Gleanings

South Indian Temples in China

That Southern Indian Art and Architecture in various forms have crossed over to various parts of Indonesia and inspired and developed Indian colonial art, is very well known, the most typical examples being illustrated in the Hindu Temples in the Dieng plateau in Java, having close affinity with the “Rathas” of Mahavalipuram. But it is less known that there exist the vestiges of a Hindu Shrine at one of the ancient Chinese port-towns on the coast opposite to Formosa now known as Ch'uan-chow, but formerly known as Zayton–from which the silk stuff known as ‘satin’ derives its name. At one time, Zayton was an international port, and very much frequented by ships from all parts of India, carrying all manners of merchandise. That a permanent colony of Southern Indian merchants lived in certain quarters of this port-town can be inferred from the fact that the basement frieze of the main hall of the K’ai-yuan Temple at the place still carries several pillars in Pandyan style which are decorated with several bas-reliefs depicting scenes and incidents from the Krishna-lila. The original Temple, according to the Temple records, was destroyed in 1155 A. D. and rebuilt a little later and it is probably at the time of rebuilding that the Indian pillars with the cubical blocks bearing panels illustrating well-known themes from Krishna Legends were copied by a Chinese hand–which unmistakably proclaim their Indian origins. There is no doubt that this temple was originally built for the use of Southern Indian merchants who had settled in the port-town, apparently for the development of the then flourishing Indian trade in spices–and “all other kinds of costly wares as suggested by Marco Polo.

(O. C. Ganguly in the Hindu: Sunday, 27th February 1944.)

Women in Indian Life

Much has been said of the Hindu ideal of wife-wood in the tributes paid to Kasturba. I was amused to find among those who have extolled that ideal some who have denounced the Sita-Savitri ideal as out of date and unsuited to the modern Indian woman. Such is the force of a great tradition. When the seas are smooth and our little boats are drifting pleasantly with the breeze, we make light of traditions, scoff at them and deceive ourselves that we have no use for them. But when the least little gust flutters our sails and rocks our boats, we run helter-skelter to the shelter of these very havens. They become full of meaning to us–these old superstitions. The fact is that what has endured for centuries has done so because of its vitality and high survival value. And this survival value itself is due to the universality of the idea underlying the tradition which survives. The Hindu ideal is, therefore, not peculiarly Hindu. It is universal. Sita pleads the precedent of Savitri when Dasaratha objects to her following her husband Rama into exile. Centuries before the Ramayana, Savitri puts off the God of Death who begs her not to follow him: he is carrying off the soul of her husband, Esha dharma sanatanah, This is the eternal law. No Hindu can contest that and the God of Death as an orthodox Hindu has no answer to that. The ideal has endured and pervaded every stratum of our society. Wives of the men who work in coal mines have felt its force. This tradition is not confined to Hindus. It has become the Indian tradition and all the castes and communities of this country, have come within its sway.

It is a mistake, common among outsiders, to think that the Hindu wife is an inert soul, slavishly subservient to her husband. The power of passive resistance is far greater than that of active. Gandhiji must have drawn his Satyagraha from the example of the women of India who through the ages have perfected its technique. One of the finest men I know was once asked in the course of conversation on married life if he loved his wife. “Love!” exclaimed he, “I fear her!” “Fear” is not the right word. Fear cannot subsist side by side with love which the friend profoundly feels for his wife. But it is certainly true that the Hindu man stands in awe of the utter self-effacement, the untiring devotion, the unflinching fortitude which his womankind consistently evince in their lives.
(RECLUSE in the Indian Social Reformer 4-3-1944)

Art and Propaganda

All creative art, is essentially an individual affair. It is individual in its creative process and it is individual in its appeal. All propaganda, on the other hand, is essentially a group affair. It is conceived by a group and propagated by it to attain its aims by a process of imposition on all other members of the society. A propagandist group uses and exploits art, not for art purposes but for its own purposes. It not only uses all available art products for its aims but seeks to impose its aims on the minds of the artists, by methods of deliberate coercion. The appeal of art being individual is free and persuasive. Propaganda, in so far as it
transgresses the limits of freedom and persuasion, necessarily degenerates into social coercion and regimentation of the human mind. The path of progress lies through freedom and persuasion, which values the dignity of every human being. Propaganda, in so for as it transgresses these limits and adopts methods of social coercion, tramples under its juggernautic wheels the dignity of man, leading thereby to cold-blooded murder of all human values. Group hysteria, whether masquerading under the name of the old and ‘civilised’ imperialism or modern fascism or communism, is a menace to human progress. It is the duty of all freedom-loving artists and writers to fight with all their might this menace which threatens to engulf the whole world in its dehumanising tentacles.

The way of art is the way of human sympathy and human understanding, the way of psychological penetration, patience, and persuasion. The way of group propaganda inspired by ready-made dogmatic ideologies is the very reverse of this. The former leads to deeper and wider human understanding and through understanding to freedom and progress, the latter leads to blind and unthinking fury, inhuman, intolerance, dreadful slavery of the many to the power-mad few and the intolerance dreadful slavery of the many to the power-mad few and the subsequent degradation of the entire human society.
(From the MANIFESTO of the All India Modern Writers’ Conference.)