Monday, December 28, 2009

The Great Arc
















The Great Arc
Author: John Keay
Publisher: Harper Collins
Pages: 172

“The Great Arc – The dramatic tale of how India was mapped and Everest was named” is a good book based on a wonderful engineering feat in the 19th century. The book gives details and anecdotes of the survey team which set about mapping India and calculating the heights of lofty Himalayan peaks. The Great Trigonometrical Survey started in the year 1800 from Madras, went south to Kanyakumari and then off they went up to Dehradun in Uttaranchal under the leadership of William Lambton and after his demise, under George Everest (pronounced ‘eve-rest’) who later became the surveyor general of India. The survey ended in 1843, and by the time the costs in terms of man power and material far exceeded that of any war made by the East India company till then. The survey corrected the maps extant at that time and several errors were brought to public notice for the first time. The width of the south Indian peninsula was lesser than previously thought. Hence, it is also said that this survey caused the East India Company the loss of more land than conceded in any war.
The survey proceeded by triangulation in which three observation points are chosen suitably, the distance (base line) between two points are measured as accurately as possible and the angle between these points obtained using great precision theodolite. It is said that the error in distance was very minute (3 inches along 7.19 miles). Such inch-perfect calculations was further complicated by the fact that the angles of such a triangle described on the curvy earth surface don’t add up to 180 degrees. Corrections for all these factors were also taken into account. The first base line was taken from Marina Beach in Madras to the grand stand in the Madras Race Course. Thus Madras (now Chennai) is called the Greenwich of India. No wonder the Indian Standard Time is actually the local time in Madras.
Till the heights of Himalayan peaks were ascertained, the tallest mountain in the world was considered to be Mount Chimborazo in Ecuador (20,565 ft, which does not include it even in the first 100). This was firmly refuted by Indian surveyors and several peaks were found to be taller than this. George Everest had never seen nor measured the height of the famous mountain which would bear his name. But he was strict on naming any peak with its local appellation and hence the names Kanchenjunga, Nandadevi, Nanga Parbat, Dhaulagiri etc. But the greatest mountain didn’t have a local name and the Nepali government, which had the jurisdiction over the site refused to cooperate with the survey. This prompted Andrew Scott Waugh, who became the Surveyor General after the retirement of Everest, to name the peak in honour of his worthy superior. Waugh’s proposal makes interesting reading.
We have for some years known that this mountain is higher than any hitherto measured in India and most probably, it is the highest in the whole world. I was taught by my respected chief and predecessor Colonel Sir George Everest to assign to every geographical object its true local or native appellation. I have always scrupulously adhrered to this rule as I have in fact to all other principles laid down by that eminent geodesist. But, here is a mountain, most probably the highest in the world, without any local name that we can discover, whose native appellation, if it has any, will not very likely be ascertained before we are allowed to penetrate into Nepal and to approach close to this stupendous snowy mass. In the meantime, the privilege as well as the duty devolves on me to assign to this lofty pinnacle of our globe a name whereby it may be known among geographers and become a household word among civilized nations. In virtue of this privilege, in testimony of my affectionate respect for a revered chief, in conformity with what I believe to be the wish of all the members of the scientific department over which I have the honour to preside, and to perpetuate the memory of that illustrious master of accurate geographical research, I have determined to name this noble peak of the Himalayas, Mount Everest.The coordinates of Mt Everest are 27 d 59 m 16.7 s N, 86 d, 58 m, 5.9 s E.
Overall rating: 3 Star

