A couple of weeks back I attended the first anniversary of a voluntary service organization in my company. They had invited a few people whom they had helped to talk at the function. I just can’t describe the impact it had on me. For the past one year several such groups have mushroomed in my organization and I had been following all their activities. But the three hours that I spent listening to their stories bought a huge paradigm shift in my perception of the work these groups were doing.
It reminded me of ‘Wise and otherWise’ which I read a few years back. Sudha Murthy is the wife of Narayan Murthy the founder of Infosys. She runs the Infosys foundation, which focuses on taking health care and primary education to the disadvantaged and underprivileged sections of the society. She is also an avid traveler and a writer. In this book she recounts some interesting experiences from her life. She is not an extremely talented writer, but her writing is just like her – Simple, intelligent and straight from the heart. This book was my first experience of the power of real life stories to move you deeply even if they don’t come clothed in beautiful words.
Her first story, is my favorite. It is about a boy called Hanumanthappa, a coolie’s son who secured 8th rank in his 10th standard. She decided to sponsor his education. The half yearly fees was Rs1,800 including food and accommodation. She gave him the first check and 6 months later she sent him his second check. Hanumanthappa wrote back to her and in the envelope she found some money. He said that his collage was on strike for two months so he did have to pay for his accommodation for those two months and hence he was returning the Rs300 which he had not used for those 2 months.
MrsMurthy says “I was amazed by his honesty. He knew fully well that I was not going to ask him an account for his monthly expenditure, yet he made it a point to return the money. Experience has taught me that honesty is not a mark of any particular class or related to education or wealth. It springs naturally from the heart”
She visited a tribal village that was still following a barter system. She wanted to educate them about money and its implication to their economy. The Tribal chief told her “This is god’s land. Nobody owns this land. No river is created by us. No mountain is made by us. The wind does not listen to us nor the rain seek our permission. These are gifts of god. How can we sell or buy land, I don’t understand. When nothing is yours how can you make such transactions”. Sudha says, “Here was a man who knew nothing of the currency movements, yet he was aware of a deeper, more eternal truth. He knew that nobody owned the land, the mountain and the wind”
On other occasion, she took some school uniforms and umbrellas for another tribal school. When she tried to give it to the person in charge of the school he offered her a bottle of special tribal drink in return. She felt delicate accepting a gift from such a poor man. You know what that man said,”Our ancestors have lived in this forest for generations and have taught us our ways. If you give us something, we accept but only when we can give something to you too.” Sudha Murthy says, “I was humbled. In my experience with giving, some people express gratitude some even complain. Here is Sahayadri hill was an old man, a tribal with no schooling, practicing a highly principled philosophy of life – give when you take; do not take without giving”. When she accepted the gift, the old man told her, “There is grace in accepting too”.
Not all stories are feel-good. There was this man who bought in his own father to the foundation claiming he was a destitute. Finally when that man died he willed his money to his son and not the charity which took care of him in his last days.
The book is beautiful. I read it again last week and it felt as good as the first time.
[...] ExtraordinaryTravel.org wrote something that might interest you todayHere’s a brief breakdownA couple of weeks back I attended the first anniversary of a voluntary service organization in my company. They had invited a few people whom they had helped to talk at the function. I just can’t describe the impact it had on me. For the past one year several such groups have mushroomed in my organization and I had been following all their activities. But the three hours that I spent listening to their stories bought a huge paradigm shift in my perception of the work these groups were doing. It reminded me of ‘Wise and otherWise’ which I read a few years back. Sudha Murthy is the wife of Narayan Murthy the founder of Infosys. She runs the Infosys foundation, which focuses on taking health care and primary education to the disadvantaged and underprivileged sections of the society. She is also an avid traveler and a writer. In this book […] [...]
[...] and otherWise by Sudha Murthy archanaraghuram added an interesting post on Wise and otherWise by Sudha MurthyHere’s a small excerptIn this [...]
[...] Little Darlings wrote something that might interest you todayHere’s a brief breakdownWise and otherWise by Sudha Murthy Nov 10th, 2007 by archanaraghuram A couple of weeks back I attended the first anniversary of a voluntary service organization in my company. They had invited a few people whom they had helped to talk at the function. I just can’t describe the impact it had on me. For the past one year several such groups [...]
