January 11, 2012
Three things that I forgot to mention yesterday. I will blame the petulant koel birds for that. Let me get through them the first thing today.
1. Malayala Manorama newspaper awards the KarshakaShree title to an outstanding farmer in the state once in two years. This year, for the the first time, a woman has become the recipient. Kunjumol Jose from Idukki, though widowed at a young age, brought up her two sons by farming in her ten acres. The article in the newspaper lists the crops that she cultivates in that estate which I think are worth noting.
10,000 coffee plants (robusta and arabica), 4000 black pepper vines, 250 cardamom, 700 cocoa, 1200 banana ('nenthran' variety), 100 coconut trees, 1.5 acres of rice paddy, other varieties of banana and vegetables, 3 cows, 30 hens, goats,rabbits, ducks, 2 ponds with katla, rohu, mrigal and tilapia fish.
Here is a sample of the yields that she manages with a permanent support staff of five. 3500kg coffee (Rs. 60/kg), 150 kg pepper (Rs 325/kg), Cardamom 100kg (Rs 70).Pepper and cardamom costs half the revenue to produce. 7000kg rice. 100-120 coconuts per tree. 100kg/week of cocoa for 4 months which sells at Rs 58 per kilo. 2000 tapioca with each plant yielding 5-10kg. 300-350 kg of bitter gourd per harvest.
Bravo!
2. The interschool Science fair recently concluded in the city. Newspapers featured some of the interesting projects that the kids had presented like fire extinguishing systems for firecracker factories, alarm system connecting dams in a river, portable pollution-free crematorium, electricity from the common weed aquarium watermoss (salvinia molesta) and so on. All simple, practical and timely. I wish all these kids get scholarships and go abroad to pursue their genuine scientific interest. This country still spends a ritual 0.5% of its GDP on R&D while on a nauseatingly chanting the mantra of its "glorious scientific past". Even in today's Hindu newspaper, Justice Katju writes about the need to make India scientific "as before" and names Aryabhatta, Bhaskara, Charaka, Ramanujam and C.V. Raman. I am personally skeptical of this myth of "glorious past" of Indian science!
3. For the last couple of weeks, I had managed to extract some traction for the idea of buying a cow. Not the cross breed big milk producer that needs a shed and professional udder servicing, but the robust, tiny, indigenous Vechur cow. Vechur cows are around 90cm tall. They don't mind the Indian heat and Kerala rain and need no shed. Their milk is healthy and the cow provides around 2 liters a day for 2 years after calving. It can be taken for regular walks like a dog. It needs mostly kitchen waste as food. If one is interested in a business deal, the milk fetches around Rs 50 per litre and more importantly the urine that is used in Ayurvedic dermatological preparations fetches a not-so-stinky Rs 160 per litre.
But the Kerala State Farming department has urinated on my plans. They don't intend to sell any more Vechur cows till they restock the breed. Currently there is a waiting list 3000 long. It will take at least 2 years!
Looking up online on Dilmun and Punt (pronounced as Poonth as in Nampoonthiri!) lost civilizations, I chanced on a 2009 paper by Iravattam Mahadevan of the Indus Research Center, Chennai on deciphering two of the most common symbols in the Indus script. He calls this alpha and omega as "Meluha" and "Agastya".
Meluha is the civilization of origin according to Egyptian and Akkadian myths. Kesari Balakrishna Pillai thought it lies in modern day Qatar. Many other researchers think it is in Bahrain. Meluha has recently re-entered the Indian reading population's psyche through the Amish Tripathi novel called "Immortals of Meluha" which casts the old Shiva in a new avatar.
The 2009 paper identifies the common diamond within diamond (as in the diamond spade heart club) symbol from Harappa as 'mel-aka' (high-inside) meaning the high citadel in Dravidian. This symbol appears regularly in the top right corner of the seals as the starting symbol (alpha). It is quite possible it means the address as in the seal is issued by the citadel or place of authority. The records of the Padmanabhaswami temple even today are called 'Mathilakom' (from inside the walls)records and angels in Arabic are Malakkhas. This Mel-akam of Dravidians, is in all probability, Meluha of the Egyptians and Meleccha of the Aryan Sanskrit.
The final symbol in most seals (the omega) looks like a jar. Mahadevan argues that it stands for the -ar,-an sounds. Akattiyar, who becomes Agastyar in Sanskrit, could thus mean the authority from the citadel. The jar symbol is arguably derived from the 'water bearing' nature of the priests. 'Sata' (of the 'thayir-sadam' (curd-rice)) originally was a sacrificial vessel with a 100 holes. Malayalam 'chata' as in 'chaatam/shraadham' for funeral rites has the same origin.
I had thought it is possible that Akattiyar could mean the man who kept the inside flame going (thee=fire) which stood for both a priest with the duty towards the flame (like in Parsi fire-temple, Atar is fire there) or someone with great spiritual inner fire!
Apparently Akattiyar led a group of Vel (Velar, vellalar) people to south India. The paper mentions that the symbol/word 'pali' stands for the village or town.
With this much, I can't help running wild with imagination. Kerala and Tamil Nadu are still land of many 'Palli' and Pilli' towns and villages. In Malayalam, Jain temples in the past and churches and mosques today are called Palli. School is Pallikoodam.The 'jar' is a 'kudam' in Malayalam and one of the prominent peaks near Thiruvananthapuram is called Agastyakoodam where reportedly there was an observatory couple of thousand years ago.
The time-calculating devices, especially the 'Nazhika', in ancient Kerala involved a holed jar. The 'Nazhika' hour, so to speak, was the time it took for such a jar to completely immerse in water. I speculate that the priests of the citadel had time-keeping duties as well for the whole town along with their rituals.
Two of the most famous myths associated with Agastya are that he lowered the Vindhya mountains to cross to south India and that he drank up the whole ocean through his palm. Both seem to be preserving memories of massive engineering projects: building of a mountain pass and draining of a lake/marsh. The draining of marsh and mudplains (settling the ever shifting land/ recovering from ocean) is a common myth both with Arabian Meluha and Parashurama's Kerala. Parashurama is supposed to have reclaimed Kerala from the ocean and settled 64 families of Brahmins here.
Huge dam construction and destruction have been discussed in the Vedas. Recently in the context of Mullaperiyar dam, I saw a Sama Veda quote which noting from a weak memory went something like this:
"Vrishtinaam Pushti Samakritam Rodhenam Papahethu" a warning against daming of rivers. I forgot the name of the king whose chief strategy was destroying the dams of the enemy kingdom to cripple them. Agasthya myths are similar to Bhagiratha's one about bringing river Ganga down from the heavens and using Shiva's hair to reduce the impact of her fall.
Vel in Tamil now is most commonly associated with the god Murugan (Velayudhan) and recently actor Vijay (velayudham). I think exploring the connection with Vella (white) and Vellam (water) in Malayalam would be interesting. 'Vellapalli' Natesan is the name of the current SNDP party!
Even while I continue to speculate, wonder, dream about these things, occasionally it dawns on me that knowing the origins and the routes is not going to make any difference. If anything, such knowledge is quickly degraded into an argument for superiority and seniority and consequent exploitation.
Yet, the yearning to know more about one's past, to establish a universal unity remains strong!
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