges near Polavaram . The dam and the flood bank were built by Sir Arthur Thomas Cotton the British chief engineer of the area 150 years back . Being sagelike and kind hearted he was very much worried about gigantic volumes of water flowing into sea while hundreds of thousands of people died of famines and cholera every few years. He built the Dowleswaram dam and tamed the river. By this helpful act he earned immortal fame in Godavari area and is even worshipped by many farmers as a god!

A wide asphalt road is laid on top of the 20 kilometre long dike starting near Kovvur town on our side of Godavari. Kovvur and Rajahmundry are at the two ends of the gigantic railway bridge across Godavari. There are beautiful little railway stations at both these places near to the shore of Godavari . A bus journey on the twenty mile long dyke gives a grand view of the beautiful river scenery . The new portion of every town and village enroute is protected from flood fury by this dyke.

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( A-9 ) A BEAUTIFUL RIVERSIDE TOWN

2012-08-13T03:43:00.001-07:00

RIVERSIDE TOWN

Polavaram our small native town on the banks of Godavari is a very beautiful place. The river flows serenely through thickly forested green hills and between kilometres long sand banks. Such mesmerising scenery is right in our town ! Thinking of this I feel a kind of wonder and delight sitting in faraway Hyderabad where I stay now. Our town Polavaram is the gateway to a vast tribal area which exists in the mountainous and forested region upstream.

As I remember the times of 50 years back the tribal people lived in the hamlets in the faraway thickly forested hill valleys following their old customs. They must have progressed a lot by now under the intense glare of modern jet age civilization creeping all around them. But we hear that even now they are still very backward and this in spite of the government’s efforts. They are simple children of wild forest and appear to be still wary of modern industrial culture.

Polavaram had been the head quarters of a revenue sub division for more than a hundred years .The British rulers perhaps treated the interior forested and hilly areas of Godavari districts as important strategically. Fifty years ago the big stone fronted building with many halls ,constructed by the British government on the outskirts of our town housed the subdivision's land revenue office , land records office and subdivision's court . Two uncles of mine worked as senior clerks in this office and I along with my cousin brothers visited this office two or three times in school days. I remember that beautiful building busy inside with dozens of people coming and going throughout the day and the red-brown soil and green vegetation all around .

( A-8 ) TELUGU PEOPLE ARE MODERN

2012-08-13T03:42:00.001-07:00

The Telugu people too are becoming modernised. They ventured into all parts of the globe and succeeded in many fields. They are adjusted to the digital communications age. But the mentalities of people remain mainly backward.

In these new times the Internet brings mountain loads of knowledge. No need of a college or university or a library. So many educational and science sites. You can keep your knowledge updated up to the week. You can read the best English books of 18^th, 19th and 20^th centuries. You can visit the home towns of Wordsworth,Charles Dickens, Sir Walter Scot or Tolstoy. You can see the houses where Dr Einstein and Sir Isaac Newton lived. You can even see with a feeling of thrill the wooden bench on which the great Newton etched his name with a knife! You can make an aerial survey of your own native town in Google maps .What great masses of knowledge! Everything comes into your “palm top”.

Man learned great secrets of Nature---- about the subatomic world of protons, electrons , neutrons, quarks, leptons, bosons etc, about stars ,galaxies and space travel, wireless communication, computer architecture , and the demoniac world of atomic and hydrogen bombs . Modern technology is both useful and dangerous.

But this is not everything. People of all the nations should go to the roots and examine life from point of philosophy,morality,spirituality,ethics and art and that too from a global viewpoint . They should think of one humanity irrespective of race and religion. I feel that all religions,races,cultures,cicilizations and philosophies of earth merged on the day when Copernicus announced that spherical earth rotates round the sphere of sun, when Galileo directed his lenses at the moon and saw valleys and mountains there and when the great Sir Isaac Newton unlocked the secret of universal gravitation. In the 1970s the great Neil Armstrong showed the ultimate proof that moon is a land just like earth.

All people of earth should develop a great service mentality and highly spiritual and international outlook. The intellectual young men of the India should read the works of the great social reformers of West. We should treat humans as demigods and not as Charles Darwin’s artless creatures.

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