Introduction to the Life and Legacy of D V Gundappa

Source: prekshaa series

[[Introduction to the Life and Legacy of D V Gundappa Source: prekshaa]]

ಅಸಮದಲಿ ಸಮತೆಯನು ವಿಷಮದಲಿ ಮೈತ್ರಿಯನು ।
ಅಸಮಂಜಸದಿ ಸಮನ್ವಯ ಸೂತ್ರ ನಯವ ॥
ವೆಸನಮಯ ಸಂಸಾರದಲಿ ವಿನೋದವ ಕಾಣ್ಬ ।
ರಸಿಕತೆಯೆ ಯೋಗವಲೊ - ಮಂಕುತಿಮ್ಮ ॥

To find equality in disparity, harmony in oddities,
A gentle strand of reconciling strife,
To find joy in the melancholy of worldly existence –
This attitude of refined taste verily is Yoga – Mankutimma

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Given the vast expanse of his work, the sweep of his accomplishments, and the elevating quality of his entire life, one could begin anywhere but the aforementioned verse is among the most representative. It encapsulates and epitomizes the vision, work, legacy, and life of the philosopher-poet-litterateur-statesman who wrote it: Devanahalli Venkataramanaiah Gundappa or D V Gundappa or simply, DVG.

This essay marks the beginning of a humble attempt to honour and commemorate his multi-hued, eventful and noble legacy spread over nearly seven decades set primarily on the vast canvas of Bharata and Bharatiyata. With the sheer dint of his spotless life, writing, and Loka Sangraha, he gradually came to be known simply as DVG, the three letters uttered reverentially, lovingly, even today by millions of Kannada-speaking people across the globe.

But the chief difficulty in this attempt is the nature of the legacy itself. DVG was a journalist, editor, chronicler, biographer, poet, intellectual, litterateur, critic, scholar, philosopher, preceptor, polyglot, statesman, freedom fighter, and an honest, detached witness of his era. He was all these but he had also transcended all these. Indeed, to what specific facet does one attribute the grandeur of a lush and sprawling forest or the majesty of mountain-peaks? Likewise, how does one couch DVG’s all-encompassing legacy without the trepidation of doing injustice to even one of these facets?

Cyncial Times

As a reflection of the melancholic and cynical period we currently live in, it is indeed a travesty that today, DVG’s name is completely unknown beyond Karnataka. Even in Karnataka, his renown rests primarily (and deservedly) on his 1943 magnum opus, “Mankuthimmana Kagga,” (“Foggy Fool’s Farrago,” in DVG’s own translation) a collection of independent contemplative verses on such topics as the meaning of life, fate, philosophy, God, and creation.

Which is why it might be surprising even to the people of Karnataka to learn that during his lifetime, DVG was associated with such greats as Sir M Visweswarayya, “Right Honourable” V S Srinivasa Sastri, Sir M Puttanna Chetty, Sajjan Rao, Dr. B R Ambedkar, C. Rajagopalachari, M S Subbulakshmi, and had closely worked with at least four Diwans of the Mysore Princely State. What is also mostly unknown is how he was part of several relief efforts in combating large-scale epidemics like influenza and tuberculosis. DVG also officiated as a Purohita in widow remarriages, a “sin” that invited social ostracism in those days. These facets even taken together are but the proverbial tip of the iceberg of his oceanic bequest to this country, its society, civilization, culture, ethos and history, to put it broadly.

What has equally been buried, not under the sands of time, but under wanton national neglect, is the corpus of his journalistic and political writing, which alone run up to over three thousand pages. This includes books and essays on political philosophy and statesmanship, critiques of policy, open letters, reports, editorials, (transcribed) speeches, monographs, and reviews and must be made prescribed reading for students and teachers today.

A distinctive mark of these writings is their innate power to elevate the reader from the mundane and the mediocre to the lofty and the enduring. For instance, DVG adorns the rather dry subject of politics and policy with an originality that bestows a literary and philosophical quality to it.

A Three-tiered Legacy

Given this expansive scope, one can regard the legacy of DVG from the three-tiered perspective that his life and work represents:

1. Public Life: as a journalist, statesman and political philosopher 2. Litterateur: as a poet, dramatist, writer, translator and author 3. Philosopher: as a commentator on the Upanishads, Bhagavad Gita and other philosophical lore.

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Hampi-Image courtesy:- Google Image search

Bharata has seen very few personalities who embodied all these facets as a unified whole both within themselves as well as reflected them in their life and work. In this, it is not farfetched to claim that DVG follows in the path set by Maharshi Vidyaranya, the iconic inspiration and spiritual founding father of the grand Vijayanagara Empire.

The world of journalism and public life is essentially a world of speed: of day-to-day, routine events occurring unceasingly at a rapid pace—events which give rise to new ones or are a consequence of prior events, or entirely new events which supplant or distract the world’s attention away from prior ones.

The world of literature on the other hand, is much slower. Literature in its purest definition must have an enduring, insightful, and universal quality to it. In essence, good literature, in the words of Shelley, “pierces the veil” of everyday events and worldly upheavals by holding its thumb over the pulse that drives them: the interplay of human impulses, emotions, and passions. In the realm of Indian thought, these impulses can be distilled into just two concepts: Artha (wealth) and Kama (any kind of desire). In the “real” world, they are transmuted as wealth, fame, and position. Thus, fame can be defamed, positions can be pulled down, and wealth, eroded. And the twin impulses that drive Artha and Kama are Raga (attachment, avarice, greed) and Dwesha (hatred, enmity). In this manner, literature also shows a mirror to the interplay of Raga and Dwesha by eliciting responses within the reader to this interplay.

This contemplation enters the realm of philosophy when we inquire into the causes that produce Raga and Dwesha. These causes in turn, are couched in the term, Gunatraya, or the three Gunas (attributes) of Sattva (peace, equanimity, serenity), Rajas (vigour, passion, zest), and Tamas (laziness, stupor). The imbalance of Gunatraya is what causes Raga and Dwesha. Gunatraya in turn is the characteristic (Lakshana) of Jiva or Life. And the Absolute (Parama) characteristic of Jiva is Sacchidananda (Unqualified, Eternal Joy or Bliss). This then is the manner in which one can trace and elevate the banal worldly events, tribulations and turbulence to the level of pure philosophy. This method is also known as the sopana krama: step-wise deduction.

Unsleeping Insight

This then was DVG’s approach: of regarding one of these three aspects in the light of or with reference to the other two. For example, of regarding a problem related to public life in the light of literature and philosophy. Or extrapolating and analyzing a literary tenet or episode to a political or social occurrence. Or expounding on say, a verse of the Bhagavad Gita with a contemporary incident. The great strength that this approach brings is the insight that it provides in evolving a solution or course correction to contemporary problems.

This philosophical quality that permeates almost all writings of DVG was not accidental, deliberate or laboured: it was intrinsic and natural like a mathematical constant because DVG had realized it within himself. One is reminded of Ralph Waldo Emerson’s observation ¹ about Henry David Thoreau:

If [Thoreau]…defied the opinions of others, it was only that he was more intent to reconcile his practice with his own belief… Never idle or self-indulgent…[h]e chose to be rich by making his wants few… there was an excellent wisdom in him, proper to a rare class of men, which showed him the material world as a means and symbol. This discovery, which sometimes yields to poets a certain casual and interrupted light, serving for the ornament of their writing, was in him an unsleeping insight… His soul was made for the noblest society… wherever there is knowledge, wherever there is virtue, wherever there is beauty, he will find a home. [Emphasis added]

Roots in Vedanta

In an age when the Yogipratyaksha or mysticism of Sri Aurobindo and numerous other mystic Gurus and Swamis gained enormous currency, DVG not only stuck to his roots in Vedanta, he disseminated it widely, wrote, presented and re-presented its integral values variously: as essays, monographs, expositions, and commentaries.

He never ventured into proclaiming a “new” philosophy or “school.” He trod the path of his senior contemporaries, the towering scholar-philosopher Prof M Hiriyanna, the Vedantin Swami Sacchidanandendra Saraswati, and Bhagavan Ramana Maharshi. Like them, his unshakeable roots in Vedanta made him realize that the prophets and heralds of “new” philosophies were innately enamoured by Rupa (form) and not Swarupa (nature, substance, spirit). Epiphanies and revelations are neither unquestionable nor eternal. Therefore, merely because Vedantic concepts are ancient or age-old is not reason enough to discard them in the quest of elusive newness. The quality of antiquity also means that they will not change in essence or substance. One only needs to provide new commentary or explanation to suit the jargon of the contemporary age. Equally, this contemporary-age commentary must be rooted in and faithful to verifiable experience (anubhavanishTa).

Prof M Hiriyanna accomplished this feat most notably in the realm of aesthetics in works such as Art Experience, and Indian Conception of Values.

Other stalwarts accomplished the same in their chosen fields: for example, Gopal Krishna Gokhale in public life, Ramakrishna Paramahamsa in the spiritual realm, and Swami Vivekananda in rejuvenating the Hindu society and heritage.

But most of these stalwarts, with due respect to their matchless contributions, left behind an office, so to say. For example, Swami Vivekanandabuilt the Ramakrishna Mission and incessantly travelled far and wide. While he was a Sanyasin of the highest order, the fact remains that Sanyasa is also an office that brings with it all the concomitant challenges.

The Fulfilment of Life

DVG charted a different but complementary course. He not only accomplished what the aforementioned eminences did in their respective realms but straddled their realms in a unifying sense. In a manner of speaking, he embellished their work with what’s known as theFulfilment of Life.

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DVG-Image courtesy:- Google Image search

DVG never traveled widely. Much before India attained independence, this untiring conscience-keeper and Yogi of public life completely withdrew from it. Neither was his vision of public life based on the sort of dry theorizing that has become commonplace today. The following is a representative sample of this vision elucidated in his masterly Rajya Shastra (Political Philosophy), where avers ² that:

…it is yet to be known how the Communist ideology actually works in Russia. Set aside Government announcements; it is but natural that they [will be] in favour of the Government. But if we need to believe that they are honest, the evidence needs to come from elsewhere. Let the Communist ideology be as it is; under Communist rule, are commodities available in the markets in Russia? [If so], what are the prices? An ordinary clerk, schoolteacher, other people from the middle class, how do they carry on their daily life? What do they do during festivals and holidays? Is the food they eat tasty to the tongue? We require this sort of investigation. There’s not enough evidence available in this regard.

Around the same period, the literature characterized by say, W.H. Auden and others began gaining worldwide popularity. It was essentially a literature of hopelessness, a negationism of life. Unfazed, DVG stuck to his roots: to the fact that the innate nature of Jiva (Life in the highest sense) is Joy or Ananda. Every work of DVG’s copious literary output underscores this quality.

His magnum opus, the versified long-poem, Mankutimmana Kagga is the distilled essence of his vision of the triad of philosophy-literature-public life. Although it appears didactic in nature, it is akin to a long monologue in verse narrated by a person to himself. Kagga is essentially a contemplative work and therefore, non-prescriptive. Coincidentally, Kagga was published in 1943, the same period during which DVG withdrew from active public life.

DVG uses images, allegories and metaphors drawn from daily life and draws from the vast bounty of rich repertoire of Indian proverbs, geographical elements and suchlike to expound difficult philosophical concepts. His commentary on the Bhagavad Gita, Jivanadharma Yoga (The Yoga of the Dharma of Life) is the most remarkable example of this method. Other examples include his commentary on the Ishavasya Upanishad and the Purushasukta.

A Pioneering Approach to Traditional Commentary

This is a groundbreaking approach when we consider the fact that almost none of the traditional commentaries written for over centuries on these texts employ the said metaphors. More importantly, DVG also takes care of maintaining the reverence for these past masters both in traditional circles and common parlance. For instance, he regards the Bhagavad Gita as a Dharma Sastra while tradition continues to consider it a Moksha (Spiritual Liberation) Sastra. While this is a departure from strict tradition, he not only reconciles ³ this departure with sound reasoning but shows how the two approaches are complementary and not opposed to each other.

The burden that we must carry in the present time is that of the travails of the material world. Earning a living to satisfy hunger, shelter, and clothing…loans and taxes, unremitting work…loss of traditions and customs…never ending worries have become our fate. Amidst such ceaseless disturbances, where then is the space and time for contemplating about things like Moksha? Given this, does the Bhagavad Gita help us? If it does, only then will it have some value.
[…]
The fact that it does have this value is evident from its own words. Although our ancient masters and commentators have laid emphasis on Moksha, they have equally stressed on the fact that the Upadesha (Teaching) of the Bhagavad Gita is useful and valuable to worldly life.
*Dharma is the most accurate guide to lead our lives in the world. Dharma and Moksha are inseparable from each other. Dharma is the prerequisite for attaining Moksha; and Moksha is the flowering, fruition, and fulfilment of Dharma. Therefore, what was regarded as the text of Moksha by our ancients has become the Dharmasastra in our own time. *

DVG also infuses aspects drawn from the social and political milieu in *Jivanadharma Yoga—*for instance, in the portion dealing with Arjuna’s moral dilemma and the inevitability of the war which was forcibly, unjustly thrust upon the Pandavas. Equally, DVG doesn’t lose sight of the poetic beauty of the Bhagavad Gita. This becomes evident when we read the verses he composed using a mixture of prose and poetry to extoll its greatness as also his liberal usage of analogy, humour, and mirth. If one needs to explain Sastra (philosophy, in the highest sense) effectively and engagingly, it needs to be direct, simple, and clear. Thus, when we regard DVG’s work in this sphere, it becomes clear that he was endowed with the clarity of contemplation required for philosophy and the compassion of heart required for poetry.

Tireless Exponent of Dharma

Dharma is the other major sphere of the Indian ethos to which DVG has bestowed lasting contributions which are truly original and exemplary. The term “Adhidharma” is his own coinage not found in our traditional works on philosophy.

In his typical self-effacing manner, DVG explains how he derived this term from the annals of the selfsame traditional lore. When the Upasarga, or prefix, “adhi” (besides, after, upon, above, over and above, etc) is added to “dharma,” we derive “adhidharma.” But when we consider the fact that Dharma is itself a relative term, we obtain greater clarity about DVG’s coinage. If Dharma becomes absolute, it will be akin to Moksha*.* In this light, the term, “adhidharma” indicates the absolute nature of Dharma itself as a value of sustenance. Therefore, various other Dharmas and their relative status to one another like Putra (Son) Dharma, Pitr (Ancestors) Dharma, and Apaddharma (Dharma during emergencies) can be seen in the light of Adhidharma. In fact, DVG himself provides an oblique explanation ⁴ for Adhidharma in his note on the renowned verse, Traigunya vishayA vedhAh (Bhagavad Gita: Chapter 2: 45):

The various Dharmas and Karmas enumerated in the Vedic and Sastra lore relate to fruits emanating therefrom. Those who desire for Heaven (Swarga), wealth, etc perform such Dharmas and Karmas. But you (O Arjuna) perform the same Dharmas without any desire for the fruits ensuing therefrom. That is when your actions become Adhidharma…you aspire to become someone who has transcended the Three Gunas [Sattva, Rajas and Tamas explained earlier in this essay]*. *

Nature and Features of DVG’s Body of Work

If one were to characterize DVG’s body of work from another perspective, the following features and themes emerge:

• AklisTa Karma: The attribute of doing all work (Karma)—big and small—without complaint or tears. - Satya and Soundarya: Or Truth and Beauty. Although his writings have a quality of all-encompassing abundance, they are also characterized with an innate beauty while explaining profound truths. DVG’s view was that unless a work is endowed with beauty, it won’t appeal to the proverbial common man. - Jivanotkarsha: Or exuberance of life. This attribute can be termed as the central theme of his work. DVG regarded life itself as a precious good, a value to be pursued and upheld for its own sake. It was the exuberance of the spirit, not of the matter.

These aspects illuminate themselves when we notice the kind of people that DVGregarded as ideals. He paid rich, lyrical, and generous tributes to heroes like Parashurama, Sri Rama, Sri Krishna, and Sri Vidyaranya who upheld Dharma. He celebrated Rishis and saints such as Valmiki, Veda Vyasa, Maharshi Kanwa and Thyagaraja. Nor were they outside the purview of his critical scrutiny as evidenced for example, by hisSri Rama Parikshanam, and Sri Krishna Parikshanam.

Sri Vidyaranya represents an ideal in which we discern a beautiful mix of intense enjoyment in the external world and profound contemplation within one’s own self. The contrast and paradox is truly sublime: when intense sensual enjoyment doesn’t lead to inner contemplation, it becomes mere exhibitionism, and when contemplation becomes exhibitionism, it results in unadulterated hypocrisy.

His Antahpura Geethagalu (Song of the Harem), and Jivana Soundarya Mattu Sahitya (Beauty of Life and Literature) among others, fleshes out very useful insights derived from a heartfelt exploration of truth and beauty in its various manifestations and dimensions. One key insight derived from his explorations is the fact that truth must attain the manifestation of beauty and beauty must graduate to truth.

Even his political and journalistic corpus reflect this same all-inclusive philosophical outlook. At every turn, we see DVG advocating individual or self-empowerment in the sense that as a democracy, we must first be deserving of governing ourselves. And at every turn, he emphasizes duties over rights because every person is endowed with rights bestowed upon us by nature. However, duties must evolve within ourselves with conscious effort, as part of culture. Therefore, culture in tune with nature (in the sense of Rta) must constantly monitor all aspects of a person’s life. It is this wholesome view that made DVG fully realize the status of Indians as subjects of the British imperial power. It is also the reason he never endorsed Gandhianism fully. His opinion piecein the aftermath of Gandhi’s reckless statements following the Vidurashwatha police firing ⁵ is a good example of DVG’s worldview in the realm of politics and public life.

In today’s parlance, the moniker of “cultural conservative” would be applied to DVG. However that maybe, the fact is that DVG didn’t want anarchy to develop in any system: all change had to be gradual and deliberated upon. He was strictly against change for its own sake or because it had to meet a temporary demand or fad. DVG was opposed to any change that would cause needless turmoil and turbulence among the masses. Needless, this is perfectly consonant with the timeless Indian spirit of admonishing violent revolution as an agent of change.

Advocate of Dharma in Politics

Few have contributed as much as DVG to educating the Indian people about a new political system called democracy at a time when it was wholly alien to India. Equally, few have shown how this new system must be adapted to a nearly-unbroken and centuries’-long tradition of Indian polity as brilliantly as DVG. Like many other eminent statesmen and political thinkers of his time, DVG repeatedly warned against the disasters of blindly following the Western (mainly, British) system of democracy. The contemporary period is the living illustration of this warning which went unheeded.

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Image courtesy:- Google Image search

Indeed, DVG’s entire corpus of political writing was inextricably rooted in classical Indian thought. His classic, Rajyanga Tattvagalu (Principles of Statecraft) begins with the invocation from the Taittirya Brahmana of the Yajur Veda (the portion dealing with the Ashwamedha Yaga), which he fittingly titles as the “National Anthem of the Rishis.” It is this same spirit of the Rishis that moved DVG to pen Swatantra Bharata Abhinandana Stava (A Hymn Celebrating Independent Bharata) an extraordinary paneygric in verse on the night that Bharata finally attained freedom.

It is therefore unsurprising that DVG elevates political philosophy, statecraft, statesmanship, and public life in general to the standard of a Darshana (loosely translated as philosophy) in the finest traditions of Sri Krishna, Kautilya, and Sri Vidyaranya, which holds Dharma as both the pulse and the spirit that guides politics and public life: in institutions as well as people. The scholar and literary critic, H M Nayak offers a valuable observation ⁶ in this regard:

Dharma is greater than the state. In reality, the state is just one part of Dharma. From this perspective, Rajya Sastra [Political Philosophy] and Dharma Sastra aren’t different or separate from one another. Those who wish to separate Dharma from Politics know neither politics nor Dharma. It is impossible for politics to exist without Dharma. But a lot of confusion has ensued because people are unaware of how the two need to be integrated…DVG had no such confusion…those who read DVG’s writings will clearly understand the substance of Dharma and will also discern how [Dharma] can be used to distill and purify politics. [Emphasis added]

To the contemporary mind, such conceptions and notions may appear fantastic and idealistic, even. However, unless we have this ideal at least in our working consciousness, we will have no goal that has any value beyond, for example, increasing the material prosperity of the nation. In DVG’s own words, this goal in politics like in life was “dhanyateya betakaata,” or the quest after fulfilment.

Personality, Character and Life

This quest reflected itself in myriad ways in DVG’s personality itself. A significant repository of anecdotes and writing regarding various facets of his life has been left behind by DVG’s contemporaries and a large swathe of disciples that he attracted. Among others, this list of DVG’s contemporaries includes such stalwarts as Masti Venkatesha Iyengar, V Sitaramaiah, Shivarama Karanth, A R Krishna Sastri,andT S Venkannayya. His prominent disciples include luminaries likeD R Venkataramanan, Padmanabhan, and Dr. S R Ramaswamy, who is the only surviving link to DVG.

In his Virakta Rashtraka (The Renunciate Nationalist), D R Venkataramanan brilliantly recounts ⁷ how DVG “bestowed upon me an accurate and comprehensive vision of the philosophy of life.” This also finds an echo in Dr. S R Ramaswamy’s note ⁸ that DVG’s contact by itself would “inculcate Samskara, or culture and refinement.” In turn, this faculty for infusing culture and values in others stemmed from DVG’s innermost convictions developed very early in his life. D R Venkataramanan traces the seeds of these convictions by quoting DVG’s own ⁹ words:

Since childhood, whenever I used to spot Jogis, Dasayyas, Bairagis, Sanyasins, Fakirs, I would think, “when can even I wander around like them with nary a worry?” – like caged monkeys think. What attracted me most in that unfettered mendicant lifestyle was their absolute freedom from worries. Not for a second did they worry about “will I get food tonight?”, “where will I be in the morning?” An abiding and total faith and conviction in some ideal. And because that conviction was strong, absolute courage, and unchained mind set. It was this enthusiasm for the non-worldly that revolved within my inner self.

D R Venkataramanan then narrates ¹⁰ how on various occasions, he and several others had seen DVG singing devotional songs, Kritis, etc with an Iktara (one-stringed musical instrument) as an accompaniment, and how he always kept a Rudraksha garland, and a Saligramam deity under his pillow.

But DVG didn’t follow the path of the Sanyasins and the Bairagis and the Yogis. On the contrary, he became so deeply inseparable with the world that he knew at least one person drawn from every conceivable walk of life: Sanyasins, heads of Mathas, politicians, Diwans, freedom fighters, judges, lawyers, mediapersons, writers, musicians, dancers, potters, cart-pullers, vegetable and fruit vendors, barbers, courtesans…he had the names of their family members and even far relatives on the tip of his tongue. On occasion, he would converse for hours with any one of them: on topics as mundane as the weather, crop, the person’s health, news from their native villages, various happenings in the circles of their family and relatives, etc.

If this wasn’t enough, he used to reply to every single letter he received from different corners of the country. He always offered a kind word, sage counsel, and consolation for everybody who wrote to him. None returned empty-handed. It was this sort of prolific letter-writing that lead his close friend, K. Sampathgiri Rao ¹¹ to remark that

*Gokhale, Sivaswami Aiyar, Srinivasa Sastri, Gundappa—these Liberals have contributed more towards the enrichment of the Postal Exchequer than anyone else. These are all literally men of letters. *

This is Loka Sangraha of the tallest and noblest order, and the purest form of lived Karma Yoga. Writes D R Venkataramanan ¹², “God did not grant the mendicant’s life that DVG so craved. This became the country’s great fortune.”

Giraffe Eats Only the Topmost Foliage

Dr. S R Ramaswamy briefly, pithily lists the chief qualities that contributed to and characterized DVG as a person:

• Simple living - Unceasing, penance-like pursuit of letters - Lively conduct - Friendship - Love of the arts such as music and poetry - Reverence for scholarship - Mirth and laughter - Non-jealousy - Unselfishness - Nationalistic thought

It was these qualities ¹³ that made “his character far loftier than all his published writings. To those who had earned the fortune of being with him in close quarters, he was an inexhaustible mine of wonder and surprise.” And in the words ¹⁴ of his contemporary V Sitaramaiah, “DVG was a giraffe. It eats nothing but the topmost foliage.”

Among numerous others, one specific instance brilliantly illuminates DVG’s character, attitude, and outlook towards life. DVG was a Member of the Mysore Legislative Council as long as Mirza Ismail was the Diwan (1926-41). After he retired, DVG decided to withdraw from public life completely and focus on reading and writing. But his close friends like K T Bashyamexerted enormous pressure to reconsider and said that they would arrange for the necessary funding, campaigning, and allied activities. DVG requested for a day’s time to think about it. Dr. S R Ramaswamy narrates ¹⁵ what happened next:

Contemplating on what was to be his next duty, DVG was strolling around in Cubbon Park in the afternoon. From a loudspeaker from afar (perhaps from some wedding function), his ears heard the strains of this Thyagaraja Kriti:
Oka mATa oka bANa
oka patnIvratuDE।
oka cittamu galavADE
oka nADunu maravakave।
[O My Mind] SrI rAma is wedded to one Word, one arrow and one wife. He is endowed with an unwavering mind.
*DVG’s earlier resolve became unalterable the moment he heard these words from Thyagaraja. He withdrew from public life. *

Nor did he harbor or ascribe any greatness to his work or least of all, to himself. He lived and worked like an epitome of one of his favourite ideals encompassed in his poem, Vanasuma (Forest Flower). In a letter ¹⁶ to Sri Narasimha Murthy (who he regarded as his Atma Guru), DVG writes:

You ask whether I am conscious of any mission. What a question to ask!…I have always viewed life as a supreme ‘Leela’—sport if you please…how could I fall into the error of making a missionary of myself? It is only people wanting in modesty that conceive great ideas of themselves and their so called mission here. So you need have no fear whatever of my ever turning into that most insufferable of all bores, a man with a mission. [Emphasis added]

Indeed, DVG was first of all, a Rasika, a connoisseur of food, fun, frolic, music, poetry, literature, and people. His numerous study circles attracted truckloads of people who would hang on to and savour his every word. His Sunday discourses on the Bhagavad Gita went on unremittingly for a record twenty-five years come sunshine or rain, whether he was in good health or had fallen ill. The agglomeration of these discourses emerged in book form as Srimad Bhagavad Gita Tatparya or Jivanadharma Yogareferred earlier in this essay.

A Modest Attempt to Recount DVG’s Legacy and Life

It is in light of this introductory backdrop that this modest attempt at bringing out DVG’s multifaceted legacy will involve an in-depth examination of the following:

• Philosophies, ideas and ideals that shaped his political views both in theory and practice. - Role as a freedom fighter, a chronicler, participant and eyewitness of the freedom struggle. - Insights as an observer and dispassionate critic of post-Independence politics of India. - Contribution as a political, social and cultural biographer. - Distinction as an advocate and practitioner of clean public life and as a statesman of global standing, and as a detached nationalist-philosopher who transcended all political and other currents.

Note*: I owe an immense debt of gratitude to the indefatigable Shatavadhani Dr. R Ganesh who has patiently guided me, held my hand, and corrected my numerous errors and filled various shortcomings while preparing this essay. My gratitude also extends to the young and brilliant scholar, Shashi Kiran B N. And to the quiet and unassuming Rishi of our times Sri S. R. Ramaswamy, who chose to remain, in the finest tradition of DVG like a Vanasuma.*

To be Continued

References

[[The Political Philosophy of D V Gundappa: National Anthem of the Rishis Source: prekshaa]]

One of the Kannada literary giants of the twentieth century, K V Puttappa (Kuvempu) once classified ¹⁷ literature as Sakaala (timely) and Trikala (timeless) literature. Given the innate nature of the medium, journalistic (news reports, opinion pieces, editorials, magazine essays) literature belongs to the former category. Yet, in the hands of masters, even this category of literature takes on a quality of timelessness. Instead of being buried under the proverbial sands of time, it becomes akin to fine and rare pearls which an intrepid diver unearths from the bottom of the ocean. DVG is one such master. In his characteristic self-effacing style, he supplies the contours ¹⁸ of how one might imbue this character of timelessness even in mundane, journalistic writing.

*Being a news reporter was how I earned my livelihood. The material that falls into the hands of such a person will be relevant only for that specific point in time. But even when such transient questions arise for contemplation, they pull on to the stage changeless principles. It is only in the realm of such practical application that the substance and meaning of such principles become clear to our mind. Because of this, a newspaper article that’s relevant for say, a day or a week acquires a lasting value. A timeless tenet has an illustration in such writing. *

Accidental Journalist

Journalism was not a profession DVG consciously chose. He stood outside the doors of the press of Suryodaya Prakashika (Literally, “Rising Sun Publishing”) as a young and impoverished lad who had to eke out a livelihood. That was to be the harbinger of a six decade-long and distinguished and unparalleled career in journalism, to severely understate it. DVG’s career and contributions as a journalist will form a separate section later in this volume.

But journalism was merely a moor. In many ways, it opened up panoramic vistas and brought him into contact with almost every sphere of human activity in which he was participant, observer and commentator rolled into one. Politics and public life was one of the most significant among them. Indeed, when one surveys his entire literary corpus, it is hard to separate his journalistic writing from that of his political literature. There is a quality of Advaita (indivisibility) in the two, emanating from his deep anchors in classical Indian thought as we shall see.

The National Anthem of the Rishis

Perhaps a fitting place to locate the inspiration for and the driving force that animated DVG’s political and journalistic writing is the Ashwamedha Yaga portion of the Taittiriya Brahmana of the Yajur Veda. DVG terms this portion as the “national anthem of the Rishis” in the prelude to his classic, Rajyanga Tattvagalu (Principles of Statecraft).

This Vedic conception of Rashtra (loosely translated as “nation” or “country”) as something that by itself is an ongoing Ashwamedha Yaga (or Yagna) ¹⁹ is quite profound and evokes a textured tapestry of dynamism, energy, activity, and purpose. This is captured in the concluding verse that avers:

Let us be bestowed with auspiciousness, safety, security, and abundance. Through this Yagna, may the citizens be blessed with unity and peace.

In this manner, there is an indivisible relationship between Rashtra and Ashwamedha Yaga.

The significance of this national anthem can also be summarized as follows:

• It is only when a Brahmana is endowed with Brahmavarcas[4] does he attain fulfilment. In other words, a Brahmana must reflect eternal values in spirit, thought, word, deed, and conduct than by the mere accident of birth. - A king or ruler should exude strength and exhibit power by the sheer force of personality ²⁰ and must not rely on his position or office to derive power. The latter invariably leads to exploitation of office and abuse of power. - Experience in war gives a ruler the power of resolute decision-making and endows him with patriotism and instills a sense of value of a unified nation. - An ideal nation will invest in training and grooming its youth to become deserving of actively and fearlessly participating in public assemblies. If this national capacity is not developed, stagnation and consequent degeneration of public life will ensue. - Women are the ones who protect a Pura[6] or a city or town. The underlying import of this is that when a girl becomes a woman, Samskara (culture or refinement) prevails. Put another way, when a male and a female graduate functionally, they become man and woman, and the intermediate process is known as Samskara. When this is transferred to succeeding generations, the entire nation becomes strong, prosperous and attains a high degree of culture. The pre-Islamic history of India shows an India that largely upheld and lived according to these values.

This then is at the heart of DVG’s conception of an ideal, strong, happy and prosperous Indian state. His long poem titled Swatantra Bharata Stava (Hymn to an Independent Bharata) composed on the midnight of 14 August, 1947 invokes Bharata Mata (Mother India) not to give birth to sons and daughters who are not courageous, who are not warriors. The invocation directly harks back to the aforementioned national anthem of the Rishis:

Let a youthful warrior be born who drives his chariot and returns victoriously from battle. ॥7॥

May he who performs this [Ashwamedha] Yajna be a warrior; may he beget a warrior-son. ॥9॥

In other words, DVG’s conception of a strong India was an admixture of Yoga and Kshema; Yoga in the sense of having an opportunity to obtain something and Kshema in the sense of retaining and sustaining it safely.

Footnotes

[[The Political Philosophy of D V Gundappa: Strengthening the Inner Government Source: prekshaa]]

DVG’s conception of a strong and prosperous Bharata was a mixture of Yoga and Kshema; Yoga in the sense of having an opportunity to obtain something and Kshema in the sense of retaining and sustaining it safely.

Blend and Balance

These ideals operate at the level of the Samashti (the nation and society) and act as guideposts for organizing and governing a nation and society. No matter however noble and lofty these ideals may be, they’re mere “paper flowers” (to use DVG’s expression ²¹) unless they are tested in the real world. Which is why, in consonance with the ancient Indian ethos, DVG also constantly emphasizes on the role, importance and duties of the Vyashti (the individual, the citizen). Not just that, he also shows the blend and balance that must exist between the mutually-dependent entities of Vyashti and Samashti. One can distill the chief characteristics of DVG’s eloquence on this subject in the form of the following phrases:

• Dharma - Rashtraka Praja or Nationalist Citizen - Rashtra Sharira or the National Body - Rashtraka Tattva or the Philosophy of a Nationalist - Rashtraka Prajna or the Nationalist Consciousness - Atma Guna or Soul Quality - Swabhava Parishodhana or Constant inquiry and purification of the nature of things (and of the individual)

In keeping with these, DVG was one of the pioneering advocates of what’s known as “clean politics” decades before the phrase became popular. But this cleanliness was not limited just to method and execution; he showed how it is possible to clothe politics and public life with Atma Guna.

Notions of Freedom

One of the most illuminative treatises that demonstrates this is DVG’s learned expositions on freedom. He unequivocally gives primacy to the role and responsibility of the individual in the practice of freedom. Accordingly, freedom is deserving of a people endowed with self-restraint, self-introspection, continuous refinement of character, and questioning whether an individual is deserving of something before demanding it. Decades later, the eminent Indian jurist Nani Palkhivala obliquely echoed ²² the same tenets when he stressed on “obedience to the unenforceable.”

In keeping with the ancient Indian spirit of all-inclusiveness, here is how DVG conceives[3] the notion of freedom.

Freedom as a principle is an indivisible whole. One cannot break it down into pieces [and still claim that one is free]…freedom is the opportunity for every individual to make decisions about any aspect of his life without restraints imposed by others by using his independent judgement and wisdom.

Contrary to the notion of unlimited and unfettered freedom that Ayn Rand-inspired libertarians espouse today, DVG is firmly wedded to the reality of intrinsic human impulses and has a keen understanding of the realities and lessons of history.

Rousseau_2.png

Rousseau

Accordingly, DVG assigns the proper place to the notion of freedom, which he says, is of recent origin. In the era ²³ of kingdoms, “the notion of ‘ruler’ was greater than that of the ‘citizen.’” Just as wild animals were domesticated over centuries, just as conveniences like railways, bicycle, motor vehicles, and technology evolved over centuries, so did political systems evolve by trial and error and experimentation. Therefore, the political systems that were once largely the preserve of the warrior class evolved into a system of kings, ministers, councils and judges. In other words, ²⁴ over time, “these systems became citizen-oriented. The notion of individual freedom therefore belongs to a political system that is citizen-oriented.”

Viewed from this historical perspective, the question that logically arises is this: individual freedom to do what? The idea of individual freedom that first arose in the West, after passing through various trajectories, can be summed up as follows:

• Freedom to dress, eat, drink, think, write, and speak even what is considered unpopular and sacrilegious because the moment freedom is subject to any restriction, it stops being freedom. This is also known as free speech absolutism. - Non-censorship of any form: on books, public speeches, art, music, cinema, etc. - Primacy of the rule of law. That is, all freedoms are guaranteed as long as they don’t violate the freedom of another individual or don’t militate against the law of the land.

All of these ideas have been implemented and are operating in varying degrees in the USA and most countries of Western Europe. However, whether the actual outcome and consequence of this has been positive and desirable is still a matter of debate. More than twenty years ago, modern Singapore’s founding father and its longest-serving Prime Minister, Lee Kuan Yew made ²⁵ the following observation:

Good governance…requires…upholding fundamental truths: that there is right and wrong, good and evil…The ideas of individual supremacy and the right of free expression, when carried to excess, have not worked. They have made it difficult to keep America society cohesive. Asia can see it is not working.. In America itself, there is widespread crime and violence, old people feel forgotten, families are falling apart. And the media attacks the integrity and character of your leaders with impunity, drags down all those in authority and blames everyone but itself.

Arguably, this state of affairs is the direct consequence of not fully thinking about the goal sought to be achieved after individual freedom has been fully realized. Besides, the Western conception of individual freedom primarily arose as a reaction to centuries’ long oppression of the majority of their population by the Church apparatus and a political system controlled by a complex and interconnected web of a nexus between the Church, the State and robber barons.

In this backdrop, DVG accurately analyzes the origins of individual freedom by providing a pithy critique ²⁶ of Jean Jacques Rousseau.

*The teacher of today’s world is Rousseau, the political philosopher who sowed the seeds of the French Revolution. He preached that freedom is the birthright of every person. Both Government and law are artificial constructs. A person must safeguard his natural rights within their confines…Although the underlying principles of his teaching aren’t erroneous by themselves, he placed a greater emphasis on rights. In their fight for rights, people paid less attention to duties. It is this neglect of duty that is the root cause for the worldwide turmoil today. *

To provide yet another illustration of DVG’s foresight and prescience of fundamental analyses, one can cite the example of the thinker and author Paul Johnson writing ²⁷ about Rousseau more than fifty years later. Unlike DVG’s restrained but firm language, Johnson is brutal, merciless, and accurate.

*[Rousseau] moved the political process to the very center of human existence by making the legislator, who is also a pedagogue, into the new Messiah, capable of solving all human problems by creating New Men. ‘Everything,’ he wrote, ‘is at root dependent on politics.’ Virtue is the product of good government. ‘Vices belong less to man, than to man badly governed.’…Politics will do all. **Rousseau thus prepared the blueprint for the principal delusions and follies of the twentieth century. ***

In spite of his constant emphasis on idealism, DVG was neither blind to harsh realities nor was he unsparing in his criticism of one-sided hortatory. At every step, he stressed on the “duty of pre-examination” before embarking ²⁸ on “adopting the child of feelings” emanating from the West. Thus, as early as in 1952, DVG cautioned that the feelings of equality, liberty and fraternity that had already become widespread in India weren’t working properly in the geography of their origin. This critique will be taken up for a more detailed examination later in this volume. He diagnosed ²⁹ that the

*…chief defect in these conceptions is that they cut off the human touch from human interactions. The relationship between humans, instead of becoming one between hearts, is becoming a lifeless, mechanical task. No matter what prosperity accrues to the physical body by these new notions, they are proving proportionately detrimental to the richness of the soul. *

The goal and objective of freedom according to DVG is the flowering and fulfilment of the soul at the individual level, and the sustenance and defense of Dharma at the level of the society and the state. No matter how noble the intent, the state must not place hurdles in the flowering of the citizen’s spirituality. This mutually-dependent and indivisible relationship is a serious responsibility as also a joy arising from purifying one’s Atma Shakti or inner strength.

At the individual level, the pursuit of freedom must follow this dictum of the Bhagavad Gita

uddharedAtmanAtmAnam ॥
Let a person raise himself by his own efforts.

DVG’s exposition is also a reflection of the Bhagavad Gita’s emphasis on the supremacy of Svadharma (one’s own duty) and the true freedom ³⁰ ensuing from the cultivation of one’s “Inner Government over that of the Outer Government.” Stronger the Inner Government, lesser one’s need for external regulation.

Footnotes

“Unless there is beauty and dynamism in administration, all legislative books are mere paper-flowers.”

[[D V Gundappa’s Critique of Western Notions of Political Philosophy Source: prekshaa]]

At the individual level, the Bhagavad Gita’s dictum of uddharedAtmanAtmAnam (Let a person raise and purify himself by his own efforts) and its emphasis on Svadharma also means that one must rule oneself, which in turn means that the onus is upon the individual to constantly rectify himself. Hidden within these tenets is a call to discard one’s ego at every step. The opaque wall of ego blocks the sunlight of self-reflection required for the said rectification.

Translated in the realm of public life, politics, and state policy, this contemplative attitude forms and informs the character of a nation.

The case of Germany, Italy, and Japan (the so-called Axis Powers) in the World War II era stand as timeless warnings if such a contemplative national attitude is not developed. The national character of all these countries during that period was premised on and informed precisely by an extreme egotism, even egomania, that allowed no room for self-reflection. In the present time, the United States offers a milder version of the same ego, which propels it to “liberate” countries by launching unprovoked aggressions and forcibly impose its version of democracy on these “target nations” whether it suits those nations or no.

Analyzed in this backdrop, we might need to revise the definitions and notions of freedom, liberty, independence and democracy. This revision becomes more significant today given the fact that most Western democracies are founded precisely on these notions, which have acquired the status of self-evident, universal truths to be pursued uncritically by and in every country. Indeed, there is a case to made in India for a thorough re-examination of these ideas in light of the increasingly dangerous trajectory they have taken precisely in the same Western nations, which have failed to supply convincing answers to urgent challenges posed by globalization, rampant environmental destruction, and Islamic terrorism among scourges. What is left unsaid and untested are the unpredictable, disastrous consequences that ensue when these notions are implemented as state policy. It is also for these and other reasons that the methods of inquiry adopted by DVG, Dr. S Srikanta Sastri, and P V Kane become even more relevant.

In India, this untested implementation of these Western theories and practical systems of governance resulted in a near-obliteration of the time-tested system of the Panchayat, which largely remained untouched even by the most oppressive Islamic tyranny. In other words, the form of democracy that India adopted after 1947 centralized political power in New Delhi to such an extent that even state governments were reduced to the status of supplicants. It is indeed tragic to read the rather depressing account of the deliberations over the Panchayat Raj in the Constituent Assembly recounted in Dharampal’s “Panchayat Raj And India’s Polity.” Some excerpts follow:

• I want to ask whether there is any mention of villages and any place for them in the structure of this great Constitution. No, nowhere. The Constitution of a free country should be based on ‘local self-government’. We see nothing of local self-government anywhere in this Constitution. This Constitution as a whole, instead of being evolved from our life and reared from the bottom upwards is being imported from outside and built from above downwards. A Constitution which is not based on units and in the making of which they have no voice, in which there is not even a mention of thousands and lakhs of villages of India and in framing which they have had no hand—well you can give such a Constitution to the country but I very much doubt whether you would be able to keep it for long. [1] - We cannot have a strong Centre without strong limbs. If we can build the whole structure on the village panchayats, on the willing cooperation of the people, then I feel the Centre would automatically become strong.[2] - Dr Ambedkar boldly admitted, and the members of the Drafting Committee do concede that in this Constitution there is no provision for establishing Panchayat Raj…When there is no such provision, it can never be the Constitution of India… If the village is to be discarded, someone can also boldly demand that this Constitution be discarded. [3]

In this case, the unpredictable and disastrous consequence continues to remain the following: at no other time in the millennia-old history of India—even under the vast and sweeping monarchies of the Mauryas, the Guptas and the Vijayangara Empire—was political power concentrated in the hands of so few a people in a single city, i.e. Delhi. Such a concentration of power is not only alien to the Sanatana spirit, it violates this spirit. Indeed, this centralization and concentration of power is the chief reason for the growth of regional and caste-based parties in just about thirty years after we attained freedom. It is a testimony to DVG’s foresight when he anticipated and warned ³¹ against the seeding and growth of regionalism as early as 1952.

…an elected representative, no matter how self-reliant he is, no matter how wise…or courageous…if his honest vision of securing people’s welfare is restricted to only a specific region, group or sect instead of encompassing the entire nation, the nation does not derive the full benefit of his vision…he must be imbued with the same compassion and feeling for every single person in the country as he has for the people of his own region or community…In the soil called the country, every citizen is an equal nationalist.

It need not be explicitly stated that DVG’s warning went unheeded. Quite obviously, the logical consequences of ignoring it emerged soon enough. The Justice Party movement in Tamil Nadu which began as an uprising for getting “social justice” for the downtrodden and the “lower castes,” quickly morphed into crude regionalism, which succeeded in capturing political power after Independence. This in turn raises fundamental questions about the manner in which we defined “independence,” as we shall see later. Equally, the aforementioned absolute concentration of all power in Delhi ensued in the same consequence: beginning in the late 1970s, the political system of India has devolved itself into a coarse hunger whose only satiation is the capture of power by any means: fair or foul but mostly foul as history shows us. Today, our political system resembles a veritable alphabet soup of regional political parties who openly boast that they are “fighting against the ‘Delhi Government’ to protect the interests of our people” as though Delhi is an alien, foreign Government. As ironic and tragic as it might sound, DVG’s foresight has rung true in a lived, nightmarish fashion to the peril of the unity and integrity of the Indian Sovereign State.

Notes

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[[Backdrop of DVG’s Political Philosophy Source: prekshaa]]

But at the doctrinal level, this consequence is the direct outcome of imposing the selfsame untested theory of freedom, democracy, liberty and related ideas fashioned in the West on an entire people who had fashioned their lives for more than three millennia based on a thoroughly different political, cultural and social inheritance. In other words, an all-encompassing and far-reaching change was thrust upon the entire population of the seventh largest country in the world without their consent. Bharatavarsha continues to pay the human cost of this change. This Britain-inspired Constitution was castigated [^5.1] among others, by Thomas Paine—one of the founding fathers of the United States—in such acidic language as the “base remains of two ancient tyrannies.” Therefore, when the Constituent Assembly members averred [^5.2] that this “Constitution as a whole, instead of being evolved from our life and reared from the bottom upwards is being imported from outside and built from above downwards,” this was what they meant.

Doubtless, those who fashioned such an imported Constitution had the best interests of the Indian people in mind but the end result was and remains a classic case of the road to hell being paved with good intentions.

And when we turn to DVG, we are astonished at how the deep profundity and pragmatism of his political philosophy was woefully ignored. This is truly tragic given that in DVG we find perhaps the optimum—if not ideal—blend of a political philosophy rooted in the native genius of a political order informed by and infused with spirituality and the mixing it with Western notions of individual freedom and democracy.

In his view, the theoretical and intellectual portion of politics was an examination and analysis of practical, everyday realities of national life lived through its people when he correctly, bluntly declares [^5.3] that a “democracy is not a rule of saints and monks.” And further, that fundamental issues of politics must be pursued in the same spirit of philosophical inquiry [^5.4] by “discarding personal attachments and prejudices.” The greater this sense of detachment, the sturdier will be our democracy. Adopting this method of inquiry also implies that there is no exclusive or only path [^5.5] to attain the desired objective. In a way, this has a parallel in the Sanatana approach to attaining philosophical goals: through Jnana (inquiry), Dhyana (meditation), Japa (chanting), Tapas (penance), and other paths and methods.

*In many cases, there is every possibility to attain a stated objective using [multiple] methods…Ultimately, it depends on the individual decision-maker’s erudition and wisdom to select the best course. *

As noted in the earlier chapters, DVG never tires of emphasizing on the role, responsibility and accountability of the individual in public life because [^5.6] “the subject-matter of politics is human nature.” And nowhere is the failure of the best laid plans more evident than in politics and public life: “in politics, the person who operates using mathematical formulae inhabits a world of illusions.” [^5.7] This prophetic vision of DVG is timeless; in a sense it is akin to the proclamation of a Rishi when we observe the fact that in our own time, the overweening mantras of “data-driven” and “technology-driven” politics continue to cause havoc. Together, these phenomena have manipulated public opinion, diverted people’s attention away from real issues and adversely impacted elections, to list a few undesirable outcomes.

In our own time, and with the obvious benefit of hindsight, the following valid case can be made as far as India is concerned: the farther we travel down the path of western notions of democracy, the more Christianized will our outlook become. One can regard this from a different perspective: beginning with the fall of the Berlin Wall and the destruction of the USSR, almost every single country to which the United States sought to “bring democracy” to has invariably been an Islamic theocracy. In turn, these countries have been the fiercest opponents of US-style democracy for a far more fundamental reason than their hatred of the US lifestyle and society. The cultural and civilizational inheritance of these Islamic nations instinctively detects the underlying Protestant-Christian nature of the United States and also recognizes the fact that America uses evangelism as one of the effective organs of its state and diplomatic policy. The clampdown and violence against Christian missionaries, destruction of Churches, etc that had occurred and continues to occur regularly in say Libya, Syria, Iraq, Egypt, and even Turkey is a reflection of this fact.

Unfortunately, during the same timeframe, the record of Bharatavarsha in this regard has been really poor, to say the least. The Christianization of the urban Indian milieu and its vocabulary has been near-comprehensive. And in the present time, this is perhaps the most urgent reason to revisit and popularize DVG’s well-informed, reasoned and even stinging critique of the aforementioned Western notions and theories. These critiques shine illuminating light on and provide invaluable intellectual and philosophical fodder for anyone who is intent on rejuvenating the Bharatiya ethos in the realm of public life (broadly speaking). As DVG himself notes [^5.8] elsewhere:

It was but natural for the Christian Padres who came to our country from alien lands to convert our people to their religion. And so they derided and mocked our dharma as the handiwork of the “Priestcraft” and our traditions as “superstition.” Imitating them, some of the highly educated folks among our own people regarded our traditional Vedic scholars with disdain and contempt. But there is indeed another perspective… no matter how far India progresses in the achievement of….material wealth, there will always be numerous other countries as competition. Indeed, I feel that our desire…to be equal to England, Germany, America, and Russia in material acquisitions…is itself an adventure. It’s our duty to attempt such things so let’s do it. But hoping that India alone will get the top spot is an argument of the extreme sort.

But the one field which doesn’t present any such competition is culture: specifically, the spiritual culture of India. This spiritual culture is the best and the finest of India’s wealth. If we don’t account for or neglect this spiritual culture, there’s no other area which India can take pride in. Forget pride, there is indeed no area where India can become useful to the world.

It will be most beneficial, useful and rewarding when we examine and study DVG’s political philosophy and critiques in this backdrop. Two other major factors are inseparable in this study: the Indian freedom struggle to which DVG arguably contributed in a more profound sense than most of the well-known leaders of his time, and his exposition of Dharma in the realm of public life.

Notes:

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• Thomas Paine: Common Sense: Of the Origin and Design of Government in General, with Concise Remarks on the English Constitution

• D V Gundappa: Rajyashastra, Rajyanga—DVG Kruti Shreni: Volume 5 (Govt of Karnataka, 2013) Pp 150.

• Ibid Pp 176.

• Ibid Pg 177. - Ibid

• Ibid

• D V Gundappa: Jnapaka Chitrashale: Vaidikadharma Sampradaayastharu: DVG Kruti Shreni: Volume 8: Nenapina Chitragalu – 2: (Govt of Karnataka, 2013). Upasamhara. Emphasis added.

[[DVG and the Freedom Struggle Source: prekshaa]]

Writing just four years after India attained independence, DVG characterizes [^6.1] our freedom from British rule as a “fruit” endowed with a “sour taste.” But more bluntly,

…what exactly is this fruit? Freedom is not a mango or a banana. It is a coconut. We need to have the skill to remove its fibre-covering, the strength to break its shell, and the patience to chew the copra [within]. Else, we will never be able to savour its full taste. This is the nature of democracy. If we wish to realise its utility and usefulness, we need to prepare ourselves for hard work. But in the unique circumstance of our country, we were forced to bear the burden of freedom before we could equip ourselves to undertake such an endeavor.

This is political writing imbued with literary flair, supplying vivid imagery embodied with vigour. As we have noted in the first chapter, DVG correctly diagnosed that the run up to our independence mainly consisted of a frenzied clamour to obtain “freedom at any cost,” and not a calm and dispassionate assessment of what we would do after obtaining it. The war-torn British were only happy to leave India in haste. This is how our freedom became a burden. As a result, after the British left, we lacked sufficient numbers of elected representatives and national leaders who were capable, competent, and deserving of the high office they occupied. But instead of questioning [^6.2] this deficiency, “we uncritically embraced electoral democracy.” This in turn led to the emergence of an attitude and the rise of a political class peopled by leaders who believed in the following [^6.3] dictum:

ghaTaM bhindyAt paTaM ChindyAt
kuryAt vA gArdhabhaswaram ।
yena kena prakareNa
prasiddhaH puruSho bhavet ॥
*Breaking a pot, tearing a cloth, or braying like a donkey–Doing something by hook or crook, become famous by any means. *

Or to borrow DVG’s phraseology, ever since, the Indian political system fell in the hands of the unskilled whose strength repeatedly crumbled in face of mob fury giving way to impatient and therefore imprudent moves, and not decisions because according to DVG, “it is no Government that does not take decisions.” And further [^6.4], that

The strength to govern effectively is a great strength in itself. It requires experience and practice to percolate in the administrative staff. The opportunity for both will be available only when a nation becomes truly independent. A people who are merely clerks cannot develop grand, noble, and lofty ideas and a sturdy work ethic.

This is perhaps the most accurate indictment of the state and character of our IAS system and bureaucracy since Independence. As an antidote, DVG advocates [^6.5] cultivating an awareness and attitude and a sense of responsibility that always accompanies freedom until such time that this “sense of responsibility becomes akin to a national educational curriculum.”

In no particular order, one can examine the fundamental nature and some characteristic features of this curriculum.

Keeping in tune with the best traditions and systems of Sanatana Bharata and various other ancient, classical civilisations, DVG correctly analysed and repurposed them in the backdrop of what can be called as the basic human impulses and had an integrative view of human nature. This is consonant with the Indian ethos of Prakrutyanurodhena Samskrutihi (culture follows in the footsteps of nature). One can extend this to say that Samskrutyanurodhena rajanithi (statecraft or politics follows in the footsteps of culture). More fundamentally, this involves a careful contemplation of the interplay of the forces of Raga and Dwesha, which in turn are the byproducts of Artha and Kama. These impulses are embedded in the aforementioned human nature and create differences and hierarchies in any society. One cannot wish this practical truth away. Nor can one forcibly attempt to equalize these hierarchies. As DVG writes [^6.6] in a related context,

The inner kernel of Dharma is the expansion of the Atman [soul], which begins with a deep, noble feeling and culminates in a sense of kinship with the universe…in this journey, one encounters frequent obstacles and doubts as to which path is Dharmic and which is Adharmic. There exists no body of knowledge or philosophical system that can make [or has made] a list of these obstacles and doubts and also the solutions to resolve them. The genius who can prepare such a list is yet to be born.

This is also perhaps the best counter to and criticism of prophetic creeds and utopian theories which as history shows us, has repeatedly resulted in disastrous consequences and suffering on a large scale.

The insights of the sort DVG possessed emanated precisely from this deep understanding of philosophy, or more accurately, his realization of Darshana. In other words, when we grasp the nature of the world characterized by form and content (Nama-Rupa), we develop what is known as the *Tara-tama Viveka—*wisdom to grade worldly events and phenomena. In his own [^6.7] words,

*The subject matter of politics is human nature…a person who desires to work in this field according to mathematical formulae truly lives in the world of illusion…[For this reason, such a person needs to] study and contemplate on philosophy with a sense of objective detachment after discarding personal feelings of anger and prejudice. Our politics will be healthy and robust in direct proportion to the extent to which this contemplation is deep, robust, and fundamental. *

Especially in an alien system like electoral democracy, where [^6.8] “everybody has the freedom and opportunity to meddle in every affair,” and because every citizen is a potential ruler, and all are [^6.9] (theoretically) equal, “how should such a political system work?After all, that which belongs to everybody belongs to nobody.”

