Trishanku in America or those betwixt and between
Published on 1st June, 2018, in The Economic Times
Trishanku is a famous character in Hindu mythology who hangs upside down between heaven and earth, belonging nowhere. Many (not all) American Hindus find themselves in the same precarious position. Officially American, owing allegiance to the American President, they passionately cheer India’s communal politicians, despite having absolutely no voting rights, or any skin in the game in the reality of India. They insist from the comfort of their homes in New Jersey and San Francisco they understand India’s problem better than any native Indian, and confidently offer simple (often stupid) solutions to India’s very complex problems. It is a symptom of not feeling they belong in their adopted homeland, yet unable to return ‘home’.
In the 1980s, Indian school students were encouraged to write essays on India’s Brain Drain: the phenomenon of the brightest Indian minds who after graduating from the best Indian institutes migrated to United States at the first opportunity for better prospects. This was an economic migration. But it was passed off as a political migration.‘We never abandoned Bharat Mata; it was escape from Socialist India to Capitalist America,’ they tell their children who subjected to their parents’ relentless glorification of India demand to know, why they left India in the first place.
This problem is not restricted to Hindus, or Indians. It is seen among most migrants from underdeveloped economies from Africa, Eastern Europe and Asia to developed economies of America and Europe. At the recently concluded Mumbai International Queer Film Festival, Kashish, the documentary ‘Abu (Father)’ by Arshad Khan told the story of a Pakistani-Canadian family, and how the parents who were liberals ‘back home’ ended up submitting to the most fanatic form of Islam in Canada , a land that welcomed them, offered them all manner of economic opportunities, but where they felt emotionally disconnected and culturally isolated. Reduced to inferiors in the new homeland, they reclaimed superiority through radicalism and puritanism.
The same thing is seen among many American Hindus. People who were never particular interested in Hinduism or Indian culture before they migrated, enthusiastically and aggressively embraced a very dark form of Hinduism that was against all things modern, from feminism to social justice to LGBT rights. In the ‘real’ India, they tell their children and grandchildren, women knew their place, the poor were adequately subservient, and gay people did not exist. It was a land where everyone spoke chaste Sanskrit, and discussed nuclear weapons, aeroplanes, plastic surgery, and Internet, before the arrival of the Muslims a thousand years ago, Christian Europeans two hundred years ago and Nehru, who chose to be secular, denying his Brahmin roots. Such tales are being legitimized by religious leaders, who have more popularity than education, and who insist that all scientists and historians who do not agree with their version of reality are conspiring to break India.
What was supposed to be a glorious economic migration has ended igniting victim complex and fantastic conspiracy theories. What went wrong? Was it the failure of the American Dream? Was it a sense of cultural isolation? Was it a realisation of one’s own inferiority in a foreign land?
Was it rage at being misunderstood for religious practices that made perfect sense ‘back home’?
Was it fear to move forward and embrace a new culture, and the simultaneous inability to turn back and return where they came from?
Not everyone in the vast Indian diaspora is successful. But everyone expects them to be successful. The pressure is huge. And back home, there are many who have succeeded without having to migrate, without the validation of the West. The envy builds up, and the rage. One needs someone to blame. A scapegoat. So the new homeland becomes problematic hater of their ancient beliefs as does the old homeland that seeks to move away from the past. The Trishanku yells in the hollow vacuum of social media. Finds meaning and purpose as a troll. And entraps himself in an echo chamber of impotent hatred. And ends up as a pawn in a politician’s game.
Program Manager at an IT Services Company.
