Independance Day reflections

15th August marks a very special day in the history of Modern India.

As for every other nation, now we as a nation too have a Birth-day and date to look forward to. It is important as far as its function in the national perspective is concerned. It helps us identify and relate with what is largely an intangible idea, the nation and the state.

With its history going as far back as 5000 BC, the recorded one, it would have been difficult otherwise to locate and place the India in the definition of 'Nation state' as is understood today by intellectuals, historians etc.

India is now largely been accepted as the nation which is not a result or a function of physical boundary, a belief in certain faith or political-ideological system, but an ephemeral, subconscious and intangible idea of interconnectedness at social-cultural and human plane.

Sometimes its very difficult to try and capture the very idea of India. Some of giants in intellectual and spiritual spheres who walked the land in late Nineteenth century and early Twentieth century like Vivekananda, Aurobindo and Gandhi provided the insights about the subconscious which flows through all of us and we call it 'Indian'.

Shri. Aurobindo who shares his Birthday with that of the birthday of modern India, provide us with a powerful insights and directions in which the India as a nation can lead in his views, writings and musings.

I take liberty in penning down the thoughts from Aurobindo's writings on 'A Call to the Youth of India',

"We must resume India's great interrupted endeavor; we must take up boldly and execute thoroughly in the individual and in the society, in the spiritual and in the mundane life, in philosophy and in religion, in art and literature, in thought, in political and economic and social formulations the full and unlimited sense of her highest spirit and knowledge. ............... only we need to work out thoroughly in life what we have always known in the spirit. There and nowhere else lies the secret of the needed harmony between the essential meaning of our past culture and the environmental requirements of our future."

A Call to the Youth of India, Shri. Aurobindo

Center for Crafts in Architecture

The idea which is being passionately developed and promoted with KB Jinan at the helm is gaining movementum.

I have had the opportunity to participate in one of the meetings that discussed various aspects of the concept and proposal in some detail, at chennai.
For me as a person and Wonder Grass as an organization there would be lot to learn from and understand tha broader context of 'Work', the craft and the artisan as part of india's socio-cultural-economic fabric.
The attempt 'Center for crafts in architecture' is probably an initiative that strives to reinvent the role artisan and craft had in the melieu of Indian social-fabric.
The number of individuals who are interested and want this initiative to take-off is slwly growing and it is adding momentum to the whole process. The first such center is proposed to be started near Visakapattanam, AP.