My Garden - Uma Gowrishankar

The mango blossoms in the tree are hardening into protrusions under whose weight the stalk  gently dips. A few embryonic mangoes have already fallen and spilled on the ground. If all the blossoms that drape the tree like a yellow gossamer become mangoes there will be thousands of them. With so many of the flowers swept by the breeze, with the few of the remaining spilling while still very young, only a few dozens will ripe to adulthood in a tree. 

She sat on the hard floor and greased her hands with oil. She held the firm stalk of the banana tree flower and observed it, mentally calculating the many layers of sepals that cradled dozens and dozens of flowers that she would rip away, and cut. She removed the first layer of the deep purple sepals and gently tugged out the pearl coloured flowers, she prized open the tips of the flowers and pinched the black seeds out. Her mother had taught her how to do this fast, and had warned her that if she were to skip this out of laziness, the dish would turn bitter. She dexterously held the bunch of flowers together and chopped them finely. She soaked the chopped flowers in butter milk to remove the residual bitterness. As she peeled the layers of sepals they turned a lotus pink in colour,  the flowers turned translucent and fragile.

The cloudscape of a place remains the same even after many years. I woke up in the morning, saw the sky and the clouds from the window of my hotel and knew exactly that I was in Hosur. The sky cannot be like that anywhere else, even after 13 years.

I had gone to the TVS Academy, Hosur, to participate in a workshop arranged for teachers on Vygotsky, the expert visiting the school was Dr Baljit Kaur. Baljit is a Senior Lecturer, College of Education, University of Canterbury, New Zealand.

I have been saddled to publications work and have had a marathon session putting together the journal for teachers and popping out inhouse publication to our schools and it seemed a good idea to look at Vygotsky when my Director suggested I participate in the program. I had taught language, poetry writing and art criticism of sorts to middle graders those donkey years ago in the TVS Academy, Hosur. In addition, I have been interacting with Baljit and reading many of her research papers that she kept sending to us. It seemed only appropriate to consider seriously a break from my work in Chennai.

There is no more of the teacher in me, but there is a lot of poet and writer in me. I have been thinking of teaching poetry writing in our school in Thiruvannamalai. I had let go various opportunities to conduct poetry workshops for teachers in Hosur and Tumkur due to personal reasons. Also I am not good at teaching how to teach children write poetry. I reckon I can write poetry with children and share a bunch of good poems with them.

I wanted to start off the process by connecting with the schools and classroom, and the first step was to participate in a workshop meant for practioners. I stepped into the room where I knew quite a few, they are all passionate teachers. We had gone prepared with some readings – one written by Baljit on experimental schools in New Zealand, a paper on Maori theory of learning and human development written by a Maori - Arapera Royal Tangaere, an article written again by Arapera on schooling experience for the Maoris in mainstream schools in New Zealand, and Vygotsky’s essay ‘Interaction Between Learning and Development’.

All of us had poured through the readings and we were an informed bunch when it came to Piaget, Carl Rogers, Freire. Vygotsky was new to us, but our practice of facilitating learning and scaffolding seems close to the zone of proximal development that Vygotsky talks of in the essay. Therefore, when we started the program it appeared as if we would be in a comfort zone, just note taking and probably racking our brains to evolve practices to be followed in the classroom that brings to the fore Vygotsky.

In the essay ‘Interaction Between Learning and Development’ Vygotsky posits the three theories of learning and development – one holds that development/maturation is prerequisite for learning; another, holds that development and learning are simultaneous; and the third, that holds that maturation makes possible a specific process of learning where the learning process stimulates and pushes forward the maturation process. Vygotsky rejects all the three theories and questions the patterns that learning and development is forced into.

Vygotsky refutes the Piagean notion of developmental appropriateness for learning to take place; he writes that learning for a child begins at the inter-psychic exchanges between the child and the people around her. He speaks of tools - cultural, material and social, that mediate learning and intellectual activity. He holds that learning presupposes specific social and cultural nature wherein learning happens out of interactions, dialogues, synthesis and cannot be quantified into developmental stages but shifts the zone of actual development and the zone of proximal development for every child independently. This is in fact an inside out notion of Piaget for whom learning takes place in the mind of an individual out of his own volition when he constructs knowledge by acting on his reflexes or environment, depending on what developmental state he is in; for Vygotsky learning takes place simply out there. That is, the inter- psychic precedes intra-psychic.