Notes

1. D V Gundappa: Rajyashastra, Rajyanga—DVG Kruti Shreni: Volume 5 (Govt of Karnataka, 2013) Pp 560. Emphasis added.
2. Ibid. Pp. 180 3. Ibid p. 181. Verse quoted in the original 4. Ibid p.127 5. Ibid 6. Ibid Pp. 267. Emphasis added. 7. Ibid Pp. 176-7 8. Ibid. Pp. 192 9. Ibid. Pp. 180. Emphasis added.

[[DV Gundappa’s Conception of an Ideal Statesman Source: prekshaa]]

The insights of the sort DVG possessed emanated precisely from this deep understanding of philosophy, or more accurately, his realization of Darshana. In other words, when we grasp the nature of the world characterized by name and form (nAma-rUpa), we develop what is known as the t*ara-tama vivEka—*wisdom to grade worldly events and phenomena. In his own [^7.1] words,

*The subject matter of politics is human nature…a person who desires to work in this field according to mathematical formulae truly lives in the world of illusion…[For this reason, such a person needs to] study and contemplate on philosophy with a sense of objective detachment after discarding personal feelings of anger and prejudice. Our politics will be healthy and robust in direct proportion to the extent to which this contemplation is deep, robust, and fundamental. *

Especially in an alien system like electoral democracy, where [^7.2] “everybody has the freedom and opportunity to meddle in every affair,” and because every citizen is a potential ruler, and all are [^7.3] (theoretically) equal, “how should such a political system work? After all, that which belongs to everybody belongs to nobody.”

There is great profundity behind this seemingly common-sense observation. It is also a warning that DVG issues: perhaps a significant and continuing challenge before Indian democracy is this: how should our political system constantly renew the intangible but real feeling of belongingness and oneness? When we compare this with the aforementioned phenomenon of the growth of regional political parties and fanatical and other lobbies, this challenge demands an urgent remedy like never before.

This phenomenon can be viewed from another perspective: in the last seventy years, each time a clash has occurred between the harsh forces of business, various lobbies and groups with those of ideals, the latter has invariably, unfailingly lost. In other words, for the most part, this trajectory has been a change for the worse. Which is another area where DVG becomes more relevant, and a study of his work, more imperative today. A change in the cabinet or in laws as a genuine response to the demands of people and public opinion is largely in tune with the principles of natural justice (another topic on which DVG has provided extraordinary insights, which shall be examined in a subsequent chapter). However, if this change occurs due to any other extraneous reason, the demonstrated consequence is chaos. In a democracy the opportunity for change [^7.4] is a healthy sign.

However, is it not a healthy sign for that opportunity to be subjected to experimentation on a monthly basis. Change is essentially a punishment. Punishment means an exposure of faults. And so, if the only job of a Government is to keep making mistakes and getting beaten for it, where will it have the time to do the right thing? Merely because the medicine to cure diarrhea is readily available, is it wise to voluntarily embrace indigestion?

It is for these and other important reasons that DVG expounded and emphasized on the necessity for a rigorous philosophical training and cultivation of certain specific traits, attitudes, and behavior on the part of any person who wishes to enter political life. Because every citizen in a democracy is *eligible—*by constitution-given right—to occupy political office, it automatically doesn’t mean that the person is qualified for it. As a representative sample [^7.5] of DVG’s vision,

The first qualification for such a (political) aspirant is this: a keen understanding of the nature of justice and harmony. The method of earning this qualification is a study of literature and philosophy. [And] A person who wishes to occupy public office must be able to visualize the noble or ideal picture of the world first in his mind. the field of activity of the litterateur is the world of sound; that of the politician is the vast world of real people.

Indeed, as the history of the greatest statesmen in the world has shown, this kind of self-education and personal traits supplies a vision of justice that is rooted in an integrative view. Thus, DVG’s conception of the ideal statesman should possess the following qualifications and traits:

1. An uncompromising fidelity to justice. 2. A conscious and active awareness of his/her debt to the nation, society and culture. 3. A constant refinement of his/her innate sense of morality and magnanimity in public conduct and affairs. 4. An awareness of the physical manifestation of the ideal that the state should strive to attain.

When translated in practical terms, this statesman must be akin to an integrating force of:

1. Theoretical scholarship endowed with what can be called a “research mind set.” 2. Nuance, subtlety and foresight 3. Clearly articulating tough concepts 4. Promoting a philosophical outlook among the people 5. Safeguarding and multiplying the ethical and moral treasure of the country.

In the same vein, DVG also warns of the perils of a statesman becoming a professional politician. And the caution he gives [^7.6] to the potential dangers faced by a nationalist who becomes an elected representative: as long as the nationalist remains outside the formal or established political system, his/her voice has limited reach but has complete freedom; the moment this nationalist becomes part of this formal system, he/she loses this freedom. It takes extraordinary ability, skill, subtlety and perception to strike a fine balance. Or to take the easy way of succumbing to the vices of what DVG calls “party politics” as a substitute for real democracy.

To the post-industrial and technology-driven sensibilities of the contemporary world, which has pretty much erased a sense of history, these might sound fanciful and therefore unattainable ideals. However, the same history (in India, for the present purpose) shows the examples of scores of such statesmen, kings, ministers, and leaders who lived these ideals from which DVG took inspiration and developed his own insights.

Notes

---

1. Ibid Pp. 176-7 2. Ibid. Pp. 192 3. Ibid. Pp. 180. Emphasis added. 4. Ibid. p.554. Emphasis added. 5. D V Gundappa: DVG Kruti Shreni: Volume 1: Vicara, Vimarshe: Sahitya Shakti (Govt of Karnataka, 2013). pp.192, 199. 6. See, for example, the discussions on pp. 152-3; 182-6. D V Gundappa: Rajyashastra, Rajyanga—DVG Kruti Shreni: Volume 5 (Govt of Karnataka, 2013).

[[D.V. Gundappa’s Vision and Ideal of Rama Rajya Source: prekshaa]]

Every creature felt happy. Everybody was intent on [performing] Dharma. Turning their eyes towards Rama alone, creatures did not kill [or inflict violence upon] one another.

While Rama ruled the kingdom, the conversations of the people centered round Rama, Rama and Rama. The whole world became Rama’s world.

Brahmins, Kshatriyas, Vaishyas, and Shudras were performing their respective duties, satisfied with their own work and bereft of any greed.

*While Rama was ruling, the people were immersed in Dharma and lived without telling lies. All the people were endowed with excellent character. All were engaged in virtue[1]. *

The ideal of Rama Rajya (the Kingdom of Rama) is also a goal in itself and is as dateless as Sanatana Dharma and Bharatavarsha. The extraordinarily vivid, compassionate, gentle, and serene picture that Maharshi Valmiki has painted in the foregoing verses is a perfectly-blended distillation of all the best elements of the Vedic conception of the “Rashtra Yagna” described in chapter 2. This picture also reminds us of a great scholar of art and aesthetics who averred that the purpose of art is to show the possibility that a better world exists. In the parlance of traditional space-time notions of Bharatavarsha, Rama Rajya can be likened to a kingdom or a world order that existed in the Krita (or Satya) Yuga[2], which Rama brought ushered in in his own time, i.e. in the Treta Yuga. A renowned description of the Krita Yuga is available in the Mahabharata:

In the Krita Yuga, there were no poor and no rich; there was no need to labour, because all that men required was obtained by the power of will; the chief virtue was the abandonment of all worldly desires. The Krita Yuga was without disease; there was no lessening with the years; there was no hatred or vanity, or evil thought; no sorrow, no fear. All mankind could attain to supreme blessedness.

In other words, no external factor was necessary to regulate order in the Satya Yuga while the very maintenance of order became an ongoing task in the successive Yugas. This point becomes significant when we consider the following phrases in the aforementioned verses: (1) rāmamevānupaśyanto nābhyahinsanparasparam – Turning their eyes towards Rama alone, creatures did not kill [or inflict violence upon] one another; (2) rāmabhūtaṃ jagābhūdrāme rājyaṃ praśāsati – The whole world became Rama’s world. This also has a beautiful parallel in “rāmo vigrahavān dharmaḥ,” that is, Rama is the embodiment of Dharma. To state the obvious, both the meaning and the message in this is that people turned to Rama, the human embodiment of Dharma in order to guide them on the virtuous path and help them abstain from wrongdoing.

Politics and Statecraft in Rama Rajya

The logical question that arises from this discussion is this: how is politics and statecraft conceived in this Rama Rajya? To which D.V. Gundappa answers in his inimitable style that [^8.3]

Rama Rajya is the grandest conception of a Master Poet… where there are no fetters in the relationship between the ruler and the ruled…where Dharma doesn’t depend on others for its functioning and is akin to breathing: effortless.

The subtext here is the fact that the political life of a ruler, the daily application of statecraft, and politics in national life do not exist in independent realms; DVG clearly eschews the popular connotation embedded in the term, “political machinery.” Instead, he (correctly) views these elements as a “jīvaśarīra,” a life-body motivated by a higher and nobler impulse because the worshipped Deity of a state/nation is the life of its people. For DVG, the primacy of the human spirit and its higher impulses in politics was paramount. Unless this spirit was underlaid and motivated by Dharma, any political system was superficial at best and dangerous at worst. In his [^8.4] own words, “politics is also a mere instrument like the numerous paths and approaches to pursue and practice Dharma,” and “the state akin to the family, is a field for the pursuit of Dharma.” [^8.5] And he provides a guidepost of sorts as to what this Dharma is in the practice of statecraft in lines that are matchless for their simple profundity

The verdict of those Pandits [wise and learned people] who have understood the nuances of tradition and act in a spirit of selfless service directed at the good of the country is Dharma.

In the realm of politics, this translates [^8.7] into the following:

The ruler is subservient to Dharma; Dharma in turn is embodied in society. Therefore, the original home of the state’s power emanates from the Dharmic feeling prevalent in the society. The seat of the ruler is just a mere implement or equipment that maintains and protects this Dharmic feeling.

This is entirely consistent with the Sanatana conception of statecraft which instructs the king to be an upholder, protector and an agent of Dharma in the verse, rājā dhārmiko bhūyāt. The most effective discharge of this duty is also the price that he pays for enjoying his royalty (or its equivalent in today’s democratic terms). Even a cursory perusal of the life and legacy of great monarchs, royal dynasties, and world leaders (in various democracies) clearly shows the verifiable truth that the yardstick [^8.8] of a politician’s merit is the condition of the citizens.

There is however a jarring note of sorts which can be made by way of contrast. The Sanatana conception of statecraft (or Raja Dharma) allowed for a certain class of people who were beyond the king/state’s power. In common parlance, these were the Rishis, Sadhus and so on who contributed at a far profounder level by staying within society and being detached to it simultaneously. Prof M. Hiriyanna offers one of the best characterizations of such people. They were people who deliberately[9] chose *Moksha or Jivanmukti “*as the ideal to be pursued, and thereafter [made] a persistent and continual advance towards it.” The system of democracy that India adopted after 1947 makes no allowance for such class of people. But the fact that they still exist and are accorded the same level of respect and reverence is not because this system of democracy protects them but despite it, owing to millennia of our civilizational inheritance.

To be continued

Notes

1. Valmiki: Ramayana: Yuddha Kanda: 131. Verses: 100, 102, 104, 105 2. Yuga is an epoch or an era in within a four-age cycle which repeats. These four are: Krita (Satya), Treta, Dwapara and Kali. 3. D V Gundappa: Rajyashastra, Rajyanga—DVG Kruti Shreni: Volume 5 (Govt of Karnataka, 2013) p310. Emphasis added. 4. Ibid. p309 5. Ibid. p319 6. Ibid. p376 7. Ibid. p377 8. See for example, the discussion on p 309: D V Gundappa: Rajyashastra, Rajyanga—DVG Kruti Shreni: Volume 5 (Govt of Karnataka, 2013) 9. M. Hiriyanna: The Indian Conception of Values: The Quest After Perfection (Prekshaa Pratishtana and W.I.S.E. WORDS, Reprint 2018) p50

[[Rama Rajya : The Crown-Jewel and an Attainable Truth Source: prekshaa]]

DVG’s essay titled *Rama Rajya *is the fitting finale and the crowning glory of his monumental, semi-academic work, Rajyashastra[1] (Statecraft/Politics) meant for a general audience. This essay touches the upper echelons of pure political philosophy akin to the precision of the tip of a finely-sharpened pencil.

While defining completeness (or fulfilment) as one of the vital characteristics of Rama Rajya , DVG simultaneously clarifies that this completeness in a *Rama Rajya *is attained in both [^9.2] our outer and inner worlds. This clarification is essential because a mere outer completeness is fraught with a terminal risk: it ushers in complacency by making self-effort and self-reliance unnecessary. World history shows that every great civilization that attained this stage (of external completeness) eventually went into a downward, self-destructive spiral. To this end, DVG offers this timeless warning [^9.3] written in a splendidly pithy style in the original Kannada.

The sight of suffering is the reminder of auspiciousness. Indigence is the brand ambassador of prosperity.

DVG’s exposition of Rama Rajya occurs at three major levels: the literary, the philosophical, and the practical (in the sense of political philosophy). This exposition is a harmonious blend of all three, marked by an element of indivisibility. Thus, when he extols Valmiki Maharshi’s description of Rama Rajya, he also makes allowance for the deep-seated, traditional faith of millions in Rama’s kingdom. Among other things, DVG’s reverence towards Valmiki Maharshi is based on the grand vision of life and perennial philosophy that he has embedded throughout the Ramayana. And whether Rama really existed or not or was based on an existing king’s life is secondary to DVG: the fact that Valmiki Maharshi offered an immortal, inexhaustible bounty to the world by conceiving such a character holds greater value. Which is why DVG invokes a sort of Advaita between Valmiki Maharishi and Rama when he [^9.4] says,

Just like how Valmiki is among the poets, Rama is literally a manifested truth in the realm of ruling a kingdom, who has no equal.

DVG also stresses [^9.5] upon and upholds the necessity and importance for a ruler to be guided by poets, philosophers, scholars and wise people, a tradition that has been maintained since the dawn of political systems throughout the world. This has an echo in P.B. Shelley’s rather passionate statement that “poets are the unacknowledged legislators of the world.” As also in an oblique warning attributed to Thucydides that “a nation that separates its scholars and its warriors will have its laws made by cowards and its wars fought by fools."

At the practical level, DVG offers perhaps the most profoundly insightful and compassionate understanding [^9.6] of what Rama Rajya really means.

Rama Rajya is an exquisite conception of the beauty of life because it is an attainable goal instead of being a finished product. A continuous quest for it, the effort to attain it, and a single-minded penance upon it is the greatest profit that our soul can obtain. Its quest is what makes our soul become deserving of completeness, perfection. Just as Rama Rajya existed in some era in the remote past, it will also be a realized possibility in some era in the future. Our very conviction in this is itself the motivation to achieve it.

An Attainable Truth

As we have seen in the earlier chapters, as far as DVG was concerned, the inner world was the surest and most reliable guide of actions and transactions in the outer. This is completely in consonance with Valmiki Maharshi in this context. Valmiki Maharshi’s conception of *Rama Rajya *has “truth in its soul.” It is an attainable truth for which the only path is continuous study, introspection, incessant pursuit, and penance unlike established facts like “statistics, data, reports, census.” In the quest for Rama Rajya , “all of us are Sadhakas—seekers—and not Siddhas” (self-realized people). The nature of our Rama Rajya will be directly proportional to the extent to which our quest and penance is truthful and noble. Or to state this in plainer words, when the entire nation is shaped by such ideals, it will be automatically reflected in its political, social, intellectual, moral, ethical and spiritual health.

A Caution

At the same time, DVG was not blind to the real-world pitfalls because the pursuit of ideals is met more with opposition than support and encouragement in an era of parliamentary democracy and a climate of free expression which exists largely in its abuse. The extent to which “old fashioned” ideas of conviction, shraddha, devotion have a place in this climate is still a matter of debate. Given this everyday reality, how pragmatic, or even possible is it to pursue this ideal of Rama Rajya? As early as in the 1940s DVG sounded [^9.7] the same caution:

*No political system is inherently perfect and beyond continuous scrutiny and refinement. Merely because we name a system as “democracy,” it doesn’t mean it is universally applicable. There is nothing magical about a system of voting. It might bring a fool to occupy a place that a wise man deserves to occupy; it cannot make that fool wise. Similar to monarchy and other systems, democracy too, is just one more experiment in human history. *

The truth of this caution and the analysis made by DVG of the aforementioned pitfalls can be accurately verified in hindsight. When we examine the history of elections fought since 1951, we observe a very prominent slogan—used almost customarily—till the early or mid-1970s. This slogan was the promise by aspiring candidates to usher in Rama Rajya in contemporary India. After seventy years, none in our political class have managed to rebuild just one Rama temple.

The reason behind this electoral promise of bringing *Rama Rajya *is no secret: it was a blind, templatesque parroting of Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi’s declared notion and dream of bringing a Rama Rajya in India.

Notes

• See Chapter 1 for a brief discussion of Rajyashastra.

• See also: the highly-elevating discussion beginning at para 4 on p. 315 through para 2 on p. 316: D V Gundappa: Rajyashastra, Rajyanga—DVG Kruti Shreni: Volume 5 (Govt of Karnataka, 2013)

• D V Gundappa: Rajyashastra, Rajyanga—DVG Kruti Shreni: Volume 5 (Govt of Karnataka, 2013) p. 315

• D V Gundappa: Rajyashastra, Rajyanga—DVG Kruti Shreni: Volume 5 (Govt of Karnataka, 2013) p. 311

• Ibid.

• Ibid. p. 316. Emphasis added.

• Ibid. p. 313

[[Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi and D V Gundappa: A Yawning Contrast Source: prekshaa]]

Any discussion about Rama Rajya in the context of the previous century of India’s history will be incomplete without objectively examining the role of Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi. In the present context, this examination becomes more crucial for significant reasons.

Both Gandhi and DVG were contemporaries; the former was senior to DVG by eighteen years. Both contributed to the freedom struggle. While Gandhi was a freedom fighter in the commonly understood sense, DVG was a freedom fighter of a far profounder sort. It can be said that while Gandhi had his finger on the pulse of the proverbial masses, DVG had invisibly established himself in the heart of Bharatavarsha. DVG was able to accomplish far more without the sort of extensive and relentless travel that Gandhi undertook; this is an oblique reminder of the famous remark of Sarojini Naidu that “it costs a lot of money to keep Gandhi in poverty.” While Gandhi was moved by and mostly saw the paint that had faded on the body of Bharatavarsha, DVG had an unerring insight into and sought to reinvigorate the foundations she stood on.

In fact, the yawning contrast between the two can form the subject of an independent study in its own right.

Nowhere is this contrast more visible than in their respective understanding of the conception of Rama Rajya. In the interests of objectivity, we can cite the words of the legendary scholar-historian, R.C. Majumdar who has presented perhaps the most unbiased assessment [^10.1] of Mohandas Gandhi’s role and legacy.

*Gandhi combined in himself the dual role of a saint and an active politician… one’s attitude towards a saint or view of his personal conduct…is a matter of devotion and personal opinion.…But one’s judgement on the public career of a political leader rests upon certain…expectations of a norm and conduct to be followed by him. The former is based upon faith…while the latter requires logical reasoning untrammeled by any personal sentiment or belief. The historian has nothing to do with the first, and is concerned only with the second…Such history must begin by discounting the halo of semi-divinity—and also…of infallibility—which was cast around Gandhi…I have to…view his life and activities…from [an]…angle, namely as a politician…leading a great political organization…formed for a definite political object…to achieve India’s freedom from political bondage. *

This contrast is also directly evident in a different manner. DVG holds the distinction of bringing Mohandas Gandhi to Bangalore for the first time apart from penning several laudatory writings on Gandhi the saint. Yet, in his characteristic and unwavering fidelity to truth, DVG also displayed the tremendous courage required to dispassionately critique [^10.2] Gandhi the politician as we can glean from this passage.

Before Gandhi’s advent, there was an open atmosphere in public discourse… After Gandhiji took the stage, this culture of free and open disagreement and debates vanished. It was said that the political stand of the entire country should be one, and that Gandhiji’s frontal leadership should be unhindered. It was said that if Gandhiji spoke, the nation spoke. The reasoning offered was as follows: unless the nation adopted this unquestioning mentality, we would not get freedom from the British… from then onwards, People were prohibited from taking his name without the mandatory honorific of “Mahatma.” Gandhiji’s thought was the nation’s thought.

Courageous Critique of Gandhi

Another similar example of DVG’s critique of Gandhi that we can cite is the caustic rebuttal he wrote condemning Gandhi’s arrogant behavior in the aftermath of the British firing on freedom fighters in Vidurashwatha near Bangalore. Gandhi had used this mass-killing as the pretext to write a haughty letter to the Mysore Maharaja, Krishnaraja Wodeyar IV asking him to abolish the Mysore Princely State and establish a “responsible government” in its place, and that he would henceforth “monitor agitations in all the princely states of India.” In practice, Gandhi’s call translated into spreading the Congress party’s machinery deeper and wider by supplanting the Mysore Princely State. The events that transpired from the Vidurashwatha firing and culminating in the Patel-Mirza Pact [^10.3] of 1938 show the manner in which Gandhi actively encouraged the Mysore unit of the Indian National Congress to foment continuous disturbances against the Maharaja Krishna Raja Wodeyar IV.

In his rebuttal, DVG termed Mohandas Gandhi’s reaction as hasty, unfortunate and irresponsible. DVG was among the very few men of his time who had seen the innate value of our Princely States in preserving and maintaining the core aspects, traditions, and unbroken social and cultural norms of Bharatiya civilization. More so with respect to Mysore which even the British had praised as a model state. Therefore, DVG viewed Gandhi’s reckless response as succumbing to mob fury under the excuse of his promise [^10.4] that the “sacrifice at Vidurashwatha will not go in vain towards achieving freedom by peaceful means.” DVG further said that if this was the nature of and the method for getting “responsible government,” one would need to question the very definition of such a government, which sought to uproot time-honoured systems which were working smoothly and replace them with something untested in practice, based solely on sloganeering and noisy activism. In fact, the Vidurashwatha eventuality can be regarded as a representative microcosm of the dangers of Mohandas Gandhi’s “cult of non-violence,” in R.C. Majumdar’s memorable phraseology.

Notes

1. R.C. Majumdar: Preface: History of the Freedom Movement in India: Vol 3 (Firma K.L. Mukhopadhyay) Pp xv, xviii. Emphasis added. 2. DV Gundappa: Vruttapatrike 3. K. Veerathappa: “Dewan Mirza Ismail and Mysore Congress.”Proceedings of the Indian History Congress, vol. 40, 1979, pp. 653–661 4. Vidurashwatha: Jallianwala Bagh of Karnataka. Retrieved from http://vifreeindia.com/history/

[[DVG’s Traditional Wisdom and Gandhi’s Whimsical Leadership Source: prekshaa]]

Drawing from history, DVG [^11.1] says,

*Before the advent of the British in India, what was the system which united the king and the citizens in our kingdoms? The answer is this: in those days, there was no cleavage between the two. The individual could directly question the king. The king ruled with the fear that the citizens would revolt if he ill-treated them. *

Mohandas Gandhi was blind to or perhaps willfully ignored these positive and life-affirming elements in our traditional systems of political organization. At one level, it seems incredible that Gandhi did not bother to ask himself a fundamental question: how was it that these systems had endured for hundreds of years even up to his own day, in the selfsame Princely States that he relentlessly condemned?

Note: For a near-comprehensive discussion of DVG’s critiques and essays on these topics, the reader is referred to the reading list [^11.2] in footnote 22.

Whimsical Leadership

However, in historical hindsight, it is quite accurate to state that Gandhi’s behavior in this instance was typical of his leadership of the freedom movement: whimsical, short-sighted, erratic, and largely a failure. We find an echo of this in R.C. Majumdar [^11.3] as well.

Gandhi was lacking in both political wisdom and political strategy…and far from being infallible, committed serious blunders, one after another, in pursuit of some Utopian ideals and methods which had no basis in reality.

The same Mohandas Gandhi had earlier extolled Maharaja Krishna Raja Wodeyar IV as a “Rajarshi” and his Mysore Princely State as a Rama Rajya. Therefore, this is a pertinent instance as any to examine Gandhi’s notion of Rama Rajya given the fact that he found it perfectly fine (or politically expedient) to provoke his Congress party to agitate against and overthrow his self-described Rama Rajya of Mysore.

The Rama Rajya of Mohandas Gandhi and D.V. Gundappa

[1] By Rama Rajya I do not mean Hindu Raj. I mean by Rama Rajya Divine Raj, the Kingdom of God. For me Rama and Rahim are one and the same deity. I acknowledge no other God but the one God of truth and righteousness. [4]
[2] My conception of Rama Rajya excludes the replacement of the British army by a national army of occupation. A country that is governed by even its national army can never be morally free…[5]
[3] The withdrawal of British power does not mean Rama Rajya. How can it happen when we have all along been nursing violence in our hearts?[6]
[4] If you want to see God in the form of Rama Rajya… You have to magnify your own faults a thousand fold and shut your eyes to the faults of your neighbours. [7]

Mohandas Gandhi’s own words cited above are the clearest contrast to DVG’s vision of Rama Rajya, which has been outlined earlier in this chapter. It is quite evident that a detailed explanation or commentary on Gandhi’s notions of Rama Rajya is unnecessary. The most charitable thing that could be said about it is that it is unrealistic and muddled. And extremely fatal in practice.

Like his views on most topics of human activity, Gandhi’s Rama Rajya was an extension of his personal experiments with truth. This is perfectly fine except for the fact that he insisted that the entire society/country follow it for their own good. His words quoted previously also resonate with what the late Christopher Hitchens [^11.8] observed, that “Gandhi cannot escape culpability for being the only major preacher of appeasement who never changed his mind.” In summary, Gandhi’s Rama Rajya leans heavily towards and is inspired by the fundamentalist idea of the Christian Kingdom of God than Valmiki’s description of Rama Rajya.

D.V. Gundappa had clearly seen through the doctrine of Christianity in practice and had a healthy contempt [^11.9] for the inherent arrogance in the grand notions of “saving souls” and so on. DVG’s exposition of Rama Rajya did not stem from a mere intellectual understanding of the ideal. He had internalized not just Valmiki and his immortal epic but drew from the inexhaustible Sanatana treasure. While Gandhi saw the need to explicitly state that his Rama Rajya was not a “Hindu Raj,” DVG had no need for such labels.

Gandhi’s Rama Rajya and indeed, his devotion towards revered heroes like Harishchandra, Rama, and so on were merely sentimental. This is also the reason that Gandhi selectively quoted from the real masters and the cultural legacy of Bharatavarsha such as Valmiki, Vyasa, and Krishna. In Gandhi’s Rama Rajya, there is no place for Dharma in its widest and deepest possible meaning and application. Therefore there is no place for Moksha as well in Gandhi’s Rama Rajya because his ideal state is one where all citizens are engaged in a lifelong quest of a perfect moral order not just in their own country but the entire world. Given this sort of a quest after illusion, there is also no place or even the possibility for Rasananda in Gandhi’s Rama Rajya. In direct contrast, DVG includes [^11.10] “leisure for the cultivation of the mind and the spirit” in the “minimal requisites” of a robust and healthy state. DVG’s Rama Rajya admits the critical questioning of even Rama, and firmly declaims against narrow sentimentalists [^11.11] in public life.

Notes

1. D V Gundappa: Rajyashastra, Rajyanga—DVG Kruti Shreni: Volume 5 (Govt of Karnataka, 2013) p. 493 2. D.V. Gundappa: DVG Kruti Shreni: Volume 5: Rajyashastra, Rajyanga (Govt of Karnataka, 2013). List of essays: (i) Purvacharitreya Rupada Pithike (ii)Uttarabaddha Rajya (iii) Badalavane (iv)Jawabdari Sarakarada Chalavali Brahmanana Pituriyalli (v) Congress Mattu Bharatiya Samsthanagalu (vi) Namma Jawabdari Sarkara Hege Saaguttide? 3. R.C. Majumdar: Preface: History of the Freedom Movement in India: Vol 3 (Firma K.L. Mukhopadhyay) p. xix 4. M.K. Gandhi: Young India, 19 September 1929, p. 305 5. M.K. Gandhi: Harijan, 5 May 1946, p. 116 6. M.K. Gandhi: Harijan, 3 August 1947, p. 262 7. M.K. Gandhi: Harijan, 26 October 1947, p. 387 8. Christopher Hitchens: The Real Mahatma Gandhi: Questioning the moral heroism of India’s most revered figure: The Atlantic, July/August 2011 9. See for example, DVG’s note in this regard in his essay titled, Nanna Atmagurugalu Narasimhamurthy in his Jnapakachitrashale volumes. 10. D.V. Gundappa: Towards a New World Order, Indian Institute of World Culture, B.P. Wadia Memorial Lecture, p. 7 11. DVG’s classic musical narrative poem, Sri Rama Parikshanam [The Trial of Sri Rama] as the title suggests, is one such questioning of Rama. The two appendixes at the end of the work are deeply instructive in the context of DVG’s ideal and goal of Rama Rajya.

[[DVG’s Rama Rajya is the Original Genius of Bharatavarsha Source: prekshaa]]

The mirage-like Rama Rajya of Mohandas Gandhi at a very fundamental level of ethics essentially must rest on untruths. This is not to imply that Gandhi deliberately spoke untruths but his claims such as Sarvadharmasamabhava (equal validity of all religions), “Ram and Rahim are the same,” and Ishwar Allah tere naam are demonstrably false and are therefore lethal in practice. How for example, is it possible to have a Rama Rajya in a kingdom peopled with religious diktats that explicitly call Rama a false god that needs to be destroyed because the whole world belongs to Allah? This is the same false equivalence that we find in the mischievous meaning attributed to the Vedic verse [^12.1], ekam sat viprā bahudhā vadanti, again an outcome of Gandhian misappropriation. This is also another fundamental reason that supports the claim that Gandhi’s Rama Rajya does not admit Dharma in the true sense.

DVG’s ideal and vision of Rama Rajya was a harmonious amalgamation of the original genius of Bharatavarsha that includes the collective wisdom, insights and legacy of our Rishis (and heroes like), Rama, Krishna, Kautilya and Vidyaranya, to the name the most outstanding ones. The Rama in DVG’s Rama Rajya was also a Jnani in the sense meant by Maharshi Vidyaranya in his immortal dictum [^12.2] of jñāninā carituṃ śakyam samyak rājyādi laukikaṃ. The summary: DVG’s Rama Rajya implies a perfect harmony of Raga and Dwesha and a balance is maintained among the three gunas. Translated in the realm of the kingdom, statecraft, social and public life, this Rama Rajya properly ensures Dushta Shikshana (punishment of evil) and Shishta Rakshana (protection of the good). Both require the application of violence if need be. In other words, DVG’s Rama Rajya assigns the rightful place to the ancient and original Indian ideal and noble tradition of Kshatra [^12.3] (spirit of valour). As recorded history shows, this is thoroughly contrary to Gandhi who wanted to establish his Rama Rajya through “winning hearts” by voluntarily sacrificing one’s life to the sword of the barbarian. Once more, we notice Gandhi’s false equivalence and selective quoting of the verse,

ahiṃsā paramo dharma ।
dharma hiṃsā tathaiva ca ॥

Non-violence is the greatest Dharma. As also is violence that is directed at preserving Dharma.

Mohandas Gandhi’s dense Ahimsa admits nary an illuminative ray of Kshatra, which in his view is equal to violence. In light of the discussions so far, the logical question arises whether his ideal deity and character, Sri Ramachandra’s victories over numerous demons including Ravana were actually a victory over their hearts.

From the same discussion, we can clearly see the truth in the great insight of D.V. Gundappa’s realistic ideal of Rama Rajya, which he terms is a sādhyasatya: an attainable truth.

The travesty of post-1947 India is that Gandhi’s Rama Rajya like the loosely-held planks of an attic floor, gave way to an indeterminate being called secularism whose very first victim was Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi himself.

Notes

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1. The complete verse is as follows:
   indraṃ mitraṃ varuṇamagnimāhuratho divyaḥ sa suparṇo garutmān।
   ekaṃ sadviprā bahudhā vadantyagniṃ yamaṃ mātariśvānamāhuḥ ॥
   They called him Indra, Mitra, Varuṇa, Agni; and he is heavenly Garuda, who has beautiful wings. The truth is one, but the sages (or learned ones) call it by many names or describe him in many ways; they called him Agni, Yama, Mātariśvan. (Rg Veda 1.164.46).
   It requires a tremendous leap of logic to interpret this verse to mean that the “Truth” meant here also includes prophetic Gods like Allah and the Christian God. 2. Translation: It is very well possible for the Jnani to engage in worldly duties such as administering a Kingdom. 3. Ref: Shatavadhani Dr. R Ganesh: Bharatiya Kshatra Parampare (Rashtrotthana Sahtiya, Bangalore, 2016)

[[D.V.G: The Adhvaryu of Political Literature in Kannada Source: prekshaa]]

A common refrain in the twenty-two chapters and forty-four essays in DVG’s Rajyashastra and Rajyanga is the natural ease, the practiced manner and legerdemain aptness with which DVG quotes from a wide range of ancient Indian texts including but not limited to the Arthashastra, the Vedas, Kavya (literature), philosophical treatises (by Adi Sankara, Vidyaranya et al) and Dharmashastras (Manusmriti, Kamandaka, et al). DVG was only adhering to the timeless Santana tradition ³² he treasured so much, “of making any affirmations for which authority could be cited by chapter and verse…and deprecated the contemporary mania for personalism.”

But these were not quotations to show off his erudition or to impress the reader or to provide scholarly backing to his own writing. They were forces of nature that could be summoned at will because DVG had tamed his muse to his own moods.

The adhvaryu of Political Literature in Kannada

And he went to the very roots. As a sample, we can consider his deliberations on the best method to coin new terminology in Kannada for producing new literature on the alien system of democracy in a way that was unambiguous, accurate, and easily understandable by the general reader.

*Let’s take the example of a new word, “vṛṇīta.” This word is akin to “punīta” (Jaimini Bharata: ॥ 18-45)…The word cunāyita is a deformed coinage. The correct synonymn for “elected” is “vṛta,” a Sanskrit word. *

This etymological discussion proceeds apace for an entire paragraph, a delicious feast of learning, before DVG offers a conclusive reasoning for selecting vṛṇīta as the most appropriate word for “elected representative.” For each alternative that he suggests, he traces its Sanskrit dhātu (root), cites various examples of its usage and provides ironclad reasoning ³³ for its suitability or otherwise. This is entirely consonant with the traditional Indian method of scholarship.

Without doubt, DVG is the adhvaryu of political literature in Kannada—both scholarly and popular.

On the larger canvas, DVG’s contemporaries like K.P. Jayaswal, U.C. Sarkar, Radhakumud Mookerji and Ananda Coomaraswamy have made valuable contributions, enriching the field of Indian statecraft and polity. However, they fall short in three key realms: (1) a sense of philosophical wholesomeness (2) applicability to the current conditions and (3) a perspective of what is known as samanvaya (integrative approach). Thus while Ananda Coomaraswamy’s Spiritual Authority and Temporal Power is doubtless a fine work, it nevertheless suffers from the minor defect of being prosaic, although one must thank him for the joyless work of translating sublime Vedic Sanskrit verses into an arid language like English, robbing both sublimity and the lived essence of the original. Likewise, K.P. Jayaswal’s meticulous, Hindu Polity is notable for an eagerness to somehow “prove” that ancient Indian republics (mahājanapadas) were similar if not superior to modern Western democracies.

Integral Calculus of the Universal Soul

But DVG is a Master chef who internalized precise flavors and cooked a fine meal even with disparate ingredients. He could use timeless Sanatana precepts and ideals and apply them intact—in both spirit and substance—to contemporary situations using an astonishing range of original, real-life allusions and literary metaphors. Talking about rights, liberty, and duties, DVG says that there should be freedom for the citizen to demand that the state should discharge Dharma; this was concomitant with the freedom for the state in turn, to demand that the citizen should discharge the Dharma that he owes ³⁴ it:

Freedom is needed to establish the rule of law and justice, and justice protects freedom. This is entirely consonant with the principles of our Rajya Shastra.

Such insights were possible because DVG was finely attuned to the universal constants of Rta, Satya and Dharma, which we have already examined. Indeed, what DVG accomplished in all his political writing is akin to an integral calculus of the universal soul if we define it as a system that makes it possible to solve by a unified method many theoretical and applied problems involving a high degree of abstraction.

One of the clearest expositions of DVG’s political-philosophical ideal in the English language is his extraordinary monograph entitled Vedanta and Nationalism. This was originally a lecture delivered at the Chennai Jana Sangham ³⁵ sometime in 1908-9 which was later expanded and published from Bangalore. DVG was just twenty-one or twenty-two then. The summary of his exposition is this: the core of Dharma expressed in the political realm is self-expansion. All systems originate in Mamata (affection, attachment) and should ideally culminate in a cultivated, inner feeling of Oneness of the universe. In his own ³⁶ words:

The duty of every right-minded man…is to annihilate the false self by giving up selfishness bit by bit…by widening the heart to larger and larger spheres…and thus to expand the real Self and see it in everything in the universe…in India, the followers of the Eternal Religion are advised to love everything, not on account of the advantages that it affords, but on account of the Self that pervades everything…This is the only just reason that demands universal love from every man, and the only sound basis of all true ethics.

DVG’s mien is palpable even here: he liberally, conclusively invokes the Bhagavad Gita, Brihadaranyaka Upanishad and works of Kalidasa, and like them, his ideal of politics was to sculpt an informed and spiritualized governance so that for the populace, “enlightenment should also be enjoyable.” ³⁷

An Honest Inquirer and Critic of Mistakes

Yet, he was not blind to harsh realities of the past and present, and reserved his harshest criticism for the degradation of the character of the Indian people during his own time. Thus, when he wrote profoundly in the foregoing monograph that the “Nation is the means of safeguarding the interest of the family,” he also observedhow

Neglecting this sublime principle, the degenerate son of India refuses to acknowledge that the family is but the training ground for the practice of self-denial…Instead of expanding his real Self, he is so utterly selfish that, if he supports a family, it is mainly, if not solely for the gratification of his own personal desires.

This among others is why we notice that other singular quality in all his political, journalistic and literary writing: an earnest longing to infuse conduct, character, vigour and verve among the Indian people. DVG led a frontal crusade against sloth, inertia and indolence in public life.

Notes

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[[Sri Vidyaranya Swami as a Perennial Inspiration of DVG Source: prekshaa]]

DVG frankly reveals the pitfalls of our history and the boundaries of tradition even while he expounds on the deeper nuances of Sanatana Dharma and the trajectory ³⁸ of its customs and practices.

*Although we find in our Vedas and Itihasas the conception of uniting our ancient country under the umbrella of a Chakravartin, we have no evidence to show that this aspiration was ever realized…Even when Muslims invaded us from outside, none of our Rajas showed any spirit of unity…the Janapada system of democracy of ancient India was immediate and physically accessible; the system of today is indirectly constituted…The aspirations and ideals of the people of that period were more honest, simple, and smooth; the mental proclivities of our people today are numerous and splintered and less than straightforward. *

Even more candidly, DVG remarks that while Adi Sankara’s spiritual and philosophical conquest showed the physical and cultural indivisibility of Bharatavarsha, its ultimate goal was not realized in the realm ³⁹ of politics. This is tragically, a verifiable fact of Indian history. A century after Adi Sankara merged into Eternity, three major Hindu Empires became extinct due to mindless infighting and the northwestern gateway of India was left unguarded, paving the way for Mahmud of Ghazni’s barbaric invasions.

Boundaries of Tradition

DVG also notes how it is natural and organic for a tradition to expand its boundaries and enlarge its scope over time. The greatest evidence for this fact is the manner in which the corpus of our Dharmasastras became bloated in number, density, complexity and amplitude. Likewise, it is equally natural for traditions to die a sudden death. Our wisdom lies in how we respond to both situations. However, DVG also adds the caveat that just because something is a tradition it doesn’t automatically become Dharma because no one can predict all the situations where one can accurately pinpoint the way of Dharma and Adharma in each of these situations. Indeed ⁴⁰, “no such Sastra exists and the genius who can write it is not yet born.” DVG offers a guide, something we can call the fourfold method: (1) independent analysis (2) theoretical mastery and contemplation (3) practical experience and (4) tradition and wisdom. In fact, a term and notion that has almost disappeared from public memory in recent times is wisdom.

In a tangential fashion, Shatavadhani Dr. R. Ganesh provides ⁴¹ a brilliant analogy to grasp the essence of DVG’s method. To paraphrase his words, none of the grand palaces that our emperors and kings built have survived. However, the domes and decorations and renovations they made to temples of untold antiquity have still survived. Thus, the hoysaḻeśvara and vijayaviṭhṭhala temples today are mere specks of their former splendour but Virupaksha, the Deity predating the Vijayangara Empire has survived. By implication, the names of the rulers who respected all such temples that have been revered by countless generations in an unbroken fashion throughout our civilisational history have also been preserved. The same principle applies to all kings and chieftains and prominent people who made endowments and contributed to our sacred tīrthakṣetras. Ahalyabai Holkar remains immortal precisely because of her immortal service to Kashi.

The other aspect to this is the fact that almost no temple that kings and chieftains built have attained the status of a Kshetra. While the majestic and grand Brihadeeshwara Temple built by Raja Raja Chola justly deserves a pride of place in world history and continues to draw thousands of devotees, it does not enjoy the stature of say Tirupati. The Sanatana tradition has always respected and revered a sacred spot or structure that has universal sanctity from untold antiquity, a place or structure that is not the work of one person.

Conversely, our civilization and culture also has a silent mechanism to relegate vain eminences to obscurity and oblivion.

Vidyaranya Swami as the Eternal Inspiration

This Sanatana spirit reverberates with the stentorian euphony of a full-bodied conch in DVG’s writings about Vidyaranya Swami, one of his stately ideals. DVG’s devotion towards Sri Vidyaranya was akin to the discharge of the sacred pitṛ-ṛṇa [5]. Over a lifetime, he had painstakingly collected a wealth of research and other material about the life and legacy of this warrior-saint who was both the inspiration for and an active participant in the founding of the magnificent Vijayanagara Empire. DVG also wrote extensively on Vidyaranya Swami including a play in Kannada. Few can equal DVG’s description ⁴² of the Swami, a panorama that envelopes us in its embrace:

Six hundred years ago, the Brahminical spirit in this sage instead of becoming a vocation of supplication was transformed into a courageous endeavor and contributed to the rejuvenation of the Vedas; the renunciation of this glorious eminence did not culminate in passive inertia but instead radiated the light of steely valour, and whose Vedanta instead of becoming dry recitation, directly became the cause for civilisational buoyance.

In Vidyaranya Swami, DVG saw a full life fully dedicated to the cause of lokasaṃgraha[7] and dharmojjīvana[8] and emulated him in his own. This has a perfect echo in Acharya M. Hiriyanna’s memorable ⁴³ words:

*…the pursuit of [service] does not mean running away from society and seeking passive isolation…what is commended here is self-renunciation and not world-renunciation. Service is not regarded here as a mere concomitant of renunciation, but the very means of cultivating it…Even more important than this…will be influence which [the renunciate] silently exerts on [the society]by his life led in entire consonance with the ideal. This is the Gita conception of loka-saṃgraha; ‘what the best men do, that becomes the standard for the rest.’ *

There was also a fundamental and immediate reason DVG found inspiration and sought refuge in Vidyaranya Swami, who epitomized his name: Forest of Knowledge. The major part of DVG’s youth was lived in an India where the British colonial exploitative oppression was at its peak and he (and thousands of stalwarts like him) had to work under throttling constraints: censorship, police action, disturbances and unnecessary deaths of fellow-Indians. Even worse, he also had to contend with the third generation of Macaulayite Hindus, who were gnawing at the vitals of the Hindu cultural inheritance he so prized, from within. Overall, it was tough for someone who worked in the public and cultural life of India to retain his sanity amid such chaotic desolation.

And then, the other reason was DVG’s early training and formative years ⁴⁴ spent in the company of and tutored by traditional scholars, pandits and teachers, and the general cultural and spiritual environs of Mulabagal and elsewhere.

Frugality, Detachment, Renunciation

The natural outcome was his lifelong attachment to titanic viraktas (renunciates) such as Chanakya, Bhartruhari, and Sri Vidyaranya whose inherent imprint we notice across his writings. In their tradition, he extols and recommends politicians to cultivate a sense of detachment even when they wield power. In an extraordinary passage, he quotes ⁴⁵ Vishakhadatta’s immortal play, mudrārākṣasa, which describes Prime Minister Chanakya’s lifestyle.

Aha! How do we even describe the opulence of Emperor Chandragupta’s Prime Minister!
Look here! there’s a stone meant to pound the dried cow dung cake meant to be used in his Homa.
And here, there’s a pile of dried grass which his disciples have brought.
And this house! Old, cracked walls; its roof, bent under the constant weight of the samits.[12]`
And the person who lives in such a house, who addresses the king as, “Hey, boy!” is highly appropriate;
Because to the person who is completely bereft of desire,
the king is akin to grass, does not count for anything.

Among contemporary political figures who lived this sort of frugal life, DVG lauds Sir M. Visveswaraya and Joseph Mazzini in his fine and detailed profiles on them.

It may be argued that the Chanakyan ideal has no place in the present time especially in the realm of politics. However, the argument itself is evidence of the urgent need to revive and uphold this ideal. Or at any rate in India, the cultural and value-anchor informed by Chanakya is still quite sturdy and widely respected and like in DVG’s time, it simply needs an electric jolt of reawakening.

DVG also cautions against mere outward exhibitions of detachment and frugality in public life. The question is not even one of honest intent in politicians but one of implementation ⁴⁶ and outcome: “You cannot kill a goat and claim that you have donated footwear made from its hide. You cannot demolish a temple and then build a dome.” As DVG remarks elsewhere, Gandhi’s saintly ideals and methods resulted in national misery. As always, arrives at the same, time-tested conclusion couched in Vidyaranya Swami’s verse:

jñāninā carituṃ śakyam
samyag rājyadi laukikaṃ ॥
Only a Brahmajnani who is detached and selfless can properly discharge the affairs of politics and worldly matters.

This certainly reminds us of Plato’s ideal philosopher-king because the eternal fount of both is the same. People who run a country must be philosophers in the truest sense because an honest realization of philosophy engenders detachment. DVG invokes the selfsame Plato to spell out the consequences of the absence of such a political leadership.

If [political leaders] lack detachment and philosophical wisdom, the fate of the country that they rule will be akin to that of a ship which is manned by a drunkard and is caught in a storm mid-sea.

Notes

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[[DVG’s Meditations on the Training for Swarajya and Surajya Source: prekshaa]]

sarakāra harigolu, teresuḻigaḻattitta ।
sure kuḍidavaru kelaru huṭṭu hākuvaru ॥
birugāḻi bīsuvudu, janaveddu kuṇiyuvudu ।
uruḻadihudaccariyo‌!‌- maṃkutimma ॥ 308 ॥
Government is akin to a coracle. Whirls and currents lash it on either side.
Drunkards are in charge of the oars.
Storms billow. People erupt in frenzied dance.
It is a surprise that the boat doesn’t collapse—Mankutimma ॥

This pithy verse couches the brutal reality of the brand of democracy that India began to embrace with unthinking fervor as the colonial British began to progressively grant greater representation for Indians in political institutions. DVG published Mankutimmana Kagga in 1943. However, most of the verses in it were written on scraps of paper several years prior to its actual publication. The foresight is truly remarkable: at a time when majority of the Indian masses were unaware of and generally indifferent to democracy and alien institutions that would decide their destiny, DVG unerringly spotted the pitfalls and warned these masses of the dangers of hasty adoption. However, the greater distinction of this verse is the stamp of absolute authority it brings with it because its truth derives from an immaculate mix of learning and labour culminating in experiential wisdom. And few people were as qualified as DVG to write this verse: he not witnessed the political upheavals of the period but was an active participant in the political process for more than three decades and a detached but sharp observer and trenchant critic for the remainder of his life. Like the woeful minority of eminences of his nature, DVG remained a freedom fighter who refused to become a politician after India attained independence.

One of his more insightful essays ⁴⁷ titled Swarjayadinda Surajyakke (From Freedom towards Good Governance) delineates an impressive range of ideas on the true meaning of freedom among other topics. With his trademark simple and direct style, DVG says, “without surajya it is doubtful that that swarjaya will even survive.” It is a truth and a prophecy which has eerily rung true. The history of India of the last seventy-two years is its living proof. From Kashmir to Kanyakumari, from Kokrajahar to Kalinga, the number and hues of forces that are actively, violently waging war against India as a sovereign nation and civilisational state is not only uncountable but have grown to become a frightening menace. The freedom that “India wrought for” in Annie Beasant’s terminology, stands threatened on a scale and intensity never witnessed before in her long history. The precious geographical and political unity attained in 1947 stands on a precipice given the manner in which almost all key institutions have been subverted from within. This is the direct outcome of throwing surajya to the winds. However, surajya is not merely “good governance.”

The Daily Bath in Public Life

DVG provides a great analogy to emphasize the indivisible link between freedom and governance. Surajya is akin to maintaining one’s body which gets dirty each second by washing it, by cleansing it with at least one bath daily. While this reminds us of the famous quote attributed to Thomas Jefferson that “eternal vigilance is the price of liberty,” the jurisdiction in which DVG deals with the theme is wider and more profound.

Swarajya or freedom or self-rule is neither a constant nor is it assured as the millennium-long history of India tragically shows. Neither is surajya merely good governance nor merely eternal vigilance but a constant process and execution of a spirit of national self-awareness. The big threats and lethal blows to a nation occur rarely in the history of any country because they can reasonably be foreseen. However, it is the unseen but gradual weakening of the national spirit in a million ways—that is, the accumulated, uncleaned daily dirt in DVG’s words—that causes the fatal downfall.

Wisdom of the Ages

Cutting through the dense verbiage of intellectual argument and copious theorizing, DVG revives the straightforward definition of surajya from the annals of ancient Indian wisdom: dushta nigraha (punishment of the evil) and shista paripalana (protection of the good), and correctly says that beyond this, the government should not interfere in the ordinary citizen’s life. This is an eternal truth and because eternal truths are to be realized in practice, they do not require elaborate tomes to uphold their validity. A fact that DVG cautions in just two words: ativāda kūḍadu (arguments of an extreme nature are not advisable). And then he distills the practical application and implication of this ancient Indian ideal of surajya in just a short paragraph ⁴⁸ dripping with the “wisdom of the ages.”

*According to our ancients, real progress of the society should and will occur from the genuine strength, energy, vitality and virtue inherent in its people and not by the force of eternal authority…People must have the freedom to enjoy and spend what they have rightfully earned…courts must be easily accessible to resolve disputes in the shortest possible time; anti-social elements like thieves must be apprehended and protection must be guaranteed. If this is made available by the government, the ordinary citizen motivated by the natural desire for leading a comfortable life will become industrious and set aside a small portion for social good and will enjoy a happy life. In this manner, the condition in which people lead a worry-free life by enjoying their incomes earned according to their ability is known as contentment. *

DVG rounds off this exposition with a beautiful application of a timeless Sanatana prayer, vinā dainyena jīvanam—a life that is free from groveling before others: “our ancients defined surajya as a government that facilitated such a condition of contentment.” An anecdote from DVG’s illustrious life is relevant in this context. A relative once requested DVG to use his influence in the government to help him secure a promotion. In reply, DVG wrote the following subashita (wise sayings):

akṛtvā parasantāpaṃ
agatvā khalanamratām ।
anutsṛjya satāṃ vartma
yat svalpamapi tad bahu ॥
Inflicting no hurt on others
Not bowing before petty people in positions of authority
Not abandoning the honest path that naturally comes to good people
The livelihood that one earns in this fashion
No matter how materially poor it is,
It is the only way that is deserving of respect.

Notes

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[[DVG’s Exposition of the Primacy of the Individual in the National Life Source: prekshaa]]

DVG was perhaps unique among the giants of his age who achieved a harmonious blend between the primacy of the individual in the realms of his spiritual, social and national life as conceived by the Sanatana tradition and as theorized by Western ideas. That spotless scholar Dr. S. Srikanta Sastri provides a fine exposition ⁴⁹ of this Indian conception of the individual:

*Indian culture gives immense importance to individual freedom…all schools [of Indian philosophy] also universally recognize the fact that the individual, based on his nature and temperament, is free to lead a life of his choosing. It is because of this that there is no scope for totalitarianism in Indian culture… The Fourfold Values of Life (Purushartha)… provide an individual the freedom to perform or relinquish certain duties (Karma) or perform them differently… Therefore, the criticism that Indian culture is obsessed only with the spiritual and the Other World is baseless. *

DVG explains the primacy of the individual ⁵⁰ in the national life following fashion:

The personal ethic of the people is greater than their national law. The individual is greater than the constitution. And the individual’s Inner Witness (conscience) is the greater than all laws framed since the dawn of civilization.

“Examine Yourself First”

However, DVG also reawakens Indians as to how this individual primacy must be adapted in the drastically altered era of democracy. If democracy is a system by, for and of the people, it follows that the quality of the government will be in direct proportion to the ethical standards of the majority of the people. Thus, DVG cautions ⁵¹ the Indian citizen, “before you question your ministers, examine yourself…if the state should be safe, the citizen must first fear the shortcomings in his own conduct.” We get a tangential reference to this in another ⁵² anecdote. A writer gave a copy of his new book to DVG and sought his opinion. The initial pages contained a list of opinions given by several people about its subject matter. After reading them, DVG asked him: “This is all fine. These are their opinions. What is your stand?”

Using art and literature as an analogy, DVG writes that if politics is an art (as it is frequently claimed to be), we need to view it from the perspective of feeling. In turn, we need to constantly fine tune it and hone it because it is most susceptible to vortexes of all kinds. Bereft of human feeling, institutions, no matter how strong they ⁵³ are, are useless.

the ordinary man on a daily basis meets the Amaldar, Shirastedaar etc and not ministers. If such low-level bureaucrats conduct themselves compassionately, truthfully and ethically, people will have no cause to complain no matter which party or government is in power.

DVG illustrates this with several real-life examples, citing the appalling downfall in the basic character of the bureaucracy from the era of the Mysore Wodeyars to the Congress governments under the super-centralised Nehruvian regime. We shall examine this in a detailed fashion later in this work. In this light, it is not out of place to claim that it will be highly revealing if in-depth research is done on the number of court cases filed by common citizens against the police and bureaucracy since independence. It is undeniable that these numbers have gone up with each decade.

The underlying theme in all of this is the fact that the average bureaucrat seems to forget that he or she is the individual Indian citizen (or in DVG’s highly accurate term, Rashtraka Praje) first and that in discharging his duty, he must be subconsciously imbued ⁵⁴ with this feeling: “I owe a debt to the nation and I am repaying this debt by discharging my duty.” This in turn is a pithy commentary on the never-ending rights vs duties debate introduced into the Indian public psyche by the West.

The Soil of Dharma and Auspiciousness

DVG’s brilliant insights into the operation of the fundamental impulses of Artha (wealth, its acquisition and enjoyment) and Kama (desire) vis a vis a system of democratic government is highly original and nuanced. The government should ideally be bereft of Kama and must regard Artha as a public trust that must be safeguarded and multiplied through transparent and ethical policies. This becomes paramount especially for a civilisational state like Bharatavarsha in order to preserve its cultural continuity in all realms. Thus, when DVG says that the soil for Dharma ⁵⁵ and welfare and auspiciousness is the same, several intellectual vistas unfold in our mind. And what are the main qualities of that soil?