[...] Little Darlings wrote something that might interest you todayHere’s a brief breakdownWise and otherWise by Sudha Murthy Nov 10th, 2007 by archanaraghuram A couple of weeks back I attended the first anniversary of a voluntary service organization in my company. They had invited a few people whom they had helped to talk at the function. I just can’t describe the impact it had on me. For the past one year several such groups [...]
[...] Ririan wrote an interesting post today onHere’s a quick excerptHanumanthappa wrote back to her and in the envelope she found some money. He said that his collage was on strike for two months so he did have to pay for his accommodation for those two months and hence he was returning the Rs300 which … [...]
Nice set of stories to reaffirm our faith in humanity. It is nice to see rich people lilke Sudha doing good work in the community.
Thanks Sukumar. I second that, it is really nice to see people genuinely interested in helping less privilaged people.
[...] more here [...]
Hai Archana
By Chance, I happened to browse your page. Thanks to your review of Sudha Murthy’s book. I was on the look out for a book that is quite compelling to read. Can you suggest any other books which are quite interesting to read? Right now, I am on the look out for light reading, not scholarly piece. If time permits, visit my page.
With regards
Vimala
[...] archanaraghuram placed an observative post today on Wise and otherWise by Sudha Murthy.Here’s a quick excerpt:She runs the Infosys foundation, which focuses on taking health care and primary education to the disadvantaged and underprivileged sections of the society. She is also an avid traveler and a writer. In this book she recounts some … [...]
[...] archanaraghuram placed an interesting blog post on Wise and otherWise by Sudha Murthy.Here’s a brief overview:She runs the Infosys foundation, which focuses on taking health care and primary education to the disadvantaged and underprivileged sections of the society. She is also an avid traveler and a writer. In this book she recounts some … [...]
Have heard a lot about Sudha Murthy! Great to know inspiring and down-to-earth people like her. The book really seems interesting. The stories re-affirm our faith in goodness in human beings without education/literacy being a criteria to judge people.
Hir Archana
The book has really moving experiences and I understand there many such moving and inspiring stories which have come to light at the first anniversary of the voluntary service organisation within CTS.
I strongly recommend that you write some these stories to Sudha Murthy, because if I recall rightly, she makes an appeal to her readers for sharing such stories.
Regards
Arun
@Vimala – Thank you very much.
@Saraswathi – Sudha Murthy is a great lady and she seems to have very keen observation.
@Arun – Thank you very much. I will have to check with my management before I can send these stories to anyone. Since I have published them in my company’s internal blog it is a requirement. Are you from Cognizant?
I don’t think so. Archana, we are taught to think of Gandhi, Nehru and Subhash Chandra Bose as far as freedom fighters are concerned. I hope you know that the content for history is dictated by the government. But, there is an immediate need to throw light on many freedom fighters, especially, women fighters. That is what Gnani has done.
Regards
Vimala
Nice review…I will read this book definitely now. Its nice to know that humanity still exists in this messed up world.
Archana..I would also recomment Old man and his God ….by Sudha Murthy a nice read…..
Vimala and Gaurav – Thank you very much.
Karthiik – Thanks a lot. I have read old man and his god. It is a good book, but I liked Wise and otherwise better.
Archana,
I feel the following lines in your post, explains the rest. It requires a broad mind to care for all.. No wonder, that the tribal chief had strongly maintained his culture even after the suggestion from sudha murthy..
/*** This is god’s land. Nobody owns this land. No river is created by us. No mountain is made by us. The wind does not listen to us nor the rain seek our permission. These are gifts of god. How can we sell or buy land, I don’t understand. When nothing is yours how can you make such transactions”
***/
When i thought of the above lines, i feel, our indian society has a similar setup before britishers came. The entire set of villages, owned by the temple, which takes care of all the people. There was no concept of land ownership before britishers. There were only administrators, local rulers.
(These details would be unbelievable for most of today’s india).
Ok.. in another points, there is something that we can learn from those tribal people. US, the richest nation in the world, has 12% of its population under poverty. Is it not a thing of importance for us to study, on why those 12% people suffer from poverty inspite of rich national economy.