The basic understanding that I have put forth has come across through various readings. That is the easiest part but appears like an intellectual pole vaulting that only some are capable of. This assumption of certain participants was shattered in the two-day program when it seemed that being Vygotskyean is simple. Baljit made it happen unwittingly in the way the program progressed, in the way she interacted with the group during the two days where she as well as all of us were constantly nudged to the zone of proximal development as individuals, teachers.

We examined our beliefs and assumptions as teachers and educators. We belong to a progressive school oriented towards learning taking place in a meaningful context. The learning is self-directed, child- centred, experiential and context-specific, the teacher is not an authoritarian figure but a facilitator who offers necessary scaffolding for learning to take place. As passionate teachers and educators we use a liberal mix of Carl Rogers, Friere, J. Krishnamurthy and Mahatma Gandhi in forming our vision, in our practices we follow Piaget, Carl Rogers, Howard Gardener and the like, but only after subjecting these to questioning and understanding their appropriateness in our context. We critically reflect on our beliefs and practices , examine the underpinnings of what has influenced us to constantly assess and review our practice, our understandings on learning, teaching and the purpose of education itself.

Our understanding of Vygotsky made us examine our practices in the classroom and our role as teachers-learners. We first looked at what happens in our classrooms. For instance, the curriculum especially of Math and Science for early and middle graders, amongst other things, is also Piagean where we provide the right environment that is developmentally appropriate for the child to actively construct knowledge. In every grade, there are learners with different abilities and intensive help is given to children with lower abilities; a class is normally divided into ability groupings and the teacher and the student for all purposes function with a tacit knowledge of these groupings. Here we have to pause and question this practice of streaming students based on their abilities. This practice draws from our understanding of how learning takes place, which might itself be flawed.

Dividing a group of children into multiple groups based on their abilities goes against the Vygotskyean understanding of learning. Learning takes place according to Vygotsky in a heterogeneous group born out of the exchanges between the students and the teachers who are at different zones of actual development. The classroom that Vygotsky has in mind is similar to the heterogeneous group that we as individuals formed for Baljit’s Program.

Let us look at the group itself; it was motley of people with different abilities and experiences. One participant was a new entrant into the teaching community, she had worked in a multinational company and is taking up teaching for the first time and was looking at culture as a static category that one embraces out of one’s own will. There was an embittered senior teacher who lamented the lack of values among the young brood of teachers in her school. There was an extremely passionate teacher of social science who is starting to believe that species like him are becoming extinct. There were the Principals of our two schools who juggle administration and academics; there were quite a few who practise Piaget without relating to the theoretical makeup. And, there was me quite determined to carry organic vegetables, especially mocchai, back home!

Each one of us carried a different understanding to the program and broadly to teaching itself due to our backgrounds, beliefs and assumptions. The exchange that happened between us opened vents in each one of us; the actual development that varied for each one of us shifted and accommodated newer layers of meaning and understanding of life, relationships, learning and teaching. Our classroom should be able to do that as well.

I am ready to engage in poetry workshops, poetry writing in a classroom is an egalitarian activity, there are free borrowings from one and all. I never feared veering from that in spirit at all. Baljit’s program will be of great help in a realm that is very valuable to me – in understanding the problems that my son probably faces in his school.

