July 12, 1998
|
|
|
|
Last
Stand of Shere Khan Lech at the majestic tiger. Your children may not be able to. By Vijay Jung Thapa RIDING THE TIGER We all carry an image of the tiger in our minds. More often than not, it's a picture of a fearsome predator that moves like a streaked phantom through dense, dripping foliage, deep inside a tropical forest -- supreme in its environment. But there are others -- a concerned and committed few, though their tribe is growing quickly -- who see the tiger in a different light: as a lonely animal fighting hard to keep away from the extending shadows of extinction.
To those familiar with fast-dwindling tiger habitats, the problems of a tiger census, the intricacies of the burgeoning wildlife trade and the fact that the tiger's extinction is imminent, much of this book will be old hat. Yet, if a sense of the inevitable remains, to delay, if nothing else, this certainty requires a collective effort -- which is this book. In many ways Riding the Tiger is the holistic picture, a huge central databank if you may, on every relevant facet of tiger conservation. Born out of an aptly named symposium (Tiger 2000) held in London in the autumn of 1996, the book maps out in encyclopaedic detail all the main issues since the tiger was internationally recognised as endangered more than 25 years ago. More remarkably, what it tries to do is break these issues into smaller, focused ones that can have practical and politically feasible solutions. So will there be a time when our children will understand and enjoy the majestic beauty of a tiger in the wild only through book or film? Riding the Tiger is refreshingly realistic in so much as it wonders how widely the contributors' vision of how important it is to save the tiger is really shared. It concludes rightly that everything depends on the people who live near and with tigers every day. It is these people, most affected by conservation efforts, who must be convinced that saving the tiger is worth their while. Well, this book is a start. The tiger people who make up this book may be a minuscule few in an indifferent world but in anthropologist Margaret Mead's words, "Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed it is the only thing that ever has." Amen. How economically viable was Pakistan in 1947? By Sanjay Kumar A SHATTERED DREAM To say that Pakistan was a "viable state in economic terms" made unviable due to mismanagement may not really be an obvious statement, even in retrospect. There were controversies that the wealth of undivided India was not properly partitioned. But at the same time it has to be understood that the new nation's ruling elite did not make the best use of inherited resources. These were squandered away by the feudal gentry that took political control. If one looks at the profile of the Muslim League, principally responsible for carving out Pakistan, the present economic perdition now seems so obvious. This book, by an engineer-turned- social scientist, seems to convey frustration more than fact to support a thesis that Pakistan in August 1947 was "economically more viable than India". To buttress his argument, the author has cited examples of the well-developed canal-irrigation system of the Indus, Sutlej and Chenab, a prosperous machine-tool manufacturing industry in Sialkot, a foreign-exchange earner in the jute of East Pakistan (now Bangladesh), rich industrial mineral sites of salt and limestone and so on. The author feels the native genius of Sialkot and adjoining areas of Punjab in manufacturing surgical instruments, diesel engines and metallic components was not encouraged enough. Over time, it was obliterated. The comparison with countries like South Korea can be more frustrating for Pakistani thinkers. But one has to create the political and socio-economic structure to realise such potential. This book does not have the incisive analysis required to justify its sub-title ("Understanding Pakistan's Underdevelopment"). Yet it can be attractive for those interested in understanding what went wrong with a dream dreamt 52 years ago. Two cultures, two fathers, one scowl. By Jyoti Arora FASTING, FEASTING A certain starkness of vision, an uncompromising realism and superbly evocative images are immediately striking in the novel. One also has a sense of wonder at the order and control of the narrative style, which serve as a counterpoint to the simmering cauldron of emotions generated in the pages. The story revolves around a family in Patna comprising three children, Uma, Aruna and Arun, and their parents. Anita Desai shows the frustrating entrapment and incarceration of the female characters in tradition, social mores and customs where conservatism and modernisation are gender specific and serve dominant ideologies. Anamika's (a cousin of Uma's in Mumbai) scholarship letter to Oxford furthers her parents' ambition of getting her a good bridegroom. Uma has to leave her missionary school to take care of her baby brother. The lack of any role that society accords to women except in marriage is what is poignantly articulated in the personal stories of Uma and Anamika. The first part of the novel alternates between the bleakness of Uma's present and her past. Part two moves to a foreign location, America in this case, and to Arun's student life. Only, the obvious contrast between Indian culture -- where Desai, in an interview, pointed out tradition takes precedence over individuals -- and the western one dominated by individualism reveals at a more subtle level a similarity. After all, the fasting of Miramasi and the grotesque feasting in Melanie and Mrs Patton's family in America are both related to hunger. It is this that permeates in Uma and Melanie as a hunger for fulfillment, and for a life against "misunderstanding against inattention to (their) unique and singular being". And the "Papas" of both the American and the Indian families, with stony indifference, cut down any challenge to their authority. And yes, both have similar scowls! |
|
Issue Contents | Write to us | Subscriptions © Living Media India Ltd |
 |
 |
They see this big
cat being persecuted for a number of reasons; they see the hunter now being hunted. That
basically is what Riding the Tiger is all about: an effort -- albeit a huge one -- by all
the famous "tiger people" of this world to come out with an all-encompassing
report of where the problems lie and what needs to be done -- fast. 