We have heard from lot of sources that “There was no beggar in india before britishers”. Some will say “Its a hyped up statement”. some will just believe it, but may not understand how come such a situation can exist.
The information is very true, and how could such ideal condition exist is researchable. To my understanding, the concept of public ownership of the land, is the main reason, where every one had their share of income.
The temples with the source of income, provided daily annadhanams irrespective of caste and creed. Unlike the western society, where one has to work to earn for living, in india, the basic survival is gauranteed. The orphans, the elders, and those who are unfortunate to be unskilled, and all other destitute people were taken care of by the temple administration.
The trading community, mainly the chettiars, paid their share of tax to the local administrator. Apart from that, they donated large sums of money to the temples, for annadhanams.
The local administrator, maintained the army, and the civil courts. The panchayat system ensured that all proceedings went before the people, and the judge has to proclaim judgement in front of public, and hence afraid of public backslash if he erred in his duty.
Apart from that, in most of the occasions in a family, like marriage, naming ceremony, people invite people and provide annadhanams. Particularly, the chettiars, vellalars, and the ruler class, has the ritual of annadhanams for all important festivals.
When such a noble culture of giving food to the hosts were ingrained in the very psyche & culture of people, can there be situation, where people suffered from lack of food, except at times of famine?
Even now, the tradition continues, where we go to a marriage/reception, and have our food and return.
From my living memory, i could recall, that almost all vellalar family has the dharma of providing food to all hosts irrespective of castes.
So i feel, the western notion of individualism, the western concept of economy, is not the best one. We had lot of alternatives, which we failed to acknowledge for long time.
We need to move on from “Survival of the fittest” to “Survival of All”.
We need to move away from western notion of competitive free market, to evolving market based on ethics.
We need to come out of a situation, where “The capable persons corner all the wealth” to “All people having the basic share of the wealth”.
Predating businesses should be transformed to mutually respectable businesses.
Thank you for those insights, Senthil. You should consider reading Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand. It has an altogether different perspective.
Archana,
Thanks for referring that book. I just referred to the following wikipedia page, and read about what the novel is and to get a basic idea.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atlas_Shrugged
I will try to purchase it from the nearby bookshop, in the weekend.
Based on the above wikipedia review, what i understood is that the novel was against the state intervention in common man’s life. This was extended to societal interferences too.
This novel seems to strongly support the concept of individualism, and advocates against a person sacrificing any thing for other, and viceversa.
Based on my above understanding of the novel, i just place my alternate comments.
1. The core concept of the novel is its opposition to state interference on individual person’s life.
I just relate What type of state interference does existed in the West and in our country?
As per dharampal’s findings, the polity of west comprised of Kings, nobles and serfs. The king controlled each and every aspect of the state, assisted by the nobles. The nobles were very rich, holding different powers given by the king, and hold power over the people. Education was given only to nobles, and members of king’s family, while common man was prevented from getting education. The common man has to serve the nobles, and those in power, and do not have any of the basic privelege. They have to simply obey orders from kings and nobles. Even what they should wear, what they should do in their personal life, (even in their most personal choices like, how a couple should mate) is controlled by the state machinery.
But let’s analyse our society. There were numerous groups of people, specialised in different professions. These groups are called Jathi. Each Jathi had a set of rituals, in accordance with their profession. Each individual person is not controlled by any dictator.. Rather they are bound by community culture and rituals.
Normally, the kind does not interfere in the internal matters of jaathi, unless anything wrong goes in.
A kindom contained numerous settlements, with right mix of each jaathi, doing their profession. A typical village settlement consisted of more vellalar, workers & labourers, few families of blacksmith, one or two family of teachers, one or two family of goldsmith, few families of carpenters, one or two family of pot makers, & few families of washerman.
Each village settlement operate at high level freedom, with local powers. The village people will choose important person as village chief, who looks after village activities, and issues judgements over many issues. When his judgement is wrong, the people go against him, and if the chief become adharmic, the learned men will take the matter to the king, who will intervene and set the order right. Another important aspect is that the jaathis are mutually interdependant, where one jaathi served another mutually. For eg, the vellalars shared their produce with all others, the traders shared their earnings as tax, the teacher served all others by imparting knowledge, the blacksmith served the vellalars with farm tools etc.