My son goes to one of those famous schools in the city that gets its fame from the results it produces. The school is a large set up, the ratio of students to teachers is 1: 40, and there are several sections in each class. The school provides a non-threatening atmosphere for the children and expose them to a variety of things; there is no pressure on academics alone per se in the early grades. In early grades, if not a very happy place, the school is certainly not a bad place to be in. There is dance, music, Veda classes, and arts and crafts. The school follows its own methodology of teaching and assessment, which I as a parent, feel is flawed in many ways. The teaching systems and processes have large gaps; the administration is not in cognizance of what happens in every classroom. So it is the question of quality vs. quantity, there is a fare of good, not so good, indifferent and plainly bad teachers. While teaching the content area the learning is not experiential, so the child is not often able to make meaning. The concepts, especially in subjects like Math, Physics and Chemistry are taught to a large group, sometimes in great haste, with very little reinforcement. Important concepts that are taught in this manner, over the years, remain abstract and unclear for the child, s/he is not able to apply these concepts in real life situations, which is what is required of him by the Board of Exams. For this reason, my husband and I do a parallel schooling at home, i.e., we teach extensively subjects like science and math.

My son is in grade 9, there is a pressure on him from the school and home, as well as societal pressure to perform. I have been providing support to him academically, many a time impatiently if my son took a little longer or did not evidence interest. Now I know how learning can take place in a more forbearing, tolerant and liberal manner through exchanges that can enrich both of us. I believe that learning happens in several ways, and that there is no singular definition of success. I know now that teaching- learning is all about helping children follow their dreams.

Learning for me as a child took place close to the kitchen; in my maternal grandmother’s house in a space called mitham ( a quadrangle space inside the house, that opened to the sky). Here my grandmother and aunts with all the children warmed ourselves on the mid- day sun, picking stones out of grains, shelling peas, double beans and mocchais. No adul-talk took place because children were always around, the exchange between adults took cognizance of the children of different age groups. There was a rich transference of knowledge, information, belief systems, the transference was both ways, or as many ways as the number of individuals involved in the exchange. We spoke of escalating price of vegetables, the worms eating the gooseberry tree in the backyard, health benefits of consuming unpolished rice, the mantras that my great grandmother used to alleviate the effects of scorpion bite. The exchange always reflected our socio-politico-cultural values, in many ways it examined and questioned them.

Now in my house the kitchen and dining area serves the function that mitham served in my grandmother’s house. This area is at the centre of our house, spatially and functionally. It is the place where we read our newspaper, drink coffee, cut vegetables and just hang around chatting up with the members of the family, the cook, the domestic help, and the gardener. My son gravitates to this space and the subtlest of lessons of life he has learnt here. Peas and mocchais are strong cultural tools, according to me. I want to see a personal relevance in everything I do. I want to bring Vygotsky to the mitham of my home, so I bought a kilo of mochai in Hosur and lugged it home to Chennai to introduce Vygotsky to everyone at home.

Today is Vaikunta Ekaadasi, the eleventh day of the waxing moon in the lunar cycle, in the month of Margazhi. It is believed that on Vaikunta Ekaadasi the devas and the asuras churned the ocean of Milk and the iridescent Lakshmi emerged with amrutham, also the earth was blessed with the like of Kalpa Vriksham, Kamadhenu and Parijatha pushpam – all blessings from Lord Vishnu.

On Vaikunta Ekaadasi, the day sacred to Lord Vishnu, many people throng the Vishnu temples to participate in the day-long sevais done to the Lord; the Lord is dressed tastefully with flowers and ornaments and taken in procession around the temple. These temples remain open the whole night, there are pravachanams, singing of Thiru-vaai-mozhi and other religious activities in the precincts of the kovil, the temple transforms into a hub of activity for the community living in the neighbourhood. Many people spend the whole day at the praharam of the temple.

Ranganatha swami temple in Sri Rangam, Padmanabha Swami temple in Thiruvananthapuram and the Parthasarathy Kovil in Chennai get inundated with devotees; the Swarga vaasal (the gate to the heavens) in the Sri Rangam temple is opened today – Vaikunta Ekaadasi is the only day when the vaasal is opened. (See the pic below)

Early in the morning utsava murthy of Lord Ranganatha dressed in rathna-angi (dress made of rathnam) is lead through the Swarga vassal or vaikunta vassal, also called the parama-pada vaasal, to the thousand pillared hall. It is believed that Lord Ranganatha led the great saint Nam–azhvaar to the heavens through this gate. This gate is then thrown open and the devotees rush through the gate to get the darshan of the mulavar in the supine anantha-sayana posture on ksheera-sagaram. People fervently pray that they too are lead to the swargam, parama-padam or vaikuntam by Lord Ranganatha. This is why Sri Rangam temple is called the Boologa Vaikuntam (the heaven on earth).

