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Ganga: The Constant Goddess blends mythology with contemporary sensibilities to create a protagonist that feels very real to the reader.
‘Parvati’, in the book Karthikeya, burnt bright in my memory for a very long time even after I had finished the book. The glimpses of her strength come back to me even now. Anuja Chandramouli, for me, had created a brilliantly inspirational POV of a woman who had taken the angriest, most destructive man as her husband.
So when I took up Ganga: The Constant Goddess, I had similar expectations and Anuja didn’t disappoint at all.
A society picks up almost everything from its mythology, and there is no question that women’s narratives are sidelined, and are mostly a third person account. So, if you look at it, the ones being written now are pretty fresh perspectives, and how good are they!
The language is smooth. It doesn’t seem forced anywhere. The blend of mythology with contemporary terms is seamless, and not jarring like it was for me in some other mythological retellings that I do not wish to name. The treatment here is raw, yet relatable, and there is a lot of social commentary interspersed with philosophical musings.
The book does follow a chronology but it takes Ganga-like leaps for obvious reasons. One has to depict Ganga in all her forms, and for that there are reincarnations that have to be looked at. At such times, there is a risk that the leaps can look tangled and the narrative can fall on the face with disjointed anecdotes. But the author manages to balance the fine line quite efficiently.
There are some really intriguing parts that throw a completely different light on the women of our mythology. Endearing exchanges between Ganga and Vishnu, their light hearted banter, the teasing and fighting, and the fact that not once does she let him walk all over her, for me were such shining points. We get to see a story where the goddesses have each other’s backs, are strong and assertive, intelligent and collected, where both Ganga and Saraswati have vehement disagreements with each other at times, and yet stand up for each other when the other is put down simply for being a woman by one of the arrogant Gods. Some comebacks are witty and quotable. At a point their friendship brought tears to my eyes, because it reminded me of my sisterhood. While they fought with each other over principles, they remained fiercely strong and protective about each other.
Ganga is rebellious, but isn’t idealistic. Her understanding of morals is different and she comes from a very confident, proud place. This pride in who she is, is misinterpreted as arrogance; and who are we fooling? That’s how it has been since centuries in our world.
She takes practical stances most of the times. But she is also flawed as a woman and as a mother. There are situations when she allows maternal love to take precedence over womanhood and there are times when she falls very weak. So even if as a character she may look pretty haughty and straightforward, the author has managed to retain her complexities. It’s as if the writer wanted to reflect the dilemmas of contemporary feminists in terms of learning and unlearning as a process, and raising men and women to fight social conditioning.
I will suggest Ganga as well as the author’s previous one, Karthikeya, to anyone who likes having an objective perspective on our age old myths.
I see this as a revolution of sorts, and we must make the most of it while we are here.
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Top image via Pixabay and book cover via Amazon
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Children should be taught to aspire to be successful, but success doesn't have to mean an IIT admission only!
Imagine studying for 2 or 3 or 4 or 5 whole years for the JEE exam only to find out that there’s only a very, very slim chance of getting into an IIT. It is a fact widely acknowledged that the IIT-JEE is one of the toughest exams not just in India but in the whole world. Apart from IITs, the NITs and IIITs of India also accept the JEE scores for admission. There are said to be a total of 23 IITs, 31 NITs and 25 IIITs across the country.
Now, let’s first get a few facts about the IITs right. First, according to the NIRF rankings of 2023, only 17 IITs rank in the top 50 engineering colleges of India and only a few (around 5) IITs are in the list of the world’s top 100 engineering colleges. Second, the dropout rate of IIT-qualifying students stands at least at 20%, with reasons being cited ranging from academic pressure and unmanageable workload to caste discrimination and high levels of competition within the IIT.
So, it’s quite clear that the journey of making it through IIT is as challenging as the journey of getting into an IIT. Third and most important of all, the acceptance rate or the odds of getting into an IIT are below 3% which is a lot lower than the acceptance rate of highly and very highly ranked US universities. Four, getting into an IIT of one’s choice doesn’t mean one will also get into a branch of one’s preference at that IIT.
Dr Nalini Parthasarathi, 79, based in Puducherry has dedicated 30 years of her life caring for people suffering from hemophilia.
It is amazing when a person turns personal adversity into a calling, and extends empathy to make a significant impact in the lives of other people. This has been the life’s journey of Dr Nalini Parthasarathi.
April 17 is World Hemophilia Day. Dr Nalini Parthasarathi, 79, based in Puducherry has dedicated 30 years of her life caring for people suffering from hemophilia. She was honoured with the Padma Shri in 2023.
Hemophilia is a condition where one or more clotting factor is absent leading to bleeding. Severe cases can be life-threatening.
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