Warrier's Collage on Sunday January 15, 2023

Welcome To Warrier's COLLAGE On Sunday January 15, 2023 HAPPY PONGAL https://youtu.be/ae-ig2bUxyw 1) Artist from Kerala https://www.artzolo.com/artist/mopasang-valath 2) Collage Adventure : On top of Monster Python Peak https://youtu.be/Hy9Z30qPD3g (Link shared by T J Kurup Thiruvananthapuram) Good Morning ☀️ In the previous issue erroneously I wrote "Next issue of Collage will be on June 18, 2023". Please correct the date ás January 15 2023 If you read "H" today 🙏 you get a licence to draw Kolam. Find out why. Nice Day M G Warrier Collage Editorial January 15, 2023 Spreading India's growth story This refers to the External Affairs Minister Jaishankar's bold statement "World admires India for its tech-enabled governance, HR" (The Hindu Business Line, January 15). Since few years, I have felt that Jaishankar is the man of the current decade for this country. The observation that "as an open society and market economy with such a large reservoir of talent, India can add to the global engines of growth" carries a loud message which should make GenNext in India sit back and think. At a time when ex-celibrities and those who refused to grow with India's aspirations are lamenting about their generation's failures, the refreshing voice of hope and optimism, coming from a no-nonsense outspoken leader, does deserve attention and encouragement. The success stories, unfortunately, are swept under the carpet by the mainstream media which prioritise sensation for their prime time stories and debates. Perhaps India may get the unique distinction of spending taxpayers' money to reach out the nation's growth story to its own people. M G Warrier Mumbai A Messages/Responses 1) V Babusenan Thiruvananthapuram This is with reference to an interesting article that appeared in the Collage of the 11th January. Among the Western thinkers who spoke highly about Hinduism is found included Bertrand Russell's name. For easy reference, I am quoting here his words: "I read about Hinduism. I feel that this is the religion of mankind all over the world. Hinduism spread throughout Europe. Many scholars studying Hinduism will appear in Europe. One day the situation will develop where only Hindus will rule the world." As a person who wrote Russell's biography in Malayalam, I have some familiarity, though limited, with Russell's style of writing and his views on religions. "I think that all the great religions of the world-Buddhism, Hinduism, Christianity, Islam and Communism-are both untrue and harmful." This he said emphatically in his famous and equally notorious essay 'Why I Am Not A Christian?' To my limited knowledge, he had never shifted this stand. He said famously in his book 'What I Believe' : "A good life is one inspired by love and guided by knowledge" and he stuck to it throughout. To be prophetic had never been Russell's style. The language used does not carry the flavour of his manner of writing. I am tempted, against my will, to suspect the veracity of the opinion. May the author of the article kindly enlighten us about its source? My request to the esteemed readers is not to think that I am impudent. I hope they will agree that attempts are being made to twist facts with a view to elevating them which really do not need that kind of support. Dr. Amartya Sen narrates one such incident in his book 'The Argumentative Indian'. It is generally believed that horses came to Bharat with the Aryans and that there were only bulls before that. In order to establish the Aryan identity in Indus valley civilization, a terracotta bull of the Indus civilization was fraudulently altered to a horse! Thanks 🙏 Babusenan Sir. I agree with you. I am tempted to quote : https://abillionstories.wordpress.com/2013 पुराणमित्येव न साधु सर्वं न चाऽपि काव्यं नवमित्यवद्यम्। सन्तः परीक्ष्यान्यतरत् भजन्ते मूढ्ः परप्रत्ययनेयबुद्धिः ॥ -मालविकाग्निमित्रम् (महाकवि कालिदास) English Meaning of Sanskrit Phrase: All poems are not good only because they are old. All poems are not bad because they are new. Good and wise people examine both and decide whether a poem is good or bad. Only a fool will be blindly led by what others say. -Malavikaagnimitram (Great Poet Kaalidaas) M G Warrier 2) V K Manchanda (Excerpts from Hitguj dated January 15, 2023) I have an advice for Pensioners of the Bank that at this age as why we are still investing in shares/ scrips / mutual funds and are keeping our deposits in large no of banks including small finance banks. Is with this increased interest /investment, will we be able to create more assets? “No”. The money kept in Banks can easily be retrieved by our next of kin rather than that lying in shares/scrips/mutual funds. We Pensioners are all at downside of our life cycle. No amount of money will make you happy, if you are not happy within yourself. So, be wise and use money for your living instead of living for money only. V K Manchanda (vkmanchanda56@gmail.com) 3) M G Warrier I joined Reserve Bank of India Thiruvananthapuram on January 15, 1968. That day I reached Bank premises very early and spent some time with M O Jacob, Secretary, RBI Employees Association whom I knew as we were meeting in trade union contexts. I had several other friends also in RBI, like C Divakaran, M A Menon, M Madhavan and N C Nair. Later I came to know that M Y Bijlee who was in Administration (Staff) Section was unhappy about my meeting Jacob even before reporting to Admin Section. 