1. Eminence of individual excellence 2. Courtesy 3. Wisdom 4. Philosophical fidelity

An ideal or optimum mix of these qualities is what infuses Dharma, and Dharma is incomplete sans Satya (Truth). However, the practical implication of ascertaining truth especially in public life is “not easy” because it is “scattered as pieces in various places. If we need to look at its wholesome and integrated form, we need to locate the places where it has been spread.” We are reminded of the superb line from one of his verses ⁵⁶ in Mankutimmana Kagga: manujaroḻagāgāga torpa mahanīyaguṇa (the noble qualities within people that come to the surface from time to time). DVG advocates that in public life, politics and government, this ability to spot virtue and nobleness (both are attributes of truth) is what needs to be cultivated and kept in constant practice. This is also the reason DVG repeatedly stresses that traditions and customs that have endured among the people from a dateless era must be maintained intact and must not be tampered with at any cost because their longevity is itself a proof of their innate value.

Notes

---

[[DVG’s Entry into the Rough and Tumble of Political Life Source: prekshaa]]

sāsirada yukti sāhasava nīnesagutiru ।
lesu phala doreye ninnella pauruṣakaṃ ॥
śeṣa ninaguḻivudeṃtādoḍaṃ novinitu ।
saisadanu nīnaḻade - maṃkutimma ॥ 636 ॥

Continue to implement a thousand ideas of adventure ।
It is wonderful if your efforts bear fruit ॥
Still, you will be left with a few failures and pain ।
Endure them all without lamenting – Mankutimma ॥

***

Even as Europe was reeling under the first world war born out of its unquenchable colonial rapacity, in faraway Bangalore a twenty-something D.V. Gundappa had already shot to fame with his magnum opus, Late Diwan Rangacharlu published in 1908. With that, DVG had almost overnight become a powerful voice of sanity, reason, balance, and hygiene in public life. His biweekly paper Karnataka (published every Wednesday and Saturday) which had begun in 1913 became highly influential, mostly owing to the force of DVG’s personality, writing, scholarship, keen grasp of a range of subjects and the tempered acidity of its views. It was a period when newspapers were subject to the Government’s whim and will. Censorship was a matter of course and writing against the British would invite assured punishment. Additionally, the British Resident in a princely state could randomly decide whether something constituted an offence purely based on his mood. It was in such an oppressive atmosphere that DVG not only criticized the Wodeyar government but took on the British with casual fearlessness, as we shall see in a future chapter. Here is a sample, a “prayer” appearing in Karnataka:

WHEN WILL IT COME –

A Firewood Depot
For the Poor in the City?
O our Kind Municipality!
O our Wise Government!
—–

*Lord, Have mercy
On poor pedestrians
And shaky cyclists
For our motorists are impatient
Our police are incompetent
Our municipality is impotent
And our Government is indifferent. *

Quite naturally, DVG’s neck-deep involvement in journalism, his frequent interactions with the highest strata of powers enmeshed him in the rough and tumble of political life of the time.

The Iconic Hindu Coffee Club

Public life in Bangalore began in earnest at the historic K.T. Appanna’s Hindu Coffee Club at Chickpet. Barely a decade after its establishment, it had emerged as a throbbing cultural hub and public-discussion magnet attracting scores of people from various walks of life. Vidwans of classical music, bureaucrats, journalists, writers, scholars, thinkers…assembled there every evening between 6 – 7:30 PM. Heated discussions, debates, expositions on political philosophy, language, literature, music, Swarajya and Swadeshi movements…nothing was taboo. Its wooden-benched confines became a solid training ground for a young DVG who was a permanent participant. The “friends” he made at the Coffee Club were nearly double his age. Some, like Guruswamy Iyer were fifty. DVG not only gleaned insights on the aforementioned topics from these seasoned experts but ingrained within himself those crucial lessons of life that cannot be formally taught.

If a parallel can be drawn at all, K.T. Appanna’s Coffee Club was akin to the Parisian Cafes, the throbbing venues of political and social ideas that animated and changed the French public life in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries.

The other venue was K.S. Krishna Iyer’s home.

Stirrings of Public Endeavours

In both venues, ideas and action plans were hatched and some took off but most were short-lived. Invariably, all these plans had only one aim: to raise the all-round standards of the people, to educate them about the new winds of democracy, liberty, and freedom, sweeping their ancient country, to improve their reading habits, to increase awareness about public health, and in general, stamp out laziness and inertia in public life.

A few notable outcomes include the founding of the Popular Education League, distributing sweets on Deepavali to terminally ill patients at the Tuberculosis Hospital at Magadi Road (it still exists), conducting night classes for mill workers in a temple on Goods Shed Road, and establishing the Bangalore Study Club and the Bangalore Book Club.

As an enthusiastic young man, DVG, the active and passionate participant in both K.T. Appanna’s Coffee Club and a permanent visitor to K.S. Krishna Iyer’s house, eventually wrote with great affection about KT. Appanna in a highly moving long-form essay and penned a respectful tribute to K.S. Krishna Iyer in his Jnapaka Chitrashale volumes. On his part, K.T. Appanna never billed DVG for the food he ate at his hotel. Like with many others, DVG shared a deep, lifelong bond of Samskara with him.

Circa 1915

Two things occurred in 1915, a year that marked a turning point in DVG’s life.

We shall begin with the second occurrence first.

As President of the Bangalore Municipality ⁵⁷, K.P. Puttanna Chetty ⁵⁸ called a public meeting at City Market ⁵⁹ to invite ideas for the development, upkeep and maintenance of the city. The Diwan Mokshagundam Visvesvaraya presided over the meeting. As the discussions progressed, DVG, the journalist and editor, who was present, raised some caustic criticism to which the Diwan said: “You seem to be a great critic. It is one thing to merely raise objections but that doesn’t solve anything. It is only when you jump in and get your feet dirty that you will understand our problems.” Not stopping at that, Visvesvaraya said, “If this young journalist’s critiques need to become useful, he needs to equip himself with insights into administration.” And then, in a gesture mixed with both admiration and challenge, Visvesvaraya nominated DVG as a Member of the Municipal Council in April 1915.

That was the beginning of a long and fruitful association of two titans, a relationship distinguished by a high degree of mutual respect whose bedrock was integrity and unqualified affection. Indeed, DVG’s brilliant memoir of Sir M. Visvesvaraya is a fine, inspirational model into the life, career, ideals and work habits of one of the few eponymous Bharata Ratnas.

Rarefied Service to the Bangalore Municipality

DVG’s appointment to the Municipality immediately, directly thrust him into the swampy waters of political life at that level. Diwan Visvesvaraya had indeed chosen well. DVG proved more than worthy to the task. In 1916, DVG initiated and then published the first Bangalore City Municipal Bulletin, an official newspaper of the Municipality. It had the full backing of the Diwan. However, it would prove to be short-lived. As Member, DVG’s debates in the Council were imbued with the strength of knowledge, impeccable logic, and his criticisms spared none. As Visvesvaraya had foreseen, DVG also got a firsthand experience of the kind of politics in these government bodies and the character and qualifications of the people that inhabited them. In numerous essays in his Rajyashastra, Rajyangatattvagalu and other scattered writings, he recounts several anecdotes from the Council meetings, a beautiful mixture of the sublime, the ludicrous, the hilarious and the shocking. His column titled Bangalore Municipal Politics published in The Hindu, 21 September 1927 is worth reading even today.

Notes

---

[[The Abiding Inspiration of Gopal Krishna Gokhale Source: prekshaa]]

Enter Gopala Krishna Gokhale

The second occurrence was the death of one of India’s pioneering statesmen and a fine democrat, Gopal Krishna Gokhale on 19 February 1915. While his death was mourned by the entire nation, only a handful took the inspiration to perpetuate his substantial and noble legacy.

Accordingly, DVG and some in his close circle seeded The Mysore Social Service League, the precursor to the Gokhale Institute of Public Affairs (GIPA) which DVG founded on 15 August 1948. The first grand event of the League was inviting Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi to Bangalore, his maiden visit to the city on 5 May 1915. The words of Gandhi’s speech as he unveiled Gokhale’s portrait resonated in DVG’s ears:

All Indians who wish to serve the country must work in the field of politics. They must discharge their services in political life and political institutions like Dharma. This is what Sri Gokhale taught me.

Gopala Krishna Gokhale’s dignified portrait still adorns the centre of the DVG Hall (“DVG Sabhangana,” in Kannada) in the GIPA premises with the inscription, “Portrait unveiled by Mahatma Gandhi on 5-5-1915.”

For a full year, DVG meditated not just on Gandhi’s words but on Gokhale’s dictum that “public life must be spiritualized.” The dictum became the slogan of his Karnataka paper from then on. What emerged from his penance was an unshakeable conviction that gave a concrete direction to DVG’s work in public life from which he never swerved. It stretched over a rich, eventful, busy and highly productive span of more than three decades (taking 1915 as the starting point) over which DVG not only wrote contemporary history but created it. One of the first things DVG did was to write a heartfelt tribute to Gopal Krishna Gokhale, and another elevating essay, In his Footsteps, reaffirming his commitment to the great savant. Indeed, for much of his life, DVG never tired of writing and speaking about the contributions and value of Gokhale in both Kannada and English.

The other insight that DVG realized can best be captured in his own words:

It is the burning of the intellect that enables the realization of a Darshana through Mantra. That burning is Shraddha or conviction. It is verily Tapas or penance.

In his case, this translated into a lifelong attempt at a synthesis in public life. DVG never viewed the Vaidika (loosely translated: religious) and Laukika (worldly) as separate. Both were complementary. Laukika would degenerate unless accompanied by the best elements of Vaidika.

Ceaseless Activity, Unremitting Public Service

It would be a mistake to assume that once DVG became the Municipal Member, he devoted all his time to politics.

DVG was first a journalist and editor and described himself as such till the end of his life. However, it is also essential to have a brief idea of the kind of prolific and intense activity he was engaged in apart from his journalism as well.

DVG was instrumental in establishing and growing the Karnataka Sahitya Parishad founded in 1915. As an office-bearer, invited scholars and litterateurs, hosted scholars, conducted seminars, Gamaka sessions, and in general, welcomed anybody who wished to serve the Kannada language and its long and profound literary heritage.

DVG also wrote and published annual reports on various aspects of the Mysore State, a topic we shall examine in detail later.

Around 1916, he was involved in an organization named Friends Union (the rechristened form of the Ranade Society). In 1917, he was made part of a small group curiously named, Non-Entities, whose intent was to raise funds for bright Indian youth who wanted to pursue higher studies abroad. He also lent his weight to the newly-formed Amateur Dramatic Association (ADA), which has survived till date with an auditorium of its own in Bangalore. He was instrumental in collecting the proceeds of several plays from this group, which he then sent to the renowned scientist Jagadish Chandra Bose’s Temple of Truth.

From the insights and learning he had acquired via writing Diwan Rangacharlu’s biography, DVG motivated a few prominent public personalities such as H.V Rangaswami (from Hassan) and M. Venkatakrishnayya and founded the Mysuru Sarvajanika Sabhe (Mysore Public Association) in Mysore city. However, it stopped functioning after three years. DVG was also instrumental in the establishment of the iconic National High School in Bangalore.

Needless, this list is merely a fraction of the full extent and sweep of DVG’s involvement in almost all spheres of national life but for now this fraction suffices as a highly representative sample.

A Blip

Diwan M. Visvesvaraya’s resignation in 1918 in protest against state-imposed quotas for government jobs generated much public outrage and DVG was personally pained by the decision. It was also the end of a principled era in public life. Diwan Visvesvaraya’s conviction was straightforward—the best man for the job and not his background or social stratum. India has long since slipped down the dangerous road to both iniquity and a stifling political correctness which almost prohibits even an informed scrutiny of the necessity of reservations. DVG was among those who abided by Visvesvaraya’s principles, and wrote on the subject:

*To the noble sentiment of uplifting the backward sections are tied several other sentiments and principles. In the attempt to uplift the backward sections, care must be taken not to deliberately push the forward sections behind. *

History testifies to the tragic fact that DVG’s warning went unheeded.

DVG’s Moral Authority and Farsightedness

At any rate, by 1922, DVG had flowered as an authoritative, truthful, courageous, selfless, and therefore fiercely independent voice of public conscience. His caustic column in the pages of The Hindu questioning Diwan A.R. Banerjee’s trips to Shimla and England caused such a massive public embarrassment that the Diwan himself wrote a personal clarification. This is also a reflection of the overall standard of officials manning high office. In October of the same year, DVG wrote a revealing note to Mirza Ismail:

The problem hitherto in this country was – How to rouse the people? How to create a democracy? The problem will hereafter be – How to keep the people well informed and sober? How to impart self-discipline and judgement to democracy? The Leviathan is astir and there need be no misgivings as to its growing force and velocity. Our fear should rather be now about any rude…movements by which he may damage good things or frighten good men*…*

DVG observed with growing alarm the kind of hooliganism that the Justice Party was beginning to unleash in neighbouring Tamil Nadu under the pretext of justice for the allegedly separate race called Dravidians. Its ripple effects were quickly felt in the Nellore region, and it didn’t take long for its dangerous inspiration to blossom in Mysore in the form of the so-called Praja Mitra Mandali. Quite obviously, the Justice Party and similar outfits claimed that their agitations were entirely consonant with the spirit of democracy. However, DVG was not fooled by such well-sounding facades and made it a point to repeatedly call their bluff.

***

A.R. Banerjee completed his term on 30 April 1926 as the Diwan of Mysore. He was succeeded by Mirza Ismail on 1 May 1926. As its longest-serving Diwan, Mirza Ismail’s tenure was marked by substantial upheavals for some of which he was directly responsible and some he proved too meek to control. His regime was also notable for a critical turning point in the contemporary history of the Mysore state as we shall see.

Flung into the Whirlpool

Years before Mirza Ismail became the Diwan, he had an abiding respect for DVG whose scholarship and public service he admired, and the two shared a warm relationship. They regularly met and corresponded with each other on a range of topics. Most of all, Mirza was impressed by DVG’s stunning capacity for fearless, impartial objectivity in a realm choked with time-servers and flatterers. Accordingly, on 27 May 1927, he nominated DVG as the Member of the Mysore Legislative Council. The public was elated with this appointment. The 7 June 1927 edition of The Mysore Patriot gushed as follows:

*A scholar in Kannada, keen student of politics, economy, pioneer in the field of “The Indian India,” accomplished writer and speaker, journalist, publisher of no mean caliber, Mr. D.V. Gundappa long ago earned his title to a place in the Councils for the State. His present nomination to the Legislative Council adds lustre to the journalistic world…and redounds to the credit of the new regime in that it has broken new ground and shown both courage and fresh outlook. *

Accolades, encomiums flowed in torrents towards DVG from all directions. His close circle of friends and other luminaries of the time wholeheartedly welcomed the move. On 9 June, a party was organized to honour DVG at the selfsame K.T. Appanna’s Hindu Coffee Club, now rechristened as the Modern Hindu Hotel. Men recognized as eminences in their own fields fussed over him. Among others, Rao Saheb Thangavelu Mudaliar, Dr. Abbayi Naidu, S.G. Sastry, Dr. Kunhi Kannan, B.K. Garudachar, Belur Srinivasa Iyengar, Pamidi Subbarama Setty, K.T. Bashyam and Mokshagundam Krishnamurthy were present at the party.

In one stroke, Diwan Mirza Ismail had hurled DVG directly into the whirlpool of hard-rabble politics. For the next fourteen years, its brutal reality would unfold strand by strand before his own eyes.

sulabhavenalla naralokahitanirdhāra ।
balake noḻpar kelaru, kelareḍake noḻpar ॥
vilavilane capalisuva manujasvabhāvadali ।
nelegottu hitakelli? - maṃkutimma ॥ 855 ॥
It isn’t easy in this human world to understand what is good and what is not ।
Some look to the right, some to the left ॥
If you seek happiness in the ever-fickle human nature
How can you ever find its true source?" – Mankutimma

[[DVG’s Eightfold Pledge in Public Life Source: prekshaa]]

The warden of Socrates’ prison is a great and enduring metaphor for several reasons. For one, when Socrates’ wealthy friend Crito says he can bribe the prison guards to help him escape an unjust punishment, Socrates refuses purely on moral grounds thereby setting a personal example. His self-sacrifice is perhaps his way of shaming the state of Athens itself. On another plane, as he tells Crito, submitting himself voluntarily to unjust laws instead of inciting a revolt also shows that Socrates valued maintaining social order and cohesion. It is not a coincidence that the Crito episode became and still remains a foundational topic in the philosophy of law. At any rate, the Socratic metaphor also stands for the truism that the world has rarely heeded the sage advice of wise men and women since eons and in some cases, has killed them because of their wisdom.

Arguably, this applies in varying degrees to DVG’s legacy in the political and public realm.

So far, we have examined some of the key facets of DVG’s political philosophy, moorings, inspiration and ideals. Now we can examine how they translated in reality in his own extensive work in public life, politics and journalism spread over six decades. This work maybe broadly divided into four categories:

1. As a representative of various public offices 2. As a tireless advocate of responsible government 3. As a visionary who warned about the problems of the princely states very early in a public atmosphere fraught with only a myopic goal of wresting independence from the British 4. As a conscientious evaluator of the Congress party during the freedom struggle and a trenchant critic of Congress governments after Independence.

A Public Representative

As a nominated member to the Mysore Legislative Council, it didn’t’ take long for DVG to carve out the same standard of distinction that he had earned as a journalist and editor so far. Although Diwan Mirza Ismail had personally nominated him, DVG never became a mouthpiece of the Mysore Government. The reverse is actually true. If public life had to be spiritualized, fearlessness was the first prerequisite. As a firm believer and practitioner of the exalted principle that Government exists for the welfare and well-being of the citizens that gave it power, DVG would passionately criticize every law or move that violated this principle. Quite obviously, his own colleagues didn’t take his criticisms kindly and over time, he clashed with Mirza Ismail himself as we shall see.

The Eightfold Path

Indeed, we have a firsthand source of DVG’s conception and ideal of public life in a remarkable vow that he publicly took. The following is the full text of this vow.

Pledge: With God as witness, I hereby embrace the following eight vows:

1. Debt to the Nation: The people of Bharata, her institutions and traditions have protected and nurtured me. I shall always remember the debt I owe this country and I shall attempt to discharge my nationalist duties with utmost purity of thought and purpose. 2. National Unity and Integrity: I shall try to preserve the unity and integrity of the Indian nation. I shall oppose anything that causes damage to this unity be it sectarian interests of sect, creed, language, economic and social group. 3. Truth: Truth should be the only basis for all decisions related to public life. I believe that the method of arriving at the truth is through honest study of the subject on hand and fearless public discussions. 4. Courtesy*: In interactions with people, if courtesy is complemented by truth, human life becomes truly auspicious. Therefore, I shall, according to my ability, assist in all endeavours that foster mutual friendship, compassion, and empathy among people.* 5. Independent Thought: In order to find out answers and solutions to problems of public life and to express them, I shall not be beholden to any faction or party and be guided by my conscience alone and conduct myself accordingly. However, I shall also truthfully contemplate upon the opinion of every group. In every matter, I shall examine every opinion with empathy and critical reasoning. 6. Striving for Peace: In cases where there is potential for conflict and fight among people, I shall strive to maintain amity among them and attempt to resolve these conflicts through friendly consensus. The peace that is established by mutual goodwill among warring groups is the peace that lasts. 7. Fearlessness: I shall remain fearless in both expressing the truth and spreading courtesy. I shall not conceal the truth owing to my obligation to or dependence on anybody. I shall not tolerate injustice. 8. Giving up Selfishness: I shall not use my public position and official perks for my personal profit or glory.

If the political class of any country is really serious about enshrining lasting national values, it would do well to first inculcate this eightfold path of DVG within itself. Indeed, DVG took this pledge after putting its constituents in practice. A few well-known episodes from his life are worth recounting in this regard.

The first episode relates to the period when Mokshagundam Visvesvaraya was the Diwan. As a young and distinguished journalist, DVG’s newspaper office once received a cheque from the Mysore Palace. When he inquired the reason, he was told that this was part of an age-old convention where the Durbar of His Highness, the Maharaja of Mysore sent a token sum to all journalists who covered the Mysore Dasara festival every year. It was supposed to be a gesture of goodwill. DVG was incensed. He visited the Diwan’s office. This was how the conversation ensued:

DVG: “Why have you sent this money?”

Official: “Because you have covered the Dasara celebrations so well in your paper.”

DVG: “And you sent money for that?”

Official: “You’re journalists. You have travel, lodging and other expenses. Besides, this is an old custom.”

DVG: “Reporting is the duty of a journalist. The paper, not the Government, has to bear these costs. Take this back. I really don’t need it.”

When Diwan Visvesvaraya heard this, he was stunned and impressed by this young journalist’s fearless integrity and fierce independence. He wrote to his secretary: “This boy is not like the usual journalists. We cannot offer him money or any allurement. Please take back the cheque.”

The second dates back to his long associations with both Visvesvaraya and Mirza Ismail. As we’ve seen earlier, in many ways, DVG was a prize catch for both these Diwans. They sought his services for various matters and insisted that DVG accept compensation. Out of respect for these eminences, DVG accepted the cheques they gave him on all such occasions. After DVG passed away in 1975, his son, the brilliant botanist and multifaceted scholar and writer Dr. B.G.L. Swamy opened his father’s large metallic trunk. Among the things he discovered were a stack of cheques signed by Visvesvaraya and Mirza Ismail. DVG never cashed them. Public service should not have a price tag.

The third episode was when the Karnataka Government announced its decision to award a monthly pension to DVG. The aged DVG summoned the Karnataka Chief Secretary G.V.K. Rao to his home and said, “What are you doing my man? For what joy are you planning to give me money? Are you sitting in such a high office to waste public money in this fashion? This is completely unacceptable.” G.V.K. Rao had no option but to yield to DVG’s remonstrance.

The fourth episode was when the Karnataka Government made another announcement: to rename the Nagasandra Road in DVG’s honour. To which DVG promptly wrote a very public letter of protest (paraphrased): “surely, the Government has better and more important work than renaming roads after old people.” Even in this case, DVG abided by one of his cherished ideals: that long-held conventions and traditions of people must not be altered or overturned overnight. However, this time the Government did not yield. D.V.G. Road remains one of the celebrated landmarks in Basavanagudi.

Such episodes are manifold in DVG’s long life and career and they necessitate a separate volume by the dint of their merit.

DVG’s voluntary embrace of poverty might sound rather extreme by today’s watered-down standards and dumbed-down public discourse. In fact, in his own time, even DVG’s staunch admirers felt deeply for him and all their efforts to ameliorate his financial condition were shot down by the man himself. One can hazard a guess. As DVG confesses so movingly ⁶⁰ in his magnificent essay, Hakkiya Payana, right from childhood, he was drawn to Bairagis, Dasayyas, Fakirs and mendicants for their carefree life dedicated entirely to the Divine. Thankfully, instead of following their renunciate path, DVG imbibed their spirit and implemented it in a far more treacherous realm: politics and public life. This reminds us of a beautiful line: “what raises travel writing to literature is not what the writer brings to a place, but what the place draws out of the writer.” DVG’s legacy is itself a superb testimony of what these Yogis and Bairagis drew out of him of which we find an echo in this verse from Mankutimmana Kagga:

Does it matter how much you eat? The body can assimilate only that much that the stomach can digest. The rest is waste.
Of all the wealth you accumulate, how much can you actually use?
Just a handful of flour is all you can use - Mankutimma ॥ 677 ॥

Notes

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[[DVG as the Ideal Legislator: A Legacy of 14 Years as Member of the Mysore Legislative Council Source: prekshaa]]

A little-known episode in DVG’s life illustrates this renunciate facet innate in him. On 2 June 1927, DVG received an invitation directly from the Mysore Maharaja to which he recorded, “Invitation from the palace. What to do?” Ever the respecter of tradition and custom, DVG visited the palace and met the Wodeyar. On 20 June 1927, his daughter Smt Tunga wrote him a letter: “I felt really happy hearing that you visited the palace. I really wanted to see you wearing the Durbar dress.”

DVG has neither spoken about or left any record of his meeting with the Maharaja of Mysore. This profound silence is also a profound testimony of how DVG regarded such things. To borrow a worn-out cliché, DVG was one of those handful of lotuses that bloom in the sludge of politics and public life. At the risk of speaking the blunt truth bluntly, DVG was several notches higher than even “Right Honourable” V.S. Srinivasa Sastri ⁶¹ who for all his erudition, eminence, patriotism and public service, wasn’t particularly courageous in matters that demanded taking a decisive stand.

***

DVG entered the Mysore Legislative Council at a crucial juncture in the history of the Mysore Princely State. The Indian National Congress had all but been monopolized by Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi in British India and was spreading its tentacles across the country at a feverish pace. However, it had no presence in the Mysore State. The only political party here was the aforementioned non-Brahmin Party in its infancy. It would prove to be a short-lived experiment. The nationwide clamour for Responsible Government quite naturally made its voice heard in Mysore as well and DVG was one of its staunchest proponents as we shall see. As a journalist deeply involved in politics and national life, DVG could not be immune to these currents furiously swirling outside Mysore. As a perceptive commentator, DVG realized that it was only a matter of time before these currents would flood Mysore as well. With great foresight, DVG anticipated the numerous problems and sudden turmoil that such a flood would cause and tirelessly wrote about them.

Although the Mysore Legislative Council had its own importance, it was largely a toothless body in the sense that its decisions could be overruled by the King or the Resident on a mere whim. Despite this overarching constraint, the sort of spirited and highly knowledgeable debates that DVG conducted in the Council is truly astonishing. Indeed, if an independent volume [^20.2] comprising all of DVG’s speeches and debates in the Council is compiled, it will make for a brilliant education for all aspiring and serving lawmakers both in our assemblies and the Parliament.

In no particular order, here is a small list of the subjects on which DVG debated: freedom of speech, legislative motions and rules, economy, prostitution, reservations, communal harmony, press censorship, untouchability, Hindu temples, child marriage, widow remarriage, and public security. Neither can these be merely classified as legislative debates in the sense it is commonly understood. They were virtuoso performances suffused with erudition, eloquence, scholarship, wit, courage, and moral authority.

Extent of Free Speech

In 1929, the leader of the House Proceedings, a Minister named K. Mathan raised an objection regarding Rules. He had a rather self-righteous bias against nominated members of the Council. Accordingly, he sought to impose limits to the matters such members could discuss. Thus, if a nominated member was a recognized expert on say economics, law, education, or reservations, he could debate only these topics, nothing else. If the member did venture to opine on other topics even on justified grounds and armed with solid knowledge and sound reasoning, it was seen as a violation of House Rules. DVG was inflamed when he heard this. In a debate ⁶² on 28 June 1929, he retorted:

I must very strongly protest against the implied censure*. I think that Government has nominated me not to represent the Government but to represent the public** and I represent the public according to my light. I interpret the Rules according to my understanding and not according to Government’s understanding.*

The minister Mathan never spoke about House Rules after this. However, this did not end here. It resurfaced in another form five years later. By then, the Indian National Congress had already made impressive inroads into Mysore and the turmoil DVG had anticipated was unfolding on a daily basis. His earlier cautions had gone unheeded but DVG persevered. In May-June 1936 just before the House convened, DVG sent two matters for consideration:

1. A committee had to be urgently set up to discuss political reforms 2. Another committee to discuss and debate the problems of integrating the 500-plus Princely States into Indian Union after the British left

Needless, both topics were inextricably linked. The Diwan, Mirza Ismail who was also the President of the Council refused to place these proposals before the House. DVG was unfazed. On 23 June 1934, he wrote a detailed essay discussing his proposals in The Hindu. In response, Mirza Ismail reprimanded DVG in the House saying that publishing such things in a newspaper constituted a violation of House Rules and gave him no chance to reply. DVG was dogged. Two weeks later, the Prajamata magazine (then based out of Madras) published a Special Supplement ⁶³, a dedicated long-form rebuttal by DVG. The entire essay ⁶⁴ is worth its weight in gold. Only a representative sample is provided below.

It is…reassuring to see the analogy of the British Parliament commended…after the requiem on Parliamentary democracy…from the lips of Sir Mirza Ismail just two weeks ago. If he would establish Parliamentary institutions and traditions in this country…we have no quarrel at all. That he is not doing is our…grievance…

In writing my article in ‘The Hindu’, my purpose was to show the limitations of the existing Constitution in Mysore…Sir Mirza desires not only that we should remain gagged on the floor of the House, but that we should remain gagged even outside as to what we suffer inside. He does not admit that the general public of the country is a higher tribunal than the Legislature which it creates. My position is different. I think that the public…which elects the legislature is a higher authority than the Legislature; and that if the representatives of the public are under any…handicaps they have not only the right but also the duty of reporting their difficult position to the people who elects them.

Needless, such occurrences were not infrequent and caused some tension in the relationship between DVG and Mirza Ismail. To both their credit, they never allowed bitterness or personal animosity to creep in and till the very end, they remained cordial friends. In a moving reminiscence in his classic Jnapaka Chitrashale, DVG not only praises Mirza Ismail but chides himself in a rather self-deprecatory Kannada term, “nannadu bhanda-jiva” (I am thick-skinned). Indeed, much before he became a Member of the Mysore Legislative Council, DVG had clearly stated his position to Diwan Mirza ⁶⁵ in a letter:

In the present circumstances of the country, politics is as often a force to divide as to unite; particularly when one of two friends happens to be an official in high authority and the other a non-official worker of the public…In such cases I hold that what, according to one’s right is due to the country is greater and more sacred than what is due to private friendship. Of course, one’s first effort…should be to reconcile the two claims. But when that is found to be impossible, the larger must, alas! be allowed to supercede the smaller…May I regard such rare good fortune as mine?

This quality of honest friendship and genuine affection in political life is in the realm of impossibility today.

An Ideal Legislator

DVG exhibited the same traits of courage and fearlessness in his debates on highly-charged and taboo issues like prostitution and child marriage and widow remarriage. Unlike other members of the Council, he did not nonchalantly dismiss prostitution as an absolute evil but strove to find ways to mitigate it based on precedent, history, social realities, and…statistics. He demanded the Leader of the House for hard facts, census data and verifiable experience before making a law regarding prostitution. These debates are truly eye-opening to say the least. On widow remarriage for example, he led by example. After tragically losing his wife to a fire accident at a relatively young age, DVG was pressurized by his family to remarry. He accepted on one condition: I will remarry only if my widowed sister also remarries. His family let the matter rest there.

It is obviously impossible to do justice to the full, rich, erudite, and wise legislative legacy of DVG spread over fourteen long years in these pages. Even the aforementioned glimpses are merely representative at best and partial at worst. What is undeniable is the fact that he elevated parliamentary democracy to a high and sublime degree that earned him enormous respect even from his opponents in the House. Other members like J. Mohammad Imam, Abbas Khan, D.H. Chandrashekhariah, Rao Saheb Chennayya, Narasinga Rao, Hassan Venkateshayya, M. Ramachandra Rao and Sir Puttanna Chetty poured generous, heartfelt compliments on DVG’s style of debate, his eloquence, wit, constructive criticism and held him as an ideal legislator.

sarvārtha sahabhāgitege rāṣṭra kula varga ।
sarvadaṇu tānenuttorva manujan ॥
sarvajīva samṛddhiganugūḍi duḍiyutire ।
parvavaṃdiḻegalavo - maṃkutimma ॥ 882 ॥

The goal of founding countries, categories and sects is to help in sharing and caring for one other.
Each person must realize that he is just an atom of the whole.
He must work towards the overall well-being of the whole.
Only then, the world will look beautiful akin to a festival day - Mankutimma

Notes

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[2] In a rare departure from a half century of legislative indolence, the Karnataka Government published a few selections of DVG’s debates in Pratibhavanta Samsadiya Patu: DVG in 2009 in Kannada, a shoddy, unsatisfactory and incomplete work.

[[DVG: The Indefatigable Champion of Responsible Government Source: prekshaa]]

Writing about the necessity for a politician to cultivate a practiced and constant study of high and valuable literature, DVG says ⁶⁶ that

*Governance is primarily an art, then it is a subject for study. As art’s innate nature, it first reveals itself in practice before it can be codified. Likewise, the first step is to strive for friendly acceptance of the people in the real world before defining a proper framework of rules and laws. Theory is akin to a mountain, art is akin to rain-laden clouds…Both theory and art must go hand in hand. *

Indeed, when one surveys the best of world literature, it is clear that they also exhibit an astonishing command over a vast range of scholarship—from Mahakavi Kalidasa to Dr. S.L. Bhyrappa in our own time. Thus, like an artist, a good politician should be able to accurately gauge what is known as the “mental makeup” of his city, for example. Indeed, we have examples of former Diwans and corporation heads who would go out and personally inspect every street in their city. This sort of hands-on governance is perhaps the most effective method of ensuring that decentralization works at its most optimum level because it ensures two things at the same: one, alertness and healthy fear among the lower levels of bureaucracy and admiration from the people that the topmost rungs of the government personally cares for them. This is also consistent with the method of the familiar, ancient system where the King would tour the kingdom in disguise etc.

Needless, DVG also anticipated the criticism that this method of governance is not feasible or practical in a modern democracy. The essence of his brilliant rebuttals to this charge can be summarized as follows: DVG regards the individual citizen’s vote as power and to use this power, self-education in democracy was the first and greatest prerequisite. Second, because the aforementioned method of hands-on administration was still in vogue and familiar to the inherited Indian historical consciousness, it only needed a change of form in the new system of democracy. Third, in a remarkable essay ⁶⁷ written in his later years, this is what DVG says:

Fifty years ago, there was clamour everywhere for the freedom of the citizen…today, if we feel that something is a public good, we automatically want the government to do it.

In other words, this is the perennial struggle—if not battle—of a democratic system where the limits of government and individual freedom, and the extent of law are engaged in a constant clash. As always, DVG’s preference is to cultivate the goodness that comes from within, which both ensures individual freedom and limits the ability of government and law to overreach into the citizen’s personal life.

Outlines of Responsible Government

Before and throughout his tenure as a legislator, DVG stressed precisely on these elements using a constant mantra: Responsible Government. That was a period that stretched from 1913-1948. DVG’s tireless advocacy of Responsible Government makes for a separate section as we shall see. But in passing, here are the key features as outlined by him:

1. The Office of the Diwan was over-centralised and exercised its authority in an arbitrary fashion. DVG advocated for a thorough but well-thought out decentralization of this power. 2. Given the ancient political tradition of this country which is innately noble (i.e. infused with Dharma), Indians are more than capable of being trained for Responsible Government. 3. The national atmosphere charged with patriotism and nationalism will eventually usher in a patriotic Government when independence comes and it is only befitting that when our people are trained in Responsible Government, future nation-building will be more vigorous, successful and will have sturdy foundations. 4. Responsible Government is perhaps one of the most workable and practical realization of the democratic fundamental, people ruling themselves.

Needless, DVG was deeply influenced by the clamour for Responsible Government raised by the Indian National Congress in British India, studied it thoroughly and was convinced of its fitness in the Mysore Princely State as well. More importantly, he witnessed the pathetic condition of most of the Princely States and was both alarmed and angry at the complete absence of democracy therein and doggedly wrote to the various Maharajas and Princes pleading for reform. Comparably, Mysore was much better. Yet, although democracy was injected in slow drops, it was a sham in practice as we have seen earlier.

Two major episodes stand out in DVG’s long fight for achieving Responsible Government in Mysore: repeated gags on the press and the infamous Bangalore Ganapati Clashes of 1928.

Quite naturally, these were also great causes of his tense relations with Diwan Mirza Ismail. The Bangalore Ganapati Clashes especially took this tension almost to a breaking point. The following is a brief summary of the outbreak.

The Bangalore Ganapati Riots of 1928

The Government School (formerly known as S R Nanjundayya School) on Arcot Srinivasachar Street in Sultanpet, Bangalore (today, AS Char Street) housed a small Ganesha idol in its campus since time immemorial. When the school underwent renovation in 1928, the contractor built a small mandap for the Ganesha idol.

Overnight, the government decided to focus its attention on this development which had gone unnoticed by the general public. The officials of the education department objected to the presence of this Ganesha idol inside the mandap. The reason? The house of Abbas Khan, the then head of the (Bangalore City) Corporation was located right opposite the school. A mosque stood next to his house.

Once this news became public, students and the general citizenry took out a rally demanding the Ganesha idol to be restored to its place in the mandap. Prominent Kannada papers like Veerakesari, Nava Jeevana and Vishwa Karnataka stood rock-solid behind this widespread public opinion. It didn’t take long for the rally to morph into a protracted public agitation.

H C Dasappa (who later became a Congress MP from Bangalore South in the second Lok Sabha and was a minister in Nehru’s cabinet), Nilagiri Sanjivayya, and K H Ramayya stood by the government’s stand to not restore the Ganesha idol. On the other side, those who supported the public agitation included the formidable Kannada editor, “Veerakesari” Sitarama Sastri, Sampige Venkatapatayya, Nittoor Srinivasa Rau (later the Chief Justice of the Mysore High Court, also the first chief of the CVC), and M P Somashekhara Rao.

“Veerakesari” Sitarama Sastri wrote blazing editorials protesting the nakedly communal stand of the government, including a fine piece of satire in Kannada with the God Ganesha himself outpouring his sorry plight in the first person.

The government, instead of resolving the issue in a rational manner, decided to use brute force. It arrested student leaders who formed a significant and influential chunk, which only heightened tensions. The unrest only intensified — now the government had two problems on its hand instead of one: the demand for reinstating the Ganesha idol and the protest against the government’s haughtiness. Thousands of protesters took out their processions in front of the Diwan’s home and the Bangalore Central Jail. Things reached such a dangerous pass that the army was called in to restrain the protestors.

Finally, the government backed down and released some student leaders on bail. Ramlal Tiwari, Subramhanyam and Bhima Rao became instant heroes — they were paraded in a massive victory procession, which eventually reached the school. The Ganesha idol was reinstalled and Arati and Puja was performed.

Muslim Hooliganism, Government Inaction

Even as the Arati was being performed, a barrage of stones and footwear came flying from the opposite buildings. This was followed by the sound of a gun going off. Within minutes, an army of Muslims armed with sticks, swords and other deadly weapons descended on the worshippers. Hundreds were grievously wounded.

That the nature and the aftermath of this unprovoked attack was so gruesome can be gauged by the fact that it not only made national headlines but was also reported in faraway London by the Times and other prominent papers.

Meanwhile, the Mysore government seemed to be hurtling towards disaster after fresh disaster. This time, it simply feigned blindness, which only infuriated the public, which perceived the government to be insensitive. An incident that was reported in the international press was being met by the government with snubbing-by-silence. A torrent of angry editorials, protest marches and other forms of strident criticism followed.

Finally, the government backed down and appointed a six-member enquiry committee headed by the retired Diwan Sir M Vishweshwarayya. After a prolonged process of collecting evidence, documents, reports, and testimonies, the committee submitted its report formally titled Report of the Bangalore Disturbances Enquiry Committee. Its findings: Things went out of hand because of the government’s inaction and delay in the face of a situation of crisis, and that “law and order was completely broken during the disturbances and the government favoured one side in the incident.”

Faced with plummeting credibility, the government turned to vent its ire against newspapers. It unleashed a regime of press censorship and threatened editors with banishment, a common punishment in those days.

Quite naturally, DVG didn’t take kindly to such repeated high-handedness on the Government’s part.

Notes

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[[The Bangalore Ganapati Clashes Set the Stage for DVG’s Advocacy for Responsible Government Source: prekshaa]]

DVG was not in Bangalore when the Ganapati clashes occurred. He had been to Bagalkot for a conference of press editors. When he returned, he found Bangalore in a state of boil. Diwan Mirza Ismail had called for a public meeting of Hindus and Muslims to pacify both parties but public opinion was almost unanimous that he was on the Muslim side. Tempers flared when it appeared that Mirza Ismail was attempting to blame Hindus for the riots. When DVG listened to the detailed eyewitness stories and reports of the clashes, he concluded that the Mirza Government was indeed trying to pin the blame on Hindus. He severed all contact with Mirza Ismail for nearly two years. Not just that. He wrote a strongly-worded opinion piece titled What is Wrong With the State of Mysore: Bangalore Disturbances and After in Swarajya dated 15 September 1928. This was DVG’s rebuttal of an earlier mischievous article in the Times of India that sought to whitewash the role of Muslim mobs that instigated the riots.

DVG traced the roots of the riots in his rebuttal and concluded that Mirza Ismail, in his zeal to beautify Bangalore City, had not consulted all stakeholders but relied excessively on Abbas Khan. Repeated complaints to various Government offices about this matter had yielded no response. Besides, the plan to shift the Ganapati Murti was not informed to the public earlier. When even this was pointed out, the Government simply ignored. Then there was the question of “secret meetings” held by the Diwan with just a few of his confidants. When the Ganapati Murti was shifted from its original location under the supervision of Government officials and the police, public suspicion acquired the colour of confirmation that Diwan Mirza Ismail’s Government was anti-Hindu. The last straw, of course, was the unprovoked vandalism of Muslim mobs.

Recounting the atmosphere of the period in one of his Jnapakachitrashale essays, DVG narrates his interaction with a traditional Vedic Pandit and teacher. The Pandit shares some snippets of his conversation with a prominent Muslim. When he questions the Muslim about the Ganapati vandalism, the man nonchalantly justifies the mob violence: “Diwan sahib hamara aadmi hai” – “The Diwan is our man.” DVG then confesses that he had no answer for the Vedic Pandit’s query: “You say you know all these people, you know the Diwan himself. What could you do about this?”

Aftermath

Faced with stinging criticism and widespread condemnation from the press and public, on 28 August 1928, the Mysore Maharaja appointed a commission of inquiry into the Ganapati clashes. It was headed by the former Diwan Mokshagundam Visvesvaraya. On 10 October, DVG testified before the committee. His tenor was acerbic. The following is a sample of his testimony.

*I am stunned to notice that the administrative machinery has been struck by paralysis. The cataclysm that hit Mysore on the 30^(th) is new. It is also a great warning to every person who aspires to enter the Civil Services…The Government, instead of acting in a timely fashion despite several reminders, was busy napping. It appears that there is no connection between the Government and the life of ordinary people it is meant to protect and govern…Even when newspapers by the dozen wrote repeated letters to the Government and penned editorials of alarm, it didn’t show even the basic courtesy of a response…When protest marches and agitations over the Ganapati issue were being taken out, the Government did nothing…Poor thing, it didn’t know anything and we are supposed to believe it. It is rather shocking to note that the Government didn’t even bother to understand the real strength of these agitations…On the contrary, it clamped down on these newspapers post facto! And it continues to impose all manner of restrictions on press freedom and calls for separate laws for further choking the press. *

On 15 January 1929, Mokshagundam Visvesvaraya submitted his report to the Government. Expectedly, it was deeply embarrassing. On the floor of the Legislative Council, DVG demanded that the Government make its contents public. He was met with silence. However, as the truism goes, no Government document can ever remain completely secret. Visvesvaraya’s Report was leaked to the press, which had a field day. DVG himself took the lead by penning a sardonic piece ⁶⁸ in the Vishwa Karnataka paper:

*We were living under the fond illusion that everything was fine in the Mysore State only to be rudely awakened…The dome or tower atop the home might be shining from afar. Inside, its very pillars and columns might be shaking. All it takes is one lash of solid rains to understand whether the dome or the pillars are more important…Likewise, it took one Ganapati clashes to awaken us to the reality of our administrative machinery, judiciary, and public safety and security systems…Our great public officials in various departments must set aside petty squabbles and reinvigorate the functioning of the Government. Only then will Ganapati himself bless us. *

Eventually, this sort of dogged and sustained pressure forced the Mysore Government to publish the Visvesvaraya Report. It was a small victory. DVG wrote another essay commending the Report for its truthfulness and thoroughness, and recommended that everyone read it. This is how he summarises the report.

1. There is excessive concentration of power in the Mysore State. This has caused a situation whereby Government officials are always scared to take independent action even in cases where such action demands timeliness and serves the interest of justice. 2. This in turn, causes paralysis at all levels and justice is not done. The Bangalore Ganapati Clashes have illustrated this in a clear-cut fashion in real life. The police did not and could not discharge their duty fearlessly and objectively because of these reasons. Faced with a crisis, the administrative machinery completely broke down. 3. The only solution to these appalling defects is Responsible Government where various functions of the Governments are optimally distributed across different departments who are accountable to one another.

This set the tone for a prolonged crusade to introduce Responsible Government in Mysore. Mokshagundam Visvesvaraya was perhaps highly impressed by DVG’s passionate and well-argued writings and speeches in favour of Responsible Government. As such, he sent a recommendation to the Maharaja’s Government as an addendum of sorts. It was titled, How to Remedy the Current Political Discontent. However, Diwan Mirza Ismail didn’t budge an inch. But that is a story for another day.

This brings us to the next phase of DVG’s political career: the aforementioned advocacy for Responsible Government.

Notes

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[[DVG’s 35-Year-Long Crusade for Responsible Government Source: prekshaa]]

Apart from his regular writings in Karnataka and other publications, perhaps the most lucid, fierce and passionate expositions on the urgent need for Responsible Government in Mysore are to be found in Problems of Indian Native States. This can be considered as a magnum opus of sorts among political literature in this genre. While most of it is addressed as Memorials to the then Maharaja of Bikaner, the sections devoted to Responsible Government are uniformly applicable to all princely states ⁶⁹ of the time. We can examine a random ⁷⁰ passage.

*In many Native States at present, the prevailing system is one of unqualified autocracy. In an India making rapid strides towards democracy, such states are an obvious anomaly…Other states…in which there is a semblance of constitutional government, the actual fact [is that]… the Assembly or the Council is simply a clever contrivance for preventing true popular ascendancy and for justifying bureaucratic sins with the seeming support of democracy. *

In DVG’s view, Responsible Government was ⁷¹ not “merely a device for political convenience and material comfort; it is also a training of character.” Needless, DVG also offers a five-point outline of a “True Constitution” for such a Government.

1. Absolute supremacy of law, which is not subordinate to any individual or class. 2. An elected Representative Assembly of which the legislature of the State is a part. 3. Autonomous local institutions from the rural Panchayats to urban bodies. 4. An executive council elected by the members of the Legislative Assembly. 5. Full freedom of speech and criticism “subject only to the conditions imposed by the ordinary penal law.”

DVG’s passionate crusade in favour of Responsible Government found enthusiastic support and endorsement from a significant section of eminent people in public life. Public meetings, seminars, debates, and conferences were organized on a regular basis. Charters, appeals, resolutions and notices were forwarded to the Government. May 5, 1929 was a memorable day. A huge gathering met at the Majestic Theatre comprising M. Venkatakrishnayya, Hosakoppa Krishna Rao, Pamadi Subbarama Shetty, M.P. Somashekahra Rao, S.R.S. Raghavan, C.V. Narasinga Rao, K.T. Bashyam, K.T. Satyanarayana Murthy, B.L. Bayyanna, Veeranna Gowda, Ramanlal Tiwari, T.T. Sharma, Sanjeevappa, and other luminaries. The special feature of the conference was D.V.G.’s erudite and courageous condemnation of the infamous ⁷² Butler Committee Report. The Report which took two years to prepare only reaffirmed the British political duplicity. DVG’s resolution that a round table conference should be called to further debate the Report was unanimously accepted in that conference.

The consequences were immediate. A fresh wave of press clampdown, arrests, forced closures of newspaper offices and other forms of repression ensued. Several of DVG’s friends were arrested.

DVG hit back with equal ferocity by openly organizing the Indian States Subjects’ Day in Kalasipalyam on 3 June 1929. More than a thousand people attended. He made a vociferous speech the gist of which is as follows:

1. The need for Responsible Government is more urgent now given the prevailing repressive atmosphere. 2. Not just Mysore, but Responsible Governments must be established in all Princely States paving way for their eventual integration into the Indian Union. Princes must give up their obstinacy of sticking to political power and voluntarily usher in Responsible Government out of goodwill. 3. The constitutional recommendations made by the Visvesvaraya Committee must be implemented forthwith.

As on earlier occasions, even this didn’t bear any fruit. The Mysore Government was simply unwilling to give in. However, the Government of India Act, 1935 was a turning point in the Indian freedom struggle. With this, there was a semblance of Responsible Government in the various states of British India. However, the Act maintained a studied silence on the Princely States by not mentioning them at all.

DVG began to study the Act with his usual thoroughness and after making solid preparations, made a speech in the Council on 26 January 1938. He categorically said on the floor that the Government of India Act of 1935 was highly unsatisfactory and unacceptable to one and all. Then he demanded that the Mysore Government should set up a committee to examine this Act minutely and come out with recommendations on the best method for merging into the Indian Union. It was a striking endorsement of his twenty-year-long refrain: Responsible Government in Mysore would make the path smoother for such a merger. A brief extract ⁷³ is given below:

*What Indian political life is suffering from today is not the paucity of truths…but the neglect of the practice of some elementary laws of the art of living together. Both democracy and nationalism are to me nothing else than certain highly evolved processes of this art of living together. It is from this point of view that I would look at the New Government of India Act…one supreme merit [is]…for the first time in Indo-British history, it marks an attempt to put both the political divisions together on one political platform and impart to India some measure of that statal unity and integrity of which she has so long stood in clamant need…We decline to make use of the present Act and defer the day of any kind of direct contact between the two parts of India now kept apart… In candid language, the chief objection of British India to taking the states as partners is that they are autocratically governed and that their influence in all-Indian councils will be anti-democratic…The pressure of nationalist aspiration is the only remedial agency…to base all our hopes for the reform of the States and their befitment for membership in all Indian polity. *

It was an inspired speech that received pan-India applause in the political circles and was widely quoted in the media. However, the outcome was pathetic: Government representatives and officials merely paid it lip sympathy.

But Diwan Mirza Ismail saw value in the speech and pressurised DVG to sit on a committee for political reforms. By this time, the earlier animosity between the two had healed. Yet, DVG declined the offer with his typical courageous dignity in a letter ⁷⁴ dated 3 March 1938:

What do you think of having on the committee a pauper pursued by bill collectors and bailiffs? Could he add to the strength…of the committee?… Let me plainly say that my position is not very different…I do sincerely wish to be left out of committees. No more the pose of a public man for me.

…I am not down-hearted or disappointed. Why should I be? … Hardship and I have long been friends, and I have courage in my heart. I am not afraid of hard work and privation. I’ll struggle…and pay my creditors like an honest man and then enjoy my freedom. This is now my prayer*. I have never looked for any prizes…and do not want any** – neither membership of the State Council nor the State’s deputyship in the Federal Legislature…I have never aspired to the honours of leadership…I am aware of my limitations. My role is that of a humble student and I am content with that. When I have redeemed my honour from the clutches of my creditors my wish is to give the rest of my life to the work of interpreting to my countrymen some of the things that I value in the great books I have read – in poetry and philosophy and politics; Shakespeare and the Ramayana and Plato are the voices that call me and to them I would go in my freedom. Public life has made me sick. My soul is crying for peace. So have mercy and let me go out of public life. *

This letter like countless others by DVG is a collector’s prize, an inexhaustible balm for the distressed soul and a salve for the troubled mind. It would be highly instructive and inspirational if an independent collection of DVG’s letters is compiled.

The letter was also a preface to DVG’s eventual and complete exit from political life just two years later. In hindsight, one can reasonably say that DVG had already made preparations for such an exit about two years prior to writing this letter to Mirza Ismail.

But there was just one final chapter in his thirty-five-year long crusade for Responsible Government.

Notes

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[[Contributor to the Patel-Mirza Pact and Member of the Reforms Committee Source: prekshaa]]

This final chapter was the formation of the constitutional Reforms Committee on 1 April 1938 by the Mysore Government. The Committee itself was the outcome of a series of agitations by the Mysore unit of the Congress Party to usher in Responsible Government. It was simultaneously another ruse of Diwan Mirza Ismail to curb the growing power of the Congress in Mysore. The wording of the Government order that established this Committee did not mention the words “Responsible Government” as the ultimate objective of the Reforms Committee. Expectedly, the Mysore Congress hit back claiming ⁷⁵ that the Committee was mere “political tinkering and as an attempt to stop recent political agitation without giving anything away.”

Mirza Ismail’s long relationship with the Indian National Congress was dichotomous. He was one of the staunchest admirers of Mohandas Gandhi. In April 1927, when Gandhi embarked on a tour of South India, Mirza made intricate arrangements for his stay in Nandi Hills for two months. During the course of their interactions, Mirza was suitably impressed by Gandhi’s advocacy of Khadi and later set up the Khadi industry in the Mysore State. It was the beginning of a long friendship. Mirza had earned the twin displeasure of the Mysore Maharaja and the British Government for entertaining Gandhiji as a state guest. Over time, Mirza also developed a similar level of friendship with other national Congress leaders like Sardar Patel, Acharya Kriplani, and Jawaharlal Nehru.

However, his relationship with the Mysore unit of the Congress was almost the exact opposite. From the start, Mirza felt that the Congress here was overreaching its boundaries through incessant agitations and making unreasonable demands on the Government. On its part, the national leadership of the Congress Party took whimsical stances with regard to its policy towards princely states. Its stated policy was one of non-interference. However, on various occasions, Gandhi would overrule this policy and issue shocking proclamations and condemnations ⁷⁶ about certain princely states. Even as Gandhi’s 1927 visit to Mysore had charged up the local Congress, his statement in 1933 dealt a big blow. The All India Congress Committee (AICC) in Calcutta that year passed a resolution expressing its unstinted support to Congress units in all princely states. However, with regard to Mysore, Gandhi condemned the resolution itself. With that, the Mysore Congress was thoroughly demoralized.

However, the Government of India Act of 1935 completely changed the equation. In one stroke, Congress Party activists and freedom fighters got a firsthand taste of wielding political power albeit with constraints. A bicameral system was introduced in the British-ruled provinces of Bombay, Madras, Bengal, Assam, Bihar and United Provinces. It was a tremendous success for the Congress Party. Quite naturally, the fire spread to the Mysore unit which began demanding Responsible Government with greater agitational fervor. By 1937, it was no longer the same Congress that the Diwan could crush at will.

Another significant development occurred.

The Praja Mitra Mandali (Association of Friends of the People) had formed a political party in the late 1920s modelled after the infamous Justice Party in Tamil Nadu. Some members of this party founded another party titled Praja Paksha (People’s Party) in 1930. In 1934, both parties merged to form the Samyukta Praja Paksha (United People’s Party). On 16 October 1937, this party merged with the Indian National Congress. As an immediate consequence, the agitation for Responsible Government in Mysore intensified.

Diwan Mirza Ismail was now truly alarmed and opened a long chain of correspondence with Gandhi, Nehru, Patel, and other leaders.

Meanwhile, DVG was observing these developments with a mixture of caution, happiness, and optimism. He wrote learned and fiery columns and editorials about these developments. As a testimony of sorts to DVG’s tireless advocacy of Responsible Government, one can read the following note ⁷⁷ by Balwant Rai Mehta, a Congress leader who toured the Mysore state in 1937:

The coming to power of the Congress Ministers, both in Bombay and Madras, to speak of only the two provinces that abut the [Mysore] State, has kindled similar aspirations in the hearts of the people of the State.

