Book Review
Buddha Presented as a Challenger of Brahminism
By Kulamarva Balakrishna
I just completed reading a great book. I had it with me for two and a half years. The book is God as Political Philosopher—Buddha’s Challenge to Brahminism, written by Prof. Kancha Ilaiah and published by Samya, 16 Southern Avenue, Kolkatta, India.
Commercial journalism today is an extension of our good old Brahminism. It is the same everywhere. Even with published names and photos we remain anonymous, as if anonymity condones irresponsibility. A case in point is what we witnessed recently in The New York Times. A reporter of the paper, who later confessed to drug-related problems, deceived himself, his paper and its readers by publishing reports parts of which turned out to be fabrications. While we should congratulate the publishers of The New York Times for their timely intervention and acknowledgment of responsibility, we should also condemn all journalists, today’s Brahmins, who have no integrity. The issue continues to haunt us journalists everywhere. It is in that context that I make my appraisal of Kancha Ilaiah’s thought-provoking book.
I came to know about Prof. Ilaiah when I read his other controversial book, Why I am not a Hindu, a few years ago. The experience was similar to my discovering Namdev Dhasal. If Namdev struck me as Dalit wrath in human form, Prof. Ilaiah comes across as one who exudes coolness and profundity through the pages of his books. Unlike the observant Vasant Moon (Growing Up Untouchable in India), Ilaiah is all set to clean up the images of the ninth, and the last, incarnation of the Hindu establishment. I call the ninth incarnation the last because the promised tenth incarnation of Kalki has not yet materialized.
Prof. Ilaiah, being a contemporary, is in the best position to judge the Buddha avatar. He teaches political science at Osmania University. Among the books authored by him, I have read only Why I am not a Hindu, other than the one under review. I have read numerous newspaper articles written by him, though. His other books are A Shudra Critique of Hindutva Philosophy and Culture and Political Economy.
Described as an activist Dalitbahujan, Prof. Ilaiah is in the good company of true preceptors of what we now call Brahminic Hinduism: Parasara, the son of Vasishtha by an untouchable woman, Adrishyanti; and his son, the ugly-looking Vedavyasa, born of a fishmonger girl, Matsyagandhi, by rape.
According to Ilaiah, the Buddha was born about 40 years before Confucius and 82 years before Socrates. The Buddha considered all men and women equal. He fine-tuned the tribal-democratic-republican life of his time to challenge the Brahminical authoritarianism. Prof. Ilaiah contrasts the Buddha with Kautilya, the younger Brahmin proponent of Dandaniti or punitive justice. Punitive justice was unknown to the Buddha.
Ilaiah also compares the Buddha’s teachings to those of Manu, the author of the notorious Hindu book of law. Manu, to this day, has remained unidentified. He could be a historical person or the self-created Swayambhu Manu or any other person by that name. The book of law, according to Hindu tradition, acknowledges its authority only as secondary. The primary authority has been accorded to the Shruti. In the third category come the Puranas. The Puranas (totaling 18 books) and the Itihasa (the Mahabharata) together represent the dreaded Brahmin-Hindu establishment.
In general, Prof. Ilaiah’s study juxtaposes Tathagata’s teachings with the dictates of the entire Brahminical establishment, where the Brahmins are considered above the law or a law unto themselves. The Shudras are served by the Hindu legal system with what was left over after serving the Varnashrama’s other two castes, namely the Kshatriya and the Vaisya.
With commendable erudition, Prof. Ilaiah goes on to show how far the Buddha preached and practiced transparency and compassion as the basic principles of his philosophy. As far as we know, the Buddha, as Bodhisatva of the Mahayana/Vajrayana Buddhists, is the only historical avatar of Hindu-Brahmin God! Ilaiah presents him as a political philosopher. A remarkable performance, indeed, especially in the context of the present political reality in India. I salute him for that.
Al Qaeda-Type Terrorism
The Brahmins waged a sustained low-intensity war against the Buddha and his teachings by injecting panjaratra agama (five nightly non-Vedic rituals) magic concepts in the name of salvaging the last life on earth. According to me, the Brahmins of the old indeed raped our civilization to father an Al Qaeda-type psycho-terrorism. It is time we exposed the continuing Brahmin-ISI (Inter-Services Intelligence of Pakistan) activities through eternal vigilance. We must root out corruption around us, even among the Dalitbahujan intellectuals. Integrity is what we need to save and secure our times for posterity. Ananda, who is in the income tax department, tells me that the Brahmin-ISI clique is very active and chases every up-and-coming Dalitbahujan in the Indian bureaucracy, just as Atal Behari Vajpayee chased Dalitbahujan Mayavati!