This day many people observe fast and attempt to stay awake the whole night in the belief that they will go to Vaikuntam, the heavenly abode of Lord Vishnu. This is not a difficult task for those who spend the night at the temple, or the tradition of staying awake the whole night might have begun with staying up at the temple participating in the activities at the temple. Life, in olden times revolved around the temple. Temple was the cultural, social and religious nerve centre for the community of people living in a village or small town. As cities developed and spread far from temples, the influence of the temple on an individual became less. Religious and philosophical motives governing certain traditions could have been replaced by more temporal intentions. For instance, in the earlier times people staying awake the whole night during Vaikunta Ekaadasi or Shiva Rathri, caught in the atmosphere of bakthi, would have spent the day and night meditating on the Lord. Later, as recent as my father’s days continuous shows of mythological movies were shown in the theatres to enable people to stay awake the whole night. The tradition continues sans the spirit. My father spoke of how he with his cousins spent the whole night at the theatre watching two to three movies at a stretch. When I was young three movies were telecast through the night on the Doordarshan. There are not too many mythological movies, so every year it was ‘Tirumaal Perumai’, ‘Sampoorna Ramayanam’ , ‘Bhakta Prahalad’ during Vaikunta Ekaadasi and ‘Thiru – vilayaadal’, ‘Thitruvarul- chelvar’ and ‘Saraswathiyin Sabadam’ for Shiva Rathri; by the time I was eleven and twelve I had seen these movies several times that I knew the dialogues in these movies by-heart.

The next day, the fast is broken with a special meal that is gentle on the body system whose metabolism would have slowed due abstention from food. A type of keerai (greens) called the avithu keerai is cooked with coconut, a pachidi (sauce) is made with gooseberry and sundakai vatha kuzhambu is included in the meal. This diet acts gentle on the stomach that might have developed acidity with a day’s fast and for ulcers of the mouth caused by staying up the whole night.

Pongal in Thamizh means ‘to overflow’. Pongal is a festival celebrated in Tamil Nadu on the first day of the Thamizh month of Thai. During this period of the year the earth is positioned in its orbit around the Sun in such a manner that the South Pole is leaning towards the Sun and the places north of the equator have long days. In a more non scientific parlance, on the first day of Thai the Sun proceeds from the south of equator to the northern hemisphere, from the Dakshinaayanam (the southern direction) to the Uttaraayanam (the northern direction), over the land of the Bharathas located in the Jambu dweepam.

Indian belief system is built on the paradigm of the good and the bad. Light/darkness, day/ night, waxing/waning around which the day-to-day life is marked, are all metaphors of the good and the bad. The monthly and yearly calendars too follow this prototype. Every month is divided into 2 fifteen-day periods of 30 days, each of the fifteen days go by the waxing and the waning of the moon called the Valar pirai and the Thei pirai. Valar pirai is the waxing time of the moon from Ammavaasai (the new moon) to Paurnami (the full moon); the Thei pirai is the waning period of the moon from the Paurnami to Ammavaasai. The Valar pirai, the waxing period is also called the Shukla patcham (’shuklam’ means bright) and is deemed as auspicious, while the Thei pirai, the fifteen day waning period of the moon called the Krishna patcham ( ‘Krishna’ means dark), is not highly favoured.

Like the monthly calendar, the yearly calendar too is divided into two periods — the Uttaraayanam and the Dakshinaayanam. During the six months beginning from Thai (mid January to mid February ) to Aani ( mid June to mid July ) the Sun proceeds north of equator, while from the months Aadi to Marghazhi the Sun proceeds to the Southern hemisphere. The first six months after the winter solstice form the Uttarayanam, during this period the days get longer; this period of bright sunshine and long days is considered as auspicious, and is sanctioned for temporal preoccupations; it is the period of celebration. Thai indicates the commencement of this period. The first day of the Thai month is celebrated as Pongal.