Mirza Ismail’s aforementioned correspondence reached a logical stage when Gandhi deputed Sardar Patel and Acharya Kriplani to Mysore. It seemingly appeared like a concession that Mirza was making to the Mysore Congress, a big climbdown. This then is the backdrop of why Mirza Ismail formed the Reforms Committee. The outcome of Patel’s negotiations with Mirza Ismail was the famous Patel-Mirza Pact published on 1 May 1938. A little-known fact is that DVG and Brahmachari Ramachandra were present in and contributed to these negotiations. No book on the history of the Indian freedom struggle mentions their names.

The main points of the Patel-Mirza Pact are as follows:

1. Responsible Government must be gradually introduced in the Mysore State under the careful and compassionate supervision of His Highness, the Maharaja of Mysore. The Mysore Congress, whose major aim is the establishment of Responsible Government must be treated with esteem by the Mysore Government. 2. Seven members of the Congress Party must be incorporated in the Reforms Committee. 3. The Committee must be given the authority to provide guidance and recommendations with regard to establishing Responsible Government. 4. There must be no curbs to hoist the national flag in public places along with the Gandabherunda flag (the official flag of the Mysore Kingdom/Wodeyars).

Accordingly, Congress members were admitted to the Reforms Committee along with an unwilling DVG who has himself written the reason for his unwillingness, as we have seen in the previous part.

Notes

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[[The Mockery of Responsible Government and DVG’s Exit from Public Life Source: prekshaa]]

orvane niluve nīnutkaṭakṣaṇagaḻali ।
dharmasaṃkaṭagaḻali, jīvasamaradali ।।
nirvāṇadīkṣeyali, niryāṇaghaṭṭadali ।
nirmitraniralu kali – maṃkutimma ।। 689 ।।
You will be standing alone in all the intense and turbulent moments of your life,
When faced with moral dilemma, fighting the battle of life,
During the moment of self-realization, and in death.
Learn to be friendless - Mankutimma

***

The Reforms Committee constituted by the Mysore Government was headed by Sri K.R. Srinivasa Iyengar. The Congress party nominees who were members to the Committee gradually stopped attending its proceedings after January 1939, less than a year after it was constituted. Among the major reasons for this development was a divergence of values and a lack of understanding the full import of Responsible Government in practice. Sri Chengalraya Reddy, a prominent Congressman said that he was in no hurry for full Responsible Government in Mysore. However, he would be satisfied if the Mysore Government would implement all the “constructive activities” that (Congress) Responsible Governments were undertaking in the six or seven states where they were in Government. Chengalaraya Reddy would become the Chief Minister of the Mysore State after India attained independence.

However, DVG had a more nuanced and an all-encompassing perspective towards this cause so dear to him. He likened Responsible Government to climbing a ladder and all the dangers that accompany it: “A slight misstep might bring us down to a rung far lower than where we had been when we began climbing.” As we have seen on numerous occasions in the preceding sections, DVG tirelessly emphasized on the necessity for a full, truthful, and thorough self-training for Government. Among other things, Responsible Government was one which could anticipate the aspirations of the people in advance and was in fact the very vehicle for realizing these aspirations. In this context, DVG, in his editorials, newspaper columns and speeches, cited and upheld the ideals of Diwan Rangacharlu who seeded the Mysore Representative Assembly. In his speech to the Reforms Committee, DVG observed with some causticity that, “although there has been tremendous political growth in the Mysore State, this ideal of Diwan Rangacharlu has not been realized till date.”

That was the beginning of a chain of petty politicking which ended in disappointment as far as DVG was concerned.

The reason was not far to seek. On one side the Mysore Government’s nominees feared that the kind of Responsible Government DVG was advocating would dilute and “bind the Maharaja’s hands from functioning with discretion.” On the other side, the Congress nominees were unwilling to undergo the kind of rigorous self-training that DVG had in mind. The same Congress Party which had repeatedly agitated for and publicly declared that “Responsible Government is our only goal” suddenly deserted DVG in the very Committee that was set up for achieving this goal. DVG was isolated and his position was akin to what he describes ⁷⁸ in his Mankutimmana Kagga as, “You stand alone in the most intense and the most trying moments in life.” However, DVG did not allow his disappointment to consume him. As always, he took the honourable route. Indeed, the conviction he expressed in the March 1938 letter to Mirza Ismail had proven to be unambiguously correct. At 9 PM, on 16 March 1939, he reiterated the same conviction in another letter:

As you know so well, I have cherished and advocated the ideal of Responsible Government for over twenty-two years now. I have spoken and written…in favour of it in public on every available occasion; and it will surely be doing violence to my own conscience if at this stage of my life I swallowed the conviction of a lifetime…On [this]… I can make no compromise…There are some things which everyone of us holds to be sacred and unassailable and beyond the province of bargaining. Responsible Government issue to me is such a thing. That being so, if the committee will not agree to recommend Responsible Government as a goal at least I can have no place in it.

The letter had the intended effect. The Committee decided that DVG’s arguments were not only persuasive but profound. Several more rounds of discussions took place and the Committee submitted its final report comprising twelve major recommendations authored by DVG. It was a tour de force that struck an extraordinary balance between the ideals, belief systems, traditions and customs prevailing in Mysore from the ancient times and the aspirations of the advocates of Responsible Government. It is also noteworthy that DVG made it a point to specifically include the prohibition of separate electorates for Muslims and Christians. Likewise, DVG also ensured that he upheld the primacy and dignity of the Mysore Maharaja by mentioning that the proposed reforms had to be carried out under his guidance, wisdom, and protection.

After the report was ready, DVG wrote a monograph anticipating the objections to the report. Its concluding paragraph is truly brilliant.

To see clearly into the future farther than a few paces in front of him is given to no man. In which exact year of grace Responsible Government will…be established in a perfect form in Mysore and what its distinct features will be questions that need to be asked, for the answer is obvious that fulfilment will be largely in accordance with the good sense and capacity of the seekers.

The last line is yet again consonant with his lifelong mantra of the qualifications required for people wishing to run a Government.

***

The Mysore Maharaja passed a royal order on 6 November 1939 in response to the Reforms Committee Report submitted on 31 August. It was a cruel blow and a complete mockery of the Report. DVG wasted no time to condemn it. In his words, while the Report sought for a gradual and systematic devolution of Government powers to the Representative Assembly, what the Government order gave was greater interference. He concludes, “What is now needed is a recasting of the relationship between Government and the people from a position of benefactor-seeker to that of Rights and Duties. This Government Hukum (Order) is so disappointing that it appears to mock the very notion of democracy.”

A barrage of newspaper articles, editorials and columns followed. Prominent editors like Tirumale Tatacharya Sharma and others relentlessly castigated the Mysore Government for its callous attitude. However, the Government was unmoved. On this side, DVG and other public figures of his stature embarked on a campaign of educating people in democracy, self-government and Responsible Government. Monographs, books, and essays encouraged young men and women from all walks of life to get a fundamental grounding in political education.

It can be argued that DVG suffered a deep, personal wound by the latest Government Hukum. He felt defrauded at what can be interpreted as political chicanery on the part of Diwan Mirza Ismail who outwardly endorsed Responsible Government but did the exact opposite in practice.

Despite such yawning differences, DVG’s faith, respect, and integrity towards the Mysore State and its royal family was abiding. A great testimony to this is his superb, near-poetic tribute on the death of Krishna Raja Wodeyar IV in August 1940. Writing in the August issue of Triveni journal, DVG described the Wodeyar as,

…his politics had for its basis a certain upward looking disposition of the soul. He was forever on a quest of Dharma…The late Maharaja was a lover of great solitudes and great silences…He was such a one among princes as might have been singled out by Plato for approbation. He belongs to the company of Ashoka and Aurelius, with the splendor of the crown made mellow by the wrinkles on the brow.

Indeed, circa 1940 was a pivotal year in DVG’s life. As he had noted in his letter, such an extraordinarily long stint in public life had made him a sick man who had realized at least one fundamental truth about this sort of life. This truth became a maxim of sorts for him and Cardinal Newman’s brilliant sermon ⁷⁹ had delivered it to him.

We are not born for ourselves, but for our kind, for our neighbour, for our country… we owe much to those who devote themselves to public life…in public life a man of elevated mind does not make his own self tell upon others simply and entirely. He must act with other men; he cannot select his objects or pursue them by means unadulterated by the methods…of men less elevated than his own. He can only do what he feels to be the second best.

In hindsight, Newman’s “second best” was imprinted in DVG’s mind. He echoes this sentiment in his Rajyashastra in his inimitable fashion:

The person who sets out to achieve his own objective no matter how noble it is, does not understand the nature of politics. He is unaware of the difficulties and dangers therein. These dangers lie in hiding. However, an accomplished politician who intends to accomplish good things knows these dangers and he keeps working to achieve the best that is available within his reach. If this best is second rate, he will be content to accomplish just that. As the political expert Morley said, ‘politics is a long series of the second best.’

Krishnaraja Wodeyar IV’s death and DVG’s disappointment with the Mysore Government’s mocking order was the dusk on DVG’s public life. He had made up his mind. In 1940, DVG’s term as the Member of the Mysore Legislative Council came to an end and he refused to contest again. The next year, he also vacated the Mysore University seat and wrote a public letter to his voters giving details of his honest service to them for six years. It was a heartfelt and moving expression of gratitude for the faith they had reposed in them.

That was the end of his public life, to which his epitaph reads as follows: “After that, I had no direct contact or association with the Government in any form. From then on, I am a mere witness—a faraway witness.”

Postscript

DVG’s much-cherished Responsible Government ultimately came in 1948 and when it did come, it was a deformed infant, a premature birth midwifed by Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru.

Notes

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[[Overall Assessment of DVG’s Career in Public Life and a New Beginning Source: prekshaa]]

DVG’s final exit from public life occurred in four broad stages, in a manner of speaking. The first was the aftermath of the Ganapati clashes, which publicly showed the dangerous chinks in the Mysore State’s administration. It also didn’t help that Diwan Mirza Ismail’s studied silence and inaction only added to the perception that the administrative machinery was powerless to punish a mere mob of Muslim hooligans.

The second was the growing decline in the standards of legislative debate due to a variety of reasons including but not limited to the appointment of favourites, incompetence, and factionalism. One of DVG’s final debates in the Council related to the Public Security Bill that the Mysore Government introduced on 23 January 1940. DVG vehemently opposed it on the grounds that it was detrimental to individual freedom and freedom of expression and that it would transform Mysore into a police state. A close reading of the full text of the debate ⁸⁰ clearly reveals the fact that very few Members apart from DVG had given it such deep and comprehensive thought. As the debate intensified, the Speaker began to repeatedly provoke DVG using a mixture of condescension, hostility, mockery, and haste. This is what an exasperated and wounded DVG said:

If the House thinks that I do not deserve its magnanimity, it is a matter of deep regret for me…At any rate, the matter of this [Bill] is something that is very dear to my heart. And now I have a feeling that this House has not provided me a fair opportunity and that this House has not treated me with dignity. This is the first time that this feeling has emerged within me…I had never witnessed such things before…Indeed, this House has become the witness for the worrying precedent of multiple Members speaking at the same time and yelling at each other…Perhaps, this will be my last ever session here. I am sorry that I had to attend this session and I regret that I will have to leave it with such a feeling.

The third was DVG’s growing alarm at the intensity, senselessness, frequency and violence of agitations. By the early -to-mid 1930s, it was clear that violence as a favoured method for achieving the desired outcome was fast becoming the order of the day. Most of these agitations were demands-of-the-moment which had no national vision or integrative intent or the welfare of the people in mind. DVG himself provides one of the most definitive critiques of the dangers of agitational politics. The backdrop is the 1926 Binny Mills Strike in Bangalore. In its immediate aftermath, the Government ordered a general clampdown in order to prevent its spread to other places. Public meetings were banned, and there was police patrolling everywhere. In this context, DVG recounts an incident. He was in his lawyer friend’s home when another lawyer visited him. This man was a ferocious opponent of the clampdown. When DVG suggested the method of persuasion and reasoning, the lawyer shot back, “It is not our method to beg before Government officials, even if he is a City Magistrate. We must forcibly snatch our rights at any cost! Only this method awakens the people in the real sense, and agitation is the best vehicle for this awakening.” Commenting on this ⁸¹ and similar fervor, DVG says:

Our Sastras say, “Dharmo Rakshati Rakshitah.” If we protect Dharma, Dharma protects us. However, if we cripple Dharma and still expect it to protect us, how will it have the strength to do so? If people preserve the decorum, system, and dignity of the Government, the Government might perhaps safeguard justice among the people. But if people themselves revolt against the Government, what Government can function?… The path of persuasion and consensus is the path of wisdom. It involves a careful analysis of cause and consequence. It is a quest for justice in the true sense, and therefore it always involves enormous patience. Wisdom does not accrue in haste and through the impatience of agitations.

As we have noted several times elsewhere, even this warning went unheeded with predictable consequences. By the 1980s, India became a nation of professional agitationists, and renting professional agitationists became a flourishing subterranean economy in which middlemen made fortunes.

Indeed, a common criticism levelled against DVG by some of his contemporaries in public life was that he was too much of an idealist and a pacifist. This is only partially true because DVG’s pacifism was the pacifism leading to the kind of wisdom required for solid nation-building. DVG’s pacifism was the pacifism of Vidyaranya Swami who inspired and helped build the splendid Vijayanagara Empire by appealing to the innate goodness even among dissenting or independent chieftains, commanders, Rajas, heads of different Hindu Dharmic sects, business leaders and so on. Indeed, Vidyaranya Swami busily engaged himself in this gentle persuasion and calm discussion for nearly twenty-five years. The noble precedent of bloodless transfer of power from the Hoysala Empire to the Sangama Brothers was the outcome of gentle persuasion and goodwill which he initiated. This was DVG’s method.

The fourth stage was his increasing disillusionment with the Indian National Congress, which had acquired a subtle dictatorial streak by the mid-1930s. On 28 November 1937, the Secretary of the Mysore Congress Board wrote a letter to DVG warning him of “consequences.” DVG’s crime? Exactly a month ago, DVG had signed an open letter published by some eminent persons, which the Congress took umbrage to. The sheer arrogance of the Secretary was breathtaking. A paraphrased version is given below.

The Congress Party finds your signature highly objectionable. It is in violation of your pledge that you will be loyal to the Congress at all times. Therefore, you must show cause as to your objectionable action. Additionally, according to the Board’s decision, you must resign from your Council membership immediately.

On 1 December 1937, DVG hit back in his characteristic style. He said that he had never taken any such pledge of loyalty to the Congress. He also questioned the Congress Secretary’s haughty assumption and schooled him in some home truths: DVG was in the forefront of the demand for Responsible Government in the Maharaja’s State decades before the Congress even had a presence here. The Congress would have his support to the limited extent that its goal of Responsible Government aligned with his in thought, word, and deed. And then DVG delivered ⁸² the knockout blow:

May I say it is the Congress Board that has since changed? It seems to me that the Board of today is not…the same as the Board…seven months ago**. I could not then detect in it any indications of the methodology now in vogue**. While I subscribe to the Congress…objective of Responsible Government, I cannot accept its recent methods of work.

For the first time, DVG had a firsthand experience of the chokehold a political party has over even its non-members. This realization was also accompanied by a whiff of the state of things to ensue. Thereafter, as we noted earlier, DVG became a mere witness from afar. When occasion demanded it, he also became one of the most trenchant and fiery critics of the Congress Party after India attained independence.

Notes

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[[Gokhale Institute of Public Affairs as DVG’s Karma Bhoomi Source: prekshaa]]

beku jīvanayogakoṃdu bahusūkṣmanaya ।
bekoṃdu jāgarūrakate, buddhi samate ॥
tākaneṃdanu yogi, nūkaneṃdanu jagadi ।
ekāki sahavāsi - maṃkutimma ॥ 703 ॥

Happiness in life needs a very fine balance.
It requires utmost caution and tranquility of mind.
Akin to a Yogi, its practitioner will not get attached to anything
Nor will he neither reject anything.
He stands alone while being friends with the entire world – Mankutimma

***

An almost visible line separates DVG’s pre-independence and post-independence public life. After actively cutting himself off from the rough and tumble of political life, DVG devoted himself with the same profound passion and spirited zeal to the more sublime pursuits of philosophy, spirituality, literature, and nationalistic ideals for the rest of his well-lived life.

His devotion to the aforementioned nationalistic ideals took the concrete shape of the Gokhale Institute of Public Affairs (GIPA), which was founded in his home at Nagasandra Road ⁸³ on 18 February 1945. Public response to this new institution was immediate and an overwhelming success. Congratulatory letters and messages and personal visits poured in from both within and outside Karnataka from such eminent people as Gopalaswamy Ayyangar, Sir Mirza M. Ismail, B.P. Wadia, V. Sitaramaiah, K.S. Krishna Iyer, S.G. Sastri, and Nittur Srinivasa Rao.

GIPA was the structural realization of DVG’s three-decade-long penance. Its impulse had germinated in his mind as early as 1915 and he began work on its draft charter 1930. It had the blessings of Sir Puttanna Chetty. However, for various reasons, DVG was unable to raise the funds to begin it. On 30 January 1932, DVG completed the aforementioned draft but expressed ⁸⁴ self-doubt:

Finished draft scheme of G.I.P.A. As I finish it I am stricken with fear and doubt…Will I be able to bring it into material existence? Can I trust myself to remain steady at it? I have been such a waverer all my life…a bee-like skipper from ideal to ideal.

History is testimony to the fact that he did bring it into existence thirteen years later. Here is how DVG summarizes ⁸⁵ its entire charter and work:

The Institute is to be looked upon as a laboratory for the analysis and assessment of opinion and policy rather than a factory to produce original contributions to thought and learning or as a platform for propaganda or agitation, or as a mission of philanthropy…It does not aim at supplanting any political party or movement…this Institute would rather leave those other forms of services to other agencies…so that it could give its undivided attention to the particular field of service which it has chosen for itself – namely to be a study-room for intelligent citizenship, an exchange house of thought…for men and women of public spirit and an unofficial secretariat for all good and worthy popular causes.

For an entire year, GIPA functioned from his home even as he put in tireless work at fund-raising and scouting for a building for this infant institution. The goodwill, affection and friendship that he had earned on the dint of his own merit, integrity and selflessness brought him widespread support. Sri Pamadi Subbrama Shetty, one of the fabulously wealthy businessmen in Bangalore was also a highly simple and devout man who gave liberally to all Dharmic causes. Accordingly, he offered one of his homes ⁸⁶ in Basavanagudi. GIPA officially moved to this location on 1 July 1946. Its first ever meeting was addressed by Hrudyanath Kunzru, the then president of the Servants of India Society.

In October, GIPA began its maiden study circle with the rather apt selection of Plato’s classic, Republic. It was guided by Sri S. Raghavacharya and continued for an entire month. Indeed, the study circle was among the defining themes of GIPA for the next three decades. Like fine honey, over time, it attracted hordes of people from all walks and stations of life: students, working professionals, teachers, lecturers, principals, journalists, scientists, doctors, and businessmen. In keeping with its spirit, there was no age or gender bar. The GIPA study circle was conducted every Sunday morning. About twenty people would come together and study and discuss a preselected English and Sanskrit work each. John Stuart Mill, Kalidasa, Shakespeare, works of Vedanta, and numerous classics of Sanskrit, English and Kannada were devoured with relish. Perhaps the most celebrated study circle was the series of lectures on the Bhagavad Gita led by DVG himself. They were eventually compiled, thoroughly revised, vastly expanded, and published as śrīmad bhāgavadgītātātparya or jīvanadharmayoga in Kannada. It remains an enduring classic till date, garnering several reprints and has a dedicated following among the Kannada people across the globe.

From such modest beginnings, GIPA continued to grow into the awe-inspiring cultural treasure that it since became. On 15 August 1948, Sri B.P. Wadia inaugurated its sparkling new library, freely accessible by public. The GIPA library is still one of the best in the country housing extremely valuable, rare, and priceless books, pamphlets, monographs, magazines, and boasts of an enviable archive of Sanskrit, Kannada, Telugu, Hindi and English works. The finest books on every conceivable subject are available: Vedas, literary classics, drama, art, sculpture, history, politics, philosophy, Dharmashastra, economics, law, geography, biographies, research journals, newspaper archives, periodicals, Constitutions of various countries, Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha and Karnataka Assembly proceedings…the sweep and gamut is truly stunning. The GIPA library is an invitation to lifelong learning in its truest sense. On another plane, it has that scarce and exquisite ambience that radiates and beckons us to acquire knowledge in its serene environs. As a crowning glory, DVG donated his personal book collection to the GIPA library.

The impulse and vision behind creating such a brilliant library was again rooted in DVG’s foresight that any member of the public who wished to examine, study, speak, or write about public and national issues would have a one-stop resource at GIPA.

The next milestone arrived on 25 April 1950 when the Karnataka Government donated land to GIPA. The finished building was inaugurated on 28 June 1956. Donations for its construction flowed in quite liberally from both individuals and institutions. The current building of GIPA stands on this site.

The other core area of GIPA’s activity was hosting regular lectures by luminaries from different spheres. Thus, in a short time, GIPA was transformed into a vibrant cultural hub that witnessed erudite, scholarly and refined lectures on literature, Vedanta, Bhagavad Gita, jurisprudence, science, economics, music, art, and important contemporary issues. To mention the forgivable fault of a personal account, I still find enormous delight tinged with a bit of nostalgic melancholy when I listen to superb, moving, and inspiring anecdotes surrounding these lectures in the voice of Dr. S.R. Ramaswamy, the last direct disciple of DVG. It is today hard to believe that GIPA in those days would be thronged by hundreds of people who devotedly came to listen to these lectures.

The ranks of admirers, donors, volunteers and contributors to GIPA grew in proportion to the prestige and quality of these programmes. As a memorial to Rajaji’s birth anniversary, Smt. M.S. Subbulakshmi has left an endowment to GIPA. Indeed, there are numerous occasions when she would visit DVG’s home and sing for him, leaving his eyes moist with tears. GIPA is also witness to her concerts. Similar endowments were given by the Kannada poet, G.P. Rajarathnam, Rao Bahadur Venkateshacharya, Justice Nittoor Srinivasa Rao, and the Dharmasthala Manjunatha Temple. These apart, service-minded and culturally-rooted individuals also sponsor these lectures. Initially, these were held every Saturday evening and DVG never missed a single lecture as long as he was alive. Happily, this tradition continues the blazing path seeded by its founder and over the years, they are conducted every evening. The calendar of lectures is published about six months in advance.

The other major focus of GIPA is publishing its monthly journal, the self-explanatory Public Affairs. It is dedicated to examining various contemporary issues relating to politics, economics, and current affairs. Public Affairs began in January 1949 and boasted of an impressive list of stalwarts who wrote for it including its editor DVG, Arnold Toynbee, Bernard Levin, C.D. Deshmukh, Prof G.S. Dikshit, Gorur Ramaswamy Iyengar, Gulzarilal Nanda, Herbert Spencer, Kuldip Nayar, N. Lakshmana Rao, Lord Hailsham, N. Madhava Rao, Minoo Masani, Masti Venkatesha Iyengar, Mirza Ismail, Nani Palkhivala, Philip Spratt, C. Rajagopalachari, Prof B.R. Shenoy, Prof. Suryanath Kamat, Uma Shankar Joshi, and Sir M. Visvesvaraya.

True to its motto of “Public life must be spiritualized,” and its declared stance of “no party affiliation,” month after month, Public Affairs mercilessly skewered the misdoings of the political and bureaucratic class, educated its readers on the meaning of democracy, service, and nationalistic spirit, and sounded frequent alarms over lapses, cautioned about the decline of decency in public life, and brought out valuable insights and essays on history, literature and published book reviews. The volumes of Public Life from its inception up to 1982 are truly a collector’s delight.

The Gokhale Institute of Public Affairs as DVG described it indeed lived up to its vision and practice of being an unofficial secretariat for all good and worthy causes. The testimony to its sturdy roots lies in the fact that it continues to thrive as a cultural and public-spirited institution that has few rivals in Bangalore.

Which brings us to a related facet of DVG’s post-independence work and legacy. By making GIPA both his Karma Bhoomi and Jnana Bhoomi, DVG achieved what he wouldn’t have achieved had he remained in active politics: of being a systematic, truthful, and caustic conscience-keeper of independent India’s political and social conscience. That conscience-keeping essentially meant an honest dissection of the Congress Party, whose only claim to political power was based on the half-truth that it had alone brought freedom from British rule.

Notes

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[[DVG as a Chronicler of the Downfall of Values in Independent India Source: prekshaa]]

At this long distance in history, it sounds incredible, insane even, when we hear somebody utter “conscience” and “Congress Party” in the same breath. However, thanks to the overarching and overreaching influence of Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, around the time of Independence, the public regarded the Congress Party not merely as a patriotic and nationalist organization but a moral outfit as well. Needless, there is an inseparable relationship between the words, “conscience” and “moral.”

This is a reasonable starting point to examine DVG’s critical assessment of the Congress after Independence. The history of the Congress Party, especially after Gandhi helmed it, is filled with rich and detailed information as to its own claims of being the conscientious fighter for India’s freedom, and DVG’s substantial critiques can be summed up as a thirty-year-long, spirited effort at showing it the mirror. As we shall see, each time he showed it the mirror, the image that was revealed became progressively blacker and cracked.

However, DVG’s criticism of the Congress was not the superficial and transitory writing of a professional political columnist or journalist. It had far deeper and incredibly profound roots. In no particular order, these roots fall in three broad categories:

1. DVG’s keen understanding that democracy was just the latest experiment in humans governing themselves, a facet we have seen in an earlier chapter. 2. His clear grasp of the limitations of democracy and the pitfalls of applying it to a spiritual civilization like Bharatavarsha. 3. As a participant, votary, and eyewitness of the trajectory of the Congress Party from its earliest days.

Thus, when DVG stood rock-solid behind the Congress in the advocacy of Responsible Government, his support was informed, well-studied and came with caveats and warnings. Equally, when he criticized the cult of Gandhi and the growing trend of violent street-level agitations, it was in the spirit of a surgeon who knows the fatal perils of an untreated festering wound.

***

DVG’s brilliant and sustained critique of the Congress Party after India attained political independence merits an independent scholarly study. The Public Affairs monthly that he edited under the auspices of GIPA is simultaneously a work of objective history of the all-encompassing downfall of Bharatavarsha, which the Congress transformed as an ill-defined “India.” The magazine spared no topic: politics, health, literature, Hindu institutions, the English language, education, public morals, revolutionary ideas, industrialization, parliamentary affairs, law, police, corruption, local issues, global developments, Hindu epics and Puranas, space exploration, panchayat, temples, art… Barring some stray essays, these issues make for truly painful reading. DVG’s junior counterpart who was an equally trenchant critic of the Congress Party was the renowned Kannada literary eminence, Masti Venkatesha Iyengar. Like DVG, Masti skewered the Party and its ministers in his monthly Jivana with honest mercilessness.

In hindsight, it can be reasonably said that Dr. S.L. Bhyrappa’s epic novel, Thantu is a highly artistic narration of the story of this downfall of Bharatavarsha that we read in the issues of Public Affairs and elsewhere.

A shrewdly-buried truth of recent history is the fact that the Congress Party was widely hated in the immediate aftermath of India’s independence. An out-of-print work, Betrayal in India by a Left-leaning editor and journalist, D.F. Karaka, published in 1950 offers a brutal account of the aforementioned truth. The picture we get of the India just eight months after Independence is not only unflattering but repulsive. Congressmen who were proud and celebrated freedom fighters become dealers in illegal imported cars; they are shown to be tampering with the value of national currency. These frugal freedom fighters now acquire bungalows and scores of cars in multiple cities. The more farsighted Congressmen become “traders of patriotism.” State Congress Governments use the dreaded “Security Measures Act” to physically wipe out their political opponents and critics. It is a testimony to the truth of what Karaka has written in his explosive but depressing book that he had to get it published in London.

This is the darker backdrop in which to understand and marvel at DVG’s patience and tempered criticism of the Congress Party. Given the sheer volume of this criticism, one can consider only a few representative samples. As we have seen earlier in DVG’s stinging response to the arrogant secretary of the Mysore Congress Board who demanded slavish obedience, DVG realized that by the mid-1930s, the Congress had ushered in a culture of party-cracy under the cloak of democracy. He delineated its stark nature in a masterly lecture at the Indian Institute of World Culture ⁸⁷ in 1955:

The party junto lays down the law and the ordinary member has to put his judgement in suspense. This abdication of responsibility for independent thought and conscientious decision by the average party member of a legislature marks the Achillean Heel of democracy. Without party, democracy stands crippled; with party, it walks awry. Political thinkers have been racking their brains for a way of reconciling loyalty to party with loyalty to country and conscience.”

DVG’s incessant warnings against adopting democracy in haste, without first acquiring the requisite moral, ethical, and educational training had come true in a nightmarish fashion. We can consider two relevant quotes to illustrate this more fully.

The first ⁸⁸ is by George Orwell.

*The words democracy, socialism, freedom, patriotic, realistic, justice have each of them several different meanings which cannot be reconciled with one another. In the case of a word like democracy, not only is there no agreed definition, but the attempt to make one is resisted from all sides. It is almost universally felt that when we call a country democratic we are praising it: consequently, the defenders of every kind of regime claim that it is a democracy, and fear that they might have to stop using that word if it were tied down to any one meaning. Words of this kind are often used in a consciously dishonest way. That is, the person who uses them has his own private definition, but allows his hearer to think he means something quite different. *

Orwell could have well been describing the Indian National Congress Party. However, Orwell’s intellect, no doubt brilliant, merely stops at this and we should not fault him for it because even brilliant people are hemmed in by the limitations of their cultural ambience. This is what DVG ⁸⁹ does:

*The dominant concept of polity in Hindu India is that the State is a single undivided entity, the king being…the head of the family. It could…be described as a “Crowned Republic.” This was a combination of Monarchy with Democracy. Dasaratha and Dharmaraja had the ready and instinctive support of the entire body of people. The king was merely the head of the…[Janapada]. The State had not been divided even as the Government and the Public…The dominant feature of the present Brummagem Constitution, adopted from the British, is the bifurcation of the State into (1) The Government…(2) the Opposition. **This is a direct contradiction of the Indian ideal…**Now the authority of the State is vested in one whose business is necessarily manipulation for office. Unless the man at the head…is pulled out of office, there is no chance for the head of the Opposition. Their rivalry is a natural phenomenon…this feature of the Constitution…is the métier of all evil of corruption and nepotism and inefficiency in the administration. *

The second quote is by the British-Canadian novelist Arthur Hailey whose criticism ⁹⁰ of democracy, especially the American variety, is sharper.

Americans see democracy as a remedy for all ills-to be taken three times daily like prescription medicine. It works for them. Ergo - it should work for the world. What America naïvely forgets is that for democracy to function, most of a populace must have something personally that is worth preserving.

This is precisely why we see DVG repeatedly stressing on and obsessing over the minute details of the lives of real people in the sense of citizens hailing from all walks of life. This deep and abiding concern beautifully comes to life in his Jnapakachitrashale volumes where he writes about masons, bullock cart drivers, small business owners, Sadhus, Avadhootas, hoteliers, teachers, and an aged beggar-couple. The same spirit, the same feeling reveals itself in his daily interactions with flower-sellers, his household help, and scores of other proverbial ordinary men and women. And in the realm of the political State, DVG gives an eightfold list ⁹¹ of “minimal requisites of welfare” of the people in any country. The last item in this list is also the most important: “leisure for the cultivation of the mind and the spirit.”

As witnesses to the contemporary world dominated by uninterrupted distraction, an outcome of planned technological obsolescence, we can easily verify that leisure has been the most profound casualty. A prime disaster in the dystopian future that Aldous Huxley predicted in his Brave New World Revisited has already come true: entertainment—a major component of leisure—has been defined by forces beyond our control and we are willingly, gladly paying money to be entertained. The trifling matter of the spirit has now been successfully branded as a superstition.

Notes

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[[DVG’s Election from Kolar and its Aftermath Source: prekshaa]]

Like all honest and pragmatic observers and commentators of public life, DVG’s pre-Independence critiques of the Congress Party included the criticism of Mohandas Gandhi as we have seen in the earlier chapters ⁹². Under Gandhi’s leadership, it became a quasi-monopolistic political enterprise that could admit only one dictator at the top notwithstanding how noble or moral or well-intentioned the dictator was. Indeed, we learn this truth straight from the horse’s mouth. This is what the official history ⁹³ of the Congress Party says about Gandhi’s complete takeover in the Ahmedabad Session, 1921:

Gandhiji was appointed as the sole executive authority of the Congress and invested with full powers of the AICC. Chairs and benches for delegates were eliminated and Khadi tents made their appearance for first time.

Commenting precisely on this alarming development, DVG wrote ⁹⁴ in his Vruttapatrike how “After Gandhiji took the stage, this culture of free and open disagreement and debates vanished…unless the nation adopted [an] unquestioning mentality, we would not get freedom from the British… from then onwards, people were prohibited from taking his name without the mandatory honorific of “Mahatma.”

DVG was equally strident in condemning Gandhi’s spearheading role that culminated in the barbaric genocide of thousands of innocent Hindus in Malabar at the hands of the Moplah Muslims. He noted with growing alarm in the issues of the Karnataka at the deadly consequences that would ensue even as Gandhi mollycoddled the fanatical Ali Brothers with unseemly haste in his quest for the chimeraesque Hindu-Muslim unity. These editorials and commentaries are truly a collector’s treasure for a conscientious historian and scholar.

More than three decades later, one of India’s fine historical scholars, R.C. Majumdar provided a similar but more acerbic assessment ⁹⁵ about the Gandhi-led Congress Party in his career-ending classic, History of the Freedom Movement in India:

To [Gandhi] the Congress was a humanitarian association…for the moral and spiritual regeneration of the world.

Unlike Gandhi who lived in a world of his own making, his closest aides had no illusions about realpolitik. Even as they sensed that independence was well within sight, they quietly abandoned the very ideals of non-violence and Satyagraha that Gandhi held so dear. So much so that by the beginning of 1946, Gandhi was completely isolated by his own followers who shrewdly put him on a pedestal, i.e. out of harm’s way.

Thus, when we read what DVG wrote in a classic commentary titled India’s Political Dilemma in 1941, we marvel once again how farsighted ⁹⁶ he was:

*An influential section of the Nationalist Press and many public men of note have…been pleading that the Congress ought not to convert itself into an esoteric body upholding a set of ethical or spiritual abstractions. Politics is a secular department of life and purposes and processes there should be pragmatic rather than transcendental. Politics being a practical art is not fit to serve as a laboratory for conceptual ethics; and to insist on absolute standards there…would be like going into a popular restaurant and looking for the disciplines of a hospital…The issue of non-violence or violence is irrelevant today…There are a great number of people in the country today, who, while not differing…from the Congress as regards the political objective are unable to accept the non-practical parts of its creed…such as Satyagraha and Charaka spinning. *

R.C. Majumdar wrote almost the exact same assessment in the early or mid-1950s. It is simultaneously a profound travesty and an unambiguous proof of the ugly trajectory that the Congress Party took after independence that both DVG and R.C. Majumdar have all but been forgotten today.

Indeed, DVG had a firsthand taste of what the Congress Party could do to someone of his stature just a year after Independence. In 1948, the Mysore Government decided to elect members to the new Constituent Assembly. Accordingly, Kengal Hanumantaiah approached DVG and insisted on enlisting his services. After much persuasion, DVG agreed and was elected unopposed from the Kolar constituency on the Congress ticket. Now he was the proverbial “insider” or “party person.” That was the beginning of his troubles which first came in the form of something called the “Congress Pledge.” It was a revised version of the same pledge that he had rebutted in a letter to the aforementioned arrogant member of the Mysore Congress Board just ten years ago. Next was a far deadlier demand: to raise funds for the Congress kitty. A furious DVG responded, “Forget me giving money to the party, if you can spare some for me, please donate it to the Gokhale Institute of Public Affairs.” And so, it spiraled downward till the inevitable finally occurred. It didn’t take long for DVG to fully understand the fact that idealism existed merely as lip service and jockeying for power and position had become the order of the day. His words once again, had no value in the Constituent Assembly. ⁹⁷ In his characteristic self-deprecatory humility, DVG said that in a democratic set up, Dharma signifies the voice of the majority and that he respected this Dharma. However, he could also not act against the voice of his conscience and support anything that violated it. By mid-1948, DVG resigned from the Mysore Constituent Assembly. This is the unflattering portrait ⁹⁸ of the Congress Party he paints:

Congress politics is far too turbid. The like(s) of me are wanted there to provide screens to others to make safe places for them. I don’t see a single man of idealism among them. They cry ‘God’ and seek Mammon…The bosses want office and power and therefore they don’t want to offend certain groups…however just be the cause…for…opposing those…groups. And they don’t care what the qualities needed for a particular office are*…. People in positions of responsibility have felt disgusted and thought of drastic steps**. *

Needless, this is a preface to the sordid, seventy-year-long tale of how the Congress Party systematically, cynically pushed out decency in public life by expelling decent, honest and men of integrity and character.

Elsewhere in India, similar voices of dissent, alarm, and criticism emerged. The following is one such voice emerging directly from the bowels of the Congress Party. It is a letter ⁹⁹ written by Konda Venkatappaiah, a veteran Andhra Pradesh Congress Unit member to Mohandas Gandhi a few days before his assassination:

Swaraj was the only absorbing passion which goaded men and women to follow your leadership. But now that the goal has been reached all moral restrictions have lost their power on most of the fighters in the great struggle. . . .the situation is growing more intolerable every day. The people have begun to say that the British government was much better.

To its eternal discredit, the Congress Party never referred to the letter and pretended it didn’t exist. More criticism followed from within the Party from no less than a paper than the Harijan, now edited by Gandhi’s disciple, K.G. Mashruwala. In the 3 October 1948 edition, he deplored how the Congress Party members were using ¹⁰⁰ “political service as a short cut to scholarship.”

Needless, as the political and social conscience-keeper, DVG supplemented these criticisms with unfailing regularity in the annals of Public Affairs beginning with a long form essay series titled Congress and Parties from the April 1949 issue onwards. He followed this up with a similar but more caustic series titled The Congress Ailing from the July 1949 issue onwards.

Notes

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[[DVG’s Unsleeping Inner Eye saw through the Facade of Western Secularism Source: prekshaa]]

horāḍu bīḻvannamobbaṃṭiyādoḍaṃ ।
dhīrapathavane bedaku sakalasamayadoḻaṃ ॥
dūradali goṇagutta bāḻva bāḻgenu bele? ।
hori sattvava merasu - maṃkutimma ॥ 573 ॥
It is okay if you fall and you fall alone.
You still must continue fighting. Always seek the courageous path. Of what value is a life lived on the side lines, complaining, but not getting involved.
Endure hardships and show your true virtue - Mankutimma

***

No criticism of the Congress Party after Independence is complete without a critique of what eventually became one of its central creeds: secularism, which over the years, it successfully transformed into a sort of an unofficial political religion of India itself. It is both unfortunate and tragic that our education system never imparted the full story of the genesis, evolution and corruption of the term secularism both in theory and practice. The origins of this story lie in the Constituent Assembly Debates and its outcome—now widely known—was dropping the word “secularism” from the Preamble of the Indian Constitution.

Naturally, Jawaharlal Nehru was one of the most vocal proponents of secularism. Fortunately for India, his contemporaries who opposed it both inside the Constituent Assembly and elsewhere were deeply rooted in the unbroken Sanatana tradition and its outlook towards all facets of life, irrespective of their educational and professional qualifications. However, it is also equally true that they were no match for his shrewd politics of quasi-dictatorship and skulduggery once he wrested absolute control of both the Congress Party and Government. It is unnecessary to recount that sorry tale here.

The Constituent Assembly debates ¹⁰¹ that took place on the fortuitous 6 December 1948 are especially relevant. The services rendered to nip the mischief of secularism in the budding Constitution in this debate by Lokanath Misra, Rohini Kumar Chaudhari, H.V. Kamath, and K.M. Munshi, among others are truly admirable. All of them were rather unanimous on one point: that the flavour of secularism proposed by the likes of Nehru were completely irrelevant, alien and innately opposed to the millennia-old Sanatana civilizational and cultural spirit.

Two instances can be cited here.

Sri Rohini Kumar Chaudhari doubts ¹⁰² the very fundamentals by asking this pointed question:

We are framing a Constitution where we speak of religion but there is no mention of God anywhere in the whole chapter… what I would object to is that there is no provision in this Constitution to prevent the…propagandist of his religion from throwing mud at some other religion… There should be a provision…in the Constitution itself that such conduct will be met with exemplary punishment.

The next is Sri Lokanath Mishra spirited argument ¹⁰³ at once blunt and unambiguous as to the consequences of formally adopting secularism. It deserves to be quoted at length:

Sir, it has been repeated to our ears that ours is a secular State. I accepted this secularism in the sense that our State shall remain unconcerned with religion, and I thought that the secular State of partitioned India was the maximum of generosity of a Hindu dominated territory for its non-Hindu population… Gradually it seems to me that our `secular State’ is a slippery phrase, a device to by-pass the ancient culture of the land. The absurdity of this position is now manifest in articles 19 to 22 of the Draft Constitution. Do we really believe that religion can be divorced from life, or is it our belief that in the midst of many religions we cannot decide which one to accept? If religion is beyond the ken of our State, let us clearly say so and delete all reference to rights relating to religion. If we find it necessary, let us be brave enough and say what it should be.

Keenly sensing the direction in which Sri Lokanath Misra’s argument was headed, Jawaharlal Nehru immediately stood up to object it on the shockingly trivial and silly ground that Misra was “reading from manuscripts.” The objection was overruled. Sri Misra continued,

…this unjust generosity of tabooing religion and yet making propagation of religion a fundamental right is somewhat uncanny and dangerous. Justice demands that the ancient faith and culture of the land should be given a fair deal, if not restored to its legitimate place after a thousand years of suppression. We have no quarrel with Christ or Mohammad or what they saw and said….To my mind, Vedic culture excludes nothing. Every philosophy and culture has its place….but now, it denominates, it divides and encamps people to warring ways. In the present context what can this word `propagation’ in article 19 mean? It can only mean paving the way for the complete annihilation of Hindu culture, the Hindu way of life and manners. Islam has declared its hostility to Hindu thought. Christianity has worked out the policy of peaceful penetration by the back-door on the outskirts of our social life…. Hinduism did not accept barricades for its protection. Hinduism is just an integrated vision and a philosophy of life and cosmos, expressed in organised society to live that philosophy in peace and amity. But Hindu generosity has been misused and politics has over run Hindu culture. Today religion in India serves no higher purpose than collecting ignorance, poverty and ambition… The aim is political, for in the modern world all is power-politics and the inner man is lost in the dust… Let us not raise the question of communal minorities anymore. It is a device to swallow the majority in the long run. This is intolerable and unjust.

Sure enough, the word “secularism” and variants thereof was dropped from the Constitution. However, the right to propagate religion was made a Fundamental Right despite meeting severe objections. The other stalwart who warned and criticised this new Constitution was the legendary Pandurang Vaman Kane. His extensive critique is available as an appendix (or epilogue) in the last volume of his monumental History of the Dharmasastra. In the present context, we can quote ¹⁰⁴ a simple question he posed:

One fails to understand the meaning of the words, ‘fundamental rights’ in a constitution which took over two years of deliberations, if they could be changed within a year and a half.

Similarly, Dr. S. Srikanta Sastri was another luminary who offered a brilliant critique of secularism and similar current political trends in India modelled after the West most notably in his foreword to Independent India and a New World Order.

However, perhaps the most focussed and comprehensive critique of secularism flowed from DVG’s pen in a largely forgotten essay titled The Secular State. It first appeared as a two-part essay series in the May and June issues of the Public Affairs journal.

The Secular State is a virtuoso performance and one of the most erudite and insightful expositions on the topic. Its historical sweep is extensive, its depth of knowledge unparalleled, its courage, characteristic of DVG’s integrity, its diagnosis, unerring and the solutions it proposes still hold true. It covers an extensive swathe of intellectual and historical territory starting from the Vedas, the Dharmashastras and Arthashastras, the history of Hindu polity, Buddha, Ashoka, Jain canons, Adi Sankara, Constantine, Dante, Pope Sylvester I, Gladstone all the way up to expressing alarm at the growing Muslim fanaticism in Palestine and the newly-formed Pakistan.

In many ways, it is DVG’s unique style of both answering and rebutting some of the points raised in the Constituent Assembly Debates. However, from another perspective, it also marks another stage in DVG’s intellectual evolution on the topic. And makes comparison inevitable.

On 14 June 1945, Lord Wavell, the Viceroy of India announced a tentative scheme that would eventually set in motion the full grant of freedom to India. On this occasion, DVG authored an extraordinary analysis ¹⁰⁵ of the announcement in the June issue of The Triveni Quarterly. His essay begins with Wavell’s speech on the aforementioned day and covers enormous ground. A chief element of his analysis concerns the perennial problem of Hindu-Muslim unity. In his characteristic style of gentle persuasion through reasoned appeal, DVG outlines some of the good outcomes of a truly secular nation and society as was in practice in Britain and says that this is precisely ¹⁰⁶ the “gift that India needs at her hands,” and remarks that “In lending countenance to religious and communal clamours in Indian politics and offering inducements to the demand for new theocratic States, England is not only proving herself untrue to the teaching of her own history, but also exposing herself to the charge of perpetuating disunity in India.”

DVG’s statement was both a criticism of the divide-and-rule policy of Britain and as a stinging condemnation of the Muslim League led by Muhammad Ali Jinnah. This had another facet as well. Wavell’s proactive announcement garnered immediate, nationwide support and goodwill including non-Muslim League Muslim organisations who “rallied around the Congress.” This included almost the entire Muslim Ulema (clergy) who “stood by the cause of undivided All-Indian Nationalism and made Mr. Jinnah’s totalitarian pretensions utterly untenable.” In general, the overall national atmosphere of the time and DVG’s innate Sanatana spirit of accommodation perhaps naively led him to believe that Jinnah was merely a fringe element who had overestimated his own influence in the Muslim community. Thus, DVG outlined ¹⁰⁷ the conception of a secular State as follows:

The heart-content of the ideal of Hindu-Muslim Unity is more accurately and more pointedly stated as the idea of a secular nationality functioning through a secular State and secular citizenship. The phrase “Hindu-Muslim Unity” implies the retention of the consciousness of one’s being a Hindu or a Muslim…we should train ourselves to transcend even this feeling of Hindu -ness or Muslim-ness in the field of civil and political life.

Contrast this with what DVG wrote ¹⁰⁸ on the same subject in the aforementioned The Secular State just five years later.

When a government or a Parliament attempts to meddle with anything pertaining to religion, it lays an impious and…mischievous hand on what it does not understand. The legislator setting himself up as an arbiter of religion not his own, exalts the gross above the subtle and prejudice above understanding…He who would be a proper judge of things in the [religious] realm should be a man of deep psychological self-experience and insight into spiritual truth. Is our average legislator such a man?…His meddling with [religion] cannot be necessary for the normal purposes of the state.

DVG’s essay not only covers the themes and critiques raised by say, Sri P.V. Kane but takes them much further and places them in the context of the hard and harsh realities of the suddenly-changed political environment that he was both a witness to and participant of. He is brilliantly prescient when he contrasts ¹⁰⁹ science with politics on the topic of secularism:

The self-confidence of science was such once as to shake our confidence in the postulates of religion…In our day, science has grown wiser and humbler; it has a clearer recognition of its limitations and is more frank about it.

And repeatedly observes how the contemporary legislator who made similar self-confident claims about secularism is neither wise nor humble, and worse, is ignorant. Then, in what can only be considered yet another call ¹¹⁰ for homecoming, for recovery, and for civilizational decolonisation, this is what DVG writes:

The idea of a secular state is by no means a new one to India. On the contrary, it is as old as the Hindu society itself…Even the advent of religions from foreign lands, Islam and Christianity, could not make for any great disturbance of the old order, because the Hindu king had by then become habituated to the attitude of friendly tolerance towards religious dissenters. To his Hindu subjects, he was the protector of their *Smarta Dharma…*Such instances of the cosmopolitanism of Hindu rulers are numerous and can be cited from our own day. The secular State is in effect the same as the cosmopolitan State nurtured by the Hindu kings of old.

The parallels to DVG’s expositions (described in earlier chapters) on the philosophical insights of Kautilya, Plato, and Vidyaranya translated in the political realm are unmistakable. This evokes another basic question: why were some of DVG’s contemporaries like Nehru who waxed so substantially on secularism unable to find this treasure in their own backyard, a treasure that DVG was able to find even with his eyes closed? I will hazard a guess: because these contemporaries lacked the proverbial Inner Eye that in DVG was unsleeping.

Notes

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[[Two Seminal Essays of DVG on the Downfall of the Congress Source: prekshaa]]

This unsleeping Inner Eye was also alert to well-intentioned inanities that the fledgling democracy in India was cooking up in rapid succession. One such inanity is our national motto, Satyameva Jayate translated commonly as “Truth alone prevails.” In a brilliantly piercing essay ¹¹¹ titled India’s Motto, DVG dedicates three pages dissecting this motto down to its last atom. He copiously quotes from the Mundaka Upanishad (where this line occurs), marshals substantial evidence from Sanskrit grammar, traditional Sanskrit commentaries and arrives at significant conclusions regarding the very prudence of selecting this line as our national motto. The essay has to be read in its entirety to savour the rich insights it offers. Using the word “Jayate” transitively will mean “exalting Truth…because it possesses the power to vanquish its opposite…In other words, success or gain is made the criterion of virtue. Is that the best way of honouring Truth? So taken, Satyam-eva-Jayate would merely be another version of the mercantile motto, “Honesty is the best policy.””

Neither does DVG stop at this. He says, “Our concern for Truth should not be utilitarian, but absolute…We adore *Satya…*not for the sake of the Jaya it may (may not!)… bring, but for its own sake.” And exposes the sheer imprudence of applying this Upanishadic verse in a realm it does not belong: politics and Government. He questions,

“Is that a way that will suit a Government?… As part of its service to Satya, how will the [Government’s] motto “Satyam-eva-jayate” sound in the context of a dishonest public official who has avoided detection and hoarded his ill-gotten money…?… Must a Government have a motto? Must it…exhibit one?… When the Government of India have such questions to decide…they should seek advice not from a close coterie unknown to the public, but from…heads of certain Mutts and a few recognized scholars like Prof P.V. Kane and Prof. M. Hiriyanna.”

A similar but far worse inanity is boldly inscribed on the entrance of the Vidhana Soudha ¹¹² : “Government’s work is God’s work,” which elicited a stern condemnation ¹¹³ from a famous litterateur: “Government’s work is a heinous slavery.”

****

Given the sheer volume of DVG’s splendid critiques of the Congress Party and Governments spread over thirty years, even a condensed rendering will amount to a separate book of a modest proportion. Arguably, these critiques have their roots in two seminal essays he wrote in 1949 in the Public Affairs journal as a series. Both have been mentioned earlier: Congress and Parties and The Congress Ailing. The rest of his Congress-critiques can reasonably be regarded as expansions of and additions to these pioneering essays. Put together, both these essays easily run up to about forty pages.

Indeed, the opening sentence ¹¹⁴ of Congress and Parties is bluntly direct: “The Congress is ailing, both in and out and that is a matter for concern even to those who do not belong to its organization, because the Congress is in charge of the country’s Government all over.”

Seven decades after it was written, Congress and Parties remains an invaluable classic in its genre, ever-relevant. It is also a great study in how to write political analyses that are original, objective, comprehensive, truthful, and ethical. The central themes of Congress and Parties hinge on the following:

· How the Congress descended to political promiscuity immediately after India attained political independence.

· How it systematically stifled internal democracy under the excuse of party discipline and how the nation had to pay a huge price for it.

· The emergence of the High Command culture, which under the garb of maintaining intra-party harmony stifled internal debate, dissent and free expression.

· The absolute urgency of birthing rival political formations to the Congress in order to safeguard Indian democracy.

DVG correctly endorses Mohandas Gandhi’s recommendation that the Congress should shut down its political activity after Independence and dedicate itself to the task of nation-building. With great foresight, DVG notes ¹¹⁵ that if Gandhi’s advice had been accepted, “political parties would have…formed afresh, independently of the Congress, and that would have been an advantage to the country.”

As we have noted numerous times in this book, DVG’s analyses considered that vital component missing in typical and superficial political writings: human nature. This keen understanding is precisely what gives us ¹¹⁶ such gems:

Power is as much a disintegrator as it is an integrator. So long as power remained a far-off object to be fought for…the rank and file in the Congress…[were united]. It is just as natural that after the prize has been captured, there should be a scramble among them for shares. Search unites. Gain divides. This is the law of human nature.

Thus, from being a patriotic and nationalist organization whose objective was getting rid of British rule, the Congress crashed down to becoming a purely political outfit immediately after freedom thereby immediately debasing its stature. DVG notes that its tearing power-hunger led to rampant political promiscuity, some facets of which we have seen in an earlier section. This is how DVG characterizes the hasty and staggering downfall of the Congress:

Great undoubtedly is the Congress; but the country is greater. Congress [was] great because it till now recognized the country as greater.

Equally, the sheer stature, pan-Indian spread and dominance of the Congress ensured that even the thought of an alternative political formation did not arise due to the sheer terror it inspired. DVG describes ¹¹⁷ this as the Congress “outgrowth,” which shut down all “open-minded study” and how there were no public meetings in the country “other than those organized by the Congress.” And more acidly, “Like the Upastree (concubine), the Congress will let no other organism thrive anywhere in its neighbourhood.” This sort of quasi-dictatorship also manifested itself in other ways. The most notable ignoble precedent ¹¹⁸ is the infamous Romesh Thapar vs The State Of Madras case. Romesh Thapar, part of Jawaharlal Nehru’s circle had upset the Prime Minister by daring to criticize him in his paper. Nehru’s Government sued him and lost the case. Unwilling to accept this loss of face, Nehru used the full might of his power and influence to bulldoze the first amendment to Article 19 of the Constitution which guarantees freedom of speech and curbed it using the vague terminology of “free speech subject to reasonable restrictions.”

Thus, with virtually no opposition either in Parliament or legislatures, the Congress turned upon itself in a Shakespearian sense. The first casualty was a systematic stifling of intra-party democracy under the garb of party discipline. DVG observes how even someone like Acharya Kriplani (a former Congress President) was humiliated under this excuse and was made to issue a cringeworthy apology ¹¹⁹ in public for daring to speak the unpleasant truth even in the “freedom of friendly conversation.” The Congress Party now demanded and got “submission and acquiescence miscalled harmony.” In reality, the Congress was implementing a milder version of the forced, public confessions of guilt by the members of the Communist Party of Russia in those innumerable notorious show trials of Stalin. DVG correctly traces this corrupt phenomenon as the first stirrings of the dictatorship of the Congress High Command, which assumed fearsome proportions over time.

Simultaneously, DVG points out that one swallow makes not a summer when that other familiar excuse is forwarded: that we have great leaders at the Centre and at the top party leadership and the party and country is largely in safe hands. He counters

Notes

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[[DVG’s Critique of the Congress High Command and Nehru’s Five-year Plans Source: prekshaa]]

The swift emergence of the High Command culture, which spawned the aforementioned dwarfs at many key-points revealed perhaps its most ugly face in the form of perpetually warring factions both in the Government and Party. One of the most high-profile victims of this culture of coteries was Dr. B.R. Ambedkar who mentions it explicitly in his resignation speech ¹²⁰ on the floor of the Parliament on 10 October 1951.