Having said all this, I like to point out that the merits of this great book could have been enhanced by including the following facts:
The Buddha came to this earth not as an Aryan but as an Indo-Tibetan of the Sakya clan, which was governed in accordance with democratic principles, when the Aryan nomads were just beginning to settle down. In the course of settling down, they caused the worst kind of varnasankara, or the mixing of castes through intermarriages, by hiring themselves as gigolos and even by raping. I would also like to point out for the sake of clarity that during those unsettled days, male prostitution was prevalent. Manu called it niyoga. The Buddha, the reformist Sakyamuni, challenged the practice. But his younger and stronger adversaries, Manu and Kautilya, were content with compiling the earlier versions of Brahmin-ISI manuals for their caste-ridden establishment. They were only codifying what was being practiced by their nomadic establishment of convenience. They do not deserve the Buddha’s status. The Buddha was the first man to accord the life-span its due place, dividing it into the past (memory), the present (being mobile) and the future (hope) and pointing to its real nature, which is constant change.
●
Ill Health Interrupts Balakrishna's Peace March
By M.P. Prabhakaran
Kulamarva Balakrishna wore and distributed T-shirts, bearing the slogan ‘Give love and peace a chance,’
during the peace march he undertook in Bombay on October 2, 2003.
‘Give love and peace a chance’ was the theme of a peace march Kulamarva Balakrishna undertook on October 2 this year. October 2, in case anyone doesn’t know, is Mahatma Gandhi’s birthday.
That the march had to be called off due to ill health a few hours after it began is immaterial. What is material is the fact that a man who is living without his pancreas had the courage to undertake it, in pursuance of a cause he firmly believes in.
Mr. Balakrishna is a journalist and social activist. After spending years of his journalistic career in Bombay, first as a reporter on Free Press Journal, a daily, and then as editor of Hi, a fortnightly, he left India in the mid-1970's. Those who closely followed his career know that he left India only physically. His heart was always in India.
The physical departure took place during the infamous phase in India's democratic history. That was when the late Prime Minister Indira Gandhi put the country under emergency rule and suspended all civil liberties, thereby making it impossible for her political opponents, intellectuals and independent-minded journalists to function freely. Many of them were sent to jail. Mr. Balakrishna chose to leave the country rather than languish in jail.
After traveling around Europe for some time, he decided to settle down in Austria, adopting that country as his second home. He now spends his time equally between India and Austria.
Though 70 years old and in indifferent health (his pancreas were surgically removed three years ago and since then he has been surviving by taking insulin shots five times a day), he continues his journalistic and social service activities with the energy and enthusiasm of a teenager determined to make it in life against all odds.
Two years ago, he vowed to undertake a peace march from Bombay to New Delhi to spread the message of peace along the way. The inspiration for the march, of course, came from Mahatma Gandhi’s teachings and the immediate impetus was provided by the 2002 communal carnage in Gujarat.
He began the march, in all earnestness, at Bombay’s Mani Bhavan, where Gandhi had an office during his campaign for India’s independence. Balakrishna’s dream was to march all the way to Rajghat, New Delhi, where Gandhi was cremated after being assassinated by a Hindu fanatic.
Although about one hundred people had promised to join him in the march, none showed up when it actually began. It began at six in the morning on October 2, 2003. Refusing to be dissuaded by those who let him down, he started the march alone. He started pushing a wheelchair with all his belongings and medical supplies for the period of the march on it. His wish was to push it all the 950 miles, all the way to New Delhi. Alas, that was not to be. By the time he reached Santa Cruz, about 10 miles from where he started, his health let him down. He collapsed. An auto-rickshaw driver came to his rescue. He had no choice but to abandon the march. Thus ended the mission in which he had invested a lot of enthusiasm and energy.
Right now, he is back at work--in social activism and journalism--at Mangalore, India. He is busy setting up a media-monitoring trust that would serve as a watchdog for the print and electronic media in India. For starters, he plans to monitor the activities in 18 Indian languages. His goal is to do what he can toward restoring sanity and decency to the media. The trust is founded on the basic principle that all journalists should respect truth, reality and privacy of individuals. Its name is Taravadu Taranga Trust for Media Monitoring.
Mr. Balakrishna can be reached by e-mail at kulamarva@vasnet.co.in
[Published on November 22, 2003]
[Readers are invited to comment. Send your comments to letters@eastwestinquirer.com]