55 years after, I still remember Bijlee as one who troubled me the most in RBI. Forget & forgive. However I was lucky to find more good friends who helped me in surviving unhurt in the institution. Troubleshooting https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/readersblog/warriersviews/some-tricks-to-avoid-problems-49207/ B Panchapagesan's Column Message to Collage SELF-Offering to Sun God… Take, O Sun God, as Your right, Receive as my gift, All my Liberty, My memory, my understanding , my will, All that I have, All that I am, All that I can be! You have given it all to me. To you, O Lord, I restore it.. All is yours, Dispose of it according to Your will! INSTEAD GIVE ME YOUR LOVE, GIVE ME YOUR GRACE! IT IS ENOUGH FOR ME.. 👌🌹👍 V T Panchapagesan Bonus : A Poem from Madras Courier A Rendezvous with a River https://madrascourier.com/art-and-poetry/a-rendezvous-with-the-river/ C Cover Story Article by Sweety Supriya on Restoration of OPS https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/readersblog/alternativethoughts/restoration-of-old-pension-scheme-benefits-and-financial-viability-49203/ D Books by M G Warrier I published my first book titled "Banking, Reforms and Corruption" in 2014. The book is now available as eBook titled "Chasing Inclusive Growth". Later I published "India's Decade of Reforms" and "Restoring Trust in Governance" (Publisher : Notion Press Chennai) : https://notionpress.com/author/m_g_warrier E Problem solving tricks : M G Warrier https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/readersblog/warriersviews/some-tricks-to-avoid-problems-49207/ Excerpts : Long ago when I visited a friend’s house, in a corner in the dining room I saw few old notebooks which attracted my attention. After serving tea, I found the housewife picking up the topmost notebook, scribbling something with a ball pen and keeping it back. My curiosity raised. Later, during our conversation, I created an occasion and asked my friend about the ‘diary’ madam was keeping. He was kind enough to share more details than what I expected. He said : “This is a practice she has been following even before our marriage. She attributes the beginning to a motivational talk she listened while in college. Any thought, positive or negative, that comes to her mind any time on any subject, she records in one or two sentences in these notebooks, before she forgets, literally. Could be anything. A guest’s family details, something unpleasant someone spoke to her, an item to be included in the next shopping list… anything! Next day or after few days she retrieves the information depending on the need. We have a collection of several such notebooks. Sometimes, we pick up one at random and read together. It’s great fun” I thought, “An !dea can change your life!” F Leisure Positives in Negatives*! A young woman was sitting at her dining table, worried about taxes to be paid, house-work to be done and to top it all, her extended family was coming over for festival lunch the next day. She was not feeling very thankful at that time. As she turned her gaze sideways, she noticed her young daughter scribbling furiously into her notebook. “My teacher asked us to write a paragraph on “Negative Thanks giving” for homework today.” Said the daughter. “She asked us to write down things that we are thankful for, things that make us feel not so good in the beginning, but turn out to be good after all.” With curiosity, the mother peeked into the book. This is what her daughter wrote: “I’m thankful for Final Exams, because that means school is almost over. I’m thankful for bad-tasting medicine, because it helps me feel better. I’m thankful for waking up to alarm clocks, because it means I’m still alive.” It then dawned on the mother, that she had a lot of things to be thankful for! She thought again… She had to pay taxes but that meant she was fortunate to be employed. She had house-work to do but that meant she had a shelter to live in. She had to cook for her many family members for lunch but that meant she had a family with whom she could celebrate. Moral : We generally complain about the negative things in life but we fail to look at the positive side of it. What is the positive in your negatives? Look at the better part of life today and make ur everyday a great day. Be Happy and Blessed Always *Shared by S Venugopal Chennai G Quotes on reading habit https://academiamag.com/quotes-on-the-importance-of-reading/ Like : 1“Any book that helps a child to form a habit of reading, to make reading one of his needs, is good for him.” -Maya Angelou