Ram , the man of the moment
By Vijaya Pushkarna
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Arun Govil and Deepika Chikhalia played Ram and Sita |
Ram
is back, and how !
Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi
Adityanath began his lockdown and social distancing at Ayodhya. In defiance of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s direction to hold all
religious gatherings in abeyance and work from home during the three weeks , Adityanath
participated in an event to shift the idol of Lord Ram to a temporary structure in the Janmabhoomi compound at Ayodhya, pending the construction of the grand temple.
Prakash Javadekar, the Union Minister for
Informationand Broadcastig announced on
March 27 that Doordarshan, the public sector broadcaster will telecast Ramanand Sagar’s Ramayana.
We will know in due course how many people watched it this morning,and whether the
viewers were just nostalgic oldies or had a sprinkling of curious, story
hungry, or bored young ones staying at home!
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Lalitha Pawar, in blue |
The
serial, when originally telecast, mesmerized the nation .Most of India wore the
kind of look it wears today—people stayed home, on their own, and remained
glued to the television. The TV had not reached every household, so some people
would be at their neighbour’s.
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Dara Singh |
Enterprising people ticketed the show for a
community; some residential communities placed a tv at a common point. Hindi cinema has shown crowds watching
Ramanand Sagar’s Ramayan on small black and white tv placed on counters outside
shops. India came to a standstill when yesteryear actor and “evergreen” Ashok
Kumar anchored it, and people caught a glimpse of character actor Lalitha Pawar
as Manthara or legendary wrestler-actor Dara Singh as Hanuman.
It
was a sure shot way of holding an audience captive. Political rallies in
Haryana used the chartbusting serial to the hilt. Organisers screened this
version of the Ramayana on dozens of screens fixed on the poles erected to hold
the shamiana as north India scorched in temperatures of over 40 degrees C. Multimedia
screens of then were nowhere like they are today, yet the strain of “Sita Ram
charit ati paavan…” attracted crowds jostling to grab a vantage position. Thus the stage
was warmed for the main speakers.
Some
of the main cast in the epic serial went on to become leaders in their own right. “Sita”—Deepika
Chikhalia, became a religious icon, and the BJP fielded her for the Lok Sabha
elections from Baroda in 1991. Of course she became an MP.
Now
the Modi government is hoping to use the serial , based on Valmiki’s Ramayan
and Tulsidas’ Ramcharitmanas to make a few hours of the lockdown easy for the people. This battle of “dharm
vs adharm” is different from the battle of man versus covid19, but both are
about man,evil and earth!
Ram
is also the man of the season for other reasons.
He
is the hero of author,politician and former diplomat Pavan K Varma’s new
book, “The Greatest Ode to Lord Ram:
Tulsidas’s Ramcharitmanas; Selections& Commentaries”.
“ A devoted son, a loving sibling, a committed
lover, an ideal ruler…who, in reality was Lord Ram?” quizzed the Amazon-owned publishing house Westland before
tweeting yesterday that the book was out.
Varma
has selected “some of the most evocative
stanza, offering a succinct commentary for each, to capture the very
core of the original(Ramcharitmanas)”, according to the book promo on Amazon.
A 16th century lyrical composition , the Ramcharitmanas in Awadhi broke with the literary tradition of
writing in Sanskrit, and as a result Lord Ram’s following only grew. Lay people
were able to relate to the “Maryada Purushottam”.
There
has got to be tremendous readability and relatability of Varma’s book with Gen Now. His previous book, “Adi Shankaracharya:Hinduism’s Greatest Thinker” was
about an unexplored aspect of the 8th century philosopher.
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Pavan K Varma |
The
new book describes “a devoted son, a loving
sibling, a committed lover, an ideal ruler and also a human, almost bereft of
divinity”. While Ram the God is widely known and worshipped, there are people
who have differences on how he was as a person, a man who threw out his wife
Sita. Possibly the book will give a new dimension to any discussion on that.
Varma however does not let go of the philosophical aspect of the
Ramcharitmanas—the immutability of the soul over the merely corporeal; the
transience of worldly pleasures; the placing of wisdom above knowledge.
The
Ramcharitmanas unravels even the most profound concepts with utmost simplicity,
blending philosophy with breathtaking verse. “Varma’s compelling new selection
and commentary achieves this effect by combining the aesthetics, romance and
imagery of the original work with the unadulterated spirituality that sparkles
through the conduct of a great god”, according to the publisher’s note.
The
BJP is on a high ever since the Supreme Court verdict in the Ram Janmabhoomi
land dispute clearing the decks for the construction of a temple to Ram at
Ayodhya. The Ram temple has been part of their political discourse all these
years. But none of their leaders has been able to celebrate Ram or Hinduism the
way those of other parties have, by prose or poetry. Or even cinema. May be
screening the old serial is their first step!
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