The House has no opportunity to know how the Cabinet works from within, whether there is harmony or whether there is a conflict… we have our newspapers. They have their age-old bias in favour of some and against others. Their judgements are seldom based on merits…. It is now 4 years, 1 month and 26 days since I was called by the Prime Minister to accept the office of Law Minister in his Cabinet. The offer came as a great surprise to me. I was in the opposite camp and had already been condemned as unworthy of association… It is difficult to understand what is the principle underlying the distribution of Government work among Ministers which the Prime Minister follows. Is it capacity? Is it trust? Is it friendship? Is it pliability? … I have never been a party to the game of power politics inside the cabinet or the game of snatching portfolios… The same old tyranny, the same old oppression, the same old discrimination which existed before, exists now, and perhaps in a worst form… Compare the concern the Government shows over safeguarding the Muslims. The Prime Minister’s whole time and attention is devoted for the protection of the Muslims… The Cabinet has become a merely recording and registration office of decisions already arrived at by Committees… They work behind an iron curtain. Others who are not members have only to take joint responsibility without any opportunity of taking part in the shaping of policy. This is an impossible position… I have never seen a case of a Chief Whip so disloyal to the Prime Minister and a Prime Minister so loyal to a disloyal Whip… If I did not think that there could be a difference between the promises and performances of the Prime Minister the fault is certainly not mine.

The existence of coteries within the Congress was as old as the Party itself. As DVG notes, they had not shown their ugly side because freedom struggle necessitated putting up a show of unity. For example, Motilal Nehru financed and founded the Congress-Khilafat Swarajya Party with Chittaranjan Das as its President in 1922 while being a Congressman. More than a decade later, Jawaharlal Nehru became one of the most prominent supporters of the Congress Socialist Party crystallised for the explicit purpose of spreading the Communist ideology within the Congress itself. Then there was the so-called “Rightist” faction led by Sardar Patel. Small wonder that the Party after independence was essentially a party of coteries and conspiracies which obviously had national interest as a secondary objective. This is how DVG describes ¹²¹ the situation:

The present pressure-group-appeasement policy of the Congress High Command is conducive neither to the growth of sound parliamentarism nor to the establishment of harmonious and efficient ministries…A patriotic party will take care not to seek strength for itself at the cost of the health of the country.

Elsewhere, DVG gives us another portrait of this High Command culture. Commenting on the nature of the ministry ¹²² formed for reorganizing the country after the Princely States merged with the new Indian Union he says,

The States Ministry’s proposal smacks of the old imperialist suzerainty, with its system of Residents and Political Agents playing the part of policemen*…He must eat the salt of the Rajpramukh…but take orders from the Ministry of the Sardar in Delhi…And the worst of the Adviser system is that it tends to kill local initiative*.

We shall examine this aspect in some detail in a later chapter.

***

By mid-1950s, DVG was convinced that the Congress was fast becoming a force for messing up the newly-independent nation and internal reform was impossible. Like other stalwarts of his time, DVG repeatedly called for the emergence of a strong alternative and urged men of public eminence not to be disheartened by the looming stature of Mohandas Gandhi whose legacy Congress had so skillfully appropriated. He also considered the prospect of the Congress itself splitting into two where one faction holds office and the other sits as a formidable Opposition. And then he brilliantly ridicules ¹²³ the very prospect as impossible by providing a fitting analogy.

We must not suppose that our politics will become better if the Congress itself splits. If a piece of dried cow dung is cut into two, will either part automatically become fragrant?

Analysing the roots of this shocking state of affairs post-Independence, DVG correctly says that the pre-Independence politics of the Congress was fundamentally the politics of propaganda. After Independence, the selfsame propaganda was substituted for governance and administration. A highly representative sample of how this propaganda worked can be gleaned from the newspaper reports of the time. It was said that one of Prime Minister Nehru’s “splendid victories” was to put capitalist America in its place by securing a large loan for India from the world’s most powerful country! DVG punctures such propaganda in his inimitable style. He examines Nehru’s “first priorities:” introduction of the disastrous Hindu Code Bill and Communal Harmony and concludes that these should not be our first priorities. He also condemns the image that Nehru built up for himself as being the sole repository of communal harmony, nationalistic and scientific spirit. DVG ¹²⁴says, “I can boldly say that there are countless men and women in India today whose love for this nation and whose ethical sense is no less than Nehru.”

A related critique is DVG’s brilliant analysis of Nehru’s pet project of Soviet-style five-year plans. The essay ¹²⁵ titled Namma Prajarajyada Pragati (Progress of our Democracy) is a valuable literature on the subject. This is akin to a companion of P.V. Kane’s far more detailed and equally brilliant analysis ¹²⁶ of the subject. Both DVG and Kane approach the problem from their original geniuses and reach pretty much the same conclusion. Both are alarmed at the enormity of these grand five-year plans and the scope for large-scale wastage inherent in these projects. DVG notes that there are “countless medium and small tasks along with these five-year plans.” This sort of concentration of a bulk of national resources on five-year plans have occurred because there is no decisiveness in the Government’s economic policy, which has in turn, discouraged private capital and enterprise. Further, the “Government must discard its notion that only it has to do every work” of national importance. In turn, this attitude ¹²⁷ was rooted in a dangerous mind set.

Delhi’s eyes are firmly set on the clouds…it forgets the minor details while thinking about grand plans…in its endeavor of manufacturing fashionable clothes, it forgets the threads and buttons.

DVG concludes his essay with a stinging slap: “till the time Congress leaders remain unafraid of the people, this country cannot expect any great change for the good.” And when we realise that DVG uttered these words in 1954, we also realise that this is beyond both comment and contempt.

Notes

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[[How our Legislators Look After Themselves: DVG’s Answer Source: prekshaa]]

Just a year later, the Nehruvian Congress authored the preface to yet another dark chapter that would lead the country to national chaos from which we are yet to recover. This was the notorious 1955 Avadi Session [^33.1] of the Indian National Congress in which Prime Minister Nehru himself gave the indecipherable phrase, “socialistic pattern of society.”

Like the handful of truly national-minded Indians, DVG was immediately alarmed. Needless, his prediction of what would occur under the guise of this perfidious phraseology came true within a decade. Equally, his exposition [^33.2] on its peril remains a classic and ever-relevant. DVG’s piercing intellect first rips off the façade of nobility underlying “socialistic pattern of society” when he writes that the use of this phrase “was in winning the Andhra elections for the Congress.” And then launches a frontal attack on Nehru himself.

When it came to clarifying the meaning of that megaphoned phrase, Mr. Nehru declared that it is not the same thing as Socialism, which itself lacks definition, but a form of organization to be discovered as we go along… how about the darkening of counsel meanwhile?… Viewed against the background of measures like Zamindari abolition and the parrot-talk of nationalization, the phrase “socialistic pattern of society” looked sinister. It spelt disaster to private enterprise and private ownership. It seemed to portend the annihilation of the individual as a distinct human value.

DVG then warns of the long-term dangers of pursuing this course, correctly observing that it would lead to the state monopolizing national resources and the emergence of illegitimate and criminal lobbies, all of which have come true. The ex-Communist, Philip Spratt was unsparing in his analysis [^33.3] of the Avadi Session and the politics and economics of Jawaharlal Nehru:

*Nehru is a Communist in this broader sense. He accepts increasing governmental power, socialisation and mechanisation, as both inevitable and desirable. He is strongly attached to the existing Communist governments, and when they clash with other governments he almost invariably supports them… through a series of constitutional amendments, he has systematically cut down the right to property, which most theorists regard as a necessary bulwark…of the other freedoms…Ten years ago the Congress Party was by no means socialistic. When the resolution on the socialistic pattern was passed at Avadi, an important Congressman compared it to the Emperor Akbar’s Din Ilahi. Socialism, he said, is Nehru’s personal fad, which will quickly be forgotten when he passes from the scene. It seemed a shrewd judgement at the time, but it overlooked the attraction of socialism for a ruling party of hungry careerists. The experience of socialism in the nine years since then has won many Congressmen over. *

Elsewhere in his analysis of the implications of the Avadi Session, DVG pointedly asks whether it would be incorrect to call the Congress as totalitarian because of its penchant to crush even those who it merely suspected were rivals. It is redundant to say but it must be said that the aforementioned crushing was carried out using mostly foul means.

By 1964, what the Avadi Session had planted in the political realm began to yield rich harvest in a highly visible manner in the public space: untrammeled and unchecked corruption at all levels. In this context, DVG notes the emergence of a new class: the professional politician, a class non-existent before Independence. He writes that the professional politician was the most corrosive of all and describes [^33.4] this new breed as the “patriotism-professing non-official,” something that the journalist and editor D.F. Karaka echoes [^33.5] more acerbically as the “trader of patriotism.” In DVG’s observation, “our public life today is thus the paradise of the professional politician.” He correctly traces the roots of this corruption to “the day that Congress, the party in power, agreed to let its men in the legislatures vote themselves attractive salaries and perks.” In another essay sardonically titled, How our Legislators Look After Themselves, DVG provides a devastating table showing the exact figures of the salaries that MLAs and MPs awarded themselves at public expense. This he calls, was a sickening betrayal of the “dreams of 1947” towards which millions of service-minded and patriotic Indians selflessly worked. DVG expresses genuine fear at how the “country’s moral stamina” would handle this “new test.”

Leaving nothing to speculation and always devoted to details, DVG delineates a caustic description of the professional politician [^33.6] that the Congress had thrown up in such substantial numbers:

The worst of democracy is in that it brings a profession of politicians into existence. Every profession has its career-side…in order to keep his career going, the politician has to…dive to the bottom of the pond and stir up muck…to the scum which naturally accumulates he must add some of his own imagining so that…[it] may attract people’s attention. Much-raking thus becomes a professional interest…its life is disturbance,—constant, unceasing disturbance…in that process, the mind of the community should be kept torn…You could then be sure of drawing some into your camp and securing their votes*. The vote is your living…it opens the way to office or…political influence. Membership to Parliament means assured salary and perquisites.** And in order to keep yourself in Parliament you must keep brawling day after day and distract the public over issue after issue…*[it] *thus throws people’s mind out of balance, and moral issues are never even remembered…The conscience of the community thus is reduced to inertia and stupefaction. *

And how did this class of the professional politician fare in its record of nation-building and the actual delivery of governance? DVG provides the brutally honest [^33.7] answer:

Congressmen…mouth promises…But word is not deed, and none of them knows anything of doing except of course for their own dear selves*…[They] have for leaders men who failed the** country when they held office and are becoming notable as windbags and vote manipulators when out of office.*

Sure enough, these windbags and vote manipulators were to have the last laugh, in a manner of speaking. Even as DVG was searing them in issue after issue of Public Affairs with his fiery pen, Mrs Indira Gandhi split the original Indian National Congress and was hurtling down the path to totalitarianism. As we now know, this political Frankenstein would eventually devour her. But back in those days, DVG was among the earliest luminaries who foresaw the ominous signs and the mordant forces that her split had caused. He is unsparing of both the so-called “Syndicate” and “Indicate” [^33.8] remarking that they were cut from the same cloth. More importantly, he notes how both had surrendered to the so-called “Young Turks,” euphemism for a group of young political aspirants who advocated and used unabashed political hooliganism [^33.9] as a shortcut to political office. As DVG predicted, these Young Turks eventually overwhelmed what was left of the original Congress Party, reducing the newly-powerful Indira Gandhi to the status of something slightly better than a puppet of the Communists who now formed her closest circle. The Congress that she had split became swiftly radicalized. It also set in motion the familiar events that would culminate in the Emergency, India’s only brush with dictatorship so far. DVG foresaw this sort of future and wrote these words [^33.10] of friendly but highly sarcastic advice to the Congress Party:

[The Congress] leaders will now be serving the country best by retiring into private life,—to delight…their grandchildren with stories of how they distinguished themselves in their service to the motherland and what miracles they wrought as Ministers and Legislators…It will be to the good of the Congress itself that it should retire from office.

Our greater admiration for DVG lies in the fact that he wrote all these at a time when a majority of influential newspapers and periodicals [^33.11] were vying with one another to curry favour with Indira Gandhi.

[[Vākyajño vākyakuśalaḥ maunamupāgamat: The Twilight Years of the Titan Source: prekshaa]]

The distilled essence of all of DVG’s brilliant critiques of the Indian political atmosphere since Independence and specifically, the trajectory of the Congress Party until its fateful split in 1969 is the fact that by 1970, he had already been convinced that the Congress was a force for the evil. In his innumerable indictments, DVG observes how the Congress Party and Government had become indistinguishable, the chief reason for the chaos both at the national level and in the states. The party and the Government had no place for people who were not up for sale and majority of ministers lacked the qualification, aptitude, training and discipline to “sit at the desk and glue their eyes to the paper.” This discipline was how the politician trained his soul. Instead, the Congress Party and Government busied itself in uprooting everything in the past that was noble and virtuous under the mindless excuse that they were erasing all vestiges of the British. DVG concludes ¹²⁸ this indictment with a touch of original genius:

*Vishwamitra embarked on an endeavor to build a new heaven and create a new Indra. In recent history, only two belong to this class of people. The first are the Communists of Russia. **The second are our Congress leaders. ***

In their zeal to Russianize India, the Congress leaders forgot the glaring irony this blind aping of Communist Russia was another reflection of the deep hold British colonization had on their psyches. In their tearing arrogance, these leaders forgot to ask public opinion vis a vis their project of Russianization. DVG puts this arrogance ¹²⁹ in perspective:

But what is public opinion?…What is the real picture we get when we examine public opinion and subject the Congress claim of being a democratic party and government to test? What we have is not the power of the people but the power of political parties. Neither is it merely the power of parties but the power of one party, and the power of only one leader of that party.

The combined consequence of all this in DVG’s words

In 1973, DVG published the revised edition of his classic political treatises (later) combined into a single volume as*Rajyashastra, Rajyanga.*Reminiscing on the state of the Indian nation in 1973, he notes:

According to some, the condition of our people today is far worse than what it was under British rule.

The year 1973 is an interesting timeline: Devaraj Urs, the blue-eyed lieutenant of Indira Gandhi had established his firm authority as the Chief Minister of Karnataka. He is also remembered for and credited with officializing corruption in the political life of Karnataka. It is unnecessary to recount the dark trajectory of events in the state ever since.

Two years later, when the nightmarish climax of the Emergency came, DVG recorded his protest in his inimitable fashion in the July 1975 issue of*Public Affairs.*It was a Sanskrit verse pregnant with meaning and profound in its implication:

*Vākyajño vākyakuśalaḥ maunamupāgamat *
The one who was well-versed in the fine art of speech took refuge in silence.

On 7 October 1975, DVG passed away. His earthly departure was the final end of an era of courage, truthfulness and decency in public life and the beginning of a demonic era from which Independent India is yet to fully free herself. He was perhaps the last of those luminaries and savants the anchor of whose soul was firmly moored in the Sanatana ethos whose wellspring he unfailingly relied upon to meet contemporary political and social challenges. With DVG’s mortal death, Bharatavarsha had lost yet another vital civilizational link that could effortlessly delineate her timeless genius to the confused mass that democratic India had become. And democratic and Independent India had lost an invaluable social, spiritual and moral guide.

No one who had known DVG for any length of time could recover from the news of his death. People he had mentored, guided, and built abiding friendships with were inconsolable. Tributes and condolences poured in from people from all walks of life: the Chief Minister, politicians, editors, journalists, litterateurs, musicians, educationists, judges, and Vedic Pandits. The October-November 1975 issue ofPublic Affairswas dedicated to his commemoration. Selected excerpts from these tributes follow. Emphases have been added.

By his innate feeling of a call to duty to the motherland and enthused by the lives of Ram Mohun Roy, Vivekananda, Dadabhai Naoroji and Dewan Rangacharlu he lived a life of dedication to great ideals and lived a purposeful life…***He made it his duty to cleanse the minds of his fellow countrymen both individual and collective and uplift their miseries to the great and the good in life.******He assiduously tried to find out the good and made it known to his fellowmen and tried to see it realised.***It is no wonder he found journalism a convenient vehicle to express his thoughts.

***

His learning was as extensive as his intellect was massive and his retentive power extraordinary. Though his schooling stopped with his failing in the matriculation examination, by that time he had read Gibbon ’sDecline and Fall of the Roman Empireseveral times.

***

Authority to him in the State was not unrelated to the holder of it. So, his insistence was on the maintenance of high moral standards of public men. Similarly, the public good was not something elusive for him.Every detail which made the life of the citizen happy was an item of good for him.

***

It was his firm conviction that when power is passing into the hands of the people, one safeguard against error and confusion in public policy is in the influence of a body of independent-minded citizens who untrammeled by party attachments and class loyalties, would keep a critical watch over the country’s affairs and inform the public from time to time.

***

When he received congratulatory letters from friends on the conferment of Padma Bhushan on him,he replied that the grass growing in a meadow does not ask for any praise for looking so beautifully green and for having pleased the looker on.

[Editorial]

I would not be wrong in saying that our education began afresh when we came in contact with him.Beginning with referring to a dictionary, punctuating a sentence, arranging chairs for a meeting welcoming the lecturer, up to the teaching of theUpanishads,the instruction spread over all aspects of life. No detail was missed. I may describe it as an attitude of thoroughness in thought as well as in action. He detested lethargy, procrastination, haphazardness, and perfunctoriness, as also deceit and hypocrisy. So it is no wonder that he partial to scholarship and efficiency and straightforwardness. All this drill and punctiliousness formed part of his philosophy of life andit is no exaggeration to say we have become new men under his influence. [D.R. Venkataramanan]

***

In the course of his public life, DVG never minced matter and whenever any action of Government offended public good, DVG was loud and clear in his indictment of that action***. He was incorruptible and he never thought of utilising his position and influence as a public man to further his interests***. [K.S. Ramaswami]

***

Fifteen years of hard and selfless service had…made Gundappa into a man of grit and incorruptible independence… Gundappa never looked for the appreciation of the work he was doing, by Government.***He was a politician but belonged to no party.***If he had joined the Congress in the earlier years, he could perhaps have been a minister in one of the administrations later. ln literature also he was indifferent to acceptance by the crowd, though maintaining high quality… Born poor, receiving no formal education beyond the secondary stage, and entering public life when he was about twenty years old,Gundappa worked hard and with a will to make something of life; and ended making it a great thing.[Masti Venkatesha Iyengar]

Notes

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[[DVG: The Rational Champion of the Princely States Source: prekshaa]]

baruvella benegaṃ maddanāririsiharu? ।
narara kīḻtanakella parihāraveṃtu? ॥
kiridu pallanu tāḻikeḻalebekaṣṭiṣṭu ।
dhareyaṃtaruṣṇavanu - maṃkutimma ॥ 670 ॥

Has anyone been able to find a medicine for all ailments that affect man?
Is there any permanent solution to the wretched behavior of man?
We have no option but to tolerate all these by clenching our teeth Akin to how the earth patiently conceals the inner heat concealed – Mankutimma

The character of Native States has baffled the classificatory skill of all writers on international law…From this anomaly the States have to be rescued.

The foregoing excerpt ¹³⁰ is part of DVG’s timely missive to Edwin Samuel Montagu, England’s Secretary of State for India. Apart from its sheer brilliance, the missive reveals several key facets of DVG’s genius-level statesmanship. The first is his sense of timing. DVG wrote it in February 1918, at the feverish peak of World War I. The second is the fact that he chose to directly address the Secretary of State, not just any other high-ranking British official. The third is the most important: it was DVG’s method of ringing the bell of conscience in an imperial Britain and in general, in a war-torn Europe where ¹³¹ “statesmen and ethicists have been lamenting that the commonly accepted law of nations have now been ruthlessly violated…[and] the old treaties…have been unceremoniously torn.”

In hindsight, it can be reasonably argued that DVG need not have written the missive because—as he himself mentions in the document—it was simply a repetition of what he had written on the subject earlier on numerous occasions. The fact that he wrote it demonstrates how focused his tenacity was: World War I was the perfect opportunity for him to put the British on the defensive on a subject not only of enormous national significance but its far-reaching future implications, especially after India would eventually attain independence. In his words, this was the “problems of the Indian Native States.” In this work, the term “Princely States” is used synonymously with “Native States.”

***

DVG stands tallest among journalists, intellectuals, writers and public eminences of all hues who participated in the Indian freedom struggle who paid such close attention to the situation of the Princely States—both in the short and long term. The corpus of DVG’s writing on the subject roughly totals three hundred pages including his numerous columns in Karnataka and the classic “Memorials” that he wrote to various Princes and to Montagu. He pursued the issue even after Independence in the editions of the Public Affairs journal. While it is tragic that this invaluable literature has all but been forgotten today, the profounder tragedy is that even in DVG’s own time, most of the stalwarts of our freedom struggle paid scant heed to this issue. One can hazard a few guesses. The first is the fact that bulk of the independence movement was concentrated in British-ruled India, and the condition of the Princely States was not exactly their first priority. The second is that a good chunk of the leadership of the freedom movement regarded the Princely States as outmoded and regressive, and were obstacles to India’s freedom struggle. The third is the emergence of the Socialists and Communists in whose eyes the Princely States were “class enemies,” who had to be liquidated physically if possible. The fourth involves the attitudes, insecurities and general behavior of some of the Princely States themselves, who wanted no part in the freedom struggle. Thus, when we regard this overall climate, we realise the nature of the treacherous tides that DVG was swimming against when he advocated the cause of the Princely States. Yet, characteristically, the force of his personality, the weight of his public eminence, the strength of his exposition, the compulsion of his arguments, the fine attention to detail and the embracive sweep of his scholarship not only opened eyes but elicited positive responses from across the country. Sir S. Subrahmania Iyer as the Honorary President of the Home Rule League wrote a glowing foreword to DVG’s aforementioned Memorials and lavished deserved praise on the work. The Memorials first written in August 1917 quickly went out of print and DVG published a revised edition in October gratefully noting ¹³² the “very sympathetic and appreciative reception given… by some leading national journals and…persons known for their patriotism.”

DVG’s literature on the Princely States is an illuminating study on the fine art of political persuasion, patience, diplomacy, reform, and the courage to tell unpalatable truths in a manner that not only appeals but enlightens. In an ideal world, this work would have been prescribed reading material for students of political science at the university level.

Neither is it blind advocacy of the Princely States. DVG considers the problem as a unified whole without missing all its constituent parts. He exposes some of the glaringly egregious faults of the Princely States with compassionate ruthlessness and equally upholds all the virtuous and noble traditions that they have maintained and sustained. As in his other writings, here too, he strives to achieve the same Samanvaya (balance or proportion) that is characteristic of his life and legacy.

***

As a starting point of sorts, we can consider the case ¹³³ of Dr. Nagendra Singh, the brother of the Maharawal of Dungarpur, Rajasthan. Dr. Nagendra Singh, Secretary of the Ministry of Transport and Shipping in Nehru’s Government was described as a “talented and scholarly man of great personal integrity and…an embodiment of refinement and culture.”

The Maharawals of Dungarpur traced their ancestry to the formidable eighth century Rajput king, Bappa Rawal. In the mid-1950s, bowing to the protests from the Communists, Prime Minister Nehru sent letters to various Princes including the Maharawal requesting them to take voluntary cuts in their privy purses. The Maharawal did not plead his own case but stood up for the young Prince of Udaipur who had just ascended the throne. He reminded Nehru of the sanctity and preeminence of Udaipur, which was more “ancient than the Japanese monarchy.” He also appealed to Nehru’s conscience by pointing out that the Government of (independent) India had recognized the Ruler of Udaipur as the only Maharajpramukh. To his credit, Nehru was not only impressed by the Maharawal but invited the new Udaipur Ruler to his residence and undid the cuts to his privy purse.

However, the story of Dr. Nagendra Singh was different. Nehru overrode him in order to favour one of his business friends who got a lucrative shipping contract.

When we compare this and similar events that occurred after Independence with DVG’s writings on the problems of the Princely States, we are stunned at how farsighted he was, and how he near-precisely anticipated such disasters three decades ago.

There was also a deeply fundamental reason for DVG to be concerned about and pursue the issue of the Princely States with such doggedness. He was himself a subject of the Princely State of Mysore, one of the model states in India at the time, and had keenly grasped both the positives and drawbacks of life in such a state. Simultaneously, DVG was an advocate of the Congress Party’s freedom movement and worked hard to propagate its ideas and programmes in the Mysore State. Add to this his profession as an editor and journalist, he had a solid understanding of what British rule meant in non-Princely States.

The combined result of all these forms the full backdrop to understand the importance and continuing relevance of DVG’s literature on the Princely States.

But the story really begins with the near-permanent downfall of eighteenth-century India whose ruling kingdoms rapidly succumbed to the British.

Notes

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[[DVG’s Memorials to the Maharaja of Bikaner as National Service Source: prekshaa]]

The Kingdom of Mysore was among the larger and more significant kingdoms to fall to the British in the eighteenth century. In the fateful fourth Anglo-Mysore War of 1799, Tipu Sultan defeat and death at British hands brought a mixed legacy to the future of Mysore. An accurate reading of history reveals that the Wodeyar dynasty, which had uninterruptedly ruled Mysore for about five centuries, had lost its freedom at the hands of a mercenary named Hyder Ali, father of Tipu Sultan. Thus, when the British liberated Mysore from these usurpers, they in a way, restored the old order of the Wodeyars at the cost of extinguishing their freedom. In doing this, the British were merely following the same formula that had yielded them great successes earlier in Bengal and Malabar: (1) demanding complete political subservience by appointing British Residents in these states (2) extorting substantial revenues as the cost for giving protection to these states. Both (1) and (2) were accomplished through treaties and agreements that were patently unjust to these states. While the now-nominal Maharajas and Princes scrupulously honoured these treaties in both letter and spirit, the British violated them at will and convenience.

After the fall of Maharaja Ranjit Singh in 1839, the capitulation of the other kingdoms was swift to the extent that on the dawn of the 1857 national war of resistance, a British multinational corporation had become the de facto ruler of an entire country.

When the British crown took over the administration of India in 1858, it retained some of the key precedents that the East India Company had pioneered in order to administratively exploit India to the most effective extent possible. Of these, the aforementioned treaties occupied a top slot. The parts of India that the British controlled directly (known as British India) posed little problem initially. However, the Princely States (or Native States) were the source of infrequent friction for various reasons as we shall see.

Neither were these treaties and their terms uniform for all Princely States. It must be remembered that the treaties were the outcomes of war, and the circumstances of each war were different. However, what was uniform was the manner in which the British drafted these treaties to the permanent disadvantage of these States. In many cases, new “treaties” were invented on the spur even after the State was completely subjugated. The vile Doctrine of Lapse concocted by Dalhousie is a representative sample. In reality, this was an imperialist method, which under the veneer of respectability, was actually a trickery to enable the political annexation of a Princely State where the ruler was either “manifestly incompetent or died without a male heir.” Needless, it was not difficult to find reasons to “prove” the said incompetency. In about thirty-five years, thirty-three Princely States were effortlessly annexed by the British using this alleged doctrine.

The other, equally vile facet of this trickery in peacetime was to make all sorts of unfair demands on the Princes citing some clause of a treaty as the justification for the demand as we shall see.

To get an overall estimate of the situation, we can recall the fact that the Princely States occupied one-third of (undivided) India’s landmass inhabited by one-fourth of her population. To put this in numbers, it was an area of about six lakh square miles with a population of seven crores. This vast geography was controlled by British Residents and British bureaucrats who had almost an autocratic veto over the Princely States. Indeed, there is an independent book waiting to be written on the kind of havoc these officials wreaked upon Indians. A favourite device the Residents used in order to torture the Prince or the Diwan was to write an unending stream of complaining letters to the Viceroy.

The press too, had to operate under truly extenuating circumstances. Even if an article or opinion piece was merely deemed offensive to the British, the press office itself would be seized and sealed and the editor thrown in prison with little or no redress.

On their part, a good number of Princes and Maharajas hadn’t exactly covered themselves in glory. As long as they toed the British line and kept the Resident and bureaucracy happy, they were quite free to do what they willed. In practice, this meant a combination of quasi autocracy and full-blown autocracy, for example, in the states of Hyderabad and Bhopal. The subjects of the Princely States ruled by Muslim Nizams and Nawabs suffered the most under this system.

On the other side were truly enlightened Princely States such as Mysore, Baroda, Travancore, and Bikaner. The rulers of these states delivered exemplary governance and ushered in modern systems without compromising on the ancient ideals and values despite the choking constraints imposed by the British. Yet, at every turn, the British reciprocated this cooperation and service of the Princely States with more unjust demands and plain ingratitude. We will be hard-pressed to find any other incident in history where in return for the enormous amount of money, manpower and resources the Princely States gave the British during World War I, the British gave…nothing other than platitudes and meaningless titles.

This is also the other backdrop in which DVG wrote his seminal five memorials to the Maharaja of Bikaner in October 1917.

Broadly speaking, these memorials and the combined volume of literature that DVG wrote on the Princely States encompasses these questions:

1. The imperial British Government 2. The subjects directly controlled by British India 3. The rulers of the Princely States 4. The citizens of Princely States 5. The freedom struggle led by the Congress and its attitude towards the Princely States

In hindsight, it can also be argued that during the years of World War I, there was a great deal of anticipation in India that the British would quit after the war was over. DVG did not want to miss the opportunity.

***

In a cautionary essay in The Bombay Chronicle, DVG sounds the alarm bell to the Princely States regarding the vastly changed practical conditions of the present writing that

The social and political conditions which set limits to the power of the Hindu monarch under the ancient regime disappeared long ago and completely; and they can never be recreated.

In other words, the status quo that the Princely States would not last long. This in many ways presages his brilliant memorials to the Maharaja of Bikaner.

The full title of these memorials reads as follows:

THE PROBLEMS OF INDIAN NATIVE STATES

OR

THEIR CLAIM FOR THE FULL RIGHTS OF MEMBERSHIP IN THE BRITISH COMMONWEALTH FOR JUSTICE, FREEDOM

AND

OPPORTUNITY FOR INDIVIDUAL AND NATIONAL SELF-DEVELOPMENT

Characteristically, DVG minces no words in both approbation and criticism. His opening statement ¹³⁴ making the case for the invaluable role of the Princely States in the Indian national life, he says,

When the deluge of 1857 threatened to overwhelm the Empire in India, it is these States that acted as breakwaters and saved India for England.

Therefore, in the aftermath of their services to the British Empire during World War I, these States ¹³⁵ “are not a negligible factor in the economy of the Empire…and they stand no less than any other constituent of the Empire, to demand a higher status and to insist on a better treatment.” More vocally, DVG hammers the message ¹³⁶ of conscientiousness when he says,

*Let no one suppose that what the States have to ask for…is a reward for loyalty. The performance of a duty has always been to India more than a commercial transaction…The Princes…ought to secure their immediate elevation from the position of meek dependents…to the position of responsible partners in the…imperial family. *

This is at once a fearless and rousing call to self-confidence and a reflection of the true character of British rule in India.

Notes

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[[DVG Examines the Problems of the Princely States Source: prekshaa]]

In examining the aforementioned five questions related to the Princely States and British, DVG covers a panoramic sweep providing a detailed and highly nuanced picture of the political, social, economic, religious and cultural situation of India at the time. His treatment of and expositions on the conditions of British-ruled India and the freedom movement has already been covered in the earlier chapters.

The substance of DVG’s writing on the Princely States can be summarized as follows:

1. A comprehensive picture of their present condition based on a thorough historical analysis. 2. A balanced view that considers both the shortcomings and the value of the Princely States to India. 3. Warnings, suggestions and recommendations to the Princely States on the urgent need for reform and the precise reforms that were required. 4. The place and status of the Princely States after India eventually attained independence.

A key factor based on which DVG argues his case for the Princely States is the position of the King of England in the democratic republic of Great Britain: he is a Constitutional King. Given the overwhelming worldwide dominance of British power during that period, DVG considers it appropriate to call England as “our political Guru.” It was one thing for England to military conquer large parts of India but an entirely different thing to sustain such a massive and diverse country and ancient culture for so long. What was the character of such a world-power, which was also a constitutional monarchy and a democratic republic? DVG provides a tangential ¹³⁷ answer: “the rise of democracy does not mean the subversion of the throne.” Our “political Guru” had indeed retained this practice and custom, as old as civilization itself for a deep-rooted reason: the value of tradition in maintaining the continuity of the collective memories of a nation embodied in an overarching person who represents this. In DVG’s words, this Sovereign ¹³⁸ person

impresses the common people as the very personification of the State, evokes their patriotism and secures their ready confidence for the government…[and] sets a high example of civic and social virtues with an influence which none else can command…He is the centre and the moving force, but not the manufacturing part of the machinery.

Both history and experience show that while the monarch’s administration could be criticized for its faults, the monarch as a person was mostly regarded with awe and exalted respect. This largely holds true even today for the Queen of England.

DVG divides this British political system into two parts:

1. The “reverence-inspiring” or dignified part represented by the monarch. 2. The working or efficient part comprising the constitutional head of state, the bureaucracy, army, judiciary, police, and so on.

Thus, one of DVG’s profound appeals to the rulers of Princely States was to adopt this system in their own dominions and shape it according to their unique local necessities and traditions. In his words, what these Princely States needed ¹³⁹ was the “grace on the part of the Sovereign to accept a constitutional position for himself.” He calls such a system a “crowned democracy,” and one of its incalculable virtues was the stability of the ages, something that is impossible to build overnight. This was in a way, the very antithesis of a presidential government imbued ¹⁴⁰ with “electioneering corruption, uncertain purposes and unsteady policies, and with no permanent and superior living force to harmonize and moderate its factious elements.”

Decades later, the iconic Prime Minister and maker of modern Singapore, Lee Kuan Yew would echo ¹⁴¹ DVG when he said that the

…exuberance of democracy leads to undisciplined and disorderly conditions which are inimical to development… Democratic procedures have no intrinsic value…the government’s primary duty is to create a stable and orderly society where people are well cared for…Democracy is one way of getting the job done, but if non-electoral procedures are more conducive to the attainment of valued ends, then I’m against democracy. Nothing is morally at stake in the choice of procedures.

On another occasion, Lee Kuan Yew deplored a marked practice of American public life: of using abusive and vulgar language against the President himself. Like DVG, he said that this was actually a degradation and not a virtue of that country where in the name of unfettered individual freedom, the highest office of the land is subjected to routine debasement. This is how he makes the contrast:

In the East, the main object is to have a well-ordered society so that everybody can have maximum enjoyment of his freedoms. This freedom can only exist in an ordered state and not in a natural state of contention and anarchy.

This neatly ties in with DVG’s observation about factious elements in a democracy and how an amorphous body of the electorate cannot ensure social and political harmony simply by voting.

Thus, in urging the rulers of the Princely States to become constitutional monarchs modelled after England, DVG actually makes a case for their elevation because while the nation itself is divided into various political parties, “the crown is of no party” and its separation from the active business of the state “removes it from enmities and desecration, which…enables it to combine the affection of conflicting parties.” In hindsight, we can reasonably say that DVG in many ways based this prescription on what he observed in the Mysore Princely State. He had enormous respect and reverence for Krishnaraja Wodeyar IV for this precise reason and has dedicated a highly moving obituary to this Rajarshi (Sage-like King). Equally, his learned essay describing the administrative and governance system of the Wodeyars is a complementary reading of sorts as we shall see. Under the Diwanship of V.P. Madhava Rao, for the first time, the Mysore State empowered the members of the Mysore Legislative Assembly to pass laws. It heralded an enlightened first step towards constitutional monarchy. DVG’s magnificent biography of Madhava Rao fleshes out this landmark reform in brilliant detail. Needless, the selfsame Krishnaraja Wodeyar IV under whom Madhava Rao flourished, blessed this reform and elevated himself to the status where he became ¹⁴² the “visible symbol of and the unifying bond of a democracy. He [was] above the region of political disputation.”

This constitutional reform also formed one of the foundations on which DVG based his advocacy ¹⁴³ of Responsible Government for Mysore in later years. In DVG’s view,

The system of Responsible Government is not the abolition of monarchy; on the contrary, it is the surest way of consolidating the position of the monarch.

Thus, if the Mysore State could provide such a healthy, peaceful and prosperous regime despite strangling constraints, if it could introduce constitutional monarchy in a measured fashion, there was no reason other Princely States could not do the same.

But there were reasons and they were plenty. The chief reason was the very nature of a majority of the Princely States as we shall see.

Notes

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[[DVG’s Learned Analysis of the Infamous Manipur Notification Source: prekshaa]]

When DVG wrote the following words about the impending fate of the Princely States in the April 1949 issue ¹⁴⁴ of Public Affairs, it was essentially his three-decade-old prophecy that had rung perilously true because the States had failed to heed his recurring warnings:

Our States signed their death-warrants first when they surrendered to Britain. The…State that has no army of its own, nor a protecting suzerain, is ever at the mercy of him who has armies at his command.

The foregoing is an extract from DVG’s detailed analysis of the report of the States Reorganisation Commission published on April 1, 1949. The Commission was headed by Jawaharlal Nehru, Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel and Pattabhi Sitaramayya.

***

An important insight that emerges from the entire corpus of DVG’s writings on the Princely States is the fact that he lived through both World Wars as well as a revelation of his astonishing grasp of international law as we shall see.

DVG’s note on armies contains several dimensions. The first is the fact that all the Princely States were in a state of perpetual quasi-military occupation by the British. Although these States had their own standing armies, they were fully under British control thanks to the aforementioned disastrous treaties that past kings had signed.

Perhaps the deadliest of them all was the notorious Manipur Notification of August 1891 which “once for all sealed the fate of the Native States in the eyes of international law.” When we study this alongside with and contrast it with the British rescinding all their treaties with the Princely States in 1947, the full extent of their perfidy becomes clear: India was thrown overnight into a situation in which 562 States were akin to independent nations without an army or other fundamental markers of sovereignty.

Indeed, DVG’s exposition of the Manipur Notification is the work of a real master, and deserves to be read ¹⁴⁵ in full. This tragic story of Manipur is among the countless of such crucial, buried histories. Only a cultural and historical archeologist of DVG’s caliber could dig it up. Writing as early as 1918, DVG calls it a “painful episode, now almost forgotten.” Forgotten just nineteen years after it occurred.

The Manipur Notification was the outcome of the last courageous rebellion against British imperialism at its peak. The Maharaja of Manipur had abdicated the throne, and the Regent Kula Chandra Singh and his Senapati (Commander in Chief), Tikendrajit Singh, sensed an opening when Quinton, the Chief Commissioner of Assam sought to meddle in the royal succession as was the British practice. The Senapati led a revolt, which led to the murder of several British officers. The predictable consequences were immediate and brutal. Kulachandra, Tikendrajit and most of the royal family were convicted for waging war against “Her Majesty, the Queen of England.” They were awarded death penalty which was later modified to “transportation for life and forfeiture of all property.” However, even this punishment was questioned in the courts given the fact that the British had so far recognized Manipur as an independent state. Besides, the lawyer, Man Mohan Ghose, who argued the case on behalf of Manipur, also held the punishment as unfair by the standards and rules of international law.

The British response to this morally-valid objection ¹⁴⁶ based on the grounds they themselves had devised was characteristic and entirely along the lines of the dark genius of the Doctrine of Lapse:

The principles of international law have no bearing upon the relations between the Government of India as representing the Queen Empress…and the Native States under the suzerainty of Her Majesty…The paramount supremacy of the former presupposes and implies the subordination of the latter. In the exercise of their high prerogative, the Government of India have, in Manipur as in other protected states, the unquestioned right to remove…any person whose presence in the State may seem objectionable.

This is the text of the said Manipur Notification. A more barefaced and shameless justification for imperial oppression is hard to find in history. DVG condemns ¹⁴⁷ this in his patented style: “in the [Manipur] case, the law-giver was neither a radical reformer nor a high-souled statesman, but only a power-intoxicated administrator bent upon achieving success somehow.”

In other words, the Manipur Notification implied that the ruler of any Princely State could be arbitrarily set aside if a case for rebellion or revolt could be made, with no recourse for redress in any court. In practical ¹⁴⁸ terms, this is what it meant:

By virtue of its preponderating share in sovereignty, Suzerainty has put the States out of the jurisdiction of International Law.

Yet, the selfsame colonial Britain suddenly woke up to the sanctity of treaties and international political ethics during both World Wars when the so-called aggressors declared war against it. During both wars, Britain recruited vast contingents of the armies of the Native States it supposedly protected. In both wars, the total Indian contingent was the largest army in history fighting to defend and save its own oppressors. A multivolume work is waiting to be written on just this important epoch of world history.

Neither was it just the army that the Princely States provided. They also supplied tremendous amounts of money, material and provisions at the cost of shortages to their own subjects.

This is the semi-detailed backdrop of and the other crucial factor why DVG urged the States to become equal partners with the British.

Tragically, the far-reaching implications of the unjust Manipur Notification did not elicit even a murmur of protest from the larger and more powerful Princely States. They were either petrified of the British stranglehold or were scared to lose their unbridled privileges and autocracy or both, and both were guaranteed by their subservience. This is why as we have seen earlier, DVG advocated the Middle Path: of ushering in representative and Responsible Government in the States in a graded and graceful manner.

However, apart from Mysore, Travancore, Baroda and a handful of others, most Princely States were happy to enjoy privileges and unbridled power. In DVG’s words, these ¹⁴⁹ were “exercised autocratically in all States, with some outward forms of constitutionalism in a few.”

We shall look at a high-level picture of how this autocracy operated in a majority of these Princely States.

Notes

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[[DVG’s Exposition on the Character and Qualifications of British Bureaucracy in Princely States Source: prekshaa]]

DVG’s detailed exposition of the climate of autocratic rule that prevailed in most of the Princely States falls under three broad heads:

1. The role played by the rulers themselves in sustaining this autocracy. 2. The pervasive interference of the British bureaucracy in the administration of these States. 3. The ground-level impact and consequences of this autocratic rule.

DVG’s splendid analytical powers and civilizational moorings blaze forth once again when he traces the appalling degradation of the original conception of Santana statecraft and polity by contrasting them with what he witnessed ¹⁵⁰ in his own time.

It is a mischievous contradiction in terms to speak of an Indian autocracy; for there was never such a thing as autocracy…in India at any time when she was her own mistress; and what we see today in the [Native] States is not a faithful reproduction of the true Aryan political ideal, but only the crude handiwork of Anglo-Indian autocrats and bureaucrats who seldom were men imbued with any lofty and enduring ideal.

As we have seen in the earlier chapters, DVG’s expositions on the original conception of the Sanatana statecraft and political philosophy are rooted in the high ideals and Darshana of Sri Krishna, Kautilya and Vidyaranya Swami, memorably encapsulated in his verse, *Jnanina caritum…*Thus, DVG holds a mirror to the Princely States by upholding these Sanatana political ideals by citing ¹⁵¹ the works of Tiruvalluvar, Shivaji, and a lecture of P.K. Telang from which the following quote is memorable:

The word ‘Rajan’ (or King) means one who can keep the people contented. Power and authority were implicitly admitted to rest on the sanction and the good-will and consent of the people…He could not transcend Dharma. What is Dharma? The custom of the people, admitted and sanctified as binding law and imprimatur of those who were the knowers and guardians of the people’s culture… states in those days were not political: the work of the people was carried on by social institutions, such as the village Panchayats, industrial or mercantile guilds…

DVG does not shy away from openly naming and shaming the more egregious Princely States that flaunted autocratic rule as if it was the natural order of things. He calls the Maharaja of Kashmir as “mediaveal-minded,” Pudukotta as being in a “piteous state” and an “unprincipled Prince of Bengal” who was not “ashamed” to be “denationalized” to the extent that he was an Indian willing to “renounce India.” Likewise, DVG lavishes praise on the more enlightened and moderate Princely States such as Mysore, Travancore and Alwar among others. However, even in these States, the situation was not exactly ideal. Decades later, when DVG was asked what was his precise complaint against the Maharaja of Mysore, he answered, “there was no freedom to talk back to him even in case of genuine grievance.”

As we have seen on numerous occasions earlier, in reality, the rulers of the Princely States were mere puppets of the British crown and were answerable to the Residents. However, the entire administrative power was concentrated in the hands of the Diwan (or Prime Minister). The Resident could—and did—overrule both the King and the Diwan. One ugly consequence of this arrangement was ceaseless palace intrigue, petty politicking in the higher echelons of the administration, and the unchecked power of the bureaucracy controlled entirely by the British.

DVG deservedly reserves his harshest condemnation for this bureaucracy, painting them with colourful adjectives: “sun-dried,” “honey-mouthed,” “Maa-Baap,” “glorified clerks,” “fussy amateurs,” “wage-earners,” “profit-seekers,” “dreaded ICS,” “above the law,” and “autocratic.” And he holds up an eternal warning ¹⁵² of history dating all the way back to the fall of Rome: the nation which allows itself to be silenced by bureaucratic concessions sells its birthright for a mess of pottage.

Arguably, DVG was among the lone few of public personalities and journalists who took the corrosive British bureaucracy head-on with a delicious mix of scathing irony, biting sarcasm, and open defiance. In doing so, he also provides an eye-opening reality of how this entire system operated together with its constituent parts.

The most notable aspect of this reality is the fact that the British bureaucracy was uniformly hated by Indians including the Princes because none had a say in it despite shelling out enormous amounts of money to the British crown.

The second is the background and character of these bureaucrats both in British India and more so in the Princely States. Middle and upper-rung British bureaucrats in India became enormously wealthy solely owing to their service here. Had they remained back in England, they would have probably retired as poorly-paid clerks in either Government service or the private sector, and would have enjoyed a far lower status in a class-and-status-conscious Britain of the 18^(th) and (mid) 20^(th) Centuries. The case of the celebrated British writer and author, George Orwell (Eric Arthur Blair) is illustrative. Born in Motihari, Bihar, he describes his family as “lower-upper-middle class.” Yet, he was able to afford a reasonably elite education at Eton and one contributing factor was his father’s employment in the lucrative Opium Department of the Indian Civil Service in Burma, then a British colony. Author William Dalrymple’s book, The Anarchy provides some graphic details of the rampant exploitation and self-enrichment that these bureaucrats indulged in which translated into phenomenal wealth when they returned to England.

DVG culls out this duplicity straight from the horse’s mouth by quoting Lord Canning’s Despatch ¹⁵³ of April 1860, calling it the “seamy side of British statesmanship.”

*The safety of our rule is increased…by title maintenance of Native Chiefs affected to us…**Restless men…*and crafty intriguers bred up in Native Courts…live there contentedly…if we made all India into zillas…our Empire should not last fifty years; but …if we could keep up a number of Native States without political power, but as royal instruments, we should exist in India as long as our naval superiority in Europe was maintained.

But in 1860, the tentacles of the British Empire had not become as pervasive and as deep-rooted. The control of all of India had passed to the British crown just two years prior. But by the turn of the century, things had drastically changed as DVG records. Colonial England now began to send ¹⁵⁴ to India bureaucrats of the following standard.

*The average Englishman in India to-day is a wage-earner or profit-seeker, pure and simple. His pride of race is too vulgar…his sense of self-interest is…too gross…to allow…chivalry. He cannot be a liberal-hearted aristocrat and he will not be an unreserved democrat. Persons of this description abound in all branches of Indian public service…Their prejudices and perversities are well known; and in the administration…they naturally disappoint the general public…[they are]intellectual mediocrities [bereft of] any lofty idealism or virtue. They are office-hunters…and sun-dried bureaucrats. *

Worse was the fact that such bureaucrats became the tutors of the Princes of the Native States, professing to teach them nuances of governance and administration. The consequences were entirely predictable as we shall see.

Notes

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[[The Profit-Seeking British Bureaucracy and the Personal Vanity of the Princes Source: prekshaa]]

Indeed, DVG himself had a firsthand taste of the real-life workings of this imperious British bureaucracy. The indefatigable imperialist, Sir Henry Cobb was the Resident of the Mysore State from 1916-20. A well-known foe of the freedom struggle and the nationalist spirit that was surging throughout British India, he kept a tight watch over similar sentiments spilling over to Mysore. One day at around four in the evening, he paid a surprise visit to the public library ¹⁵⁵ at Cubbon Park. When he saw copies of The Bombay Chronicle, and Annie Beasant’s New India—both were highly influential publications and organs of the freedom movement—he erupted with fury and yelled at the staff: “Why are you subscribing to these poisonous tracts? Throw them out right now!”

An hour later when DVG paid his customary visit to the library, he learned what had happened. The very next day, he wrote a scathing editorial in the Karnataka: “What right does this British Resident have to interfere in this institution established by the Mysore Government for the public benefit of the citizens of Mysore? Who is he to meddle in this matter?”

In response, an incensed Cobb wrote to the Government directing it to punish the Karnataka paper. The Diwan, Sir M. Visvesvaraya sent Cobb’s letter to D.V.G through his secretary. DVG remained unfazed, unapologetic.

DVG dedicates an entire, brilliant section titled Education of the Princes that details ¹⁵⁶ the sort of education that the Princes were getting at the hands of the aforementioned British bureaucrats. Indeed, they could “train a Prince to be everything but a constitutional ruler.” But what did they become? DVG answers:

[The Prince] might become a good Shikhar, a fine “society” man, an amiable post-prandial orator, a pompous stickler for ceremonies, and…a veritable incarnation of obstinacy in his dealings with his ministers. Nurtured upon the traditions of bureaucracy, and scrupulously shut out from the liberalizing influences of history, of the philosophy of politics, and of the literatures of modern national and democratic movements—it is small wonder that many a Prince suffers from a narrow outlook upon life and from an exaggerated notion of his own importance. These feelings naturally beget in him a partiality for honey-mouthed courtiers; and therein begin the troubles for his subjects.

This stark criticism of both the British bureaucracy and the Princes has to be seen in a twofold context. The first was the incredibly high standards of governance, and sturdy administrative precedents that the earlier Diwans of Mysore had set. This process roughly began with stalwart Diwans like C.V. Rungacharlu and ended with the ascendancy of Sir Mirza Ismail, a period of about sixty years. As we have seen in the earlier chapters, Visvesvaraya’s resignation ushered in an era where these high standards were gradually diluted and the gradual decline of the Mysore State began. Added to this was the aforementioned sort of bureaucrats that the British thrust upon Mysore. DVG rues this situation in his characteristic style.

The [British] tutor should not be a member of the “heaven-born service” [the ICS]…with an axe to grind and…he should be a man devoted to study and thought, possessed of liberal culture and ripe experience…Such were Rangacharlu and Madhava Rao; and the luminous addresses which the latter delivered for the benefit of the Princes of Travancore on the science of government and the art of statecraft are models of lessons that should be instilled into the minds of kings.

The second aspect relates to the tidal flood of changes unleashed in British India by the freedom movement. DVG was an eyewitness to the kind of energy, leadership and national renaissance that this movement produced. He also noted with anxious melancholy and righteous indignation that the Princely States not only ignored all this but, in many cases, actively fought it. In that respect, DVG was perfectly justified when he repeatedly remarked that the Native States were indeed truly loyal to the British. The final goal and aspiration of this loyalty was ¹⁵⁷ to “gain nothing more substantial than rank and precedence and title to feed their own personal vanity.” This is reminiscent of Diwan Rangacharlu’s early warning, which ¹⁵⁸ DVG quotes:

The weakness of a native Samsthanam is that, instead of the affairs of the People, the Palace becomes the chief object of thought and the governing principle.

Thus, by the time DVG wrote his renowned memorials to the Bikaner Maharaja, things had already gone far downhill. The Princely States which had been famed just three decades ago as the sanctuaries and refuges of art and literature were now ¹⁵⁹ “conspicuous for their intellectual inanition and soullessness.” Even worse,

Among the greatest names of Modern India, not even one can be claimed by a Native State as its own. Our greatest politicians, public workers, historians, scientists, lawyers, orators, poets and novelists…all belong to some part or other of British India.

DVG spoke from experience. Included in his list of acquaintances and circle of friends were luminaries such “Right Honourable” V.S. Srinivasa Sastri, Sir S. Subrahmaniya Iyer, and Sir P.S. Shivaswamy Iyer, who had attained a mellow blend of the culturally-rooted Hindu life and contemporary Western learning. In addition, DVG was also keenly aware of the value and contributions of titans such as Jadunath Sarkar, J.C. Bose, Dadabhai Naoroji, Pherozeshah Mehta, and Rabindranath Tagore about whom he wrote with great respect. As he notes, not one of these names hailed from the Princely States. However, this was not always the case.

Three decades ago when there was a keen rivalry between “natives” and outsiders for distinction in practical statecraft, and when men had to act in the light of their own independent judgement and had no precedent to follow, the States were able to produce…first-rate administrators and statesmen. But…the Dewan of to-day is generally a glorified clerk or a fussy amateur, or a hardened British Indian bureaucrat.

This bureaucracy had no power to produce ¹⁶⁰ a “succession of Seshadri Iyers.” Instead, it had a self-power to make itself “doubly hateful and intolerable.” On the contrary, the Princely States had reached such a nadir that they had to import Diwans and officials from British India, a pathetic phenomenon that DVG acidly ¹⁶¹ censures:

The State that, after decades of education…is still unable to produce its own Dewan and councilors, is either confessing its poverty in brainpower and character, or is condemning its own policy of the past.

Invariably, these imported bureaucrats were drawn from the ICS, which DVG dreaded from the bottom of his heart. In his words, these officers were “alien birds of passage and of prey.” However, as we have seen earlier, majority of the Princely States were not only content with such a bureaucracy but pretty much handed over the reins of administration to it.

As a civilisationally-rooted political philosopher speaking the tongue of a modern democrat, DVG foresaw two major dangers inherent in this fossilized autocracy of the Princely States. One, while the specific peculiarities and local conditions of each Princely State hugely differed from the other, the Princely States converged in the realm of problems and threats they faced precisely due to these conditions. Second, if the Princely States allowed the sweeping changes and turbulences that were occurring in British India to bypass them, their plight would become truly piteous when the British left. Which is exactly what happened.

But before we reach that phase of history, we can examine the nature and some details of solutions that DVG recommended so that the Princely States could reform their present condition.

Notes

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Seshadri Iyer was among the more eminent and farsighted Diwans of Mysore who pioneered an extraordinary range of reforms and development activities whose fruits the state of Karnataka continues to enjoy. He initiated the hydroelectric project at Shivanasamudra, the first in Asia. He is also known as the Maker of Modern Bangalore, among other distinctions.

[[DVG’s Severe Rebuttal to the Nehru Report of 1928 Source: prekshaa]]

Writing in the aftermath of the Nehru Report of 1928, DVG made a contrast with the Princely ¹⁶² States:

*The Princes may give…benevolent administration, efficient administration, occasionally even responsive administration; but that, taken even at its very best, cannot prove half so good…to the people as a system…which, instead of looking for gifts and charity, they are obliged to think for themselves…The wise parent is not he who keeps the child always a child, but he who…allows the child to grow into a man capable of looking after himself. This lesson, our Princes have not yet learnt; and they do not seem willing to learn either. *

This was yet another among the countless wake-up calls that DVG sounded to the Princely States in an effort to set their house in order. A slight detour is necessary in this context.

Published in August 1928, the Nehru Report was essentially a memorandum to the British Government appealing for a new Dominion Status for India, calling for a federal setup of government for the Constitution of India. Key signatories to the Report included Motilal and Jawaharlal Nehru, Tej Bahadur Sapru, Subash Chandra Bose, M.R. Jayakar, and G.R. Pradhan. The Nehru Report was also akin to a protest against the unilateral British policy which said that only the British Parliament had the power to decide the timing and the nature of the development of a constitution for India. Despite the Government of India Act of 1935, this unilateral policy continued till the Cripps Declaration of 1942.