We knew that a lot of kingdoms were destroyed in india over the entire period of history. Particularly, in somnath, the entire city & temple was destroyed.
Have we ever put our thoughts on how they rose again, with same amount of richness & wealth.
Its only because of caste system.
As you have told in your symbology blog, the knowledge was distributed among people, in the same way, the professional & manufacturing knowledge was maintained in the form of caste. Successive generations in a caste went on learning and practicing their profession, and hence all arts, science & manufacturing were alive, even if the kingdom collapsed.
how a new kingdom is formed? The kshatiryas will identify a place, clear them of dangerous animals, prepare the basic infrastructure, and then invite all types of people to settle in their newly formed country. Members from each caste will settle in his kingdom, and when more and more people come, more activities takes place, more businesses conducted and more income generated.
Here, the people will come only if the king protects and nurtures them. Otherwise, they will move on to adjacent kingdoms.
Thus, the common people were mostly detached from the politics. Whichever ruler supports them,they will settle there. And whichever king wins over, they continue the same patron to the general public, and maintain law & order. Thus the societal setup existed as strong foundation for the numerous kingdoms to rise like phoenix bird.
i read from some source, on how kepegowda created bangalore, and its same as i described above. He just invited all sets of people to his area.
Now, where will people come from? If there was no caste system, the entire population of a kingdom would have been dispersed, and our civilization would have been destroyed just like persia got destroyed with 19 years of founding of islam.
I think, i am deviating from the core..
I just described my understanding of the west & east.
now, my interpretation of the novel based on the review is that we have to consider the background of the writer to understand why they have written like that. The writer is supposedly from America, which is the heaven of individualism, (although established at countless cost of Red Indians, which we never acknowledge).
Ok.. again i dont deny completely the concept raised in this novel.. There is lot for us to learn from them. And let me find, how it fits in to our own society & culture.
One thing is clear to me.. Its difficult to form a community like those tribals, which believes in equal share and access to nature.
But its very easy to collapse the culture of tribals, and make them as individualistic.
Its up to us whether to preserve and learn from our existing culture, or keep on destroying each and every cultures of ours, in the name of individualism.
Good points Senthil. We should also look at the feasibility of going back to good-old-days. Wouldn’t it be easier to correct the existing system of it’s flaws, instead of trying a drastic rehaul of the society.
Archana.. you have hit on the nail.. That’s what i exactly mean.. We should understand our society, culture, and correct its mistakes, and at the same time, uphold all the positives. That’s what i strongly believe.
When japanese were nuked, what they did was to first preserve the national talents of their country. Then after that, they analysed their society, and listed out all the inherent strengths of their society. THen they deviced, planned all policies based on their inherent strength, and now, they are one of the most developed economies, which they achieved with their own japanese language, which is far difficult to learn than any of our indian languages. (Still now, most japanese dont know english, as we understood from the experience of some people in our company, that they use only translators to understand mails received in englihs.)
So, in order to correct the mistakes, we need to understand our society, without bias.
But, how could we understand our society, when we express instant hatred, on anything that’s indian. For example, we are taught, that hinduism is full of Superstitions, illiterate people, and barbarians. But, your post on symbology demolished all myths, that most of the rituals have an inner meaning.
After reading your symbology posts, i understood many of the rituals in my own community, and when i start looking at our culture, away from the western prism, i felt treasure of gold in us, which was hidden by the biased opinions, negativism, and more at all, we are so focussed on what happens in the west rather than what happens in our own country.
That’s why, I was so strong in my belief, that i will learn the west only in indian perspective, and as a result i am irritating many persons, mostly you, by my strong views
.. (I will continue to do so … 
)
Thank you for your kind words Senthil. You have always been a regular reader of Symbology and your comments have added lot of value to my post.
Having said that, I also want to say that I have seen both sides of religion. I have seen great people with amazing knowledge and who really walk the talk and there are is also a large cross section who misuse and abuse the same knowledge. One thing I have learnt after close association with leaned people, is that there is disconnect between how things are supposed to be and how things really are. I don’t believe any society could have been perfect.