Pongal is celebrated to offer thanks to the Sun, the energy that bestows life and vibrancy to all the organisms on the earth. It is a festival that is significant to the farmers, whose life and livelihood depends on the benevolence of the Sun God. Pongal is celebrated as the harvest festival. Though it is a festival central to the farming and pastoral communities, it is celebrated with great zeal by all the people in Tamil Nadu – for, who would not want to be blessed with prosperity and bounty!

True to its name, the Pongal is replete with simple earthly rituals that symbolize happiness and prosperity. Before sunrise, Kolam is drawn with rice flour and decorated with red earth. Mango leaves and toranam made of tender coconut leaves are tied on the doorways. Pongal (Chakkarai/ sweet Pongal), a sweet dish prepared with rice, lentil, milk, and jagerry is offered to the Sun God. The dish is prepared at the time the month of Thai is born, the preparation of the dish is significant and a ritual by itself.

The ponga panai (’panai’ means pot, earthen or brass pot; ‘ponga panai’ literally means the pot that overflows) is decorated with turmeric and ginger saplings, sandal wood paste and kumkum. The milk is boiled first, and as it boils over the children and the adults in the family chant ‘Pongal - O - Pongal’. Then rice, lentils and jaggery are added to prepare the sweet dish Chakkarai Pongal, this is offered to the Sun God along with sugarcane – all the offerings carry the hope that life overflows with sweetness and happiness. After the offering is made to the Sun God people have a festive lunch that includes rice, Chakkarai Pongal, Vadai, Kootu (a special mixed vegetable dish prepared with the fresh vegetables of the season like pumpkin, different varieties of beans, brinjal, raw bananas and sweet potatoes).

Pongal is celebrated in different ways among the different communities in Tamil Nadu. In the villages Pongal is celebrated with great pomp as the families gather outside their houses and offer Pongal to the Sun God. The day after Pongal is celebrated as Mattu Pongal (’madu’ is cow). On the Mattu Pongal, the cows are lead to the lake or river, scrubbed and given a good bath. Scented water is sprinkled on the cows and then the cows are decorated with garlands, bells and their horns are polished. The cows are lead home to be fed a nutritive meal, after which they are worshipped.

Pongal is one of the few festivals that is indigenous to the Thamizh culture, it is totally Dravidian with no influence of Aryan/ Vedic practices. There are references to the festival of Pongal in the Sangam literature. It was not very different from the way it is celebrated today in the villages. This goes to prove that culture is a continuum; by celebrating Pongal we keep alive the continuum.

Footnote - Months In Thamizh Calendar 

Chithirai falls mid April to mid May

Vaikaasi falls mid May to mid June

Aani falls mid June to mid July

Aadi falls mid July to mid August

Aavani falls mid August to mid September

Purattasi falls mid September to mid October

Aipasi falls mid October to mid November

Karthigai falls mid November to mid December

Margazhi falls mid December to mid January

Thai falls mid January to mid February

Maasi falls mid February to mid March

Panguni falls mid March to mid April

Madangalil aval Margazhi

Malargalile aval malligai

Of the months, she is Margazhi

Of the flowers, she is jasmine

Why is a beautiful woman compared to the month of Margazhi? Margazhi is the much poeticised month in Thamizh calendar. Tamil Nadu experiences tropical climate with hot summers, blustery monsoons, and sweltering post monsoon heat. The Margazhi month that falls between mid December to mid January is a hiatus before the mercury picks gradually up through the months of Thai (mid January – mid February), Masi (mid February to mid March), Panguni (mid March to mid April) to climax with agni nakshatram the 14 day hot period at the end of Chithirai (mid April to mid May) and the beginning of Vaigasi (mid May to mid June).

That is for the earthly calendar. What about the calendar of the devas? In the deva lokha one human year equals one day. The six months from Aadi (mid July to mid August) to Margazhi corresponding to the southern solstice make up the night of the Gods, the six other months make up the day of the Gods. So the beautiful month of Margazhi is the dawn, the Brahma muhurtham, when the celestial beings wake up for their day. So we spend the whole of the Margazhi month gently coaxing the devas, the blue hued and lotus eyed Vishnu to wake up.