However, a key element in the Nehru Report was the complete exclusion of the Princely States from its purview.

First, it defined ¹⁶³ “Dominion Status” in unambiguous terms:

India shall have the same constitutional status in the community of nations, known as the British Empire, as the Dominion of Canada, the Commonwealth of Australia, the Dominion of New Zealand, the Union of South Africa and the Irish Free State, with a Parliament having powers to make laws for the peace, order and good government of India, and an executive responsible to that Parliament; and shall be styled and known as the Commonwealth of India.

And then, it was equally unambiguous about the exact status it accorded to the Princely States:

The powers of Parliament with respect to foreign affairs, not including the Indian States*, shall be the same as exercised by the self-governing dominions… The Commonwealth shall exercise the same rights in relation to, and discharge the same obligations towards, the Indian States, arising out of treaties or otherwise, as the Government of India has hitherto exercised and discharged.*

Even worse,

Foreign and external relations including relations with States in India and political charges; domicile, naturalisation and aliens; passports; and pilgrimages beyond India.

For the first time, the Nehru Report called for a reorganization of (British) Indian Provinces along linguistic lines. In substance, the Report unmistakably, defined “India” by completely omitting the Princely States based on the reasoning we have seen earlier.

DVG denounced it by writing ¹⁶⁴ a severe rebuttal entitled Indian States and the National Congress. Once again, it was not merely a rebuttal but a balanced perspective that called out the Congress Party’s highhandedness and sounded an alarm to the Princely States (quoted above). Here is a sample ¹⁶⁵ from his salvo:

there used to be a time when the Congress “National” (with a big “N”)…was not less punctilious than its very adversary, the bureaucracy of the Indian Government, in tabooing the States as “foreign territory.”

In like vein, he asks whether the Princely States “can come into the Congress without violating their treaties…with Britain only if the Congress agrees not to cut off the British tie.”

What this meant in practical terms was that the Congress could never declare full political independence as its goal because that would mean non-cooperation from the Princely States in the freedom struggle. The bind was clear: the Princely States viewed the Congress as a threat to their quasi-independent political existence while the Congress saw them as barriers to independence from British rule. Yet, on more occasions than can be counted, the Congress top leadership led by Mohandas Gandhi did not shy away from taking money ¹⁶⁶ from the same Princes and Maharajas it frequently vilified.

DVG advocated the Golden Mean: he recommended creating a special Congress Department in the Princely States where members from each party could meet in a spirit of mutual trust, sort out differences and eventually arrive at some sort of solidarity. In this context, it is pertinent to recall once again, DVG’s criticism ¹⁶⁷ of Mohandas Gandhi’s egoism in the wake of the police firing at Vidurashwatha, near Kolar. Gandhi cited this sole instance as evidence of the total failure of the Mysore State and demanded that its administration be handed over to the Congress.

DVG’s other remedy to ameliorate the conditions of the Princely States was a tireless advocacy of self-education and spreading awareness of the workings of democracy among its people. His conviction was that when this method was introduced in a gradual and systematic fashion by the ruler himself, it would eventually lead to Responsible Government ¹⁶⁸ in its truest sense. Among other things, DVG’s advocacy stemmed from his own experiences with press censorship and other minor repressions in the Mysore State. This will be discussed in a separate chapter.

DVG regarded ¹⁶⁹ the Princely States as schools for statesmanship and wrote an entire section dedicated to its exposition. Among other things, he called upon the rulers to infuse in their subjects ¹⁷⁰ a “restless spirit of patriotic aspiration and the political sense that comes with it” as the “necessary pre-conditions of true and lasting national progress.”

Rays of Hope

DVG’s dogged championing of and the expertise he had built up on the subject of the Princely States began to bear fruit. Over time, several Maharajas foresaw and grasped the inevitability of democracy in India as a whole. They also understood the future reality that their own states wouldn’t be immune to it. By the mid-to-late 1920s, some Maharajas began to actively seek DVG’s advice regarding administrative reforms in their kingdoms. For instance, when the Maharaja of the Paltan Princely State requested Sir M Visveswaraya’s advice in this matter, the latter entrusted this job to DVG. The Maharaja not only appreciated DVG’s recommendations, he implemented a majority of them and maintained a close correspondence with DVG till the very end. This apart, we have already seen some details of the Memorials that DVG wrote to the Maharaja of Bikaner. These Memorials were precisely what catapulted the Maharaja to national and international fame.

DVG was a much sought-after speaker, scholar and expert in a series of high-powered conferences held at various periods to discuss the problems of the Princely States. These include but are not limited to:

• The People’s Assembly of the Princely States, 1921. - The People’s Conference of South Indian States, May 1925 in Pune. - The All India States People’s Representative Conference, December 1927 in Mumbai. DVG was appointed as the representative of the South Indian Princely States. - The South Indian Princely States Conference, 1929 in Travancore.

Of special note is the laudatory recommendation given by “Right Honourable” V.S. Srinivasa Sastri testifying DVG’s prowess on the anvil of the second session of the All India States’ Subjects’ Conference and South Indian States’ People’s Conference that was scheduled to be held in Bangalore in early 1930. Written in beautiful cursive handwriting, Sastri’s recommendation ¹⁷¹ was addressed to M.R. Jayakar, a powerful Congress leader and freedom fighter, and reads as follows:

My dear Jayakar,
Let me commend Mr. D.V. Gundappa to you. He is a good man and keen student of public affairs. What he doesn’t know of Indian States isn’t worth knowing. He is getting up a meeting in this place [Bangalore] of people interested in the States, which is likely to advance the cause we have at heart…

What is more important than Sastri’s endorsement is the timing of DVG’s proposed conference, which reveals his unsleeping vision over national issues. The objective of the aforementioned second session was the “attainment of responsible government in all Indian States and…securing…an equitable place for the States in the future Constitution of India.” The reason the year 1930 was chosen is highly illuminating in light of three important developments that had just occurred. The Simon Commission had made an announcement that its “scope…was extended so as to include questions pertaining to…the Indian States.” Second, after the Commission submitted its report, it intended to have a Round Table Conference to which representatives of the Indian States would be invited. Third, the Butler Committee had published a report “regarding the position of the States.” That was enough for DVG to seize the opportunity to reinforce the appeal of the Princely States by calling for yet another conference of the states.

In this context, it is also highly relevant to narrate DVG’s brilliant arguments making the case for the Mysore State before the Butler Committee.

Notes

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[[The Ultimate Failure of a Three-Decade-Long Struggle Source: prekshaa]]

To be sure, recognizing DVG’s proven expertise in the subject, the Mysore Princely State requested DVG to put forward arguments on its behalf before the Butler Committee. But much before the actual meeting took place, DVG had already written a critique noting that its Terms of Reference ¹⁷² had a lacuna.

When the Committee met, a member, Holdsworth had this question for the Mysore State: “You said that once the citizens of the Princely State are granted constitutional rights, the responsibility of the British Government ends. However, when the people of the state do not carry on the administration effectively, shouldn’t the British government step in?”

DVG: “The citizens here are aware of their own interests much better than others. If they commit an error due to lack of experience, they will correct themselves. This self-education is also an organ of Responsible Government.”

Butler & Holdsworth: “So you say that Responsible Government is the best among all administrative methods?”

DVG: “Isn’t this the same view of British Parliament? How can that administrative system which is regarded as the best for the British, be improper for British India? Of late, we have the instance of H.G. Wells and others critcising British democracy. In spite of that criticism, my faith in the British system hasn’t diminished.”

Sydney Peal: “Do you mean to say that all the subjects of all Princely States should become part of British India?”

DVG: “I did not say that. My argument is that the people of the Princely States are deserving of the rights available to the citizens of British India. Taking cognizance of this is an important step in the direction of the country’s constitutional reorganization.”

This is but a mere tidbit ¹⁷³ of DVG’s political prowess both within closed-door committees and outside. Both in theory and practice. We observe the same prowess in his critiques of the Chamber of Princes and the Council of Princes.

The Chamber of Princes or the Narendra Mandal was an overarching institution established by the royal proclamation of King George V in 1920. It was originally meant to be a platform where the rulers of the Princely States could voice their needs, aspirations and present their problems to the colonial Government of British India. In hindsight, the formation of the Chamber appeared to be a major breakthrough in the relationship of the British crown with the Princely States. Until its formation, the British crown kept the Princely States isolated from one another and also from the rest of the world. This policy was among the major points that DVG condemned the British policy towards the States when he said that “the character of Native States has baffled the classificatory skill of all writers on international law.”

The first meeting of the Chamber occurred on 8 February 1921 and from then onwards, met once annually with the Viceroy presiding. The Chamber convened at the Sansad Bhavan, which is today the Parliament Library.

In the first meeting, the Chamber comprised only 120 members. Of these, 108 members hailed from the significant states. The remaining twelve seats were for representation of a further 127 states. This meant that a whopping 327 seats were left unrepresented due to various reasons. A key reason was the refusal of some states to join the Chamber. These states included the powerful kingdoms of Baroda, Gwalior, and Holkar. Till the Chamber of Princes was finally disbanded in 1947, its meetings, operations and its entire trajectory was largely chaotic resulting in precious little good.

The final essence of these critiques of DVG with regard to the Chambers and Councils lies in his own call for federalism ¹⁷⁴ as “the only principle” to end the “peculiar feature” of the people of the Princely States who had “a double government, a double allegiance, a double patriotism.” Even worse ¹⁷⁵,

…in India, there is no authority, moral or legal, to which an injured Native State may appeal for redress as against the agents of the Supreme Power, who are far removed from the scrutinizing eye and controlling hand of the Parliament. The laws that govern the relations of the Government of India with the Native States are not fixed or defined; and the Governor-General’s powers in this matter are almost unlimited.

DVG thus envisages his federalism as a system that has a States’ Council “expressive of the general will of our Native States.” He is also cautious and aware of practical realities when he says that this States’ Council must not be equated with the “Upper House of any country.” And then he unambiguously delineates ¹⁷⁶ its exact character and function:

…the States’ Council of India will stand by itself, speaking for a territory and a population quite different from those which find their spokesmen in the Governor-General’s Legislative Council. This diversity of the interests represented respectively by the two legislative and advisory bodies of India is only…to recommend their simultaneous constitution, inasmuch as either of them could not by itself stand for all sides of India’s political life—whereas between themselves they could cover up the entire field of Indian interests.

This may be best described as an enlightened Federalism. Like we have observed numerous times earlier, this recommendation-cum-solution once again shows how DVG was steeped in the cultural unity and civilizational indivisibility of Bharatavarsha.

Neither does he stop at this.

DVG offers both this theoretical background and practical working details of the States’ Council. Just as how we remarked in the first chapter that his Rajyashastra and Rajyangatattvagalu was a combined user manual to run the administration of an entire country, DVG’s treatise on the States’ Council could have ideally become a similar manual on sculpting a non-acrimonious harmony among British India, the Princely States and between the Princely States themselves. His vision of the States’ Council also includes a concrete working arrangement that he elaborates ¹⁷⁷ in four steps and concludes with a draft Constitution of the States’ Council. Here are some highlights ¹⁷⁸ of this Constitution.

As to its numerical strength, it may bear to the British Indian Supreme Council the same proportion that the Senate bears to the House of Representatives in the Australian Commonwealth: 1 to 2. Taking the number suggested by the [Indian National] *Congress as the proper standard for the British Indian Council—namely 150, the membership of the States’ Council may be 75 strong. *

The climax of DVG’s tour de force is a visual chart titled, The Constitution of the Council in which he computes the allocation of seats in the States’ Council as follows:

StatesCouncil.jpeg

Finally, DVG once again throws ¹⁷⁹ the ball of conscience in the British court when he says that the formation of the States’ Council—or in general, any arrangement that harmonises the diverse and disparate conditions of India as a whole—was a “challenge offered to British liberalism by history.”

****

Like notable tragedies in DVG’s illustrious life, his three-decade-long advocacy of the Princely States with a view to concordantly blend them into British India thereby reuniting an ancient civilization, ended in failure. DVG valued the Princely States as a civilizational good irrespective of the pit their rulers had flung them into. These States were the harbingers and the upholders of all that was noble, virtuous and valuable in the Sanatana spiritual and cultural tradition.

The world of the Princely States had irreversibly changed for the worse by 1947. As DVG himself notes later, the slackening had begun much earlier in his beloved Mysore State itself, roughly after Mirza Ismail became the Diwan, as we have seen earlier in this chapter. The State’s grip over the administration had weakened and the forces of mindless agitation heightened divisiveness. If this was the condition in a state ruled by a Rajarshi (Sagely King) like Krishnaraja Wodeyar IV and genuinely constitutional monarchs, the situation in other states were much worse.

Thus, when the Ministry of States ¹⁸⁰ was established in May 1947 to deal with the integration of the Princely States in the soon-to-be-independent India, it was just a matter of time before the final denouement.

The Ministry of States was also the last leg of DVG’s attempts to somehow salvage the position of and stress the value of the Princely States to the citizens of the newly-independent Republic of India. In this, he directly locked horns with Sardar Patel and his lieutenant, V.P. Menon.

Notes

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[[DVG’s Blistering Criticism of the States’ Ministry Source: prekshaa]]

The Ministry of States or the States Department was the new avatar, or a mere renaming of the British Government’s Political Department, which was in charge of administering and managing the relationship of the British crown with British India and the Princely States. The Political Department exercised its power on the basis of paramountcy as long as the British ruled India. Shorn of its veneer of formal politeness, paramountcy was in reality, a naked exercise of unchecked imperial power. That imperial power was now in the hands of Indian leaders of an ostensible new democracy and a free nation.

Today, it might sound incredible, but back then, the States’ Ministry was one of the most powerful ministries, second only to that of the Prime Minister given the fact it was wholly controlled by Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel who was also the country’s Deputy Prime Minister and Home Minister. Its administrative head was V.P. Menon, the Sardar’s most trusted aide.

The States’ Ministry was synonymously known as the Sardar’s Ministry.

The manner in which both Sardar Patel and V.P. Menon went about integrating the 562 Princely States into the Indian Union led DVG to suspect whether the States’ Ministry was the replacement ¹⁸¹ of the “old Political Department of the British Government, always sheltered in twilight and always moving mysteriously.”

DVG’s suspicion, nay, fear was based on the solid ground of the hard realities that were unfolding before him almost on a daily basis. Given how the problem of the Princely States was so dear to his heart and for which he had devoted one-thirds of his life, his trepidation was fully justified. Neither was the justification merely based on his emotional attachment towards it. There was a practical side to it, which roughly falls under three categories:

1. History and value 2. Propriety and procedure 3. The Ultimate goal

We have already seen in some detail DVG’s brilliant expositions on the history of the Princely States and their unmatched and irreplaceable value as repositories of the finest cultural traditions of ancient India. Likewise, we have also discussed DVG’s proposed solutions on how they could best be integrated into the new Indian Union: a gradual introduction of democracy through a graceful application of constitutional monarchy leading to a true Responsible Government in the States.

However, in hindsight, what happened in practice was nothing short of chaos.

The integration of the Princely States was accomplished in utter haste, throwing propriety and procedure to the winds and done in the kindred spirit of the British who had imposed debilitating treaties and conditions on the Princely States barely two centuries ago. DVG narrates the details of this ungainly “accomplishment” in the Public Affairs journal beginning from the February 1949 issue up to the February 1954 issue. His arguments were so compelling, forceful and devoted to the highest standards of integrity that V.P. Menon himself had to write an elaborate paper titled Relationship between the Centre and the States, a defense of sorts in the January-February 1959 issue of the journal.

***

In one sense, DVG’s blistering criticism on the functioning of the States’ Ministry was a continuation of and reflects the same sense of the equanimous balance that characterizes all his pre-independence writings on the Princely States. Accordingly, he praises Sardar Patel for his sternness in dealing with the Princes and his decisive action of liberating Hyderabad from the Nizam’s stranglehold. Simultaneously, he takes a highly objective view ¹⁸² regarding the hardboiled obstinacy of the Princes and reminds them of the numerous opportunities they squandered in the past.

Since the time of the first Round Table Conference (I930) the Princes have been playing a game of hide-and-seek. Opportunity came to them several times, of taking the initiative for solving of India’s political problem. When the 1935 Act came, they jibbed. When Sir Stafford Cripps came, they stood aside. When the Cabinet Mission came, they tried to bargain and perpetuate their isolation. They would never come into the democratic currents of India’s nationalism*. If they had only been true to the ancient ideas of Hindu kingship, they should, of their own accord, have seen 20 or at least 15 years ago the justice as well as the inevitability of the course which they have now had to adopt under pressure. They pinned their faith on the prospect of Britain’s permanence in India** and could not foresee that their own country would some day shake off the foreign yoke and that their subjects would assert themselves…For their perversity of those days, the Princes have today to see their pride broken.*

The ancien regime was broken but the character, attitude and behaviour of its replacement is the question that is at the core of DVG’s critique. Its replacement was, in Sardar Patel’s words ¹⁸³, the recognition of the “aspiration of the people” and the introduction of “a constitution in which all powers would be transferred to the people.” While DVG does not doubt the intent or truth of Patel’s words, he marshals a pointed counter, worth reading in some detail ¹⁸⁴ for its insight:

Integrating the States with free India and getting responsible government proclaimed in the States is, however, only a part of the task that needed accomplishing…Securing efficient and progressive administration is the other part. Sterilizing autocracy is its negative aspect; the positive aspect is the creation of a sensible and strong democracy. The place vacated by an autocratic Prince is not automatically filled by a good democracy…Who is to manage affairs when democracy is still preparing? This is a question which those who wish well by the…States have got to face.

Democracy is still preparing are words worth their weight in gold. Even seventy-two years after DVG wrote them. As he writes ¹⁸⁵ on countless occasions elsewhere (in both Kannada and English), the democracy that existed in non-Princely States even after India attained political independence was partycracy, in which the Congress Party was indistinguishable from the Government of India. Given this reality, DVG was unsure whether Congress ministers and the bureaucracy was competent or qualified enough to handle a highly complex issue like the smooth introduction of Responsible Government in the Princely States. He had support for this view from some distinguished quarters as well. He quotes a 1948 radio lecture ¹⁸⁶ from the retired ICS officer, S.V. Ramamurti:

The immediate introduction of responsible government without time or machinery to establish the good administration which must sustain self-government had produced dissatisfaction in several States, so that the people there were led…to wonder whether the change in rulership had…done any good. But the pace and manner of the change needed to be reconsidered…

The number of competent men for leadership was small. Of those who were available, few could rise above selfishness, petty-mindedness and the desire to exercise personal patronage among friends, relations and followers.
The States Ministry had now found that the vested interests of Rulers had been replaced by the vested interests of Ministers and that the autocratic ulcers of India which Sardar Patel sought to avoid might be replaced by democratic ulcers.

To DVG, this was a flagrant violation of every tenet and principle of public life he espoused. In the name of integrating the States, the States’ Ministry not only did not behave in a courteous fashion but ran roughshod. Sardar Patel’s stern treatment in demanding the accession of the Princely States should have ideally concluded after they merged with the Indian Union. The near despotic measures that his States’ Ministry imposed on these States and the boorish manner it treated their former rulers was completely unconstitutional and is still symptomatic of the pervasive rot in our bureaucracy.

An incensed DVG observes ¹⁸⁷ that the whole business of mergers and integrations has proceeded

in avoidance of democratic practice. The course followed by the States Ministry has not behind it any explicit plan or programme previously approved by the Constituent Assembly*…in some States which can now boast of “responsible ministries,” the Ministers are men of the Congress Party and…dubbed as “puppets…”*

Not stopping at that, DVG characterizes the States’ Ministry’s actions as a “virtual revolution,” repeating his warning that such abrasive methods would erect a new “Delhian Paramountcy in place of the old British Paramountcy.” The Delhi of independent India should not be the seat of a “new Imperialism,” but should be the “centre of our new nationalism.” He further throws the gauntlet to Sardar Patel in two important areas. The first, Patel’s States’ Ministry “should itself be an institution above the reach of suspicion and sure of public confidence.” In the second, he indirectly asks whether Patel was willing to be “critical even of supposedly Congressist Ministries and unhesitant to correct them.” As history reveals, these are grey areas in the otherwise commendable achievement of Sardar Patel’s mammoth exercise of the merger of the Princely States. In Patel’s defence, it could be argued that the criticisms levelled by DVG were collateral damage. Yet, DVG’s criticism was based not on blind advocacy of a pet cause but on proven realities that he witnessed during this exercise—on the ground, in the behavior of bureaucrats, speeches of Congress leaders, and voluminous documents.

Notes

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[[When the Princely States Faced the Death Sentence Source: prekshaa]]

A chief factor that characterized the arbitrary nature of and the “revolutionary” approach followed by the States’ Ministry was to perpetually shift the goalposts through random announcements and haphazard policy revisions. DVG cites numerous such instances and we can cull out only the most illustrative ones here.

Thus, he quotes ¹⁸⁸ Nehru’s interview to Daily Mail dated 11 April 1949 as saying:

It ought not to be difficult to fit a republic into the framework of the (monarchical) commonwealth.

And turns it on its head:

Obversely, can it not be held:–“It ought not to be difficult to fit a monarchical State into the framework of a republic either?” The Constituent Assembly has decided once for all that the national polity of India is to be a republic. Why should not the same Assembly be asked to decide whether an inner monarchy would he out of place within the periphery of a republic?

DVG’s arguments, while focusing on the technicalities, procedure and due process also have a profoundly ethical marker. He observes how before Independence, Congress leaders “held out assurances to the Princes as to the political and territorial integrity of their States and their autonomy in matters not absolutely essential for the purposes of the national government.” But with the formation of and the manner in which the States’ Ministry behaved, the “position has changed radically.” The conclusion of this ethics-based argument can only be summarized bluntly—there is no polite way of saying it.

1. The Congress leaders nonchalantly broke their solemn promise to the Princes. 2. The deciding authority, i.e. the Constituent Assembly itself had become a whimsical body in dealing with the Princely States.

DVG described the situation as a neo-paramountcy.

On the same day that Nehru gave his aforementioned interview, the States’ Ministry announced a new policy. Accordingly,

1. Advisors were appointed to the States. 2. There would be dual responsibility in the administration of the States. 3. Standardised Constitutions would be implemented in the States.

On the surface, this would pose no problem. However, DVG correctly saw through this new ruse from Delhi. These advisors were, to recall his memorable phrase, “sun-dried bureaucrats” who neither had empathy for nor understood the local nuances of the States they were sent to advise. This confusion was further compounded by the fact that Delhi had also decreed having two sets of such advisors: one for the Rajpramukh and the other for “popular Ministries.” However, it didn’t end there. The definition of who a Rajpramukh was varied from state to state. Suffice to say that with regard to Princely States, the Maharaja was the Rajpramukh (the office was abolished in 1956 and was loosely supplanted with that of the Governor). In hindsight, a reasonable case can be made that this threefold policy was, in reality, engineered chaos. Thus, DVG who observed all this at such close quarters wrote ¹⁸⁹ with undisguised anger that they were not advisers but paralysers.

*…the worst of the Adviser system is that it tends to paralyse local authority and kill local initiative…The States Ministry’s proposal smacks of the old imperialist suzerainty, with its system of Residents and Political Agents playing the part of policemen. That the new Advisers will be servants of the State Government is no mitigation…On the contrary, it makes the Adviser’s position the more irksome. He must eat the salt of the Rajpramukh…but take orders from the Ministry of the Sardar in Delhi. In the event of a difference between the two parties, to whom should the Adviser render loyalty? *

To bolster this stark situation that was unfolding, DVG compares the Adviser system with that of the Imperial British system concluding that there was little if no difference between the two. In doing so, he draws from the fount of recent history and his own lived experience of that era in an enlightened State like Mysore. The entire passage ¹⁹⁰ deserves to be quoted at length.

This [the system of Advisers] *is reminiscent of Clause 22 of the Mysore Instrument of Transfer of 1881 which required that “the Maharaja shall at all times conform to such advice as the Governor General in Council may offer him.” The British Resident in Mysore was then the Adviser acting under instructions from Calcutta or Delhi…the need for this “advice…” never arose in Mysore in **its sixty and more years’ history since that date…*Mysore was fortunate in its Dewans and its Maharajas. Their ability and their patriotism were always such that they could afford to snap their fingers at the Residents. But such luck is not common. And the “Adviser” technique…was of no help to any but the holders of those offices and those who could afford to buy them up. If that technique had succeeded…there should have remained no States’ problem. Will the new “Adviser” technique of Sardar Patel fare better?

The answer that History gives to DVG’s last question is in the negative. Rather, it has proven that DVG’s prediction was nightmarishly correct that the Adviser system gave “opportunists and adventurers their life’s best chance to do well by their dear private selves.” Neither was it DVG’s case that all Advisers were opportunists. There were indeed honest and well-meaning Advisers but their bureaucratic outlook was their greatest impediment, a classic illustration of the road to hell being paved with good intentions. DVG cites ¹⁹¹ the case of none less than Sardar Patel’s confidant, V.P. Menon in truly unflattering terms.

If the present adviser to the States Ministry (Mr. V.P. Menon) has ever had any experience of executive administration, the public…are not aware of it. A clever handler of Secretariat files (which he is said to be) is not necessarily the man with a first-hand knowledge of…executive administration and insight into its requirements. The sporting yachtsman is not necessarily the sea-diver to tell us of the marine world.

As the overarching hand of the States’ Ministry expanded and enlarged with each day with greater brazenness and impunity, DVG observed how a virtual coup was executed in scores of States. In this regard, the sections titled Standardization and Some Suggestions in the April 1949 issue of Public Affairs deserve close reading. Public opinion was neither sought not cared for when it was given. DVG terms ¹⁹² this situation as one which was “not the fulfilment of a people’s mandate constitutionally expressed.” Quoting the press report of the States’ Ministry dated 18 March 1949 with regard to Mysore, this ¹⁹³ is what DVG writes:

A report of the States Ministry…has been quoted in the Press…as saying: – “As regards Mysore…the policy to be adopted is receiving attention.” Is Mysore a merely passive recipient of the “attention” or an active participant therein? Who acts on her behalf and with what authority?”

Thus, by April - May 1949, DVG was convinced that the ultimate goal of the States Ministry was not the integration but the complete annihilation of the Princely States and likens their current condition as facing the death sentence.

Concomitant with the integration of Princely States was the other side of the same coin: the political reorganization of India on linguistic lines.

Notes

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[[The Finale: DVG’s Unforgiving Assessment of Sardar Patel and V.P. Menon Source: prekshaa]]

This political reorganization of India meant redrawing the map of India by erasing old boundaries and creating new ones on the basis of the widely familiar reasoning: language. As we have noted earlier, this reasoning had its origins in the Nehru Report of 1928. However, in practice, this meant the erasure of the centuries’-long unwritten cultural and local customs, usages, traditions, and norms in the 562 Princely States. In other words, the linguistic reorganization of independent India was accomplished by slaughtering countless cultural strands that had invisibly strung the society together as a functioning, cohesive whole. As a direct consequence, thousands of art forms, crafts, festivals, practices, and other unifying bonds vanished in less than half a century. On the political plane, this aggressive implementation of India’s political reorganization annihilated the well-oiled political institutions that had survived not only the successive waves of Islamic invasions and regimes but had withstood even the shocks of British colonial rule. From Rajasthan to Bengal, from Haryana to Tamil Nadu, this unbroken political system originating from say, the Mauryan period, was undone in one brutal stroke. For a majestic and detailed exposition of this subject, the iconic Dharampal’s Panchayat Raj and India’s Polity is an invaluable source work.

A week prior to Nehru’s aforementioned interview with Daily Mail, New Delhi had launched another missile in the form of the Nehru-Patel-Pattabhi Report on Linguistic Provinces dated 5 April 1949. DVG immediately published ¹⁹⁴ his unreserved contempt for it, which needs to be quoted at some length.

The…Report observes:-­“Kerala and Karnataka Provinces can be brought about not by a merger of the present Provincial areas into the States, but by the reverse process and must entail the virtual disappearance of these States…”
*What is “virtual disappearance” as distinguished from disappearance simple and unqualified? Will any vestige of the erstwhile statehood be left behind? If so, why so?… it is unfortunate in the extreme that the dangerous undesirability of keeping the people of the States…on tenterhooks did not occur to the minds of our illustrious leaders. *

***

The half-century-history of India after Independence is just one massive lump of the history of unrest. The appalling civil war during the partition is still a festering wound and a Brobdingnagian memory because of the engulfing scale of its violence and tragedy. However, the recurrent clashes, strife, death and destruction in what remained of the original India throughout the period from 1947 up to 1993 is comparable in number—if not intensity—to the partition. We could go a step further and claim that India has never known a decade of peace since it attained political freedom. In many ways, this is what V.S. Naipaul referred to when he spoke of India as a land of a million mutinies.

Apart from the calculated violence unleashed by the Communists, the initial roots of this unrest arguably lie in the reorganization of states. The “illustrious leaders” that DVG refers to had unwittingly created a two-headed monster. On the one hand, the smash-and-grab action by the States’ Ministry left a trail of discontent, protests and violence in various Princely States. On the other, the linguistic scheme birthed an even bloodier consequence: large-scale riots citizens that threatened to hurl the new republic into instability.

We can briefly examine both these aspects.

The journalist in DVG reports ¹⁹⁵ how this diarchic system of Delhi did not have the “complete approval of the whole population” in the Princely States. For example, the unilateral dissolution of the Princely States of Baroda, Bikaner, Cochin, Travancore and Pudukottah (Pudukottai) resulted in protests throughout these lands. Then he notes how trouble had also started in “Vindhya and Matsya ¹⁹⁶ regions, and how underground activity had begun in “Madhya…and Greater Rajasthan…far too great to be able to live in comfort…explosive ingredients are forcibly huddled up in its womb.” Thus, it surprises DVG that Sardar Patel is unaware of all these disturbances when he declares the exact opposite. According to Patel, the high-handed appropriation of Baroda, Bikaner, Travancore, etc was “the unanimous wish of the…States!” DVG is not ¹⁹⁷ fooled.

This shows that the Sardar would like the public to believe that the States Ministry is keeping an open mind and would be ready to take guidance from public opinion…so much of open propagandizing by V.P. Menon!…Things achieved by coups have, however, a way of turning into fiascos when not supported by the deeper facts of the situation. Among such facts are the long-established geographical loyalties of men and the physical conditions and…peculiarities of the areas…
The States Ministry’s ostentation of concern…for the Princes and the States…[reminds]…one an ancient Nyaya (analogic maxim): Alamkritya Shirashchhedah: “The animal to be offered in sacrifice should first be painted with saffron, bedecked with flowers and worshipped…”
A man under sentence of death is not the man to be expected to put himself in the mood of valuing his life and planning for its development.

The sorry finale of the Princely States was reached in 1956 when these individual States as well as the system of voluntary unions of states (for example, the Chamber of Princes) was thoroughly dismantled and the position of Rajpramukh was abolished. A long and hoary tradition of Rajarshis like the Mysore Wodeyars, the Maharajas of Baroda and other truly enlightened rulers had, overnight, become subservient to a faceless democracy which in practice meant that they had to now bow down to Congress ministers and party leaders whose only distinction was Gandhian opportunism. The new states that were created along linguistic and ethnic lines on the rubble and the graves of the Princely States tore apart the traditional ties that had existed in the former Princely States.

Border disputes and linguistic fanaticism became the New Indian Order.

And so, when we examine the second head of the aforementioned monster, history shows us that it was rigidly malevolent in its impatience and stubbornly intractable in its demand. In reality, the demand for linguistic reorganization translated into political blackmail on the ground owing to a complex and noxious mix of opportunism, fanaticism, and vested interests. The British author, Michael Edwardes provides a highly incisive and riveting analysis ¹⁹⁸ of this sorry chapter of recent Indian history.

The boundaries created by integration of princely states with the old provinces of British India were generally assumed to be temporary. The essential criterion had been speedy integration not rationalization*… A commission of inquiry was set up and delivered its opinions at the end of 1948. The commission’s view was that things should be left as they were. The provinces of British India had the sanction of the years. It was recognized that the old boundaries contained dominant linguistic groups…No new boundaries could remedy this. The commission most strongly criticized the creation of linguistic states on the grounds that they would inspire linguistic and therefore local patriotisms which would inhibit the growth of a national consciousness…*

Sardar Patel’s death drastically altered the situation. Jawaharlal Nehru was now the unchallenged Caesar of both the Indian Government and the Congress Party. After the phenomenal victory of the Congress in the 1951 general elections, rumblings began in the Madras State. The then Chief Minister’s differences with “Lion of Andhra” Tangaturi Prakasam erupted into clashes between Tamil and Telugu speakers which soon manifested itself as a demand for a separate state for Telugu speakers.

Nehru’s government was in a bind: the Congress poll manifesto of 1951 had explicitly stated that “on the matter of states reorganisation, the democratic right of the people to express their opinion would be taken into consideration.” But now since the demand had been made, all that Nehru could muster on the weight of the aforementioned commission’s report was to thunder that he would “not be intimidated by such tactics.” But Potti Sriramulu, the well-respected leader of the Telugu people followed the Gandhian model and launched a fast unto death until a separate Telugu state was “given.” Not cowed down, Nehru roared that he would not “yield to blackmail.” But Potti Sriramulu actually died and Nehru’s bravado evaporated. He did an overnight volte face, declaring ¹⁹⁹ in Parliament that Sriramulu’s sacrifice was exemplary.

[Nehru’s] speech was an open invitation to extra-democratic pressure…it seemed to underline his capitulation to violence*…Nehru personally attended the inauguration of the new state of Andhra in October 1953**. The message was immediately read by other special-interest groups — the Government was susceptible to mass agitation**…Pressure built up so rapidly that less than three months after…the formation of Andhra, the Government announced the appointment of a States Reorganization Commission.*

The Commission submitted its report in October 1955. In its wake, widespread rioting and violence followed in Orissa, Bengal, Bihar, Bombay, Ahmedabad and Punjab. This, in a span less than a decade after India achieved Independence and was supposedly “united” politically. The first of a long series of language wars among Indians had begun. Tamil Nadu of course, stands as the most extreme example of this linguistic chauvinism.

The essence of this longish discussion is to underscore the fact that this multi-pronged internal disruptions after independence was the direct outcome of ignoring the warnings of stalwarts like DVG who had foreseen all these decades ago.

It can be reasonably argued that but for Sardar Patel’s hasty and maladroit measures in integrating the States, Indira Gandhi wouldn’t have gotten the confidence to virtually bulldoze whatever remained of the power and wealth of the Princes into despotic submission. This is not to unfairly belittle Patel by comparing him to Indira Gandhi, but as DVG says, to place his overall legacy in an objective context. This point gains greater clarity when we read the melancholic epilogue that Dr. S.L. Bhyrappa offers on the fate of the Princes under Prime Minister Indira Gandhi. In his fine autobiography, Bhitti, Dr. Bhyrappa vividly narrates how Congress leaders would routinely mooch off the Princes, treating their estates and palaces as their Congress-bestowed fiefdom, drinking copious amounts of expensive foreign liquor, and helping themselves to lavish banquets and various other forms of costly entertainment. In scores of cases, the Princes were forced to borrow enormous sums to fund these junkets. In others, some Princes had truly fallen into penury and maintained only a façade, just to keep up the pretensions of a royalty that an impulsive democracy had annexed. But in all cases, they had no alternative: their refusal to fund the neo-democratic plunderers would mean their literal ejection to the streets, something that was accomplished during the Emergency.

Finally, the Sardar’s indomitable will won the day but one-third of India’s landmass and one-fourth of its inhabitants that had sustained its unbroken cultural heritage and was largely insulated from the “Brown sahib” outlook towards life lost both territorial belongingness and its cultural inheritance. This is DVG’s unforgiving assessment ²⁰⁰ of this Patelesque finale.

In the end, what united the Princely States and British India was not the efforts of the Rajas and Maharajas. Neither was it the efforts of their subjects. It was the haughty blow delivered by the Congressites who had come to power. Mainly, it was Vallabhbhai Patel’s arrogant attitude. In reality, it did not occur in a smooth fashion that had the consent of both parties…Patel did not think that the patient and contentious path of due process was appropriate. Neither did he require it.
The wife’s phlegm-filled flu had enveloped her head. Fury had consumed the husband’s hand. When both clashed, the vexed problem profusely dripped down the nose…The diamond-studded nose-ring has been permanently lost in a rush to get rid of the dirt in the nose.
Did Princely States ever exist in India? The fact that this question is even being asked shows the extent to which they have been deformed and liquidated. If this was not enough, the regional borders that had existed for centuries on end have been chaotically littered under the guile of linguistic brotherhood. The old attachment to one’s local geography has been shattered. The new feeling of regional-love has remained elusive. The root of a Princely State as an institution is a kind of affectionate bond. Today, it has no place. While everybody is eager to grab the benefits of such an institution, nobody wants the quiet contemplation that births such an institution.

DVG’s assessment is akin to the Congress and Sardar Patel making a cruel mockery of not only his three-decade-long labours at achieving a smooth merger and harmonious transition but of this profound verse of Mankutimmana Kagga:

koḍugallanu hatti dūravanu noḻpaṃge ।
goḍegottugaḻenu? meḍu kuḻiyenu? ॥
noḍu nīnunnatadi niṃtu janajīvitava ।
māḍudārada manava - maṃkutimma ॥ 801 ॥
The one who climbs up the hill and looks far
Cannot make out the details of walls, gardens, holes.
Stand aloft and view the life of people where
Petty differences in people don’t matter anymore.
Expand your mind, accommodate magnanimity – Mankutimma

Notes

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[[DVG: The Pioneering Lodestar of Journalism Source: prekshaa]]

suṃdaravanesagu jīvanava sāhasadiṃde ।
kuṃdillavadake sāhasabhaṃgadiṃde ॥
muṃdakadu sāguvudu maraḻi sāhasadiṃde ।
ceṃda dhīrodyamave - maṃkutimma ॥ 269 ॥

Accomplish the beautiful in life with a spirit of adventure
When it yields no result, do not subdue the spirit
Proceed again with the same spirit of adventure for
Courage and adventure is what makes the world beautiful – Mankutimma ॥ 269 ॥

Journalism was not a profession I consciously chose. It came to me owing to the force and inevitability of circumstances. When I look back even today, I think I would have been more than content if I had a job that would pay me ₹ 10 -15 each month. I still feel that destiny commanded me to seek my food in this profession.

This was how DVG reminisced about his fortuitous entry into journalism after spending more than half a century as a journalist, editor, columnist and writer, contributing to an impressive array of newspapers, periodicals and special interest publications.

A close study of DVG’s literary and journalistic corpus reveals that destiny had indeed willed DVG into the arms of journalism. It could not have been otherwise given his childhood, upbringing, formative education, and the cultural environment ²⁰¹ he grew up in. All these factors separately and together had already instilled a high standard of inner refinement when he stood on the anvil of journalism. However, the circumstances that presaged his journalism are worth recounting on their own merits.

DVG did not distinguish himself in formal education, failing in the Matriculation examination in Kannada, Science, and Mathematics. And then, owing to dire family circumstances, he had to seek out a livelihood by 1905 at the mature age of eighteen. On December 3, 1905, DVG landed a clerical job at the shop of Haji Ismail Sait ²⁰² at Champion Reefs ²⁰³ at the Kolar Gold Fields. The job lasted for six months. Ismail Sait’s shop wrote the following certificate ²⁰⁴ of conduct when DVG quit on June 6, 1906:

This is to certify that Mr. D.V. Gundappa was working in the Department (Metal and Mine Store Department) as a clerk from 3-12-1905 to 6-6-1906 during which time his conduct was good, attendance regular and work satisfactory.

If DVG’s writings are distinctive for their uncompromising fidelity to truth, courage, objectivity and bluntness, it solely owes to his fiery spirit of independence whose roots lie in a profoundly spiritual realm. DVG himself provides the contours of this realm in his Journey of the Bird[5] where he invokes the fearless, carefree attitude of Bairagis, Yogis, monks, and Fakirs.

However, as an eighteen-year-old boy looking for a livelihood, this independent spirit manifested itself as an attempt to become an entrepreneur. The School of Arts run by the Madras Government announced its patronage to fund the development of the tin industry. DVG decided to try his hand at this and wrote to his father. The proposal was immediately shot down owing to objections steeped in tradition. Years later, DVG remarked that this rejection “shattered my industrial career.”

Returning to his hometown, Mulabagal, DVG worked for some time as a substitute teacher at the school. One of Bangalore’s prominent citizens, K.P. Puttanna Chetty who visited the school was impressed by DVG and offered him a Government job. DVG stubbornly refused to work in Government service, a vow he upheld till the very end. But the demon of earning a living was a constant nightmare. Family, friends, relatives and well-wishers suggested a range of career options: life insurance agent, postman, Purohita, Patel…nothing appealed to DVG.

He was determined to become an entrepreneur and Bangalore appeared to be a fertile ground. And so, in 1907, with the meagre savings he had, DVG opened a paint-making outfit and promptly lost the money. Undeterred, he shifted his focus to soap-making. That endeavor put him in touch with a revolutionary freedom fighter from North India who coached him in the fine art of making bombs. Needless, this too, was a failure.

Unemployed and penniless, DVG began to wander on the streets of Bangalore in search of work, some work that would keep the hearth burning, the stomach full and the head held high. One of the regular haunts of his wandering was the Navaratna printing press which brought out the Suryodaya Prakashika, a Kannada paper owned and edited by B. Narasinga Rao. The paper had fallen into some difficulty and Narasinga Rao had transferred the ownership of Suryodaya Prakashika to Ananta Rao, who owned the Navaratna press. Thunder struck Ananta Rao in the form of an intimidating government communique issued by the Chief Secretary. The reason: some time ago, Suryodaya Prakashika under Narasinga Rao’s stewardship had written a critical article against Diwan V.P. Madhava Rao’s decision to barter away Bangalore and Kolar to the British in exchange for Bellary and Ananthapur.

Suryodaya Prakashika was standing on the edge.

When DVG learned of this, he immediately wrote a brief rebuttal to the Government’s missive and saved the day for the paper. It didn’t take long for the rebuttal to be noticed in eminent circles. This included illustrious scholars and teachers and other distinguished men like K. Ramachandra Rao, K.A. Krishnaswamy Iyer, and M.G. Varadachar who became acquainted with DVG, a bond ²⁰⁵ that would sustain till their death. The young writer, barely an adult, showed enormous promise.

Suryodaya Prakashika recruited DVG. It was his virgin foray into a journalistic career and calling of life that lasted over sixty years.

The office of Suryodaya Prakashika, DVG’s maiden Karma-Bhoomi, was modest, measuring eight feet long and four feet wide. The professional arrangement was simple: Ananta Rao would provide DVG two meals a day, coffee and snacks and a monthly salary of twenty rupees paid in cash. DVG had to contribute four leading articles each month along with smaller pieces to fit four columns.

DVG supplemented this income by writing two weekly articles for the Evening Mail published from the Bangalore Cantonment area. This fetched him eight rupees each month. Of these princely earnings, he sent seven rupees to his father every month.

However, DVG’s initial journalistic days were not limited to writing. He would visit various offices and other establishments to collect the source material, return to office and begin writing. Then he would go to the press, perform the role of the compositor, read the proofs, neatly fold the papers and wrap them, and write the addresses and stick the postage stamp.

Unfortunately, Suryodaya Prakashika was destined to be short-lived. It was shuttered by December 1907, and DVG was jobless once again. He describes his work experience at the paper as, “it was akin to boyhood exercise for me.” An exercise that stood him in good stead throughout his life because he had learned it to perfection.

Notes

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[[When DVG met Subrahmaniya Bharati in Pondicherry Source: prekshaa]]

A few months later, Navaratna Krishnaswami teamed up with DVG and founded a Kannada daily titled Bharati. It quickly earned renown as a quality paper notable for its highly inspirational articles and in-depth analyses on various issues of national importance. Like at Suryodaya Prakashika, DVG’s role in the paper was limited to writing, compositing, proofreading and other activities on the production side. Bharati too, met a premature end.

During this time, DVG simultaneously wrote for the English biweekly, The Mysore Standard and the Kannada weekly, Nadegannadi, to supplement his income. The Mysore Standard was run by a distinguished editor M. Srinivasa Iyengar. Impressed by the young DVG’s talent and dedication, Srinivasa Iyengar took him under his wings and became his journalistic mentor in the true sense of the word.

But June 1908 would become a watershed year in DVG’s fledgling journalistic career. Diwan V.P. Madhava Rao steamrolled a stifling law ominously titled The Mysore Newspaper Regulation Act, explicitly meant to put the press in the doghouse. Accordingly,

1. Every newspaper owner had to take the Government’s permission to start and/or run his paper. 2. The Government could revoke this permission at any time without stating any reason. 3. Anyone who ran a newspaper without the Government’s permission was liable for punishment. 4. Anyone who ran a newspaper after the Government had revoked its permission was also liable for punishment.

The outraged journalistic fraternity responded to this muzzling legislation by launching protests. Srinivasa Iyengar was one of the prominent editors who led the protests from the front. Following his suggestion, several prominent papers completely shut down their operations as a mark of this protest. These included Vruttanta Patrike and Mysore Star, both published from Mysore. The Government refused to budge.

Srinivasa Iyengar decided to fight the oppressive press law from outside. And so, he took the young DVG with him and landed in Madras. His immediate task was to compile all the criticisms against the Mysore press law into a single volume. These criticisms had appeared in various papers and periodicals published outside Mysore. Srinivasa Iyengar entrusted to DVG the actual tasks of collecting, compiling, summarizing, writing prefaces and explanatory notes, proofreading and finally, getting them printed. It was labourious, backbreaking work, which DVG accomplished with passionate sangfroid. The result was a superb book titled, Press Gag in Mysore published by the Lokananthan Press. It opened to instant acclaim in influential circles. And even as he was assisting Srinivasa Iyengar, DVG regularly contributed columns to The Hindu and The Indian Patriot.

In retrospect, DVG’s year-long stay in Madras was eventful, formative, pivotal, and historic.

In the early 1900s, Madras was one of the great hubs of intense political activity and enormous social upheaval. Most importantly, it was home to feverish nationalist agitation against the British. Patriotic stalwarts like V.O. Chidambaram Pillai (owner of the Swadeshi Steam Navigation Company) who delivered frontal challenges to the monopolistic might of the British maritime dominance were jailed by the dozens. All these developments left a deep and indelible impression on the mind of the young DVG. His writings during that period are distilled outrages borne out of remarkable sensitivity and heartfelt compassion. Sometime after Chidambaram Pillai was arrested, DVG travelled to Pondicherry and met the blazing Tamil poet, Subrahmaniya Bharati and spent several enriching days with him.

Towards the end of 1908, DVG delivered a magnificent lecture under the auspices of the Chennai Jana Sangham in a hall titled Gangaikondan Mandapam at Madras. Titled Vedanta and Nationalism, the lecture immediately catapulted DVG to celebrity status in the influential circles of Madras. He later expanded the lecture into a 57-page monograph ²⁰⁶ and added two fresh articles to it: a preface and an epilogue. Published in 1909, it remains a brilliant classic. The ideas, ideals and philosophical outlook contained in Vedanta and Nationalism is still an invaluable guide to understand the substantive underpinnings of DVG’s work and legacy in public life. It is also the earliest map that helps us navigate the trajectory that DVG traversed in his continuous quest to attain the life-goals he had set for himself.

DVG’s spell in Madras also taught him an enduring lesson in journalism. Still seething with anger against V.P. Madhava Rao’s press gag in Mysore, DVG wrote an open letter to him. It was published as a supplement on 30 December, 1908 in a Madras-based weekly titled, The United India and Native States. DVG’s open letter began with some verses from Dante’s epic poem and used it as a base to describe the numerous sins of Madhava Rao’s administration and asked him to reform his ways. He signed the letter under the name, A Kid from Hosur. He followed this open letter with another article titled, Wail of the Ghosts. This was an elaborate and juicy narrative that revealed the unsavoury details and licentious behavior of some powerful officials. More than ten thousand copies of both these articles were circulated during the Madras Session of the Congress.

DVG was only twenty when he wrote this.

However, it didn’t take long to find out the real author of these pamphlets. Gopala Iyengar, elder brother of DVG’s journalistic mentor Srinivasa Iyengar, summoned DVG and dealt him a severe reproach: “You have committed a grave crime. Two major blunders. The first is the fact that these articles are deplorable in nature. The second is that you’ve written anonymously. If you had the self-confidence that your writing contained merit, you should’ve put your real signature to it. In that case, I would have told you that although you were stupid, you at least had courage.” It was a lesson DVG never forgot. He apologized to Gopala Iyengar and vowed that he would never repeat it. Reflecting on this much later, he told this to his close ²⁰⁷ friends: “That incident left a huge impact on my life. I think that I haven’t slipped from the word that I gave to Sri Gopala Iyengar.”

***

DVG’s majestic lecture on Vedanta and Nationalism also heralded the end of his stint in Madras. A family friend from Mulabagal who was studying in Madras wrote an anxious letter to DVG’s father detailing the young lad’s political activism concluding with a dire warning: “the police might arrest your son any time.”

And so, in January 1909, DVG was back in Bangalore and jobless and once again, contemplating what he should do next.

Notes

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[[DVG, Kasturi Ranga Iyengar, Karunakara Menon and the Triumph of an Ideal Source: prekshaa]]

But before we narrate the story of how DVG’s fortunes unfolded after his return to Bangalore, it is pertinent and educative to provide a brief survey of his last days in Madras.

DVG’s journalistic mentor, Srinivasa Iyengar had returned to Bangalore after Press Gag in Mysore was published. Before leaving Madras, Srinivasa Iyengar had secured a job for DVG with Rama Rao, a Kannadiga who had prospered by running a lucrative mail order ²⁰⁸ business. Rama Rao would publish attractively-illustrated advertisements in newspapers and magazines for products such as scented hair oil, razors, combs, wrist watches, talcum powders, perfumes, and brushes. He would dispatch the products via VPP (Value Payable Post). DVG was recruited as an editor and copywriter for Rama Rao’s product advertisements, which were published in a Kannada literary periodical titled Nudigannadi which was later renamed to Veerakesari. But DVG’s job there was short-lived due to the aforementioned pressure from his father. At any rate, he remembers Rama Rao with great fondness, calling him “generous, affectionate and compassionate.”

As we shall see, experiences even in such odd jobs contributed quite a bit in shaping DVG’s overall outlook towards journalism, among others.

Two other editorial stalwarts also left quite an impact on DVG’s journalistic life. The first was the managing editor of The Hindu, Kasturi Ranga Iyengar. This is how DVG describes ²⁰⁹ him:

He was a man of few words and endowed with a serious disposition. Outside, he was a hard rock, inside, butter. Once when I met him, he placed before me a fat news report and said, “Condense this. It should be no longer than two pages.” After I submitted my revised copy, he went through it. Then, he took a blue pencil and struck out some of the sentences I had written and said, “read it now.” This was his method of editing…It appears that my writing style was harsh, direct and blunt. Perhaps this is why Kasturi Ranga Iyengar kept my writings under a tight leash and mercilessly edited them.

The other stalwart of journalism was Karunakara Menon, editor of the Indian Patriot. Prior to starting the paper, he had served as the predecessor of Kasturi Ranga Iyengar at The Hindu, and commanded enormous respectability in public life. He had a different view of the columns and reports that DVG contributed to the Indian Patriot. This is how DVG describes ²¹⁰ his style:

Karunakara Menon was a superb orator, deeply committed to the welfare of the people. He accepted my writings without making too many edits. In his view, my harsh writing style was also an “expression of public opinion from one perspective.”
Kasturi Ranga Iyengar’s method was one of constant refining. Karunakara Menon’s method was to provide encouragement.
For a boy aged 18-20, both encouragement and refinement are necessary, right?

Reflecting on this sixty years later, DVG remarks that in the realm of journalism, these were two separate Manvantaras[4].

***

When DVG returned to Bangalore in 1909, Diwan Madhava Rao’s oppressive press law was still in force. The statewide closure of newspapers as a mark of protests had yielded zero results. As he wryly notes, the objective ²¹¹ of the veterans and elders in the journalistic fraternity to morally shame the Mysore Government had ended in failure: it appeared that the Government was perfectly fine having no newspapers at all.

Mulling over his future once again, DVG thought of opening a bookstore or starting a paper. The first option worked out initially. Accordingly, he started Swadeshi Library at Chickpet. It began publishing the Vande Mataram Series that included books, monographs and pamphlets on topics dear to DVG’s heart. A partial list of its publications is sufficient to give a flavor:

· Samyukta and United India

· Religion and Nationalism in India

· Vedanta and Nationalism

· Tolstoy and India

Like his earlier endeavours, Swadeshi Library met a premature end owing to various factors.

Unfazed, he started a Kannada weekly titled Sumati in June 1909*.* An endorsement and blessing given by the Mysore Star paper reads as follows:

This magazine does not contain topics related to current affairs. Its articles will neither praise nor criticize people. It contains articles and essays on topics related to law, philosophy, religion, and education. May it flourish forever. These are our blessings.

The annual subscription for Sumati was a princely sum of one rupee and eight paisa. Those who sent four annas (or twenty-five paisa) in advance would automatically become subscribers entitled to special benefits. They would be able to buy the annual issue running up to 1200 pages printed in the crown size at a highly discounted price. Here is a short list of the works brought out by Sumati:

· Biography of the late Diwan Rangacharlu

· Kanakaluka: a Kannada adaptation of Alfred Tennyson’s play, ‘The Cup.’

· Eulogy of King George’s coronation

· Children’s stories

· Rammohan Roy

· Vande Mataram

· Haribhakti-saara

Once again, we come across the familiar refrain: Sumati’s destiny was ill-fated and shut down its operations in January 1912.

Around roughly the same period, a parallel development had occurred. A new biweekly (published on Wednesdays and Saturdays) titled Mysore Times had begun operations. It was printed at the iconic Irish Press located at the corner opposite the municipality park facing today’s Bangalore bus station. As a journalist and publisher, DVG was a frequent visitor of the Irish Press.

The editor of Mysore Times was an extremely wealthy lawyer named N.S. Ramaswamy Iyengar given to a life of extravagance and opulent tastes. His editorship of the paper was largely a vanity project. He had no real interest in running the paper and recruited DVG as Assistant Editor. In other words, the full responsibility of running the paper fell on DVG. Ramaswamy Iyengar would rarely visit the paper’s office and rarely wrote in it. Depending on his whim, he would occasionally write an essay or two on random topics, mostly his personal reminiscences and critiques of a highly subjective nature. He never contributed an editorial, never wrote on politics.

As Assistant Editor, DVG was tasked to visit Ramaswamy Iyengar’s sprawling bungalow opposite the Puttanna Chetty Town Hall every Monday and Thursday. When we read DVG’s subtle and dignified account ²¹² related to this episode, it is clear that these were not editorial meetings but the idle ruminations of a bored master delivered to a subordinate.

This set routine was struck by thunderbolt in the form of a letter to the editor, Ramaswamy Iyengar. The essence of the letter: a clash had erupted between the administrative and cooking staff of the Central College hostel. The reason for the clash was due to some unhealthy ingredient mixed in the hostel food. The incident was brought to the college management’s notice.

DVG published the incident in Mysore Times.

The head of the hostel’s cooking staff retaliated immediately by filing a defamation suit against the editor of Mysore Times, alleging that the paper had ruined his reputation. When Ramaswamy Iyengar brought this to DVG’s notice, he wrote an explanation defending the publication of the report. He said that the report was published after consulting with eminent lawyers and that there was no intention to defame anybody.

