On a Shoestring to Coorg

by Dervla Murphy

  Before the Thimmiahs left yesterday it was arranged that we should go to stay with them on 9 December, for Huthri. This is the most important of all Coorg’s religious festivals and the occasion when every family member returns to the ancestral home. Meanwhile, we should have time to visit (at last!) Bylekuppa Tibetan Camp, and to spend a day or two in Mysore City looking up Kay Webb – a medical missionary with whom I worked in Nepal. I feel tonight that Fate has taken over the organising of this journey and is making a pretty good job of it.

  5

  Musings in Mysore

  2 December. Kushalnagar.

  Having said our good-byes to the Fosters, Rachel and I strolled for a couple of hours along a narrow, pot-holed, tree-lined road. The only traffic was an occasional herd of cattle being driven by ragged, grim-faced men, none of whom returned our greetings. We passed a few huts with shaggy straw thatches and glimpsed a few toddlers who fled from our strange white faces, howling with terror. Perhaps their mothers use Europeans as bogy-men.

  At noon the remains of a bus picked us up. Its seats were torn, its glazed windows broken, its floorboards sagging in the middle and its brakes so imperfect that at every stop wooden blocks had to be thrust under the back wheels by a small boy specially employed for the purpose. As long as the road remained level we crawled along at ten or twelve m.p.h., the engine sounding like a concrete-mixer, but at the foot of the first slope we stopped dead where we would have seriously impeded any other traffic had it existed. I soon realised that this was no crisis, but common form. All the standing passengers scrambled out without comment and proceeded to walk up the hill, followed by the bus containing its legal load (according to the notice over the engine) of thirty-eight seated passengers. In due course I counted forty-three illegal passengers re-entering through the back door and several others squeezed into the cab. We then went careering down a steep mountain at hair-whitening speed and I began to understand India’s bus-disaster statistics; had we gone over that parapet none of us could possibly have survived. In reports of bus crashes one usually reads that the driver and conductor, if amongst the survivors, have ‘absconded’. (A favourite word of Indian journalists.) But those drivers and conductors who escape both death and imprisonment must be rich men, since for them the fares of the illegal passengers are clear profit.

  On buses one often observes sex discrimination in action. At Kodlipet, where we changed into a marginally less decrepit bus, a poorly dressed young couple came aboard when there was only one seat vacant – in the ‘Ladies’’ section. The obviously pregnant wife was holding a baby boy, but it was the husband who sat down and took the baby on his knee. His woman was to be left strap-hanging for two hours and she had to refuse my seat because I was in the ‘Men’s’ section. I then offered it to her husband, so that she could have his; but though he had no right to be in the Ladies’ section he simply gave me a stony stare, knowing that in any dispute public sympathy would be on his side.

  It was five-thirty when we arrived here so for Rachel’s sake I decided to stay in a hotel – Rs.3 for a twin-bedded room! – though we are only seven or eight miles from Bylekuppa.

  3 December. Bylekuppa Tibetan Settlement.

  Last night my sleep was disturbed every few minutes by fleas, mosquitoes, pi-dogs fighting under our ground-floor window, jackals howling in the compound and strident Indian jazz being played over a public amplifier from 4.10 a.m. onwards.

  As we walked out of Kushalnagar at seven-thirty we saw many prosperous-looking Tibetans coming into the town on their own bicycles or scooters or bullock-carts, or in settlement jeeps or trucks. At the Bylekuppa police-checkpost I had to produce a letter of introduction from T.C. and the security precautions here underline the essential difference between this settlement and Mundgod. Bylekuppa was started in 1963, amidst considerable controversy and publicity, and it has always been under Indian supervision and influence. Also, being on the main Mangalore–Mysore road it is over-exposed to Western curiosity and interference. But one must not expect perfection everywhere and, as T.C. readily admits, Mundgod has benefited through avoiding the mistakes made here during the first experimental resettling of large numbers of Tibetans in South India.

  Despite these mistakes, most of Bylekuppa’s 8,000 Tibetans are now prospering. Some have built, independently, little houses for married children on their own fields, and the majority are probably better off, materially, than they could ever have been in Tibet. Whether they are as well off in other respects is a matter of opinion.