I understand that our varnashrama dharma worked well at one point in time. But we have come a long way from then Senthil. We cannot go back to those days. Within the frame work of how our society is currently structured we should try to improve it.
We should be proud of our culture. I am proud of India and so much in love with it. There is no other place I would rather be. That does not mean I am blind to its faults. I have a 9 year old son. I can’t think of another person whom I love more. That does not however mean, I think he is perfect. I feel there are lot of things that needs correction. That does not make my love for him any less.
Thats the way I feel about India or our culture. Just because I am critical of certain aspects, does not mean I love it less or I don’t recognize it’s greatness.
You have known me over the past year both in the internal blogging world and here. I don’t believe in extreme stands. You must have heard of Buddha’s principle called ‘Golden Mean’. I feel it is always best to stand at a place where you can see two ends of the spectrum. Otherwise it is not possible to learn any thing new. More importantly it is not possible to change for the better.
You are right. We have to be proud of our past. To remember that we are capable of greatness, not necessarily go back to those days. No one has ever been able to travel in time
Thanks archana. I agree with your principles. (I heard from one of the learned men, that 2 decades back, most of the people feel ashamed of calling themselves indian, or Hindu. Most who settled abroad at that time, believed that there is nothing greatness in india.. Now the situation is changing a lot..)
criticising is always welcome, if its for the goodness. But much of the media is doing what’s called negativistic view of our culture, pulling ourself in to a cycle of blaming ourself, and degrading ourselves.
With information from various sources, i realised, that this type of negative critisation is carried over as a result of background conspiracy. (again, i will do a post about those, with facts and details).
Simple example is that few months back, (at the height of sabarimala issue), CNN-IBN aired a programme on Hinduism, completely negative. They choose one particular phrase from Manu Smriti and generalised it for the whole hinduism. (In manu, it is said that lead should be poured in to shudra’s ear if he listen to veda). In the same program, it also aired “Women were highly oppressed in Hinduism for ages”.
This is what i call, negativistic portrayal of our religion, unfortunately done by most of English media, for which most of us fell prey to.
I do criticise a lot of things in our religion.. But certainly, i dont believe in any of the articles or news appearing in western / indian english media, for i am convinced enough, that much of them all ill-conceived and ideologically motivated.
I dont know i am contributing positively to your blog. I am just explaining, how i got realised, and transformed in the recent years. Please excuse me, if i were too extreme so far.. I will change in future.
I agree, understood and would follow your advice of Buddha’s principle called ‘Golden Mean’.
Thanks a lot archana..
Hii Archana,
First time reading your blog and really hooked up! Nice review of book and well defined the indian culture. Your reviews are tempting me to read this book.
Did you read the “Mediocre But Arrogant” by Abhjit Bhaduri? if yes than waiting for your review.
regds
raina
Thank you Raina. I have not read that book. Will definitely do a review when I read it.
I read this book a year back and i should say i really liked the book.I gifted it to my cousin on her birthday and she started reading books from then on!Thnaks to sudha for her vivid stories!;)
Thanks a lot Ranjhani.
archana n senthil, the book wise and otherwise is really an inspiring one.pl.read “the japanese wife” too.
Thank you for the tip, Aprati. I will look it up.
hi can anybody please tell me the website where i can get the free online books of sudha murthy
Nice thoughts.I will read this book definitely.I Like infosys Mr.Narayana Murthy and i have a website about Mr. Narayana Murthy.
Preeti and Prem – Thanks you very much for your comments.
Hi ,
i just now read teh book.. its very good with full of moral stories..
But does any oine know.. when is sudha murthy’s birthday..
i wanna wish her
really it is very nice to read …..
it represents th sudha murthy’s keen observation..
I used to hate reading like anything….i was like …i would not read a book even if anyone says they would kill me…..but one day i got very much bored and i had nothing to do to kill time and i started reading a book which i took from my roommates shelf….i started reading the book..i felt it was simple ..so i continued reading it…i did not notice the time until i read till the last page of the book…I found that book…very touching and intresting….the book was “Wise and Otherwise”….by SudhaMurthy……
hi
i want to know more about the sudha murty.could u tell the other source from where i can know about her & work of her.