This is the holy month in the Hindu Tamil calendar when people immerse themselves in devotion, there are no marriages held in this month, men and women are expected to spend their time visiting temples, invoking bhagavath nama through japam, meditation and by singing bhajans. The mornings begin with women drawing large kolam, they then visit temples where they sing the proverbial ‘Thiruppavai’ composed by the Vaishnavite woman mystic Andal. Group of men and women sing bhajans and circumambulate the streets around temples.

Margazhi is synonymous with Andal’s ‘Thiruppavai’, a collection of 30 verses that correspond with the 30 days of the month.

Kodai,

the daughter of the devout Brahmin of Srivilliputtur,

who offers cool, fragrant, green lotus-garlands to the Lord -

Kodai is the composer of these verses.

Thirty in number,

a string of Thamizh verses

when rendered with passion and devotion

O, my friend,

secures the grace of my Lord,

whose eyes shine crimson.

He is fortune embodied,

the handsome husband of Lakshmi.

Identifying herself with the ayarpadis or the cowherd community, Andal, the fifteen year old girl sang these songs of deep and pure devotion twelve hundred years ago during the beautiful month of Margazhi in a village called Srivilliputtur not very far from the Pandya capital of Madurai. Andal the mystic poet was the adopted daughter of Periazhvar, a Vaishnava saint, who found the orphaned child in the brindavanam of the temple in Srivilliputtur. He named the child Kodai and the beautiful child grew in an ambience of godliness, she accompanied her father to the temple every day and wove the garland of flowers with great care that the devout man offered to Lord Vishnu. She spent the day in the temple with her father, listening to the songs that he sang in praise of the Lord.

Being a child of circumstances, the girl grew with an abiding love for the Lord whom she started seeing as her lover. She dreamt of visiting the Ranganatha temple in Srirangam, pined for the lord and sang songs pleading her lord to come and take her away from the binding world. Her ‘Thiruppavai’ songs are replete with the rasa of Bhakti and devotion, the plaintive cry of the jiva yearning for union with the paramatma is brought out in a simple manner as the songs effortlessly move between earthly images and the ethereal as they delineate the legend of the Govinda, the cloud hued cowherd of Gokul.

Historically the songs serve as a source for the rituals and practices followed in the Thamizh country during the eighth and ninth centuries. The songs allude to Pavai nombu, a ritual observed by young girls and women to bring prosperity to the land and happiness to all the people. It is generally believed that the nombu was observed for Katyayani (a form of Durga). Women and girls observing pavai nombu woke before dawn, bathed in the river and made an image of Katyayani with the clay found in the river bank and offered prayers to the Goddess.

‘Thiruppavai’ commences with a group of girls routing their way on a cold Margazhi morning to the banks of the river to observe nombu for the Lord who measured the world with his three strides. Andal says to her companions -

We will sing in praise of the Lord

Who rests on the waves of the ocean

We neither partake of rich foods, milk nor ghee

Having bathed we do not adorn ourselves with kohl or flowers

 We follow a virtuous life and are gentle on our words

We offer gifts to the needy

 We are blissful as out thoughts turn toward liberation.

The entourage straggling to the river wake up the girls still sleeping, chiding them for their negligence of duty towards the Lord.

Apart from the bhava of Bhakti, the poems are evocative of Margazhi thingal, the beautiful Margazhi morning laden with dew that inspired a sensitive girl to write a poem that is as much, according to me, a dedication to the Margazhi day that carries kisses of cold nights, as much as it is a dedication to her Lord. The dawn takes a long, long time to come by as the eastern skies nudge the daybreak with tinges of the purple and orange. So does her Lord takes his time, agonises the nayaki.

