Mythologist | Author | Speaker | Illustrator
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Articles
Accounting Rivals and Saints
Balancing the Ledgers of Karma, and the Economy: The history of record keeping and accounting in India is the story of Brahmins and Kayasthas, with their skills linked deeply to the cultural & spiritual beliefs, as well as their services to the governments of their times…
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Seasonal March of Festivals
Festivals around the world have a number of intimate links to seasons, legend and history. From Indian celebrations linked to the sun’s path, weather and mythic legends, to Christian reflections of a spring rebirth, seasonal festivals worldwide are a manifestation of each unique culture…
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Articles
Did Rishi Agastya Colonise the South?
Nowadays two ideas are being pushed by social media intellectuals. First, that mythology is history. Second, that Indian culture needs to decolonise itself from foreign influence. This makes rishi Agastya, a highly-venerated Vedic sage, a problematic figure in South India…
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Articles
Pleasure, a Brief Indian History
Atharva Veda says, “Desire gives. Desire receives”. Kama, we are told, is what stirs the first being to create the world…
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Why is Holi celebrated more in north India than south India?
Holi is indeed celebrated mostly in north India, not south India. No one knows the reason why…
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It Is Not Just Hindus Who Love an Imagined Past
Imagined history has always served ideologies. Colonial powers have sought to present precolonial states as barbaric and savage to justify their imperial outreach. Muslims insist that a society before conversion to Islam is ignorant (jahila). For Marxists and Cultural Marxists, the world is full of social injustice, which is why a revolution is needed…
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Articles
Glamorising Violence, Gamifying Debate
For the past thirty years, that is what we have been consuming from Hollywood. …
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Articles
Vikings Saga on Combat and Curiosity
Like the Greeks, life was tough for the Vikings, and they were fiercely independent people. …
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Articles
Indian Knowledge Systems
The first list of an educational syllabus in India comes from the Chandogya Upanishad, when the Sanatakumar sages ask Narada what subjects he is proficient in. …
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Articles
Were Our Hindu Gods Meat-eaters?
Hinduism is a plural religion, an umbrella term for many jatis, sampradayas and paramparas, some of whom may be vegetarian some of the time, or not at all…
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Articles
How We Tell Our Histories
A lot of history depends on consensus and institutional approval. No nation-state, for example, will present a history that shows it in a negative light…
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Articles
The Many Mythologies of God
Hindus have a very complex idea of god. God is not all powerful. Nature and karma serve as the background in which God exists. …
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How Faith Destroys Historical Facts
Believers always prefer matters of faith and get irritated with matters of science…
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Articles
How Ramayana and Mahabharata Spread the Idea of Dharma
The earliest Ramayana retellings do not refer to the Lakshman rekha. The earliest Mahabharata retellings do not refer to Draupadi’s vastra-haran. …
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Articles
Is Governance a Yagna?
The word yagna is translated even today by eminent scholars as sacrifice, or fire-sacrifice, or fire-ritual. …
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Articles
Monks Who Loved Combat
We would like to believe that saints are above mundane rivalries, and have conquered the ego, which means they have no urge to compete or conquer…