Saturday, December 26, 2009

Empires of the Indus











Empires of the Indus
Author: Alice Albinia
Publisher: John Murray Publishers
Pages: 314
Empires of the Indus is the story of a journey from the confluence of the river Indus in the Arabian Sea to its source in Tibet through three nations (India, Pakistan and Afghanistan) and an occupied territory (Tibet). Along the journey, the historical details of the territory as well as ethnic minorities (to whom the author appears to have a special affinity) is also narrated in a compact and easy way. The travel was done in 2005 when the author was only 29. In a sense, this may be said to be an epic journey by a solitary female journalist travelling through often lawless regions and where women are generally considered inferior. May be because of the misogynist sentiments harboured by the inhabitants, all doors will be spontaneously opened for a daring and charming white woman! These people who cover their own womenfolk in purdah would do anything for a lady who dares to ask for what she needs! We find people eager to accompany her as guides in urban Karachi, hilly Swat valley where the writ of Taliban runs supreme, in Kargil and in occupied Tibet where the source of the river is finally found.
The journey begins from the delta of Indus near Karachi. The author makes friends with the sewage cleaners of Karachi, the Sheedis (descendants of negro slaves brought along with Arab Muslim invasionists in 8th century), the Mohana boat people, Kalash tribals and Tibetans. The sources and references indicate that the material is well researched and scientifically chosen. There is an interesting anecdote in which the Sheedis of Pakistan believe that Tipu Sultan, the ruler of Mysore in the late 18th century was also a Sheedi. This confirms a lingering doubt a tourist might have after visiting Darya Daulat Ganj (Tipu’s summer palace in Srirangapatna near Mysore) where portraits of the Sultan are exhibited even though against Islamic law which prevents the portrayal of a living being. The sultan is shown as an unusually black person when compared to the other Muslim nobles in his court. I had wondered about this after visiting the site in 2009, and now in the backdrop of the Sheedi theory, perhaps it is now clear.
The author, being one of the ahl-al-kitab (people of the book) gets free access to Islamic holy places. She says, “Early Islam was influenced by the holy scriptures – and prophets – of Judaism and Christianity, and the ahl-al-kitab have advantages in Muslim polities. As believers in one God they might go to paradise; if they are women they can marry Muslims; they can certainly go to each other’s worship-places”.
Regarding Jinnah, several pages are dedicated. “He (Jinnah) had not packed away a single silk sock from his mansion in Bombay or his colonial bungalow in Delhi (fondly imagining weekend retreats to India with his equally naïve sister Fatima). Until the very last moment he seems to have had in mind a vague cohabitation of dominion states; he even seems to have convinced himself that the nation he had won for Muslims would be a realm where religion didn’t matter. ‘You are free’ he said three days before independence in a speech that has become the mantra of Pakistan’s embattled secularists (and conversely is excluded from editions of Jinnah’s speeches by the pious), ‘you are free to go to your temples, you are free to go to your mosques….you may belong to any religion or caste or creed – that has nothing to do with the fundamental principle that we are all citizens and equal citizens of one state”. And what a hue and cry was raised against L K Advani’s speech terming Jinnah as a secularist!
The book also shows in details the hate propaganda circulating sometimes officially in India and Pakistan against each other. She quotes a social studies text book in Pakistan which says, “Muslims and Hindus are completely different in their way of life, eating habits and dress. We worship in mosques. Our mosques are open, spacious, clean and well-lit. Hindus worship inside their temples. These temples are extremely narrow, enclosed and dark”. See the venom in these words! Children are taught in an official text book that “we” worship in mosques! No wonder Pakistan has become and most dangerous country in the world with all forms of religious terrrorism in every nook and corner of the country where even the Army headquarters is not safe.
The unnatural sexual preferences of a large section of the society in the deeply religious areas of Pakistan are also noted in passing. It seems that Islam’s much fabled separation of the sexes was purchased at the cost of sodomy. Even emperors were no different – Emperor Babur’s mother had to virtually push him into the room of his newly wed bride from the clutches of a slave boy who was his lover. Similar was the case of Sultan Mahmud of Ghazni, who was portrayed as kissing the feet of the sleeping Ayaz, his negro slave-lover. In fact, the romance between Mahmud and Ayaz became an iconic theme in Persian culture!
However, the book loses relevance at some points where the author has relied solely on facts based hearsay. In page 270, it is shown that, “How completely it (the river Indus) exists at one remove from the Indian mainstream was illustrated clearly when L K Advani, India’s right-wing Home minister, visited Ladakh in the late 1990s. ‘What is the river here?’ he asked his hosts, who told him that it was the Senge Tsampo – using the local Tibetan name for the river; the Sindhu, they added, using the Sanskrit appellation. ‘The what?’ Advani asked; then somebody explained: the Indus”. It really requires a substantially large pinch of salt to accept this story about a man who had spent the prime of his youth on the shores of the same river and the same province which bears its name ‘Sindh’.
Altogether, a good work, eminently readable and touches on some aspects of the cultural psyche which still connects us to river which gave us our name.
Overall rating: 3 Star

Saturday, December 12, 2009

Antony and Cleopatra

This is one of the tragical pieces of William Shakespeare composed in 1606 based on historical records. A review is obviously not intended.

Some scenes are really masterful, particularly the last few. The suicides of Antony and Cleopatra bring forth the contradictions and worldly pressures experienced by the lovers. Antony paid the price of ignoring his call of duty and immersing in the pleasure of Egypt. He was defeated in the Battle of Actium by Octavius Caesar and had to commit suicide as no room was granted to him by the victorious Caesar.