https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maya_Angelou#cite_note- 2“Literacy is a bridge from misery to hope.” -Kofi Annan H Vathsala Jayaraman's Column Let's talk about Kolam Having been brought in a house with spacious frontage kolam drawing was a daily ritual, contesting with all women in the family. Girls from the age of four or five were trained in kolam. During temple processions when deities are taken out through residential streets, we used to draw very big kolam sometimes dashing the kolam of the opposite house. Drawing imaginary border lines was an interesting affair. There is no reference to the kōlam either in the Tamil word-lists (called Nigandus), Tamil literature, in ancient paintings or in any travellers' account. Contrary to popular belief, the common threshold patterns are not very ancient. The practice of decorating the floor may go back to about six hundred years and not more. A few designs may be traced to the Jain temples of South Kanara and at least one to Mahayana Buddhism… In Tamil literature the use of the word kōlam for drawing patterns on the floor is met with for the first time in a Kuravanji called Madurai Meenatchiammai Kuram and a little later in Kutrala Kuravanji. The former work belongs to the sixteenth century and the latter to the seventeenth. However some geometric patterns, yantra or Tantric designs that are used in kōlam are of quite ancient origin. references to drawing sun petals on the ground can be found as early as the Vedic texts. Though the word kōlam appears several times in ancient Tamil Sangam literature, not one of the references refers to the actual designs themselves; they allude to the other meanings of the word, kōlam: disguise, play, beauty and form. In some of the Vaishnavite Tamil works, the word ‘mandala’ is used as a reference to women’s ritual art and not to the kolam of the present generation. In some of the inscriptions of Tirunelvel district it is mentioned that the threshold of homes should not be left blank; they should be filled with ritual designs. An opportunity to draw kolam within the prakaram of the temple was a boastful event. Completion of a design covering nearly 300 sft was a task in itself. During week long festivals kolam inspired everybody. During summer festival of Pancha Prakaram of Thiruvanaikoil Some ten or 15 girls formed a team to discuss about various designs in different prakarams. An entire week was spent for the activity.. The main job went to the expert Mami. Kōlam is a daily women’s ritualistic art form created by Tamil Hindu women throughout southeastern India. Each day before dawn, during the Brahma Muhurtam (believed to be the time when Brahma and all other deities descend to the earth) and sometimes before dusk, millions of women in the town, villages and the cities of South India Tamil Nadu draw kōlam on the thresholds and floors of houses, temples and businesses. In Tamil culture, the threshold is of great significance as the meeting point of the internal and the external and kōlam is one of the many manifestations of that significance. The kōlam patterns are drawn deftly by women with the tips of their fingers using pinches of flour held between the thumb and the first finger and letting the powder fall in a continuous line by moving the hand in desired directions . The patterns of lines and curves are based on a grid of pullis (dots) that are encircled, looped or joined using straight or curved lines. The process involves concentration, memory and a series of disciplined hand and body movements. Working with great dexterity and speed, the women make highly intricate and complex designs. At first glance the patterns appear quite simple, but it takes years of practice and training to master the complex Kōlams. The kōlam is created in a few minutes or a few hours, and after only a few hours, it disappears under the feet of a passerby. In kōlam making the process of making and getting lost is repeated as a rhythm, wherein fresh patterns are made as old ones get lost in some moment of the day. As ants, birds and tiny insects feed on the rice flour, wind and people’s footsteps further disturb and eventually erase the kōlam; the cycle is repeated again the next morning. It is almost like a renewal visual performance in which both tradition (continuity) and change (innovation) exist simultaneously. Kōlam is also more geometrical and involves an intrinsic mathematical aptitude as compared to Rangoli or other popular floor art traditions. There is definitely a strong mathematical thinking in kōlam as the arrangement of pullis is based on Fibonacci series, algebraic and numeric principles. Kōlam epitomizes geometrical properties of symmetry, periodicity/repetition, recursion and rhythm Most kōlam patterns frequently include the use of concepts from calculus and applied mathematics. For example, the use of continuous curve in two dimensions is a graph in which there are no holes or breaks and for which the beginning and ending points are the same. The kōlam