6 年To Dr. Pattanaik, I have read and followed your writings on numerous fora and liked most! However, I find myself disagreeing with a lot of what you have written in this. To start with, Trishanku was a king in Hindu mythology who wanted to go to heaven in the same form in which he was born. Since this was against the law of nature, which was that you could go to heaven on the basis of your karma - but? only after death, there was a tussle between sage Vishwamitra, the architect of his heavenly journey and the Gods of heaven - more specifically the king of the Gods Indra. So, he couldn't succeed. However, though Vishwamitra had allowed Trishanku's rise to heaven, he wouldn't allow his fall back to earth, when refused entry by the Gods (led by Indra), due to his anger at the temerity of the Gods' challenging his knowledge! So, he hung between heaven and earth, in a state of limbo - being neither here nor there.? Trishanku might have hung upside down, but his example is definitely not applicable in this context - definitely not in the way you have mentioned! Trishanku is quoted in Indian writings to denote the haplessness of people who are in extreme distress, because they can neither succeed at one thing, nor retrace their steps and go back to where they were, before they took steps towards their goal i.e fail back to their original condition. The condition of Hindus in America or Europe has never been even remotely similar. Having lived in both these places, I know this from my own personal experience! Also, Trishanku signifies what could go wrong when you try to be an upstart i.e when you are too arrogant to accept and admit that people are superior to you, when it comes to knowledge! The same meaning is also inherent in the word "Dharmasankat", which is sometimes used analogously with what is known as "Trishanku halat" or the plight of people who don't know their place, as far as their knowledge or abilities are concerned and foolishly tread along paths that lead to ruin, in spite of others' advice!?? Also, you are wrong on several other counts. People of Indian origin have never shied away from returning to India, though they might have even been born in a foreign land. Do you think India would have been able to create such a hugely successful Information Technology industry, if people of Indian origin didn't want to return back to India? A more pertinent case in point would be that of Dr. Raghuram Rajan, who I think, needs no introduction! Most overseas Indians are generally so much ahead of their bretheren in India, that they are usually not welcome back in India, though their intentions in coming might be noble. Also, they discus the things they do e.g about lower castes being subservient to the higher ones, so that their children learn about their roots and also because Indian religious thoughts are completely absent in and alien to the west, which practices monethistic religions like Christianity. Such societies can't accept the Hindu concept of religion, which is based on the philospohy that if you have something good in you, you should be worshipped, so that others come to know about these qualities and keep them alive / practise them themselves, so that? mankind can benefit as a whole. So, the concept of man and his good qualities as Gods worthy of worship, is alien to such societies.? You have mentioned about envy, inferiority complexes, glorification of the past etc. Nowhere have you mentioned about discrimination on the basis of skin colour, hatred, ridicule of accents, negative and discriminatory coverage in print and electronic media and general dislike, which will motivate a white American to cross the road and walk on the other side, because your skin is not of their hue and because they confuse you with an African American black and also the generally ignorant populace, which confuses a Sikh with Osama Bin Laden. In such lands, the last resort of a person is usually religion, which gives the believer at least something to be proud about! Nowadays, many Americans (and even Europeans) hate Indians, because they know that, they can never match their intellect and are afraid that the Indian being mentally superior, will grab his job - forcing him to queue for government dole with food stamps! So, the Trishanku analogy is to some extent true - just not in the way, you have mentioned! I have read and enjoyed most of your articles and agree that you are an authority on Indian mythology. You have given it unabashed popularity, by making it accessible to the masses. However, this article shows that you have neither lived abroad long, nor been associated closely with someone who did. It's contents make you guilty of the same thing you have accused Indian Americans of i.e giving a simple (and if I may so, stupid) solution to extremely complex issue(s), which are psychological, social and several other things.
Co-Founder and CEO at Simsoft Technologies (India) Pvt. Ltd.
6 年Very aptly written Devdutt. The perspective of migration and the change it brings about is very well captured. Kudos.
Training Consultant
6 年Interesting observations and nice article Mr. Pattnaik, but possibly a narrow and dated view about migrants. Despite political borders, there have always been those who leave a country and those who stay back. Why not focus on the reasons why people leave and why they stay..? Perhaps if these reasons changed, the ones who left would return and the ones who stayed might go..? There are a lot of people from the West who have moved to the Far East and do not wish to return to their own countries either - no reason to go back, so staying! At the end of the day its the world and its okay to go anywhere or stay anywhere. All those who migrate do carry in their hearts attachment to their own native country. In an increasingly globalised world as long as we're able to live anywhere but do good work for the benefit of whole world, it's all good isn't it! Hopefully some day soon, the world will be one big country and there will no longer exist any "Trishanku" :-))
School van Ayurveda, schrijver, trainer, speker,
6 年Just read your book of. I am divine, So are you . Super good book. Thanks for tot knowlegde and in spiration. ??
illustrator at sobigalpa
6 年I think patnaik is reading a lots of Amar Chitra Katha comics.Pattanaik is just like a small child who has discovered that what a huge hiduism is now.Wow Wow