Then the full truth emerged. In reality, the cooking staff had been instructed by the management of Central College to file the defamation suit. The Principal was an Englishman named J.G. Tait and the hostel’s warden was Prof. C.M. Vijayaraghavachar. In other words, the highest echelons of Central College had closed ranks to hush up the scandal.

On his part, Ramaswamy Iyengar gave a written apology to the court and pleaded the plaintiff to withdraw the case. The matter ended there. Ramaswamy Iyengar had effectively thrown DVG under the bus: he neither informed nor consulted DVG before writing the apology.

DVG resigned the moment he heard this news.

In turn, his friends and well-wishers chided him for taking this hasty step. K.S. Krishna Iyer about whom DVG has written with great respect in his Jnapakachitrashale volumes said:

“You’re still a boy inexperienced in the ways of the world. Ramaswamy Iyengar is a big man. You must listen to him.”

DVG was adamant. He retorted:

“It is against my conscience.”

“Then what will you do for your livelihood.”

DVG’s gold standard reply was in Sanskrit:

“deśo viśāla: prabhavopi anaṃtā:” – The country is vast and opportunities are infinite.

If DVG learned the mechanics, craft and grammar of journalism under mentors like Krishnaswamy Iyengar, Kasturi Ranga Iyengar, and Karunakara Menon, he learnt the real ethic and philosophy of journalism on his own via this incident.

It was the earliest high point of his journalistic career and it was also a turning point.

From then on, DVG made a vow to himself that he would never work under anyone for the rest of his life.

DVG is among the meagre pioneers who truly deserves the exalted status of being an independent journalist in the profoundest sense of the word. Indeed, when we recall his aforementioned Manvantara comment, and when we survey the journalistic climate ever since, it is clear that “independent journalists” today fall in these broad categories:

· Actors who have perfected the art of hiding the funding sources of their “independent” journalism

· Disgruntled journalists who are unemployable owing to unsavoury reasons

· Ambitious journalists with unrealized ambitions

Thus, when DVG quit Mysore Times by the end of 1912 and was contemplating yet again, on his future, a lucrative job prospect reached him via a telegram dated 2 January 2013. It was from the selfsame mentor, Srinivasa Iyengar who had now relocated to Lahore. The telegram read as follows: please let me know your willingness to join the position of subeditor at the Punjabi at a salary of ₹ 100. D.R. Venkataramanan, DVG’s Kannada biographer stirringly narrates ²¹³ what happened next:

DVG was faced with this question: should I take up an employment merely for work or should I live my life for an ideal?
In the end, the ideal triumphed.

And the triumph took the form of an independent journalistic venture, the peerless English journal titled Karnataka.

Notes

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[[How DVG founded The Karnataka Biweekly Source: prekshaa]]

In a letter dated January 17, 1913, DVG outlined his future plans ²¹⁴ to his father. It was titled Safe: A Personal Matter.

*Following what Sri Ramadasappa had proposed in your presence while you were here, I am trying to start an independent English newspaper. He and other friends are helping me in this endeavor. I have also received the necessary permissions from the Government. So far so good. However, it is a money-intensive venture. I am seeking help in that regard as well. Both Sri Ramadasappa and Sri Narasimhamurthy are giving me great support. Still, if it is possible for you to help me with capital, this is the suitable time. Under these circumstances, it is difficult for me to send you money. The more capital we can raise personally, the better it will be. Please keep this matter highly confidential. Please do not share it with anybody, not even in your close circle. Of the total capital required, our investment must be substantial. If I don’t start this paper, I have no prospects for my future. I know that you won’t like it if I migrate to another state. *

DVG estimated that the seed capital would roughly amount to ₹ 4,000. Accordingly, he decided to raise eighty hand loans of ₹ 50 each at an interest of five percent per annum. Explaining the necessity of starting his new paper, he wrote ²¹⁵ to prospective investors as follows:

No one can gainsay that there is now in the Mysore State an urgent need for an independent newspaper to organize as also to articulate public opinion on all matters connected with the welfare of the people. The absence of open criticism and unbiased discussion of public affairs during the past few years has proved in an unmistakable manner the impending necessity for a strong press as an instrument of vigorous public life.

Fortunately, DVG’s efforts bore fruit and he was able to raise a tidy sum. The next step was perhaps the most difficult: obtaining the Government’s permission in a climate recently vitiated by the former Diwan Madhava Rao’s inexorable press gag. But in 1913, fortune had smiled on DVG because Sir M. Visvesvaraya was now the Diwan of Mysore.

The long, fruitful and cordial relationship that DVG and Sir M. Visvesvaraya shared is the stuff of legends and forms an eminent topic for an independent essay. In fact, DVG’s extraordinary profile of the titan running to hundred pages is perhaps the best tribute to him. While it can hardly be bettered, it is the most truthful and authentic raw material for the interested writer to flesh out their nuanced relationship. By all parameters, it is an ideal relationship between a selfless journalist and a passionate nation-builder endowed with indomitable integrity.

In earlier chapters, we have noted the chiseled role that Sir M. Visvesvaraya played in DVG’s life as a public personality. That was a much later development. DVG had first attracted Sir M. Visvesvaraya’s attention when the latter was the Chief Engineer of the Mysore State. In 1911, he took note of an article that DVG had written for the Madras-based monthly Indian Review. It was a brilliant analysis ²¹⁶ of Diwan Rangacharlu’s administrative acumen. Sir M. Visvesvaraya contacted the editor, got DVG’s contact details and wrote a commendatory letter to the young journalist. That was the beginning of the aforementioned long relationship between the two eminences.

And now, two years later, DVG found himself meeting Diwan Mokshagundam Visvesvaraya at the iconic Balabrooie guest house in Bangalore seeking permission to start his independent newspaper venture. The Diwan said with a smile:

“May I know your age?”

“Twenty-four or five”

“So, you will criticize people twice your age, eh?”

“Not criticism, but assistance, help.”

“How will you help them?”

“Through an objective assessment of merits and flaws. If I inform the merits, your government will earn the goodwill of the people. If I point out the flaws, you will rectify them.”

Diwan M. Visvesvaraya laughed loudly when he heard this and said:

“I have no difficulty granting permission to people like you. What will you name your paper?”

“I haven’t decided it yet. Some friends have suggested Karnataka.”

“You can call it Progress, Forward, Development—something that indicates its purpose?”

“I shall discuss your suggestion with friends.”

The stage was set. The Diwan had himself signaled his approval. And then the proverbial devil of bureaucracy kicked in. DVG sent his application to the Secretary to the Government who in turn sent it to the Deputy Commissioner, Kumaraswamy Nayak. DVG was personally summoned and when he went there on time, Nayak was unavailable. This happened three more times after which DVG wrote a complaint to the Government. On the fourth occasion, Kumaraswamy Nayak met him. DVG observed ²¹⁷ how he was immediately hostile. He did not extend the courtesy of asking DVG to be seated. He placed copies of Indian Review, Hindustan Review and other non-Mysore publications before DVG and began the interrogation:

“What is this? You’ve written in all these papers?”

DVG could barely contain his laughter. He said, “That is my profession.”

Deputy Commissioner Kumaraswamy asked him to leave and wrote his report: “He is a mere boy. Plus, he wears a Topi. He is not fit to discharge the serious responsibility of running a newspaper.”

The next chain-link in the bureaucratic rigmarole was the office of the Inspector General of Police headed by C. Srikanteshwara Iyer. When summoned, DVG stood before him with folded hands. This round of interrogation went as follows:

“Which is your native place?”

“Mulabagal. Kolar.”

“Where in Kolar?”

“Lawyer Sheshagiri Ayya is my grandfather.”

The Inspector General asked DVG to sit.

“So, you’re Sheshagiri Ayya’s grandson eh?”

Srikanteshwara Iyer’s father Subba Rao was posted as the Deputy Commissioner of Kolar and had great regard for DVG’s grandfather.

On March 12, 1913, the Mysore Government officially granted permission to DVG to start his newspaper venture, The Karnataka. On April 2, 1913, DVG gave a sworn statement before the District Magistrate affirming that he was the paper’s editor and owner and that it was printed at K.S. Krishna Iyer’s Irish Press located in Siddikatte, Bangalore.

The first issue of The Karnataka hit the stands on the same day, a Wednesday. The next issue was published on Saturday. The publication cycle was followed till the very end. The annual subscription to The Karnataka was eight rupees. Monthly subscription was fourteen Annas (roughly about 75 paisa). The following is a bird’s eye view of the paper:

· A total of twelve pages

· Four pages of advertisements

· A main editorial

· Letters to the editor

· Government news

· News about Bangalore and other important cities and towns

· Essays and op-eds

· The name of the editor was not published

Over time, a new column titled Views and Reviews was begun. This featured both scholarly essays and opinion pieces written by eminent people from various walks of life such as the Chief Secretary, Advocates, litterateurs, poets, and scholars. This is an eminent testimony to the kind of widespread goodwill that DVG had earned from such distinguished people at a young age. In no time, The Karnataka had emerged as the brightest new star emblazoned with honour, prestige and credibility in the annals of journalism in Karnataka.

In fact, the fruitful and highly productive journey of The Karnataka is a major chapter in the history of the modern Karnataka state itself, as we shall see. Today, when we read the archives of The Karnataka, we undergo a humbling experience of taking a profound guided tour of history. By itself, it remains DVG’s journalistic tour de force.

Notes

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[[The Karnataka, the Indian Review of Reviews and Aftermath Source: prekshaa]]

The first edition of The Karnataka contained a long form essay by Aluru Venkata Rao, popularly known as Karnataka Kulapurohita (High Priest of the Kannada Family), on the topic of the unification of Kannada-speaking regions. This apart, no less than Diwan Rangacharlu himself wrote a learned critique on the functioning of the Muzrai (Hindu Temple administration) Department. Other articles included analyses of the Government’s administrative machinery, various aspect related to social reform, and reports on the working of the Legislative Assembly.

In many ways, the first issue gave a foretaste of what the public could expect from The Karnataka, and DVG exceeded those expectations issue after issue. In fact, his lead editorial in the first issue made his stand quite explicit. It can be encapsulated as follows. The paper would:

· Champion the greatness of Indianness (Bharatiyata)

· Stimulate and encourage patriotism

· Carry the torch of national unity that was lit by the freedom movement throughout India and write on its importance and urgency for the Mysore State as well

· Instill a sense of purpose, direction, vigour and enthusiasm in all matters connected with public life in the Mysore State

· Foster healthy public opinion among all sections of the society

· Fearlessly condemn wrongdoing by anyone, anywhere

· Deliver news truthfully and in a timely fashion

In a sense, The Karnataka and DVG were inseparable—the young editor was the paper. It was fired with and blazed the passionate zeal of a future seer and sage who had discovered his life’s calling. And it singed the powers that be in an era where people in high office were unused to being scrutinized. Perhaps for the first time in its recent history, a journalist had actually dared to dissect the speeches of the Diwans—the de facto rulers—with pitiless honesty, a practice he applied to other high officials across various departments as well. Apart from this “insolence” of having the gumption to even question these administrative non-questionables, DVG’s phraseology also stung. For instance, when a certain Subrahmanya Iyer was appointed as a probationary to the Law Department, DVG wrote that he had “entered through the backdoor.” Mr. Iyer was unqualified for that important post: he had flunked his B.A. thrice in a row, had not practiced law even after passing his B.L. Thus, there was every possibility that this post was a reward for the services that his father or grandfather had rendered to the Government.

The summary ²¹⁸ of this relentless badgering can be read in DVG’s own words:

What we now see everywhere is noise. Talk to any person and the talk is only about conferences and committees. Speeches and discourses are emanating from the mouth, not from the heart. It is not easy to distinguish whether the bluster about patriotism and service to people is simply because they are tasty to the tongues of these speech-givers or whether they are lights genuinely shining in their minds. The wise man must always be a man of few words.

In fact, The Karnataka did not spare even Diwan Visvesvaraya’s administration. The Diwan’s officials routinely began to pour the molten lead of complaints and tirades in his ears against the paper. Some senior bureaucrats who DVG knew personally told him in so many words: “You are not Karnataka, but Karkotaka,” an extremely dangerous poison. In turn, Diwan Visvesvaraya frequently told DVG, “You have become a very virulent critic.”

Indeed, when we read these sucker-punch-like criticisms of DVG, we’re reminded of the immortal lines of advice ²¹⁹ given by Polonius to his son:

Be thou familiar, but by no means vulgar.
Those friends thou hast, and their adoption tried,
Grapple them to thy soul with hoops of steel;
But do not dull thy palm with entertainment
Of each new-hatch’d, unfledged comrade. Beware
Of entrance to a quarrel; but being in,
Bear’t that the opposed may beware of thee.
Give every man thy ear, but few thy voice;
Take each man’s censure, but reserve thy judgment.
This above all: to thine own self be true,
And it must follow, as the night the day,
Thou canst not then be false to any man.

In his characteristic style of introspection, DVG lists three chief reasons for these recurring clashes between The Karnataka and the Mysore Government:

1. The British Resident who despised the paper’s strongly uncompromising nationalistic stand wrote repeated letters to the Government recommending ²²⁰ it to severely punish The Karnataka. 2. Pressure from certain self-interested cabals in the Mysore Palace who hated Diwan Visvesvaraya. They went so far as to spread the rumour that The Karnataka was actually run by the Diwan himself. 3. Critiques in The Karnataka regarding Diwan Visvesvaraya’s economic policies, especially his approach towards public spending and the establishment of the Mysore Economic Conference. In DVG’s view, both these were a drain ²²¹ on the exchequer.

The truly august man that he was, Diwan Visvesvaraya never uttered a harsh word against the paper or DVG. Instead, he would personally invite DVG and discuss the criticisms at length. He would patiently listen to the young editor and seek clarifications where required. With the benefit of historical insight, it is quite clear that Diwan Visvesvaraya was the appreciative receptacle of DVG’s work in public life, his gentle mentor, and the protective cushion that both guarded The Karnataka and spurred it to newer heights.

****

In spite of these periodic hassles and other professional hazards, The Karnataka grew from strength to strength. Its acclaim, credibility, popularity, and the unimpeachable integrity of its editor had made it a household name by mid-1914, just over a year of launching it.

Thus, DVG’s friends and well-wishers advised him to start a Kannada edition of the paper, which he did on June 6, 1914. Some of the pieces that it published are notable:

· A long form profile of Bindiganavile Venkatacharya, a prolific novelist and an early translator of Bengali classics into Kannada.

· A glowing eulogy to Lokmanya Tilak

· A Kannada translation of Shakespeare’s Merry Wives of Windsor

· Robert Browning’s poem, The Pied Piper of Hamlin

However, this paper ran for just a few months and had to be closed owing to tepid public reception.

***

In 1915, DVG came under the profound spell of Gopala Krishna Gokhale, as described on several occasions in the earlier chapters. What is relevant here is Gokhale’s renowned dictum that public life must be spiritualised. These five words had such a lasting impact on DVG that he gave a new tagline to The Karnataka issue dated February 23, 1916. It now read: Devoted to the Cause of National Progress: Public Life must be Spiritualised. This tagline would carry over to the Public Affairs journal that he started in 1946. It also remains the tagline of the Gokhale Institute of Public Affairs, Bangalore.

The Karnataka’s Dénouement

Two major events in the public and political space of the Mysore State around 1920 became the pivotal milestones in DVG’s life as well. Both occurred almost concurrently.

The first was the resignation of Diwan Visvesvaraya in 1919 on moral grounds. The second was the formation of the Praja Mitra Mandali and its political outgrowth, the Praja Paksha. The Praja Paksha took its inspiration from the ruffian-like political tactics of the Justice Party in the Tamil speaking regions. Both were premised on an especially vicious targeting of Brahmins, who became a marked community. Both events have been described at some length elsewhere ²²² in this work.

It is best to read the consequences of both these events in DVG’s own ²²³ words.

Not once did Diwan Visvesvaraya ask me, “From where did you get this news? Who is your reporter? Who actually wrote this article.” On the contrary, he said, “I respect your independence and self-respect. But consider my difficulty. This large bludgeon—the Press Law…I can’t touch it. I keep getting pressure from various quarters to use that bludgeon against your paper. What am I supposed to do? What would you do if you were in place? Show me the way.”
Sri Visvesvaraya was a great man by birth. It is fundamentally against his nature to inflict injustice and pain. Not once did any bitterness arise between us due to my paper. It was an immensely pleasurable and joyous duty to run the paper during the tenure of such an exalted personality…
Competent officials are those who can tolerate blunt and fierce criticism. When incompetent and petty-minded officers occupy positions of authority, the profession of journalism becomes joyless. After the Praja Paksha was formed in Mysore, I felt that it was best for me to stop “The Karnataka.”

The trail of pioneering national and public service that The Karnataka had blazed in 1913 came to this abrupt, unfortunate halt in 1921. The total amount that subscribers owed to the paper at that time was around eight thousand rupees.

The Indian Review of Reviews

Later in the same year, DVG yet again, started a monthly, The Karnataka and the Indian Review of Reviews modelled after the legendary W.T. Stead’s Review of Reviews. Its archives remain a collector’s treasure for the breathtaking array of the topics it covered, the quality of its analyses and the wealth of insights they contain. Opinion pieces, independent essays, book reviews, profiles, historical essays, literary pieces, and articles on major national and international events formed its staple diet. Its annual subscription cost was ₹ 8 within India and ₹ 10, “foreign.” It also offered a carrot for advertisers in the following verbiage:

This journal circulates throughout India and among all classes of readers, and is expected to be permanently preserved and frequently referred to. Hence, it furnishes an excellent and unique medium for advertisement.

Perhaps owing to his experience in outstanding subscriptions at The Karnataka, DVG printed the following text in large capitalization in Indian Review of Reviews: ALL PAYMENTS TO BE MADE STRICTLY IN ADVANCE.

However, even this was not meant to be. Similar to his previous venture, The Indian Review of Reviews too, attracted enormous praise, respect, and admiration in all circles. Its articles were read with great interest by the various Maharajas, Diwans, judges, and scholars throughout India and copiously cited. However, all of this did not pay DVG’s bills.

The Indian Review of Reviews ran sporadically before being shuttered in 1927.

The Financial Side

A few incidents narrated ²²⁴ by DVG himself reveal both a pragmatic and rather touching picture of the financial side of DVG’s publishing endeavours.

Ganapathi Agraharam Annadhurai Ayyar Natesan, who ran the highly successful publishing house, G.A. Natesan & Co from Madras, was among the many prominent public personalities close to DVG. The Indian Review, a popular monthly which he founded and edited was not only highly respected but brought him fortune as well. Once when he visited “Right Honourable” V.S. Srinivasa Sastri in Bangalore, he took keen interest in DVG’s The Indian Review of Reviews. This was the conversation between Natesan and DVG:

“You are truly brilliant. You work so hard and your journal is of high quality. But in money matters, its business side is really pathetic. If you don’t garner advertisements and continue in this fashion, you will drown.” After this, Natesan proceeded to give valuable lessons to DVG on the methods of getting advertisements, and the tactics of improving revenue. Srinivasa Sastri who listened to this with great interest, finally said to Natesan: “Hey Natesha! Why are you telling him all this? You’ll never forget these lessons but he’ll never learn them. He believes that success in business is a sin. It is his fate, let him undergo it.”

Then, there was the other episode at Hassan. DVG had accompanied Srinivasa Sastri on a tour to the district. A visitor who had come to see Sastri spotted DVG, took him aside and said, “I owe you subscription dues for three or four years. I must confess that I kept forgetting to send you the money. And now, the moment I saw you, it struck me once more. Here, please take this now. I think there’s twenty-three rupees in this bundle of notes. If there’s shortfall, please write to me, I’ll send the rest.” This was DVG’s reply: “But what was the hurry for this? Keep it with you for now. I’ll look at the accounts once I return to Bangalore and write to you. You can then send me the exact amount.”

Venkatasubbayya, who was part of the entourage was livid when he saw this. He scolded DVG: “Bewakoof! You fool! You returned the money that was legitimately due to you.”

Srinivasa Sastri chipped in with his own diagnosis: “Useless sir, useless! Money does not stick to his hands. This level of stupidity! How much did he owe you?”

DVG: “Thirty-two rupees. Subscription for four years.”

Srinivasa Sastri: “Instead of taking what was offered, you said ‘you’ll see the accounts.’ You fat-cat!”

The other episode relates to a proposal DVG mooted in a letter to C. Rajagopalachari after the close of World War 2. The proposal was to start a new, niche journal devoted to exploring the various aspects in the aftermath of the war: efforts at preventing another such war, formation of international bodies like the United Nations, the Atlantic Charter and so on.

Rajagopalachari’s reply ²²⁵ of admonition was just one line: “Don’t. You have burnt your fingers enough!”

Recalling this incident much later, DVG’s notes: “I suppose some divine voice made me accept this advice. Else, I wouldn’t have been around to write this.”

***

As we have seen in detail in an earlier ²²⁶ chapter, DVG’s last and the most successful publishing venture was the Public Affairs journal which he ran till he shed his mortal coils.

Notes

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[[Vruttapatrike: A Classic Tome on Journalism Source: prekshaa]]

An exasperated American President Thomas Jefferson famously thundered at the beginning of the nineteenth century that “the man who reads nothing at all is better educated than the man who reads nothing but newspapers.”

More than a century later, on the other hemisphere, DVG delivered an earnest lecture in July 1928 that would posthumously annul or soothe Jefferson’s fury over journalism. That lecture was subsequently expanded into a modestly-sized book in December 1928, which was further expanded, revised and republished in 1954. After a prolonged lull of thirteen years, DVG brought out the final edition in 1967, revising the manuscript even as he was suffering from cataract. As he gratefully ²²⁷ records, credit is also due to its publisher, Wesley Press, which patiently waited for more than a decade.

Written in Kannada, primarily with an Indian audience in mind, Vruttapatrike (Newspaper) deservedly finds a place in the world’s annals of pioneering and lasting works on journalism. It still retains its preeminence as a classic work encompassing the history, philosophy, art, craft, grammar, mechanics, ethics, law, and the business of journalism. It also remains an enduring manual for both the profession and the professional of journalism. Just like how his Rajyashastra and Rajyangatattvagalu are theoretical and practical guides to administer an entire state, Vruttapatrike too, is an invaluable guide to start a newspaper from the scratch and run it successfully.

More profoundly, Vruttapatrike is the refined, wisdom-concentrate of living an outstanding life as a journalist and editor. Its authority derives from the purity of its purpose and its value from being moored in lived ideals. Especially in DVG’s case, the journalist cum editor was also an active and conscious participant of the tumultuous history of his time, a history that shaped him and he shaped in turn. The work was also written in a spirit of public service, which DVG ²²⁸ calls, “the urge of my inner life.” In the evocative words ²²⁹ of Sri H.M. Nayak,

DVG regarded his journalistic life as a sacred Dharma…This book gives us the Vishwarupa-Darshana[4] [Cosmic Vision] *of Journalism precisely because he regarded journalism as a Dharma…The fact that not a single work surpassing this has emerged even after seventy years is not a matter of pride for the Kannada people. *

When DVG published the first edition of Vruttapatrike, journalism in India was on the threshold of adolescence but had already attained adulthood in Europe. He was also one among the undoubted pioneers of journalism in Karnataka (and India, broadly speaking). Two major instances testify to this fact. The first is how he foresaw and repeatedly emphasized on the need to evolve technical terms in journalism done in Indian languages. The second was his personal involvement in seeding shorthand in Kannada. Today it might sound anachronistic, even ridiculous, to even mention shorthand, which instantly died with the emergence of the Dictaphone. However, in DVG’s time, reporters and journalists were required to quickly and accurately transcribe say, two-hour-long speeches by politicians and other public personalities.

Other instances too, offer vivid but tangential testimonies to DVG as one of the eminent pioneers of Indian journalism as we shall see.

***

Characteristic of all his non-fiction writings, Vruttapatrike is sequined with a lovely literary quality starting from Page One.

DVG correctly traces the history of journalism to the invention of the printing press, a pivotal epoch that drastically altered human history like the invention of the wheel. He describes ²³⁰ the printing press as a “Great Power” whose chief Avatar was journalism, and that the praise of journalism is the “subject of this book.”

***

The story of journalism in India in Vruttapatrike, begins in the regime of Minto who was India’s Governor General from 1807-13, roughly coinciding with Thomas Jefferson’s presidency (1801-09) in the United States.

This story originates in a request from a highly unusual, even unlikely, place.

The Nizam of Hyderabad, Mir Akbar Ali Khan is curious to witness the practical applications of the wonders that science and technology have created in Europe. The British Resident, Captain Sydenham readily agrees. Accordingly, three machines are shipped to Hyderabad: an air pump, a printing press, and a model warship.

When the British Government reads Sydenham’s report on this procurement, its immediate response is nervous imperial fury: a dangerous weapon like the printing machine falling in the hands of the Indian kings will have perilous consequences.

Sydenham had to go to great lengths to reassure his masters that no such thing would happen.

Doubtless, this is a fascinating tale of history but DVG’s commentary ²³¹ on it is instructive:

*This was the nature of the fear that they had about the printing press in that period. It would inform people about things they weren’t aware existed. It would provoke desires and wants that they didn’t have until then. It would stir new passions and courage. It would alter their psyches and thinking and conduct and behavior. The British had realized the printing machine’s capacity for all such mischiefs, long ago. This is the chief reason they were unhappy with the development of newspapers in our country—including papers in Indian languages. *

Following this, DVG encapsulates the full history of newspapers, finishing off with the contemporary journalistic scenario in Karnataka in less than fifteen pages. That is, from Bi-Sheng, the Chinese artisan who invented the movable type technology in the 10^(th) century all the way up to 20^(th) century Karnataka.

***

The aforementioned story of how Vruttapatrike evolved as a book from a 1928 lecture reveals another facet as well: DVG’s foresight, of which we have seen numerous instances in the preceding chapters. In this context, we notice DVG repeatedly stressing on the importance of laying solid foundations for a tradition of quality and honest journalism very early in its evolution. In his own ²³² words,

*Democracy…the rule of the people…will be the inevitable future of India no matter when it arrives…Newspapers have paved the way for democracy to be firmly established…Newspapers are both the vehicles and the weapons for our people to study and understand how they can govern themselves. *

Equally, DVG also understood the practical difficulties of adopting an alien political system like democracy to an ancient civilizational nation like India using newspapers as the medium. Which is why, as we shall see, he generously peppers Vruttapatrike (and other writings on journalism) with an awesome wealth of our own cultural metaphors. One such brilliant allusion is a section titled Narada-smarane, in which he traces the origins of the Indian tradition of journalism to Sage Narada, the divine news reporter, indeed, the first news reporter of the universe, in Hindu annals.

Notes

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[[The Felicitation of a Triumphant Journalist Source: prekshaa]]

This is how DVG invokes ²³³ Narada:

In the past Yugas, Narada performed the same tasks that news reporters today perform in our world. In the realms of our Devatas and demigods, he carried news of different worlds, drew attention to evil deeds and gave sage advice.

After giving a brief list of Narada’s glories with examples, DVG poses a searching question and sounds a call of conscience, relevant to all times:

In the present Yuga, this Naradaesque duty is required. But there is no Narada today. News reporters and journalists need to fill his place. But if Narada were to come to our present world, there is every reason to doubt whether he would enjoy the same reverence as before. This is because in our time, on this earth, independent thinking has increased more than ever before. Indeed, many of our newspaper brethren have laid down this dictum with enormous bravery: “Nobody should be swayed by the melody of Narada’s Vina and say yes to whatever he says.”

This section of Vruttapatrike is pregnant with multiple interpretative possibilities. DVG’s note on the bravery of journalists who laid down the foregoing dictum is also a subtle criticism. Indeed, in the decades after he wrote this, the full ramification of this “bravery” has become a verifiable daily reality in public and media discourse. The devaluation of Narada, considered a Rishi in our cultural heritage, has been swift, appalling and vulgar. In popular fiction and especially in cinema, Narada has been reduced to a clownish caricature whose only job is to generate controversy and stoke fighting among people. Narada was devalued because journalists of our time devalued journalism and themselves.

In fact, the philosophy and ideals of running a newspaper, the qualities and qualifications of a journalist that DVG elucidates in Vruttapatrike have today been realized in their flagrant violation.

On the mundane plane, journalism is a great training ground for and an incessant practice of democracy in its most profound sense. However, where the individual journalist and the newspaper owner was concerned, journalism was the “practice of soul-examination ²³⁴,” reminding us of Socrates’ famous maxim that the unexamined life is not worth living. It was DVG’s conviction that this soul-examination would “instill within the journalist and paper-owner a sense of remorse about his past deeds and behavior” leading to inner refinement in proportion to this practice. This is because the opinion-shaping and argumentation done in newspapers is directly related to ethics. In a democracy, the newspaper ²³⁵ is the “conscience of the Citizen Collective and the noblest work of conscience is discernment.”

Indeed, few people have extolled the singularity and virtue of the journalistic profession as honestly and as passionately as DVG. But it was not the directionless passion of the activist but the purity of purpose of the Karma Yogi. As we have seen, DVG “chose” journalism as his profession by accident but once he embraced it, in the timeless Shakespearean sense, he “grappled it unto his soul with hoops of steel.” Perhaps his most eloquent and heartfelt exposition of this grappling embrace was his July 31, 1928 Presidential address ²³⁶ to the All Karnataka Journalists’ Association delivered at Bagalkot. Spread over thirty pages, the lecture is a majestic tour de force demonstrating his absolute command over journalism as a profession, calling, business, craft, and national service. His panoramic erudition gushes forth encompassing everything in its Gangetic current. Sadly, constraints of space prohibit me from capturing even the distilled essence of the lecture—it needs to be translated in full in multiple languages. Only a few highlights may be offered by way of giving its flavor.

Speaking about the condition of journalism in England, DVG says how there is an Institute dedicated to the all-round well-being of journalists. One of its services included a magnificent resort at Oak Hill where fatigued and stressed-out journalists could visit for rest, relaxation and rejuvenation.

DVG also notes the fact that most of our celebrated freedom fighters, thinkers and people of eminence were professional journalists or had cultivated the habit of regularly writing in newspapers and periodicals. This list includes Dadabhai Naoroji, Mohandas Gandhi, Krishnadas Pal, Surendranath Banerjee, Agarkar, Lokamanya Tilak, and Kasturi Ranga Iyengar, “whose names should undoubtedly be etched in gold.”

On the service and duty aspects of journalism, DVG writes that newspapers occupy the position of ministers in a monarchy but goes a step further: papers must actively dissuade the public from being sloppy and slothful, and must inculcate a habit of independent thinking among them. In his characteristic discursive style, he provides ²³⁷ a superb analogy:

The child must be able to easily digest the food that its mother feeds. But no mother will chew the food in her mouth first and then feed only the soft spittle to her child. She will cook the food properly and then give it to her child. Over time, the child will learn how to eat it properly and develop its digestive powers.

Thus, in DVG’s view, “journalists must not preach ideology but must delineate the process of arriving at wisdom” through erudition, logic, skill, finesse, law and justice. He also recognized the newspaper as perhaps the most powerful, popular and effective medium to spread mass education in even specialized areas. Towards this end, he calls upon editors to invite experts, scholars, professionals and experienced people from various walks of life to write columns and essays. This includes “pensioners, lawyers, legislators, municipal members, bureaucrats, doctors, scientists,” and even “Congress leaders.” And he led by example, as we have seen in the section on The Karnataka. At this distance in time, all of these have become commonplace in newspapers and periodicals, but we must recall the fact that DVG spoke these words at a time when newspapers in India—specifically in the Mysore State—were mostly groping in the dark for direction and guidance. In his ²³⁸ words,

So far, the major task of our newspapers has been to awaken people from slumber and to ensure that they stand firmly on their feet…Now the task is to inculcate awareness, understanding, knowledge and wisdom in them. If this is not done, their awakening will only culminate in disaster. The slumbering person is preferable to the ignorant person who is awake but charges forth with a sword in his hand.

This analogy evokes in our mind the story of the demon Kumbhakarana in the Ramayana. He was hastily awakened in the thick of the final war into which he rushed headlong armed with nothing but brute strength which was negated by the stupor of his ignorance.

An important purpose and goal of this continuous process of instilling wisdom among the people is the development of Samskara (refinement, culture) leading to order, stability and contentment in the society. Sans this, newspapers will become “that huge engine for keeping discussion on a low level,” says DVG quoting Morley. More fundamentally, he throws a razor-edged gauntlet to editors, newspaper owners and the general public: those who wish to rectify newspapers must first rectify the life of people.

When these high standards are scrupulously adhered to, and when a paper is run on the basis of these ideals, we get a journalist of this description:

When a person who runs a solid paper emerges triumphant, the felicitation that he becomes entitled to is no less than the felicitation awarded to a minister who governs a country.

Notes

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[[The Journalistic Role Models of DVG Source: prekshaa]]

As in the other realms of his busy, productive and eventful life, DVG’s constant quest in journalism too, always sought the noble and the virtuous, thereby embodying the Rg Vedic dictum, ā no bhadrāḥ *kratavo yantu viśvatah—*may noble thoughts come to us from all directions. Consonant with this spirit, DVG displayed selfless profusion of generous praise towards British (in general, Western) papers and journalists that were independent and fair-minded. He had special regard for the following titans of journalism:

1. The philosophical and fearless William Thomas Stead. 2. The legendary C.P. Scott who he calls the “Maharshi” of journalism. 3. The “father of journalism education,” Walter Williams, the acclaimed American journalist and editor.

In fact, DVG opens his Vruttapatrike with Scott’s enduring maxim: fact is sacred; comment is free. And he dedicates an entire chapter in the book to elucidate Walter Williams’ renowned, eightfold journalistic doctrine titled, The Journalist’s Creed.

However, DVG reserved his special reverence for W.T. Stead and wrote perhaps the best obituary to that doyen of journalism in The Karnataka. He acknowledges his lasting debt to Stead who “owes not a little of this writer’s education, both in general and journalistic, to the publications of Stead.” Indeed, this moving Ekalavyan tribute is fittingly titled, W.T. Stead: Our Journalistic Ancestor. Another measure of the devout esteem in which DVG held Stead is available in the very name that DVG gave to one of later publications: The Indian Review of Reviews. This was modelled after Stead’s acclaimed, Review of Reviews, in which “there was not a line that was dull, not a sentiment that was unworthy and not an observation that had not a message.” In what can be considered as perhaps the finest expositions on journalism and the media, DVG dips his pen in acid, searing the paper with a rare viscosity permeated by integrity:

There were many successful journalists in Stead’s time and there have been…many more since then. England has its journalistic colossus in Harmsworth; America in Hearst. They live for circulation, for big “business,” for the power of teasing the statesman and toying with States. They live to tell the people not what they ought to be told, but what they would like to be told. Sensation, slander, gossip, or whatever else may be wanted by the whim or passion of the hour, they would readily supply as the price of their popularity…They thrive as giants, having crushed or absorbed into themselves all smaller individualities endowed with talent still germinal and with independence still potential… journalism…[is] but a mode of seeking the fulfilment of…ideals…The true journalist, like the true poet and the true philosopher, has to extend his vision to the whole field of man’s life and thought…Stead was a journalist who was not a mere retailer of political news or fomenter of political irritations…one who was not unprepared to face unpopularity when justice necessitated it.

DVG’s own body of journalistic (and other literary) work is the accomplished reflection of giants like Stead and Scott, strictly speaking in the context of journalism. It is true that W.T. Stead “was not unprepared to face unpopularity when justice necessitated it,” and even went to jail for exposing the shocking depravity of teenaged prostitution in London.

However, in India, DVG had made a chronic acquaintance with unpopularity on recurrent occasions. As we have seen earlier, he staked his reputation and livelihood and earned the ire of the Government most notably during the 1928 Ganapati Clashes in Bangalore. This is apart from his numerous and sustained conflicts with Diwan Mirza Ismail and other powerful people.

But there is crucial difference that markedly sets DVG apart from his Dronacharyaesque Stead. In a way, Stead carried out his work from a relative position of strength: he was a newspaper editor in an England at the height of its colonial arrogance and his battles were criticisms against his country’s government, officials and so on. However, DVG as a subject of the same colonial England butted heads with the imperialist by fighting for India’s freedom. It was in this spirit that he acidly condemned the racist and imperialist writings against India by British papers, that is, against Stead’s counterparts in the press.

****

It is said that the writer’s conscience is the matrix of his art, and nowhere has this been more truthfully realized than in DVG’s journalistic career. As a journalist, DVG was not a chained observer of events but was both a herald and a director of our nationalist conscience. The entire gamut of this becomes clear when we note the philosophical, ethical and practical underpinnings ²³⁹ of his journalism. In his own words, this is as follows:

1. There are no qualms in stating that the profession of journalism occupies an important place in our national life. 2. It occupies a similar significance from the perspective of our ethical refinement. 3. Therefore, the responsibility that it must shoulder is enormous. 4. This responsibility has two facets: one, the dissemination of education; two, dissemination of ethics. 5. The work of knowledge constantly demands the labours of study and scholarship. It is never enough. 6. The realm of ethics demands intellectual objectivity and judicious caution. 7. Nobody can honestly say that he is fully endowed with this wealth of scholarship, intellectual objectivity and judiciousness to separate right from wrong. 8. It is purely a matter of luck to expect worldly rewards for all these labours. 9. Like in other spheres, there are ample temptations for satisfying one’s greed and to stray from the righteous path in journalism. 10. The chances of a journalist falling from high standards are greater owing to disappointments of not receiving rewards or fame.

This is timeless advice by any standard. And in DVG’s view, the editor’s responsibility is the greater. Thus, the ²⁴⁰ “editor must have a philosophical outlook and must objectively investigate any issue with a quest for truth. This disposition of seeking the truth is the moral and ethical capital of a newspaper.”

Neither does DVG ignore the other areas: his expositions on the role of the citizen vis a vis the press, the Government’s relationship with the press, the business face of journalism and his conception of an ideal newspaper are all equally worth their weight in gold.

Notes

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[[The Grace of a Sadhu and the Heart of a Poet Source: prekshaa]]

In the realm and history of journalism, it appears that “truth” is in a state of constant swirl akin to the invisible, monstrous air-rings of a typhoon. Almost since its dawn, truths reported by the journalistic profession seem to comprise several annuli in a maze of concentric circles: lesser truths, selective truths, subjective truths, incomplete truths, fashionable truths, limited but verifiable truths, and unverifiable untruths that became truths because they are unverifiable. The most notorious example of the last category is Walter Duranty whose journalistic infamy has immortalized him. At his peak, he won a Pulitzer Prize in 1931 for his ²⁴¹ “intimate comprehension of conditions in Russia…marked by scholarship, profundity, impartiality, sound judgment and exceptional clarity…excellent examples of the best type of foreign correspondence." For two decades, Walter Duranty was stationed in Stalin’s Russia as The New York Times’ foreign correspondent. His reportage was considered truthful because the other side of the world largely had no way ²⁴² of verifying.

The New York Times is both a relevant and representative example in this context. Also, because it remains an iconic global media institution till date. Adolph Ochs, the legendary American publisher who purchased The New York Times, overhauled its fortunes in a history-altering fashion. His stewardship transformed a dying newspaper into ²⁴³ a “cathedral of quiet dignity” and a “bible emerging each morning…that thousands of readers accepted as reality.” Readers across the world accepted that if something, in fact, anything, was printed in The New York Times “must be true, and this blind faith made monks of many men on The Times.” This formidable reputation directly owed to Och’s simple motto: “All the News That’s Fit to Print. To Give the News Impartially, Without Fear or Favor.” A lofty and admirable motto, no doubt. Yet, apart from the everlasting stain of Duranty, journalistic scandals have regularly emerged from the paper.

In this hemisphere, DVG’s journalistic motto, as we have seen earlier, was just five pithy words: Public Life Must be Spiritualised. The process and purpose of spiritualizing is all-encompassing: truth, ethics, morality, compassion, fairness, justice, independence, and purity of conscience at all levels and in all realms, private and public.

In the interest of fairness, there were any number of papers in India in DVG’s time, which were in the eye of scandal akin to The New York Times. In Vruttapatrike, DVG dedicates a brief chapter ²⁴⁴ titled Lanchavatara (literally, the Incarnation of Bribery) to outline the fundamental character of such papers. He traces both their existence and underlying motivations to a verifiable, daily reality: “the world of newspapers is a melee of fame-hunters and fame-enviers.” Without naming the real-world papers that plied such journalism, he assigns fictitious but representative alternatives: Night-Queen, Daily Memorial, Art-Beast, Death-Dance of Logic, and so on.

Indeed, this lived idealism and unquestionable truthfulness innate in DVG’s journalism earned him respect from even his most dogged opponents ²⁴⁵ in public life. When news emerged that he was nominated for the Mysore Legislative Council, these opponents too, joined the chorus of those who congratulated the Government for such a wise choice.

Small wonder that the word “scandal” remains absent in the thousands of pages of DVG’s body of journalistic work.

In hindsight, an obscure episode in DVG’s life offers a nuanced insight into how he regarded the notion and mainstream practice of journalism in the West. DVG writes ²⁴⁶ how in 1920-21,

I declined scholarship or help from Government offered by Sir M. Visvesvaraya when he was Dewan, for me to go abroad to study journalism. I declined the offer because I felt that for one practicing journalism in Mysore, there is little that should be learnt in London or New York.

Our only reaction after reading this is wistfulness, a disconsolation of how far journalism has come, how low it has sunk especially in India. The immediate generation of journalists after DVG immediately looked in the direction of expensive journalism schools such as Columbia, Syracuse, etc. The consequence has been the creation of at least two generations of Indian journalists who might be adept at their craft but little of India has remained in them.

And yet, despite confidence in his own abilities, professional competence and unwavering conviction, it appears that DVG is actually writing an introspective “note to self” when he says the following at the aforementioned address ²⁴⁷ at Bagalkot:

Above all, the journalist must have a philosophy of life. That philosophy must emanate from his independent study and contemplation leading to a firm conviction which he must reflect in his action and behavior…To arrive at such a conviction, the editor or journalist must first make an analysis of the reasons for the rise and decay of civilisations; he must have studied the history of various nations; he must have a working knowledge of various societies; he must have a solid grasp of world literature… This entire process is truly the fruition of Tapas. And when someone like me thinks about it in such a fashion, my heart drops, my face becomes ashen. This is because these words don’t come from someone who has attained that Tapas. It is more the lament of a person who has not attained it…Most importantly, the journalist must consciously imbibe the grace of a Sadhu and the heart and talent of a poet. The greater the proportion of these qualities, the greater will his honour rise.

In fact, Vruttapatrike is a superb treasure chest of such quotable quotes. While these quotes primarily relate to journalism, they also have an independent or neutral quality about them.

Notes

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[[DVG as the Eyewitness to the Tabular Downfall of Indian Journalism Source: prekshaa]]

DVG’s well-founded, wise, and grounded expositions and advice to journalists, editors and newspaper owners also extend to two other vital areas which have birthed journalism and are its oxygen: the citizen and the government.

He begins with a straightforward declaration ²⁴⁸ of a truth that is so commonplace that we forget it exists: “Most people don’t read newspapers in a spirit of duty.” And he supplies the reason ²⁴⁹ for it:

Reading newspapers is not a sacred vow. Neither is it a Shraddha ceremony [annual death rites performed for one’s parents]. Nor is it a work that earns one’s livelihood. There is absolutely no stricture that compels one to read newspapers.

A chief reason for this broad negligence of the general public towards the intrinsic value of journalism is rooted in what can be called the humdrum of daily life and the pressures of earning a living. DVG notes the irony of this situation, which has only worsened in our own era. In his profound vision, newspapers are the “face of the citizen,” and the “vehicle that shows the path leading to democracy and sustains the rule of people.” Yet the same people display such apathy towards the innate value of journalism. DVG describes ²⁵⁰ this imbroglio with a single word: poverty.

The poverty of newspapers [i.e. negligence] *applies to and affects the entire nation. The poverty of a newspaper owner or editor culminates in the poverty of service that he can potentially render to the citizen. *

It is also important to note the historical setting in which DVG wrote this. This setting also offers us valuable insights and comparative analysis of the path India has traversed. This was the picture ²⁵¹ of India when DVG published the first edition of Vruttapatrike:

Quite naturally, the practice of independent thinking is rare in our country. Our people have immense Shraddha in our Sastras. They have unshakeable faith in the words of our Gurus and Swamis. They exhibit a natural humility and obedience to political authority. They have genuine respect for educated people. They display extreme courtesy in public gatherings. This is the typical mind set of our people. It is not easy to teach independent thought and critical reasoning to such people.

In less than three decades of writing this, the exact opposite occurred. DVG’s heartfelt concern for using journalism as a medium for teaching independent thinking was drowned in the cacophony of what he himself calls “demagoguery,” as we shall see. The aforementioned natural behavioral and social traits of our people had been shaped and tempered by two millennia of civilizational purification. But the nature of politics after independence ensured that Shraddha became superstition, faith in Gurus a tradeable commodity, humility was equated with pusillanimity, and courtesy a mark of weakness. This is the perverse, real-life realization of P.V. Kane’s early ²⁵² clairvoyance:

In these days of growing popular education, when [an ancient] myth becomes exposed, the men who once believed it not only give up that myth but also might give up everything contained in ancient works as unbelievable… *The old structure…is tottering and laxity in morals has made great headway. *

As the maxim goes, the more things change, the more they remain the same. DVG’s call for inculcating critical and independent thinking stemmed from truly virtuous motives, from his soul. His impetus that in the ensuing democratic setup, it was essential for the citizen to develop the faculty, skill, and judgement required for critiquing public personalities and government policies was meant to be a force for the good. Yet, after more than eighty years, we notice today that the “unshakeable faith and obedience” that he spoke of has reincarnated in its worst form: a slavish worship of personality cults ranging from political leaders to self-proclaimed spiritual entrepreneurs. Which is precisely what he warned ²⁵³ against:

*The of people does not mean a kingdom without enemies. Let alone external enemies; its internal enemies are far more powerful. Chief among these include writers who are the cacophonic inciters of crowds, and demagogues. By writing inflammatory nonsense, they stun people’s sense of judgement and instill hatred and fury. Such journalists are the real thorns in any democracy. *

Then there is the business side of newspapers which inflicts similar damage. When DVG wrote ²⁵⁴ the following, the damage was within containable limits as we shall see.

The very headlines of articles might distort the reader’s mind. The intent is to deliberately provoke people so that they continue to buy copies. Newspaper owners adopt multiple business tactics and stunts to sell more copies of their paper. They use large typeface while publishing sensational headlines. They publish all sorts of weird and bizarre pictures and photographs…As a result, feelings of revolt and superstition increase among the people. Articles and analyses rooted in deep study and independent thinking take a hit. This is the injury that newspapers inflict on the nation.

As we notice yet again, and because repetition is a friend of knowledge, ignoring such sage warnings from eminences of DVG’s stature has cost the nation enormously. It took about fifty years for the aforementioned profit motive to grow into a Frankenstein best exemplified by the ethically questionable media “practice” of “paid news,” which ²⁵⁵ is today a national epidemic.

This decadal debasement and ruin of journalism is just collateral damage, nevertheless, a substantial damage. Instead of being a force and vehicle for nation-building and cultural renewal after 1947, journalism has morphed into a nationwide enterprise for fomenting anarchy, a consequence of ignoring the very warning ²⁵⁶ DVG sounded in the 1930s:

If a Government falls, another Government must and will take its place. Unseating a Government means unseating some people from their position of authority and replacing them with a different set of people. It does not mean abolishing the system of Government itself. However*, if newspapers propagandize the abolishment of Government itself, they are in reality, promoting anarchy.** The Penal Code and courts exist to punish such papers. *

In all honesty, DVG was being severely optimistic. Our country has now reached a stage where papers, periodicals, television channels and an ever-growing slew of online media not only proselytizes anarchy but far from being punished, are actually rewarded for it.

Among the numerous roads that have led to such an alarming situation, the vigilance-failure and a lackadaisical attitude of our citizenry cannot be under-emphasized. At the risk of generalization, perhaps we as a people forgot, or never realized the fact that citizens, apart from laws, have a right over the press. Thus, if the press is the watchdog of the Government, the citizen is the watchdog of the press. In DVG’s view, the citizen will earn this right to become such a watchdog not only by participation in journalism but by financially supporting it. In an appeal that is simultaneously moving and is a mirror of societal shame, this ²⁵⁷ is what he writes:

*There are significant numbers of philanthropists who donate thousands of rupees for charitable choultries, temples, and conclaves of fun and frolic. If only a fraction of them realise the true value and importance of newspapers and look at their pitiable plight, and perchance their heart melts, that will be the greatest service for us and to the nation…Air seems to be the only investment to do the nation’s work. There is a pervasive expectation in our country that those who wish to serve the nation must compulsorily…work for free…This is not Dharma but its inversion. In this area, Western countries are clear about their Dharma…Journalists are paid for their work or service…because their citizens recognize it as an honest profession that must be given its value. *

If a summary of the trajectory of Indian journalism maybe offered, DVG, one of its illustrious pioneers, offers it brilliantly in the form of an illustrative table. It is also a tabular downfall of journalism that he witnessed in his professional career spanning from 1912-1975.

| | | | |———————|———————————————-|——————————–| | Topic | Then | Now | | Investment | A few thousand rupees | A few lakhs | | Staff | Ten – Twenty | Hundred – Two Hundred | | Machinery | Primitive | Advanced, massive | | Circulation | About two thousand copies | A few lakh copies | | Content | Ten or twenty important questions and issues | Hundred or two hundred | | Goal | Primacy of education, learning, insight | Business | | Nature or Character | A sacred vow (Vrata) | A labour that earns livelihood | | Purpose | Enlightening the public | Entertaining the public | | Outlook | Reporting the truth | Propagandizing an ideology | | Owner | Poverty | Opulence | | Employee | Half-filled stomach | Two square meals | | Overall Situation | Charitable food-house | Hotel |

The quasi-epitaph of sorts that follows this table is equally revealing.

In our time, we as journalists aspired to be counted in the erudite class peopled by professors, lawyers, doctors and engineers—they were known as Learned professions. The aspiration of journalists of that era was to elevate their profession up to that standard of respect.

Today’s journalists have completely abandoned this aspiration and have identified themselves in the workers’ class. Writers and journalists have quickly realized the benefits of belonging to the fraternity of compositors, printers, binders, and machine-workers.
When these workers form unions, they can launch strikes and extract salary hikes by pressurizing the owners. It is solely from this motivation that the new group called Working Journalists has been birthed.
Indeed, what does respect beget except the additional burden of duty? The worker gets hard cash in hand…the benefits and opportunities that elude a scholar are easily available to one who identifies as a worker.
Respect or profit: which is greater?

Notes

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[[DVG’s Expositions on Journalism as a Crusade and Press Freedom Source: prekshaa]]

This progressive degeneration of Indian journalism in DVG’s own lifetime—by reducing its high standard as a sacred calling to a routine job and thereby destroying its worth as a profession as well—prompted him to note ²⁵⁸ that what “we need for our country is a Government of the people, not a Government of journalists.” Here, DVG, the Ekalavya surpasses his journalistic Dronacharya, W.T. Stead who wrote an influential tract ²⁵⁹ unambiguously titled, Government by Journalism, in which he openly called for editors and journalists to don the role of rulers.

The very conception of journalism as an instrument of government is foreign to the mind of most journalists. Yet, if they could but think of it, the editorial pen is a sceptre of power, compared with which the sceptre of many a monarch is but a gilded lath… In him are vested almost all the attributes of real sovereignty.

In hindsight, it can be argued that this idea germinated in Stead’s mind while he was serving a prison sentence in the notorious Eliza Armstrong case, ²⁶⁰ an expose which was also the highest watermark of his journalistic career. DVG describes Stead’s life in prison quite ²⁶¹ movingly:

He bore the trials of prison-life with the cheerful fortitude of that comes naturally to a man of true, steadfast faith. From the very beginning full of spiritual longing and devotion to all that is godly…he grew more introspective in the solitude of the gaol and…conceived the idea of combining the Churches with newspapers in the work for the moral regeneration of the people…

Without diluting Stead’s deserved eminence, and purely with the benefit of more than a century of history, it can be said that Stead did harbor a pint of bitterness when he wrote his Government by Journalism. While that tract was equally influential, it simultaneously earned Stead the unflattering moniker: muckraker.

In his characteristic style, DVG broadly agrees with Stead that the “editorial pen is a spectre of power.” In fact, he goes a step further when he says that the “newspaper is a great weapon.” But it is a sacred weapon to be used for the well-being of the citizen. And then he delivers ²⁶² another quotable quote: “the weapon must not induce stupor within its wielder,” and further notes how “this alarming development has already occurred in Europe and America. My fear and hope is that it must not occur in India as well.”

****

W.T. Stead’s monograph houses within itself perhaps the greatest danger built into journalism: activist crusade leading to unpredictable political upheavals and societal tumult. In this context, we can recall DVG’s warning ²⁶³ against political activism and agitation as substitutes for reasoned debate and forethought about long-term consequences. Indeed, he offers a sterner warning to journalists who think that journalism is some sort of crusade. The entire section ²⁶⁴ is worth reproducing at length.

Our youth are fired with the zeal to start newspapers. Their minds are enchanted with these grand dreams—let us sound the bugle of justice; let us condemn the officials who have the capacity to frighten the whole world; let us sit in public gatherings and show the sharp spike of our pen to the speech-giving mammoths…However, these youth don’t realise that this enchantment is merely a veil and that the stuff inside is far from being enchanting.
My routine response to any young person who approaches me for advice on becoming a journalist is “no.” The profession of journalism is fundamentally injurious. Those who wish to take it up and hope to succeed need to have enormous amounts of external and internal wealth. I have personally realized this truth after fifteen years of experiencing all varieties of travails. Anybody who sets out to offer knowledge and happiness to the world through this profession—no matter how enthusiastic he is—will undergo disappointment that is many times greater than his enthusiasm. He will then retreat from the profession cursing the same world he wanted to please.

At the risk of sounding trite, we notice yet again, how the realist and the pragmatist in DVG is wide awake to the foibles and pitfalls of his own profession. On the one side while DVG assigns the high status of philosophy to journalism, he also alerts us to the fate of failed philosophers, to extend the same metaphor. And then, he gives some guidelines for the honest and dogged aspirant of journalism in an extraordinary section ²⁶⁵ titled Kashtajivana, or the Hard Life.

A person may regard journalism as a sacred, lifelong vow, or regard it as a profession. But if he systematically pursues it with vision, insight, patience, and competence, he will become useful to the entire country. For such a pursuit, he must be willing to live the Hard Life. It is a profession that brings severe exhaustion. It constantly creates distress in the mind, and for this reason, the body also gets fatigued.
A journalist is akin to a solider or police who stay awake at night so that the city or town can sleep. The journalist must work by forgoing his own happiness so that the society can remain happy. He must be lost in thought and contemplation when his friends are having fun. When his peers are earning good amounts of money, he must be content with what he gets…
It is indeed easy to preach this lofty ideal but who said it is easy to live the ideal? This is the reason I don’t encourage youngsters to take up journalism. When he is new, the zeal which is natural to youth makes him forget the fatigue of this profession. After five or six years, it will inevitably induce boredom in any person…
In our country, this profession lacks the following: resources, money, books, research, relevant literature, printing facilities, sympathetic friends and support of the general public.[9] Amidst all this, the journalist’s family would have grown. His youth will be progressively declining, his strength, deteriorating, and his boredom, increasing.
If a young person unaware of all these, is brought into this profession, he will begin to regret his decision, and may choose unsavoury paths and hanker after profit and fame. It is also unsurprising if such a person eventually lets out this curse: “Neither do I need my countrymen nor do I want any Punya.”
If a good journalist becomes a national asset, a journalist who falls to disgrace because he is unable to be good, becomes a national threat.