Illustrations: Lalitha Thiagarajan

I visited the Raj Ghat with my husband and son on October 3rd. We handed over our slippers at the counter for safekeeping and paid one rupee for each pair. There were racks where you could leave your slippers without paying money. I observed that many opted to do that. Near the shoe rack, on a marble slab are inscribed Gandhi’s words. I read it aloud as my son listened. It said that every thought and action of ours should bring a change in the lives of the poorest of the poor. We went in and stood before the Samadhi. There were not too many visitors, there was a family standing before the samadhi and posing for a photograph, a group of men languidly stretched on the freshly watered lawn, a group of workers were dismantling the stage set for musicians and bhajan singers, rolls of white bedsheets and bolsters were heaped – the October sun on the white linen stung our eyes.

These were the many distractions that I had to tide over while I tried thinking what Gandhi means to me now and how I can take this man across to my 13 year old son. I did not want a history class with him. There were several one liners that I had directed at him during the times he got addicted to action movies and thought that power and strength were only of the physical kind. I used Mahatma Gandhi as an illustration of my point ‘True strength lies in forgiving and letting go’, ‘A great war can be won without raising your little finger’ - there were punch lines that I created and chanted like slogans when he got back home after boxing someone’s ears. I knew these were very simplistic and told myself several times that I would present the complexities involved in any struggle like the one Gandhi spearheaded, once my son grew up. So when my son got carried away with Sylvester Stallones and Arnold Scwhazeneggers I introduced him to Richard Attenborough’s movie ‘Gandhi’.

When I saw the film with my son I realised how much I had underestimated his power to critically reflect. When he saw the scene where Gandhi compels Kasturi ba to clean the toilet my son observed, “So Gandhi’s wife refused to support him.” He was upset that Kasturi ba had to be forced, Gandhi’s sudden burst of anger that was shown in the film went against his understanding of Gandhi. He at once saw that Gandhi was also coercing Kasturiba at a very subtle level by making her do what she loathed from the bottom of her heart. That made him uncomfortable about Gandhi.

On seeing the film he was surprised that freedom struggle involved so much blood shed despite the fact that Gandhi was involved in it. He had believed that Gandhi delivered the goods for Indians and that he carried on his frail shoulders the fate of our country. He learnt that Gandhi was not in total control and that there were forces that were beyond his control. And that non-violence and non cooperation did not always yield positive result.

As a sole historiographer of India’s struggle for freedom in my son’s home education process and in my keenness to use Gandhi for a personal agenda I had caused enough damage and have been unfair to true historical thinking.

I recollected that Mahatma Gandhi was like family to me when I was my son’s age. I grew up hearing how my grand father was a Gandhian, how my father’s cousin wore Khadi as a protest, my father waited as a young boy at the Kumbakonam railway station to see Gandhi who was travelling past the town. I was strongly advised to read Gandhi’s autobiography, large tracks of it was narrated as stories when I was barely a toddler – especially the episode of Gandhi refusing to take the help of his teacher to spell right as it amounted to cheating the School Inspector, and the story of Harish chandra came en route Gandhi. I grew to feel pride at the legacy of Nehru and Gandhi; my opinions of critical political events were influenced by this. I grew to believe that Hindu-Muslim conflict broke Gandhi and the Indo-China war ruined Nehru. A great sense of tragedy accompanied such knowledge. My understanding of colonial and post colonial history was embedded in the common sense discourse of the middle class Hindu milieu that I hail from. The trite history texts in fact remained independent of the rich narrative that I acquired otherwise. I did not have the tools to critically read these narratives till I came to college. The teenage phase of defiantly declaiming the past should not be accounted for.

At Raj Ghat I had read to my son Gandhi’s words with a voice filled with passion. As I stood on the lawns I told myself that I should not sell Gandhi, my son can find Gandhi on his own. So as we stepped out to wear our slippers I read the same words with a controlled voice and placed Gandhi for my son to analyse and understand in the way he deems fit. Two generations away, distanced by time and with the shadow cast by the specific historical period paling away, for an adolescent Gandhi is no more a name invoked by an anxious mother driving home a point about ahimsa. I have observed my son sift certain rudimentary tools to analyse historical events, I might offer him simple frames of class, caste and class to understand Gandhi. Any suggestions?