Travelogue, ode, lament
RAMASWAMY R. IYER
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A journey down the Ganga portraying life along its banks and the issues the river faces today
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GANGA: Julian Crandall Hollick; Random House Publishers India Pvt. Ltd., 301, World Trade Tower, Barakhambha Road, New Delhi-110001. Rs. 450.
This is a book about a journey down the Ganga (from its source to the delta) by the author and his group for making a radio programme about the river and the life alongside of it. Apart from being a smooth-flowing narrative of the journey and of the making of a radio programme, the book is a vivid account of the lives, practices, customs and cultures of people at different places as the journey proceeds down the river, and simultaneously a portrayal of the different person
alities of the river in the various stretches (Gangotri, Haridwar, Kanpur, Allahabad, Varanasi, Patna, Farakka, Sagar island in the Delta). It is also an ode to the river, a lament over its present state and the possibility of its further decline and death, and an earnest plea for its restoration to health.
Special relationship
That description should not be misunderstood to imply a romantic or sentimental attitude. The book is always clear-eyed, and the people that one encounters on its pages are observed with a dry humour. The tone, however, never becomes patronising or sardonic or satirical. There is an understanding of the complex and mundane motivations of people, their worldliness and their vanities; but there is also a sympathetic and respectful recording of the faith that impels them to undertake pilgrimages and observances and perform rituals, with or without a full knowledge of what they are doing.
The author’s sense of a special relationship with the River Ganga is a strand that runs through the whole of the book. He repeatedly refers (with evident regret) to the impediments to the river’s natural flow caused by human interventions (dams, reservoirs, canals) and the heavy abstractions for agricultural and industrial purposes, which cumulatively threaten to destroy the river as we have known it. Though he does not offer any radical criticisms of the prevailing ideas of “modernity” or “development”, it is clear that he would have preferred less drastic interventions in nature.
He sees the Ganga Action Plan as a wholly inappropriate answer to the problem of river pollution. He draws attention to alternative answers that others (for instance, Vir Bhadra Mishra, written as Veer Badre Mishra by the author, of the NGO Sankat Mochan) have proposed, and regrets that the planners and bureaucrats have not paid much attention to them but have preferred to look abroad for solutions. The criticism of the Ganga Action Plan in the book needs to be carefully read by people in the government and by all the scientists and engineers in the Central and State governments or in academia who deal with such problems.
Farakka Barrage
The other major government project that is the subject of severe criticism in the book is the Farakka Barrage. There have always been serious doubts about the wisdom of that project and its relevance as an answer to the problems of the Kolkata Port. Those doubts are reinforced by the book, which presents the project as an unmitigated folly and disaster. This indictment again needs to be carefully pondered by the planners, bureaucrats and engineers in government and outside.
This exciting book has — alas — its blemishes. There are errors in the Sanskrit “slokas” cited in English transliteration in many places. The run-on of text from one page to the next is marred in some cases by repetitions or omissions (e.g., pp 84-85, 87-88, 90-91, 91-92, 94-95, 96-97). The copy-editing could have been better: see for instance the clumsy second sentence in footnote 26 on p.84; the footnote on p. 101 refers to “other rivers notably the Krishna” when Krishna has already been listed; in the cited title in the footnote on p. 102, “last rover” presumably means “lost river”. On p.115, the author says that Rama “more or less openly” accused Sita “of being unfaithful with Ravana…” One’s impression was that Rama was imposing an obligation on Sita to prove herself because he wanted to quell gossip in the city and not because he himself suspected her. If there is textual evidence for the latter explanation, one would like to see it.
Water sharing
On p. 189 (bottom), the author wonders whether Farakka was built in order to punish Pakistan (later Bangladesh). In his Sharing the Ganges Ben Crow has gone into the allegations of Indian malevolent intent and shown them to be basel
ess. The author also suggests that canal water (on the Indus system) was cut off to Pakistan in 1948 “as tit-for-tat for Kashmir”. Following the Partition there was a Stand-Still Agreement to keep things going, and on the day that it expired the Provincial Government in (Indian) Punjab stopped canal supplies to Pakistan. This was a case of sticking to the letter, and this might have been partly motivated by the state of hostility between the two newly formed countries, but to describe it as “tit-for-tat for Kashmir” seems unwarranted. (As soon as he became aware of the stoppage of canal waters, Nehru intervened and restored supplies.)
To return to praise, no review can do justice to the riches that the book contains. The reviewer can only say to all readers with all the emphasis at his command “Read it.”
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