Intertwined with DVG’s warning against the crusader and activist model of journalism is his brilliant chapter ²⁶⁶ on journalistic or press freedom. Independent India has indeed come a long way in this regard from the frequent press gags and the hawk-like watch over newspapers in the pre-Independence era. This journey is also marked by the highly regrettable and unconstitutional first Amendment of our Constitution [Article 19 (1)] which was bulldozed by Jawaharlal Nehru in the Parliament specifically to restrict press freedom. The reason was to throttle the stringent criticisms directed against him by the press. The first Amendment was also the first precedent where Parliament would bypass the verdict ²⁶⁷ of the Supreme Court by passing legislations specifically meant for circumvention. Ever since, our dominant political class since independence has liberally used Article 19 (1) to target or stifle critical voices emanating both from the press and outside of it. It is thankfully, largely a thing of the past now. However, what we have today—especially after the advent of the Internet—is absolute freedom of the press of the worst kind.

DVG’s exposition encompasses both these aspects.

We can begin with the second point first: about the absolute or more accurately, unhinged freedom of the press we have at present. The nakedly heinous and vulgar public discourse that has become so commonplace in what passes off as journalism today is repeatedly justified as the “freedom that the press/media enjoys.” Embedded in that justification is a demand for immunity against unaccountability. DVG puts press freedom ²⁶⁸ in perspective:

Nobody should forget the fact that press freedom is the same right that all citizens enjoy, and that the press is not granted a special freedom. If he does not become dependent on an external power, the full benefit of press freedom will accrue to all citizens…
Newspapers are not greater than the citizen…In fact, the informed citizen is the greatest constraint and the most powerful watchdog of newspapers*.*

DVG notes that the press is also subject to the same penal laws that are applicable to all Indian citizens and that it must behave responsibly and fairly in order to maintain this freedom. Alongside, he says that while the press must play the role of a watchdog of the Government, it must not become its adversary. In DVG’s words, the duty of a newspaper is not merely to question but to do something higher than mere questioning. If this is not done fairly and fearlessly, the “national life of our country will be akin to living with a permanent lie in our domestic lives.” ²⁶⁹ DVG traces the logical conclusion ²⁷⁰ of all such failures:

If there is no Government that gives space for a truly independent paper run on these ideals of fairness and accountability, there will emerge papers that will favour such a Government. These are words from my experience.

More fundamentally, he asks and answers a question ²⁷¹ inextricably linked with press freedom among other crucial aspects using his patented allegorical style:

The hotelier prepares items that people demand. Whether it is harmful to health or no is not his concern. What he needs is business, money and profit. The matter of health is left to the doctor.
The question before newspapers is similar: should they follow the popular trends of the people? Or should they uplift the people?
If national well-being and progress is the paper’s chief objective, it must not rest with giving the fashionable to the people. On the contrary, it must provoke and inspire people to read the material which will elevate and ennoble them. The greatest responsibility of newspapers is to stimulate knowledge and wisdom. This is true national service.

Notes

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[[The Training and Education of a Journalist: A Finale Source: prekshaa]]

Apart from the foregoing note about Vruttapatrike being a rich source of quotable quotes, one can also distill a wealth of invaluable practical advice for both an aspiring and professional journalist. Such a compilation will prove to be a constant companion that will guide, train, and offer succor and solace to the journalist. It will perchance also act as a chastity belt on the scribe’s conscience.

While this advice is interspersed throughout the book, it is concretised in two chapters titled, Patrikeya Chaturanga (The Four Organs of a Paper) and Kasabu, Tayari (Profession, Training). The following is a summarized paraphrase of the two chapters.

But before that, we can cite a profound response ²⁷² that DVG gave in an interview to All India Radio dated 1 August 1968 to Sri N.S. Sitarama Sastri, the then editor of Kannada Prabha, on the subject of journalism and literature.

About an hour before starting his concert, the great musical Vidwan, Sri Mahavaidyanatha Bhagavatar would sit alone and deliberately clear his throat. The throat has to first be tempered. Only then will the music be melodious. In the same manner, those who are engaged in journalistic or literary work must first clear their throat. The first thing that forms in the throat is phlegm. Unless it is spat out, the throat won’t become clear.

The Training of a Journalist[2]

Recently, a new fashion has emerged in the reporting style of our newspapers. It is the style of drama. The reporter first writes a preface: “the minister delivered the following speech today.” But he doesn’t report the speech in an orderly fashion. In this fashionable reporting style, the reporter picks up some random line from the minister’s speech and begins his report as follows: “There is no cooked rice without rice. There is no rice without paddy. There is no paddy without farming,” said the minister. Then he continues the report, “The minister further said that when paddy is threshed, rice is obtained. To cook rice, it must be boiled in water.”

Such reporting style is repulsive. It wastes time and doesn’t inform the mind in any manner. These are the latest journalistic fashions, perhaps directly influenced by the Americans.

There is absolutely no need for our papers to imitate the trends of American or any other foreign papers. Our papers are our own and they have to find their independent voices. Our papers must be in tune with and reflect our traditions and the nature of our society and people. In matters of conduct, manners, and behavior, our mores and etiquette vastly differ from that of the West. In fact, in many cases, they are the polar opposite. Using salacious language to describe the bodily parts of women or plastering provocative pictures of females are unacceptable both to the Hindu and the Muslim community. The same holds true for delving into the private lives of people. This unfortunate trend is being taken to unhealthy levels in American journalism.

Newspaper reporters are chiefly the servants and messengers of truth. They must neither sugarcoat the truth nor inject entertainment into it. Reporting the truth and facts is a work of purity, devotion.

Language and Writing

Writers and journalists of the previous era paid close attention to excellence in word usage and composition. This fact applies in equal measure to both Kannada and English papers. It appears that the downfall in the quality of writing in Kannada journalism is the direct consequence of the downfall in its English counterpart.

However, it is nobody’s contention that everything in the past is good and nothing in the present is good. In fact, newness in writing style has its own charm and beauty. However, this newness must have the solid foundation of fundamental and time-honoured linguistic and compositional traditions. As long as we use a language, we must first learn it with sincere effort, practice it for years and use it with the finesse it merits.

Kannada Journalism

Now a word about Kannada newspapers. The language itself is undergoing rapid change. Ours is an age of innovation, novelty. This extends to the sphere of language usage as well. Innovation is definitely a mark of progress. However, innovation must not be adopted untested because it contains inherent dangers and pitfalls.

Progress means change, and change must remain within certain boundaries. That which grows must not grow so much as to alter its original form. When an infant deer grows up, it must not resemble a wild elephant. This same caution eminently applies to language. The Kannada that we speak and write today must not become unrecognisable from that used in Pandit Kempu Narayana’s ²⁷³ time. An inextricable feature in the evolution of a language is unbroken continuity.

To achieve this in their own writing, our journalists must undergo a healthy dose of study and practice. At the minimum, they must have a solid grasp of Gadugina Bharata, Jaimini Bharata, Nalacharitre, Dhruvacharitre and other poetry composed in the Shatpadi style. ²⁷⁴ Additionally, they must study our Kannada inscriptions. The language used in all such literature is close to the Kannada we use today. A sustained practice of this literary corpus will hone the journalist’s linguistic skill. For contemporary prose style, the precedent set by Cha. Vasudevayya, M.S. Puttanna, and Prof. A.R. Krishnasastri is worth emulating for their vigour.

In essence, the aforementioned method of practice leading to the cultivation of good usage is essentially a development of refinement (Samskara). Linguistic freedom sans this Samskara leads to madness.

The Education of a Journalist

The standard of education of those who wish to enter journalism as a profession must be higher than it currently is. Merely because a journalist is endowed with the ability to string words together in an attractive or appealing fashion does not mean that he or she is a sufficient authority on everything. Apart from writing on specialised topics such as art and literature, journalists writing on everyday affairs of the world must, as a prerequisite, have knowledge in the following subjects:

· Politics

· Economics

· Jurisprudence

· Logic or the method of critical analysis (in reality, this is the subject of analysing opinions for what they really are)

It will also benefit the journalist if these are supplemented with studies in the history of different nations, ancient history, and a working knowledge of the social organisation in various cultures.

Indeed, there is no knowledge or fact that is not useful to a journalist. Anything that is related to the life of humans will prove useful for a journalist at some point. Therefore, a journalist must attempt to reach the goal of becoming Omniscient as far as possible.

It is self-evident that a journalist must be endowed with the ability to write in a style that is simple, clear, decisive, unambiguous, and tight. However, this must also be accompanied by a rigorous study in at least two branches of art or science. He must be well-versed in the history of his own country, and know its geography intimately. Because various countries and cultures have made inroads into India throughout history, the journalist must be acquainted with the geography, history, and culture of those countries and cultures as well. He must constantly and daily revise his knowledge in politics and economics. Likewise, he must also have authoritative knowledge in art, poetry, drama, music, and sculpture.

Therefore, unless the journalist inculcates specialised and in-depth knowledge in at least one field that falls outside the purview of his routine work, his standard will fail to rise higher than mediocrity. Those who lag in performing regular exercises in the field of knowledge will invariably stagnate and rot. This in turn, will reflect in the writing of the journalist, which becomes tepid and repetitive.

An Attitude of Responsibility

The greatest danger that confronts a journalist is the opportunities his profession affords for enacting drama. Perhaps no profession other than journalism, provides the opportunities and avenues for putting on a show of one’s ignorance as profound knowledge. The journalist has the luxury of selecting a random sentence from a famous work and another from a notorious work and stringing them together in an article.

Few people have the erudition to challenge the errors and fallacies in such articles, which therefore remain unexposed and become accepted as authoritative. Moreover, the journalist is the Master of the Printing Blocks. What he prints obtains circulation. But those who are actually qualified to expose his errors remain quiet owing to shyness, courtesy or for some other reason. Besides, who has the time to engage full-time in such an activity given the reams and reams of printed matter that is churned out every day? Other journalists can correct minor errors committed by one of their own fraternity; it is almost impossible for the common people to engage in this task.

Those who take advanced degrees in journalism and similar courses from universities must not forget that there is a limit to their scholarship. Like others, they too must remain perpetual students.

If a journalist always remembers the following crucial truth, he will be able to minimise the danger of treading the wrong path: on any topic that he writes, there will be at least one or two readers who are more knowledgeable than he himself is. He must ask himself what such people would think of his writing. Such an attitude inculcates a healthy fear, which is the root of responsible journalism. The greater this fear, the greater this sense of responsibility, and the greater it motivates the journalist to read widely, deeply, and examine any topic from as many perspectives as possible. Ultimately, this results in the greatest benefit to the reader. This is how the paper earns the respect of people and society.

I personally know many young journalists who walk around in public with thick books in their hands. Sometimes, they carry a different thick book each day. Knowledge has immense strength. But I don’t think it has the strength to automatically transport itself from the hand to the brain. One needs to tax the mind in order to acquire, earn and retain knowledge. Expansive knowledge is not attained by reading a hundred books; it is done by putting the mind through the grist-mill of just a few definitive books.

Personal Ability

The journalist must also be endowed with physical agility. He needs to run around from place to place, and at times, must do so at great speed. However, he must also ensure that his movements are the least conspicuous. His eyes need to focus on several things at the same time and must be able to grasp all of them in the same vision. He must not discard anything that he sees or hears. He must cultivate an outlook where every fact, every new titbit of information, however trivial, becomes useful to him. He must honestly work to earn the trust and respect of everyone he meets.

However, the primary and basic qualification for a journalist is to develop a character of culture and refinement.

A good journalist is one who is useful to the nation.

As we noted earlier, these two chapters of Vruttapatrike must be printed out and carried in the pocket of every aspiring and professional journalist. Whether the journalist attains excellence or eminence or no, he will most certainly not go astray.

As we noted earlier, these two chapters of Vruttapatrike must be printed out and carried in the pocket of every aspiring and professional journalist. Whether the journalist attains excellence or eminence or no, he will most certainly not go astray.

DVG’s Ideal Newspaper

The American writer and novelist, Howard Fast once said ²⁷² that “there is no passive literature worth its salt,” a line that perfectly characterizes the awesome body of DVG’s journalistic work. When any work attains the pinnacle of excellence, manmade categories of convenience automatically disappear. Thus, one would be hard-pressed to detect where “journalism” stops and “literature” begins in the context of DVG. The argument that given the innately fleeting nature of journalistic writing doesn’t lend itself well to qualify as literature has minuscule exceptions to which DVG strikingly belongs, as we have seen so far. But there’s yet another reason why this is so: with the passage of nearly a century, most of the events he wrote about as a journalist are distant, dim and irrelevant, but when we study his journalism, we find a deeply inquiring quality embedded in it which is what gives it the greatness of a literary sort.

This selfsame transcendental quality of excellent is reflected in DVG’s conception of an ideal newspaper. Yet again, this was no theoretical conception. It was his encapsulated wisdom of more than half a century of starting and running papers. The following are a few highlights from his essay ²⁷⁵ titled Adarsha Patrike or Ideal Newspaper.

• The ideal newspaper that he envisaged would not exceed four pages in the broadsheet format. The main news items would fill the cover page. The editorial was reserved for the second page. Editorials were not mandatory every day. They would be written only on important issues. Else, the page would publish extracts of speeches on various topics. The top half of the third page would feature letters to the editor and the bottom half, for specialist topics. The fourth page was reserved entirely for advertisements.
• In all, the paper would not occupy more than fifteen minutes of the reader’s time. - A special edition or supplement would be published during highly critical or extremely urgent occasions. - Those who value the wisdom, judgement, and independent thinking of the reading public will be abhorred by the practice of publishing bulky newspapers. - This is an era of hectic, routine activity. Work, factory, office, or business eat up roughly eight or nine hours of a person’s day. When we subtract this and also subtract the time spent for our natural functions and social activities, a person is left with about four hours. Thus, a person must somehow find at least an hour for reading newspapers. In that case, when and how will he find time to study serious and profound books? Where is the time for literature and art? - If the mind gets accustomed to reading petty questions and following trivial issues, it will soon develop an inability to even admit the existence of deep subjects. In this fashion, such bulky newspapers become the direct cause for promoting intellectual sloth and weakness. - An ideal paper should thus be small in size; it must cover news and issues ranked by importance and timeliness, and it must be written in a succinct style.

The Undivided Life

As we have seen so far, while journalism was an accidental profession DVG stumbled into, he embraced it as his sacred calling. But in discharging his professional duties, he was actually practicing Dharma, a term that is being used with great nonchalance of late as a verbal suffix, and not where it actually matters: action.

Even in his role as a journalist, DVG not only cleansed the minds of three generations, but uplifted them after cleansing. The phrase “holding the head high” became a profound reality in the lives of everyone fortunate enough to come into his close contact. It was a height that taught these folks to only look at and scale the Himalayas. Sri S.R. Ramaswamy continues to shine as a distinguished testimony of this truth.

Indeed, DVG’s own response ²⁷³ in an interview best sums up his goal, approach and method.

I have looked upon life as one undivided whole. All aspects of it are equal to me. Without good morals, there is no good citizenship; without culture, you can expect no good morals. I have tried to do that which occurred to me as the proper thing in every field of the life of our people… [if I was born again], I would like to carry on my work for the good life, viz., a life of purity, of devotion to truth and universal fellow-feeling.

These are not words but fragrant breeze befittingly wafting from this gentle forest-flower (Vanasuma) who gave so enormously but took almost nothing from the country and its people he so lovingly served for his entire life.

Concluded

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Appendix I: List of Publications DVG Founded

1. Bharati (Cofounder) 2. Vande Matram Series 3. Sumati 4. The Karnataka 5. Karnataka and the Indian Review of Reviews 6. Public Affairs

Appendix II: List of Publications DVG Contributed to

1. Suryodaya Prakashika (Kannada) 2. The Evening Mail 3. The Mysore Standard 4. Nadegannadi (Kannada) 5. Mysore Times (Assistant Editor) 6. The Hindustan Review 7. New India 8. Servant of India 9. The Hindu 10. The Wealth of Mysore 11. Daily Post 12. Vishwa Karnataka (Kannada) 13. The Pioneer 14. Swarajya 15. The Bombay Chronicle 16. The Madras Mail 17. Triveni Journal 18. Current Science 19. Daily News 20. Deshabandhu 21. Samyukta Karnataka (Kannada) 22. The Indian Express 23. Prajamata (Kannada) 24. Prajavani (Kannada) 25. Kannada Prabha (Kannada) 26. Deccan Herald 27. Mysindia 28. The Literary Criterion Summer 29. The Aryan Path 30. Bhavan’s Journal 31. Illustrated Weekly of India 32. Kalki (Tamil)

Notes

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1. Thoreau: Ralph Waldo Emerson (The Atlantic: August 1862) ↩︎

2. Pg 3, Munnudi: Rajya Shastra (DVG Kruti Shreni: Volume 5, Govt of Karnataka, 2013) ↩︎

3. D V Gundappa, Srimad Bhagavad Gita Tatparya or Jivanadharma Yoga (Kavyalaya Publishers, Mysore, 2007), pp 21—22. Extract translation by Sandeep Balakrishna. ↩︎

4. D V Gundappa, Srimad Bhagavad Gita Tatparya or Jivanadharma Yoga (Kavyalaya Publishers, Mysore, 2007), Pg 105. Extract translation by Sandeep Balakrishna. ↩︎

5. Vidurashwatha near Gauri Bidanur in Karnataka is known as the “Jallianwala Bagh of the South.” On 25 April 1938, as a part of the freedom struggle of India, a group of villagers had congregated to organise a Satyagraha. The police fired indiscriminately at the group, resulting in the death of around 35 people. A memorial has been erected in this location bearing the names of those who lost their lives in this incident. ↩︎

6. H.M. Nayak, Munndi: Rajyashastra, Rajyanga—DVG Kruti Shreni: Volume 5 (Govt of Karnataka, 2013) Pg xix. ↩︎

7. D R Venkataramanan, Virakta Rashtraka DVG (Navakarnataka, 2014) Pg 28 ↩︎

8. Dr. S R Ramaswamy, Divatigegalu (Sahitya Sindhu Prakashana, 2009) Pg 8. ↩︎

9. D V Gundappa, Hrudaya Sampannaru: Jnapaka Chitrashaale (Govt of Karnataka, 2013) ↩︎

10. D R Venkataramanan, Virakta Rashtraka DVG (Navakarnataka, 2014) Pg 29 ↩︎

11. Dr. S R Ramaswamy, Divatigegalu (Sahitya Sindhu Prakashana, 2009) Pg 41. ↩︎

12. D R Venkataramanan, Virakta Rashtraka DVG (Navakarnataka, 2014) Pg 31 ↩︎

13. Dr. S R Ramaswamy, Divatigegalu (Sahitya Sindhu Prakashana, 2009) Pg 5. ↩︎

14. Dr. S R Ramaswamy, Divatigegalu (Sahitya Sindhu Prakashana, 2009) Pg 1. ↩︎

15. Ibid, Pg 24 ↩︎

16. Quoted in: D R Venkataramanan, Virakta Rashtraka DVG (Navakarnataka, 2014) Pg 113 ↩︎

17. H.M. Nayak, Munnudi: Rajyashastra, Rajyanga—DVG Kruti Shreni: Volume 5 (Govt of Karnataka, 2013) Pg xx. ↩︎

18. Quoted in H.M. Nayak, Munnudi: Rajyashastra, Rajyanga—DVG Kruti Shreni: Volume 5 (Govt of Karnataka, 2013) Pg xx. ↩︎

19. It is difficult to render the precise import and connotation of Ashwamedha Yaga (or Yagna) because it is steeped in raw, unique cultural experience and civilizational memory. The literal meaning “horse sacrifice” is misleading. A near-accurate import is that it is a means to acquire political power, for building and sustaining a Rashtra by using the combined energy of a populace that shares the common goal of collectively achieving a robust, prosperous, and contented Rashtra. ↩︎

20. The history of independent India is the best illustration of rulers deriving power bestowed by their office. ↩︎

21. D V Gundappa: Rajyashastra, Rajyanga—DVG Kruti Shreni: Volume 5 (Govt of Karnataka, 2013) Pg 165. The full quote is as follows: ↩︎

22. Nani A Palkhivala: We the People. The full quote: “the feeling of obedience to the unenforceable is the very opposite of the attitude that whatever is technically possible is allowed.” ↩︎

23. Ibid 130 ↩︎

24. Ibid 131 ↩︎

25. Lee Kuan Yew: Interview with New Perspectives Quarterly, 1995 ↩︎

26. D V Gundappa: Rajyashastra, Rajyanga—DVG Kruti Shreni: Volume 5 (Govt of Karnataka, 2013) Pg 111. ↩︎

27. Paul Johnson: Intellectuals, Harper Collins, 1998. Pg 26. Emphasis added. ↩︎

28. Ibid, Pg 110 ↩︎

29. D V Gundappa: Rajyashastra, Rajyanga—DVG Kruti Shreni: Volume 5 (Govt of Karnataka, 2013) Pg 110. ↩︎

30. Ibid, Pg 145 ↩︎

31. D V Gundappa: Rajyashastra, Rajyanga—DVG Kruti Shreni: Volume 5 (Govt of Karnataka, 2013) Pp 185-6. Emphasis added. ↩︎

32. Aldous Huxley: The Perennial Philosophy ↩︎

33. For the full discussion, see: D V Gundappa: Rajyashastra, Rajyanga—DVG Kruti Shreni: Volume 5 (Govt of Karnataka, 2013) pp 7-8 ↩︎

34. D V Gundappa: Rajyashastra, Rajyanga—DVG Kruti Shreni: Volume 5 (Govt of Karnataka, 2013) pp 100-101. ↩︎

35. The Chennai Jana Sangham was stewarded at various points by the doughty freedom fighter, advocate and shipping magnate, V.O. Chidambaram Pillai who had to suffer grievously at the hands of the British for daring to wreck their maritime trade exploitation of the Indian seas. ↩︎

36. Selected Writings of D.V. Gundappa Volume One (1908-1917): Vedanta and Nationalism (Gokhale Institute of Public Affairs, Bangalore, 2019) pp 34-37; See also: D V Gundappa: Rajyashastra, Rajyanga—DVG Kruti Shreni: Volume 5 (Govt of Karnataka, 2013) p 267 ↩︎

37. Saul Bellow: How Higher Education Has Failed Democracy and Impoverished the Souls of Today’s Students (Simon & Schuster, New York, 1988) p. 12 ↩︎

38. D V Gundappa: Rajyashastra, Rajyanga—DVG Kruti Shreni: Volume 5 (Govt of Karnataka, 2013): Episode 1: Purvacharitreya Rupada Pithike: pp 11-18 ↩︎

39. D V Gundappa: Jivana Charitre, Makkala Sahitya—DVG Kruti Shreni: Volume 4 (Govt of Karnataka, 2013) p 486 ↩︎

40. D V Gundappa: Rajyashastra, Rajyanga—DVG Kruti Shreni: Volume 5 (Govt of Karnataka, 2013): p 267 ↩︎

41. In guidance provided to the author ↩︎

42. D V Gundappa: Jivana Charitre, Makkala Sahitya—DVG Kruti Shreni: Volume 4 (Govt of Karnataka, 2013) p 260. ↩︎

43. M. Hiriyanna: The Quest After Perfection – The Message of Indian Philosophy (Kavyalaya Publishers, Mysore, 2000) pp 47, 53) ↩︎

44. See the first chapter of this work for a fuller description. ↩︎

45. D V Gundappa: Jivana Charitre, Makkala Sahitya—DVG Kruti Shreni: Volume 5 (Govt of Karnataka, 2013) pp 188-9 ↩︎

46. D V Gundappa: Jivana Charitre, Makkala Sahitya—DVG Kruti Shreni: Volume 5 (Govt of Karnataka, 2013) pp 189 ↩︎

47. D V Gundappa: Rajyashastra, Rajyanga—DVG Kruti Shreni: Volume 5 (Govt of Karnataka, 2013) pp 442 ↩︎

48. D V Gundappa: Rajyashastra, Rajyanga—DVG Kruti Shreni: Volume 5 (Govt of Karnataka, 2013) p 443 ↩︎

49. S. Srikanta Sastri: Bharatiya Samskruti: (Kamadhenu Publishers, 2015), pp 19-20 ↩︎

50. D V Gundappa: Rajyashastra, Rajyanga—DVG Kruti Shreni: Volume 5 (Govt of Karnataka, 2013) p 302 ↩︎

51. D V Gundappa: Rajyashastra, Rajyanga—DVG Kruti Shreni: Volume 5 (Govt of Karnataka, 2013) pp xx-xxi ↩︎

52. Dheemanta —Rasarushi DVG (Gokhale Institute of Public Affairs, 1988) p 222 ↩︎

53. D V Gundappa: Rajyashastra, Rajyanga—DVG Kruti Shreni: Volume 5 (Govt of Karnataka, 2013) pp 312 ↩︎

54. D V Gundappa: Rajyashastra, Rajyanga—DVG Kruti Shreni: Volume 5 (Govt of Karnataka, 2013) p 304 ↩︎

55. D V Gundappa: Rajyashastra, Rajyanga—DVG Kruti Shreni: Volume 5 (Govt of Karnataka, 2013) p 303 ↩︎

56. Mankutimmana Kagga: Verse 59 ↩︎

57. Later renamed as Bangalore City Corporation. Currently, Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike. ↩︎

58. The Town Hall, a landmark in Bangalore is named after him. ↩︎

59. Now Krishnarajendra Market or K.R. Market ↩︎

60. D.V. Gundappa: Hrudaya Sampannaru: Jnapaka Chitrashaale (Govt of Karnataka, 2013) ↩︎

61. DVG had great regard and affection for V.S. Srinivasa Sastri and has written a detailed profile about him. ↩︎

62. D.R. Venkataramanan: Virakta Rashtraka DVG Navakarnataka, Bangalore, 2019, p 121. Emphasis added. ↩︎

63. Dated 13 July 1934 ↩︎

64. D.R. Venkataramanan: Virakta Rashtraka DVG Navakarnataka, Bangalore, 2019, pp 122-3. Emphasis added. ↩︎

65. D.R. Venkataramanan: Virakta Rashtraka DVG Navakarnataka, Bangalore, 2019, p 80. Emphasis added. ↩︎

66. D V Gundappa: Rajyashastra, Rajyanga—DVG Kruti Shreni: Volume 5 (Govt of Karnataka, 2013) p. 168-9 ↩︎

67. D V Gundappa: Rajyashastra, Rajyanga—DVG Kruti Shreni: Volume 5 (Govt of Karnataka, 2013) p. 141-2 ↩︎

68. D V Gundappa: Ganapati Prasangada Goodartha: Vishwa Karnataka, January 1929. Excerpt translated into English by Sandeep Balakrishna. ↩︎

69. Princely States were also called Native States ↩︎

70. S.R. Ramaswamy & B.N. Shashi Kiran: Selected Writings of DVG: Volume 2 (Gokhale Institute of Public Affairs, 2020) p 203. Emphasis added ↩︎

71. Ibid, p 201 ↩︎

72. Prepared by the British bureaucrat Harcourt Butler. It apparently was an investigation into the nature of the relationship between the British crown and the princes of the Princely States of India. Much discontent had been brewing among the princes as to their exact position under the British. The Butler Report simply reaffirmed what was then known as the “paramount power.” In more candid terms, paramount power was the untrammeled political power of the British to overrule or veto the princes without assigning any reason. ↩︎

73. D R Venkataramanan: Virakta Rashtraka DVG (Navakarnataka, 2014) p. 178 ↩︎

74. Ibid, p 180. Emphasis added. ↩︎

75. Veerathappa, K. “DEWAN MIRZA ISMAIL AND MYSORE CONGRESS.” Proceedings of the Indian History Congress 40 (1979): pp 653-61. ↩︎

76. See for example, Majumdar R.C. “History of the Freedom Movement: Vol III,” Firma KLM, Calcutta ↩︎

77. Quoted in Virakta Rashtraka: D.R. Venkataramanan, Navakarnataka, Bangalore, 2019, p 85 ↩︎

78. orvane niluve nīnutkaṭakṣaṇagaḻali ।
    dharmasaṃkaṭagaḻali, jīvasamaradali ।।
    nirvāṇadīkṣeyali, niryāṇaghaṭṭadali ।
    nirmitraniralu kali – maṃkutimma ।। 689 ।। ↩︎

79. The National Institute of Newman Studies: http://www.newmanreader.org/ ↩︎

80. Raghavendra Patil: Pratibhavanta Samsadiya Patu: DVG, Karnataka Legislative Library Committee Bangalore 2009, pp 157-169 ↩︎

81. D.R. Venkataramanan: Virakta Rashtraka Navakarnataka, Bangalore, 2019, pp 194-5 ↩︎

82. Raghavendra Patil: Pratibhavanta Samsadiya Patu: DVG, Karnataka Legislative Library Committee Bangalore 2009, pp 112. Emphasis added. ↩︎

83. Since renamed as DVG Road in his honour ↩︎

84. Quoted in Virakta Rashtraka: D.R. Venkataramanan, Navakarnataka, Bangalore, 2019, p 219 ↩︎

85. Quoted in Virakta Rashtraka: D.R. Venkataramanan, Navakarnataka, Bangalore, 2019, pp 218-9. Emphasis added. ↩︎

86. This home was located at the Northeast of M.N. Krishna Rao Park. ↩︎

87. Towards a New World Order: Lecture delivered at the Indian Institute of World Culture, Bangalore, p 15. Emphasis added. ↩︎

88. George Orwell: ‘Politics and the English Language’ First published: Horizon, London, April 1946. ↩︎

89. D.V. Gundappa: “Crowned Republic,” Public Affairs, Vol. XIX-6, June 1975, p 122. Emphasis added. ↩︎

90. Arthur Hailey: Evening News, Open Road Media, 2015 ↩︎

91. Towards a New World Order: Lecture delivered at the Indian Institute of World Culture, Bangalore, p 7 ↩︎

92. See Chapter 4: Notion of Ramarajya ↩︎

93. https://www.inc.in/en/inc-timeline/1915-1925. Last accessed on 10 October 2020. Emphasis added. ↩︎

94. For a fuller discussion on this point, see Chapter 4: Notion of Ramarajya. ↩︎

95. R.C. Majumdar: History of the Freedom Movement in India: Vol III, Firma KLM, Calcutta, p xxi ↩︎

96. Quoted in Virakta Rashtraka: D.R. Venkataramanan, Navakarnataka, Bangalore, 2019, p 205 ↩︎

97. Then known in its shortened form as “Consembly.” ↩︎

98. Quoted in Virakta Rashtraka: D.R. Venkataramanan, Navakarnataka, Bangalore, 2019, p 215. Emphasis added. ↩︎

99. Quoted in: THE PEOPLE SAY CONGRESS WORSE THAN THE BRITISH: March, April 1948, Bombay. Emphasis added. ↩︎

100. The other relevant excerpt from Mashruwala’s stinging criticism may also be noted: “it seems to be a doubtful method of consolidating one’s party through the power which a governing party necessarily possesses in the State. It sets a bad example for other parties to follow when any of them come into power. In a democratic form of government this might happen at any time… in the course of time the very heat of coercion might enable some of these parties to grow strong enough to overthrow the Congress party. Such a new party in power will follow the example of Congress party by rewarding all those who might have suffered under the Congress regime, and in this way the country will always have the kind of government which thrives on nepotism… By rewarding those who suffered out of patriotic sentiment we are transferring them from the list of patriots to that of mercenaries or farsighted businessmen.” Emphasis added. ↩︎

101. See: https://indiankanoon.org/doc/1933556/ for the full debate. ↩︎

102. Ibid ↩︎

103. Ibid. Emphasis added. ↩︎

104. Pandurang Vaman Kane: History of Dharmasastra: Vol 5 (Part II), Government Oriental Series, Class B, No. 6, BORI, Poona, 1962, p 1665 ↩︎

105. D.V. Gundappaa: Simla and After, Selected Writings of D.V. Gundappa, Vol IV, Gokhale Institute of Public Affairs, 2020, Bangalore pp 194 – 212 onwards ↩︎

106. Ibid pp 205-6 ↩︎

107. Ibid, p 210 ↩︎

108. D.V. Gundappa: The Secular State, Public Affairs, Gokhale Institute of Public Affairs, Bangalore, June 1949, p 44 ↩︎

109. Ibid. pp 44-5 ↩︎

110. Ibid p 46 ↩︎

111. D.V. Gundappa: India’s Motto, Public Affairs, June 1949, Gokhale Institute of Public Affairs, Bangalore pp 47 – 49 ↩︎

112. The building which houses the Karnataka Legislature ↩︎

113. A.N. Krishna Rao, the renowned Kannada novelist, writer, and activist. ↩︎

114. D.V. Gundappa: Congress and Parties, Public Affairs, April 1949, Gokhale Institute of Public Affairs, Bangalore p 33. Emphasis added. ↩︎

115. Ibid. Emphasis added. ↩︎

116. Ibid. Emphasis added. ↩︎

117. D.V. Gundappa: Congress and Parties, Public Affairs, May 1949, Gokhale Institute of Public Affairs, Bangalore p 42. Emphasis added. ↩︎

118. For the full text of the judgment, see: https://indiankanoon.org/doc/456839/ ↩︎

119. D.V. Gundappa: Congress and Parties, Public Affairs, May 1949, Gokhale Institute of Public Affairs, Bangalore p 42. ↩︎

120. Books and Writings of Ambedkar: Vol. 14, Part 2: https://www.mea.gov.in/Images/attach/amb/Volume_14_02.pdf. Emphasis added. ↩︎

121. D.V. Gundappa: Congress and Parties, Public Affairs, May 1949, Gokhale Institute of Public Affairs, Bangalore pp 41-42 ↩︎

122. D.V. Gundappa: Working of the States Ministry, Public Affairs, April 1949, p 27. Emphasis added. ↩︎

123. D V Gundappa: Congress Sarakaragalu*,* Rajyashastra, Rajyanga, DVG Kruti Shreni: Volume 5 (Govt of Karnataka, 2013), pp 528-9 ↩︎

124. D V Gundappa: Republic, Congress Mattu Praje*,* Rajyashastra, Rajyanga, DVG Kruti Shreni: Volume 5 (Govt of Karnataka, 2013), pp 588-9 ↩︎

125. D V Gundappa: Namma Prajarajyada Pragati*,* Rajyashastra, Rajyanga, DVG Kruti Shreni: Volume 5 (Govt of Karnataka, 2013), pp 592-8 ↩︎

126. P.V. Kane: History of the Dharmasastra, Vol 5, Sec X, Ch.XXXVII, pp 1677-1699 ↩︎

127. D V Gundappa: Namma Prajarajyada Pragati*,* Rajyashastra, Rajyanga, DVG Kruti Shreni: Volume 5 (Govt of Karnataka, 2013), pp 594 ↩︎

128. D.V. Gundappa. Rajyashastra, Rajyanga, DVG Krutishreni, Vol 5, Government of Karnataka, pp 634-5. Emphasis added. ↩︎

129. D.V. Gundappa. Rajyashastra, Rajyanga, DVG Krutishreni, Vol 5, Government of Karnataka, pp 638. Emphasis added. ↩︎

130. A Memorial on the Position of The Native States in The Empire, Selected Writings of D.V. Gundappa, Vol I, Gokhale Institute of Public Affairs, 2020, Bangalore pp 295 ↩︎

131. Ibid. p 293 ↩︎

132. Ibid. p 177 ↩︎

133. Narrated in M.O. Mathai, My Days with Nehru, Vikas Publishing House, Delhi, 1979, pp 171-173 ↩︎

134. The Problems of Indian Native States, Selected Writings of D.V. Gundappa, Vol I, Gokhale Institute of Public Affairs, 2020, Bangalore p 192 ↩︎

135. Ibid ↩︎

136. Ibid, pp 192-3 ↩︎

137. Memorials on the Problems of Native States—III, Selected Writings of D.V. Gundappa, Vol I, Gokhale Institute of Public Affairs, 2020, Bangalore p 224. Italics added. ↩︎

138. Ibid. pp 224-6. Emphasis added. ↩︎

139. Ibid. p 225 ↩︎

140. Ibid. p 226 ↩︎

141. Quoted in, Graham Allison, Lee Kuan Yew: The Grand Master’s Insights on China, the United States, and the World, Penguin Random House, 2020 ↩︎

142. Memorials on the Problems of Native States—II, Selected Writings of D.V. Gundappa, Vol I, Gokhale Institute of Public Affairs, 2020, Bangalore p 212. Italics in the original. ↩︎

143. For a detailed discussion, see Chapter 6: Rough and Tumble of Politics ↩︎

144. p 31 ↩︎

145. The Genesis of the Present Anomaly, Selected Writings of D.V. Gundappa, Vol I, Gokhale Institute of Public Affairs, 2020, Bangalore pp 299-302 ↩︎

146. Quoted in: Ibid, p 301 ↩︎

147. Ibid ↩︎

148. State Powers, Selected Writings of D.V. Gundappa, Vol IV, Gokhale Institute of Public Affairs, 2020, Bangalore p 11. Emphasis added. ↩︎

149. Ibid, p 12 ↩︎

150. Memorials on the Problems of Native States – V, Selected Writings of D.V. Gundappa, Vol I, Gokhale Institute of Public Affairs, 2020, Bangalore p 249. Emphasis added. ↩︎

151. See for example: (1) Shivaji’s System of Government (2) Tiruvalluvar (3) Democracy in Ancient India. Quoted in Selected Writings of D.V. Gundappa, Vol I, Gokhale Institute of Public Affairs, 2020, Bangalore p 251-4. Emphasis added. ↩︎

152. Lord Islington on the Native States, Selected Writings of D.V. Gundappa, Vol I, Gokhale Institute of Public Affairs, 2020, Bangalore p 245. Italicised. ↩︎

153. Memorials on the Problems of Native States – IV, Selected Writings of D.V. Gundappa, Vol I, Gokhale Institute of Public Affairs, 2020, Bangalore p 238. Emphasis added. ↩︎

154. Education of the Princes, Selected Writings of D.V. Gundappa, Vol I, Gokhale Institute of Public Affairs, 2020, Bangalore pp 227-230. Italicised. ↩︎

155. Now known as the Sir Seshadri Iyer Memorial Library or the State Central Library. ↩︎

156. Ibid. Footnote 25 ↩︎

157. Unreality of Advertised Progress, Selected Writings of D.V. Gundappa, Vol I, Gokhale Institute of Public Affairs, 2020, Bangalore p 240. ↩︎

158. Native States and British Interference, Selected Writings of D.V. Gundappa, Vol I, Gokhale Institute of Public Affairs, 2020, Bangalore p 261 ↩︎

159. Ibid. Footnote 28 ↩︎

160. Thoughts on Democracy, Selected Writings of D.V. Gundappa, Vol I, Gokhale Institute of Public Affairs, 2020, Bangalore pp 267-8. ↩︎

161. The States—Schools for Statesmanship, Selected Writings of D.V. Gundappa, Vol I, Gokhale Institute of Public Affairs, 2020, Bangalore p 220. ↩︎

162. D.V. Gundappa. “Indian States and the National Congress.” The Bombay Chronicle. Emphasis added. ↩︎

163. Nehru Report (Motilal Nehru,1928): https://www.constitutionofindia.net/historical_constitutions/nehru_report__motilal_nehru_1928__1st%20January%201928. Emphasis added. ↩︎

164. D.V. Gundappa. “Indian States and the National Congress.” The Bombay Chronicle. ↩︎

165. Ibid. Emphasis added. ↩︎

166. For example, see: R.C. Majumdar. History of the Freedom Movement in India, Vol III Firma K.L.M, 1962, Calcutta ↩︎

167. See: Chapters 1 and 4 ↩︎

168. See Chapters 5 and 6 ↩︎

169. The States—Schools for Statesmanship, Selected Writings of D.V. Gundappa, Vol I, Gokhale Institute of Public Affairs, 2020, Bangalore pp 219 ↩︎

170. Ibid. p 234. ↩︎

171. M.R. Jayakar. Private Papers, National Archives of India, p 126-7. Emphasis added. ↩︎

172. H. Butler. Appointment of our Committee and terms of reference, Report of the IAN States Committee, p 5. https://dspace.gipe.ac.in/xmlui/bitstream/handle/10973/29648/GIPE-009152-01.pdf?sequence=3&isAllowed=y ↩︎

173. The account of DVG’s arguments before the Butler Committee is taken from Dr. S.R. Ramaswamy’s profile of DVG in Deevatigegalu, Sahitya Sindhu Prakashana, Bangalore. ↩︎

174. D.V.Gundappa. Federalism, the Only Principle, Selected Writings of D.V. Gundappa, Vol I, Gokhale Institute of Public Affairs, 2020, Bangalore pp 307 ↩︎

175. Ibid, p 308. Emphasis added. ↩︎

176. Ibid, p 310. Emphasis added. ↩︎

177. For the full illuminating discussion on this topic, see Selected Writings of D.V. Gundappa, Vol I, Gokhale Institute of Public Affairs, 2020, Bangalore pp 304 – 315. ↩︎

178. Ibid, p 312 ↩︎

179. Ibid, p 315. ↩︎

180. The Ministry of States or the States Department was the new avatar, or a mere renaming of the British Government’s Political Department which was in charge of administering the relationship of the British crown with British India and the Princely States. The Political Department exercised its power on the basis of paramountcy as long as the British ruled India. ↩︎

181. D.V.Gundappa: Working of the States Ministry, Public Affairs, Vol. 1, No 3, March 1949, p 24. ↩︎

182. D.V.Gundappa: Working of the States Ministry, Public Affairs, Vol. 1, No 2, February 1949, p 16. Emphasis added. ↩︎

183. Speech of Sardar Patel in January 1948 ↩︎

184. D.V.Gundappa: Working of the States Ministry, Public Affairs, Vol. 1, No 2, February 1949, p 16. Emphasis added. ↩︎

185. See Chapter 7 for example. ↩︎

186. D.V.Gundappa: Working of the States Ministry, Public Affairs, Vol. 1, No 3, March 1949, p 23. Emphasis added. ↩︎

187. Ibid. p 24. Emphasis added. ↩︎

188. D.V.Gundappa: Working of the States Ministry, Public Affairs, Vol. 1, No 4, April 1949, p 26. Emphasis added. ↩︎

189. Ibid. p 27. Emphasis added. ↩︎

190. Ibid. p 27. Emphasis added. A complementary reading in this context is DVG’s masterly exposition of the system of governance in vogue in the Mysore State under the Dewans and Commissioners. DVG describes this sixty-plus-years’ rule as a golden epoch. The original Kannada essay forms the first chapter of his classic Mysurina Diwanaru, Jnapakachitrashaale – Vol. 4. The English translations are available at: (1) https://www.prekshaa.in/system-of-governance-before-independence-part1 and (2) https://www.prekshaa.in/system-of-governance-before-independence-part2 ↩︎

191. D.V.Gundappa: Working of the States Ministry, Public Affairs, Vol. 1, No 4, April 1949, p 30. Emphasis added. ↩︎

192. Ibid p 29 ↩︎

193. D.V.Gundappa: Working of the States Ministry, Public Affairs, Vol. 1, No 3, March 1949, p 24. Emphasis added. ↩︎

194. D.V.Gundappa: Working of the States Ministry, Public Affairs, Vol. 1, No 4, April 1949, p 26. Emphasis in the original. ↩︎

195. D.V.Gundappa: Working of the States Ministry, Public Affairs, Vol. 1, No 4, April 1949, pp 29-30. ↩︎

196. This region comprised the States of Bharatpur, Dholpur, Alwar and Karauli. ↩︎

197. D.V.Gundappa: Working of the States Ministry, Public Affairs, Vol. 1, No 4, April 1949, pp 29-31. ↩︎

198. Michael Edwardes. Nehru: A Biography, Allen Lane, 1962, p 250. Emphasis added. ↩︎

199. Ibid. pp 252-3. Emphasis added. ↩︎

200. D V Gundappa: Rajyashastra, Rajyanga—DVG Kruti Shreni: Volume 5 (Govt of Karnataka, 2013) p 643. Translated into English by Sandeep Balakrishna. Emphasis added. ↩︎

201. For fuller details, see Chapter 1 ↩︎

202. Haji Ismail Sait was one of the wealthiest merchants and businessmen in south India in the early 1900s with diverse business interests including milk powder, industrial machinery, clothing mills, horse gram, timber, distilleries, carbonic acid, soap, sugar, banking, and gold mining. ↩︎

203. Champion Reefs was the second deepest underground mine in the world, located about thirty kilometers from Kolar in the mining town of KGF (Kolar Gold Fields). It was continuously operational for about a century before shutting down in 2001. ↩︎

204. Quoted in Virakta Rashtraka: D.R. Venkataramanan, Navakarnataka, Bangalore, 2019, p 42 ↩︎

205. DVG has written brilliant pen portraits of these men with great feeling in his classic Jnapakachitrashale volumes. ↩︎

206. A reprint of the full text of Vedanta and Nationalism is available in Selected Writings of D.V. Gundappa (in four volumes): Gokhale Institute of Public Affairs, Bangalore, 2019-2020. ↩︎

207. Narrated in Virakta Rashtraka: D.R. Venkataramanan, Navakarnataka, Bangalore, 2019, pp 58-9 ↩︎

208. In those days, it was known as Postal Order Business ↩︎

209. D.V. Gundappa. Sankeerna, DVG Krutishreni, Vol 11, Government of Karnataka, pp 225-6. ↩︎

210. Ibid ↩︎

211. D.V. Gundappa. Sankeerna, DVG Krutishreni, Vol 11, Government of Karnataka, p 231 ↩︎

212. See: Appendix I: D.V. Gundappa. Sankeerna, DVG Krutishreni, Vol 11, Government of Karnataka, pp 231-4 ↩︎

213. Quoted in Virakta Rashtraka: D.R. Venkataramanan, Navakarnataka, Bangalore, 2019, p 59 ↩︎

214. Virakta Rashtraka: D.R. Venkataramanan, Navakarnataka, Bangalore, 2019, pp 59-60 ↩︎

215. Ibid p 60 ↩︎

216. A comprehensive account of Diwan Rangacharlu later became part of the volume titled Mysorina Diwanarugalu, part of the complete works of DVG titled DVG Kruti Shreni, Government of Karnataka, 2013. ↩︎

217. D.V. Gundappa. Sankeerna, DVG Krutishreni, Vol 11, Government of Karnataka, p 235 ↩︎

218. Quoted in Virakta Rashtraka: D.R. Venkataramanan, Navakarnataka, Bangalore, 2019, p 63 ↩︎

219. William Shakespeare: Hamlet, Act 1 Scene 3 ↩︎

220. A highly representative incident of this hostility is the behavior of Henry Cobb, narrated in an earlier chapter. ↩︎

221. In his mini-biography of Diwan Visvesvaraya written much later, DVG seems to have revised his view. Here, he says that Diwan Visvesvaraya’s approach to public spending was premised on the creation of national assets, which would be beneficial to the State in the long run—say, after twenty or thirty years. As for the Mysore Economic Conference, DVG’s stance remains unchanged. This had less to do with Diwan Visvesvaraya’s farsighted vision behind it and everything to do with the caliber and attitudes of the people who populated it. ↩︎

222. See Chapters 6, 7, and 8 ↩︎

223. D.V. Gundappa. Sankeerna, DVG Krutishreni, Vol 11, Government of Karnataka, pp 236-7. Emphasis added. ↩︎

224. D.V. Gundappa. Nenapinachitragalu - 2, DVG Krutishreni, Vol 7, Government of Karnataka, p 447 ↩︎

225. Ibid. p 450 ↩︎

226. Chapter 7 ↩︎

227. D.V. Gundappa. Sankeerna, DVG Krutishreni, Vol 11, Government of Karnataka, p 141. ↩︎

228. Ibid ↩︎

229. H.M. Nayak: Foreword in D.V. Gundappa. Sankeerna, DVG Krutishreni, Vol 11, Government of Karnataka, p xx. ↩︎

230. D.V. Gundappa. Sankeerna, DVG Krutishreni, Vol 11, Government of Karnataka, p 144. ↩︎

231. Ibid. pp 143-4 ↩︎

232. Ibid. p 160 ↩︎

233. Ibid p 160-1 ↩︎

234. Ibid p 165. The English translation of DVG’S original Kannada phrase, “ātmaparīkṣeya abhyāsa” hardly does justice to the full gamut of its meaning. ↩︎

235. Ibid p 166 ↩︎

236. This was also the first convention of the Association. The printed form of the lecture is titled vṛttapatrike: adara kartavya, adakke sahāya (Newspaper: Its Duties, the Support it Requires), available in D.V. Gundappa. Sankeerna, DVG Krutishreni, Vol 11, Government of Karnataka, pp 156-188 ↩︎

237. Ibid p 167. ↩︎

238. Ibid p 174 ↩︎

239. D.V. Gundappa. Sankeerna, DVG Krutishreni, Vol 11, Government of Karnataka, p 213 ↩︎

240. Ibid. p 241, Italicised. ↩︎

241. https://spartacus-educational.com/USAdurantyW.htm ↩︎

242. Walter Duranty enjoyed his Pulitzer-prize celebrity status for a full decade till the New York Times recalled him from the USSR in 1941. In the interim, some editors at the paper began to have misgivings about his dispatches from Soviet Russia. He whitewashed Stalin’s disastrous collectivization of Russian agriculture that led to a national famine, killing millions in 1932-3. Even after the paper recalled him, it did not rescind the Pulitzer Prize despite sustained pressure from the journalistic fraternity. The full extent of Duranty’s notoriety came to light roughly in the 1980s after which The New York Times finally began publicly acknowledging his unsavoury record. For further reading, see: S.J. Taylor. Stalin’s Apologist: Walter Duranty - “The New York Times’s” Man in Moscow, Oxford University Press, 1990. ↩︎

243. Gay Talese. The Kingdom and the Power: Behind the Scenes at The New York Times: The Institution That Influences the World.” Apple Books, pp 17, 25. ↩︎

244. D.V. Gundappa. Sankeerna, DVG Krutishreni, Vol 11, Government of Karnataka, pp 264-5. ↩︎

245. See Chapter 6 ↩︎

246. D.V. Gundappa. A Modern Tapasvi. Deccan Herald, 6 September, 1960. Emphasis added. ↩︎

247. D.V. Gundappa. Sankeerna, DVG Krutishreni, Vol 11, Government of Karnataka, pp 182-3. ↩︎

248. D.V. Gundappa. Sankeerna, DVG Krutishreni, Vol 11, Government of Karnataka, p 162 ↩︎

249. Ibid ↩︎

250. Ibid. p 160. Emphasis added. ↩︎

251. Ibid. p 170 ↩︎

252. P.V. Kane: History of the Dharmasastra Vol 5: Part 2. Bhandarkar Institute of Oriental Research, Pune, p 1710. Emphasis added. ↩︎

253. D.V. Gundappa. Sankeerna, DVG Krutishreni, Vol 11, Government of Karnataka, p 171 ↩︎

254. Ibid. p 254 ↩︎

255. Further reading: Samanth Subramaniam, Supreme Being, The Caravan, 01 December 2012 ↩︎

256. D.V. Gundappa. Sankeerna, DVG Krutishreni, Vol 11, Government of Karnataka, p 196. Emphasis added. ↩︎

257. Ibid. p 187 ↩︎

258. D.V. Gundappa. Sankeerna, DVG Krutishreni, Vol 11, Government of Karnataka, p 171. ↩︎

259. W. T. Stead. Government by Journalism, The Contemporary Review, Vol. 49, May, 1886, pp. 653-674. ↩︎

260. The Eliza Armstrong case was a massive scandal that erupted in England in the late 19^(th) century uncovering widespread child prostitution that flourished most notably in London. W.T. Stead in his capacity as the editor of the Pall Mall Gazette, wrote a four-part series sensationally headlined, The Maiden Tribute of Modern Babylon. It was a detailed investigative report on this social evil and sent shockwaves throughout England. To demonstrate the truth of his findings, Stead and his team arranged to “purchase” a 13-year-old girl, Eliza Armstrong, daughter of an impoverished chimney-sweep. The first instalment of this series was sold out in record numbers and was traded in the black market for twenty times the original price of the copy. Stead’s daring feat was enormously influential. George Bernard Shaw named his lead character in Pygmalion as Eliza Dolittle. The expose also resulted in the passage of the Criminal Law Amendment Act, 1885, also known as Stead’s Act. However, it also landed Stead in jail because his detractors caught hold of a technical law point: that he had failed to actually secure the permission of Eliza’s father for the aforementioned “purchase.” See, for example: Gretchen Soderlund. William T. Stead and the Soul of Sensationalism in Sex Trafficking, Scandal, and the Transformation of Journalism, 1885-1917. University of Chicago Press, pp 24 – 66. ↩︎

261. D.V. Gundappa. W.T. Stead: Our Journalistic Ancestor. Selected Writings of D.V. Gundappa (in four volumes). Gokhale Institute of Public Affairs, Bangalore, 2019-2020, p 335. ↩︎

262. D.V. Gundappa. Sankeerna, DVG Krutishreni, Vol 11, Government of Karnataka, p 171. ↩︎

263. See Chapter 7 ↩︎

264. D.V. Gundappa. Sankeerna, DVG Krutishreni, Vol 11, Government of Karnataka, p 180. ↩︎

265. Ibid. p 184. Emphasis added. ↩︎

266. Titled, Vruttapatrika Swatantrya: Literally, “Freedom of Newspapers.” Sankeerna, DVG Krutishreni, Vol 11, Government of Karnataka, p 189-98. ↩︎

267. For the full verdict, see: Romesh Thappar vs The State Of Madras on 26 May, 1950. https://indiankanoon.org/doc/456839/ ↩︎

268. D.V.Gundappa. Sankeerna, DVG Krutishreni, Vol 11, Government of Karnataka, p 190, 192. Emphasis added. ↩︎

269. Ibid. p 248 ↩︎

270. Ibid. p 238 ↩︎

271. Ibid. pp 273-4 ↩︎

272. D.V. Gundappa. Sankeerna, DVG Krutishreni, Vol 11, Government of Karnataka, p 282. ↩︎ ↩︎

273. Kempu Narayana was a 19^(th) century Kannada literary luminary best known for his prose work, Mudraa-Manjusha based on the famous story of Chanakya overthrowing the Nanda dynasty. It is considered to be a pioneering work of modern Kannada prose. Kempu Narayana flourished in the reign of Krishnaraja Wadiyar III. ↩︎ ↩︎

274. These works are the acclaimed classical works in Kannada, still widely studied and recited. Shatpadi is a meter in Kannada prosody that has been used extensively in Kannada poetry. The meter typically has six paadas (literally, foot) of syllables, divided into groups of various fixed numbers of maatras (length of time required to pronounce a short vowel) in each line. ↩︎

275. As mentioned the main text, this section is the paraphrased summary of the chapters in DVG’s Vruttapatrike titled Patrikeya Chaturanga (The Four Organs of a Paper) and Kasabu, Tayari (Profession, Training). D.V. Gundappa. Sankeerna, DVG Krutishreni, Vol 11, Government of Karnataka, pp 244-50 and 259-63. Emphases added. ↩︎