Devdutt

Published on 8th May, 2016, in Mid-Day. In the 19th century, Hans Christian Andersen wrote the fairy tale of the princess and the pea. A prince wanted to marry a ‘real’ princess and, so, his mother designed a test. Princesses were invited to the house to sleep on a special bed of 20 soft mattresses piled on top of each other. Only one princess complained that the mattress was uncomfortable; something beneath the mattresses poked her all night. True enough, under the pile of 20 mattresses – enough to cause the princess discomfort – was just a single pea. A similar story is found in ..

Published on 14th February, 2016, in Mid-Day. When I read Amartya Sen’s Argumentative Indian, I was confused. Why was this book being written? I realised that it was to present India’s heritage of public debate and intellectual pluralism. It was also an argument against Hindutva, which many find to be rather singular, non-inclusive and contemptuous of intellectualism. Suddenly, the virulent ire of the Hindu Right against Amartya Sen made sense. But, I realised something even more interesting: Amartya ‘disagreed’ with Hindutva’s version and vision of India and Hindutva ‘disagreed’ with Amartya’s version and vision of India. For me, this use of ‘agree’ and ‘disagree’ and ..

Published on 11th January, 2016, on www.dailyo.in . In a recent TV show, the story of Shabari, the aged tribal devotee of Ram, was retold. In it, she feeds Ram grapes, not berries. This upset a lot of people, who felt too many liberties were being taken by the channel. There were complaints on Twitter and sarcastic comments on Facebook. What most people do not realise is that the story of Shabari has gone through dramatic changes in the past 2,000 years. The tale of her feeding Ram berries, and that too after "tasting" them, is probably only about 300 years old, at best 500, ..