patterns are one and many things intertwined, exemplifying geometrical symmetry, precision and an understanding of the complex, interconnected existence of human beings with nature and the cosmos. For special occasions to make the kōlam hold longer, the rice flour is made wet by adding water. A small cloth piece folded over (or a paper towel) is dipped into the liquid rice paste and placed between the thumb, the forefinger, and the middle finger and pressed until drops of wet white rice flour pours through the front end of the three fingers. The kōlam is created, almost as if the fingers were acting as an ink pen. These semi-permanent kōlam are called mākōlam. The challenge here is to ensure that the rice flour spreads evenly on the ground in a smooth, continuous, flowing manner so that the shapes appear smooth and evenly drawn. The designs can be divided into geometric, figurative and landscape styles, or a combination of them. The basic geometrical shapes used in kōlam include the circle, triangle, square, spiral and so on, each having its own significance. The popular six-pointed star represents the union of the male and the female, made of triangles in opposite direction. Basic geometrical shapes are combined and overlapped in increasing complex designs to represent particular forces or qualities embodied in some aspect of creation, evolution or dissolution. Based on a regular(square /triangle/rectangle/rhombic) grid of pullis, a perfectly symmetrical design of geometrical patterns or flowers, birds, trees or divinities, gradually emerges as these dots are either joined by lines or looped. Many of the kōlam patterns are abstract. There are special kolams for various occasions like Deepavali, Pongal, Janmashtami, New year etc, Birth Days etc • Kōlam on special occasions–vrats( sacred vows) :There are also some rarely done kōlams, such as the navagraha kōlams, which are done only in front of household shrines, and only on special occasions. Kalyana Kolams are unique. • Kōlam on 13th-day ceremony of the departed soul (Kalyana Kolam) : A very big Kōlam is made in the house on the 13th day of the ceremony of the departed soul. The grih shanti hawan (ritual wherein offerings are made to a consecrated fire) is done. Chikku/Sikku (Knot or twisted) kōlam : In this kōlam design the curved lines are made around the dot making an intricate pattern where one can not figure out where the design begins from and where it ends. Many kolams can be made out of plus and double plus symbols and X designs. Unless you see the kolam in process, you cant find out how the final figure has arrived. Interesting. Most say they draw the kōlam to honour, invite, welcome, host and express gratitude to particular gods and goddesses–Bhudevi (representing the earth, soil, and sacred geography), Lakshmi(→ Shri Lakshmi , Goddess of wealth , prosperity , good fortune, good health, and good luck), Surya (→ Sun god , God of good health and wisdom) and Ganesha (→ Ganapati/Ganeśa , the elephant-headed god, who is considered to be the remover of obstacles). The kōlam acts as a visual device to remember and ask for forgiveness for walking, stepping and burdening her. It is also believed that the kolam is performed to fulfill one of the daily obligations of a Hindu household, ‘to feed a thousand souls’ The absence of a kolam signifies either the household is not Hindu or an inauspicious event like death has occurred in the household. In that sense the kōlam can be seen as an underlying visual mapping of the auspiciousness and inauspiciousness; ritual purity and ritual pollution for Tamil households in the context of ritual space and time. Besides the ritual resonance, there are a host of other layered meanings ascribed to the kolam. It is considered as a matter of pride and satisfaction for Tamil Hindu women to be able to draw the traditional one-curve kolam in one go rather than in pieces. Traditionally, Kolam skills are considered as a sign of the talent and prowess of a woman in her capacity as the proprietor of the household. During the sacred Margazhi month women compete with one another in a spirit of playful competition in the various Kolam contests organized in cities, towns and villages in Tamil Nadu. From the point of ethnomathematics, Kolam is known to have ‘embedded mathematical properties’ that a range of mathematicians have attempted to decode. In the making of Kolam all the six categories of mathematical skills: counting, locating (identifying), measuring, designing, playing (experimenting) and explaining are involved . In order to be able to make a perfect design, the women need to keep a count of vertices, the numbers of curves and the points at which the curves or lines meet. Thus the practice of Kolam is a truly diverse and experiential one that can be fully appreciated only when seen from the wide perspective of everyday life. Though physically at the age of 81 I am not able to sit at a place to draw large kolams, I am able to put it in writing. Thank god! Vathsala Jayaraman