  As I write – in the settlement guest-bungalow, drinking the settlement beer – I find myself rapidly becoming incompetent to comment further. This beer is a Sikkimese variation on the chang theme and is made here from ragi, a highly nutritious grain known as ‘the national millet of Mysore’. It is served in a huge glass jar placed in a shallow dish and filled to the brim with fermenting ragi, from which protrudes a bamboo ‘straw’. To mix one’s drink one slowly pours hot water from a half-gallon kettle on to the grain. After a few minutes the brew is ready to be imbibed through the ‘straw’ and one thinks how pleasant and innocent it is. One adds some more water, and imbibes again, and after repeating this ritual a few times one begins to spill a little of the water as one adds it …

  4 December. Mysore City.

  On the Mysore plateau many solitary, spreading trees grow in the wide, red-brown fields, giving the landscape a slightly English look – accentuated today by a scatter of bulky white clouds drifting across the deep blue sky. It could have been a perfect June day at home, and as Mysore is almost 2,500 feet above sea-level it was not too hot even when we arrived in the city centre at one o’clock.

  A helpful receptionist at the Holdsworth Memorial Hospital told us that Kay will be back from her village leper-clinics tomorrow afternoon and we then rambled off in search of suitable accommodation. In this ‘Palas Hotel’ our Rs.3 room has no window, scarcely enough space for me to turn around when wearing a rucksack and so much wild-life on the floor (already I have counted six species of insect) that I shall have to sleep beside Rachel on the narrow plank bed. Judging by the goings-on in the corridors, the place is an ill-disguised brothel; but since I am above the age of provoking sexual assault, and Rachel below it, this detail is of no practical consequence. More disquieting is the fact that the restaurant washing-up is done on the floor of the filthy latrine just outside our bedroom door – something I did not observe until after we had enjoyed an excellent lunch.

  Mysore City is said to have deteriorated since the British left but I find it most attractive. It is small enough to be tackled on foot and there are few motor vehicles on the wide, straight, tree-lined streets, most of which run between solid, well-kept, cream-washed buildings with terraced roofs and spacious gardens. The traffic consists mainly of horse-gharries, pedal-cycles, bullock-carts and multitudes of wandering cattle, many of whom lie complacently in the middle of main roads chewing the cud as though the internal combustion engine had never been invented. One has to like a city in which the cow still takes precedence over the car.

  The people, too, are congenial – except in the State-run tourist bureau, where I found the staff most unhelpful. In a desperate effort to arouse their sense of duty I murmured something about collecting material for a travel-book, but this merely prompted them to exchange smiles. Plainly they found it impossible to believe that anyone so poorly clad and generally unimpressive could sign her name, never mind write a book. Indians tend to rely heavily on outward appearances when judging foreigners, which is natural enough. Occasionally, however, the use of this criterion, unaided by any other, leads to regrettable contretemps with sartorially eccentric visitors who are really quite respectable.

  5 December. Mysore City.

  I notice, with some unease, that the older I get the more sentimental I feel about kings and queens, emperors and emirs, the Nizam and the Wali and suchlike personages. But perhaps this is less a symptom of senile decay than an emotional retreat from a world whi
ch daily becomes more anarchic, ugly and false. In Europe the lot of the average man has in some ways been greatly improved over the past half-century, but in India technology seems only strong enough to erode valuable traditions, without providing even the limited amount of good we have derived from it. Hence modern India encourages one to look back, even more wistfully than usual, to an age when life was slower, more rhythmic and more dignified – and yet in many ways gayer, freer, more colourful and more spontaneous.

  So wandered my thoughts early this morning, as we strolled along neat gravel paths between neat lawns in the vast compound of Mysore City’s famous fort. All around us stretched handsome red-brown fortifications, ahead rose soaring twin temples – the ‘private chapels’ of the ex-rulers – and dominating all else was the Maharaja’s Palace, built in 1897 and extravagantly though not displeasingly ornate. Indeed, from the romantic tourist’s point of view it is eminently satisfactory, being just the sort of edifice in which an Eastern Potentate might be expected to reside.

  The feudal past looks good in Mysore. By the end of the eighteenth century the British had defeated the Muslim interloper, Tippu Sultan, and restored to the throne an old and much-loved Hindu dynasty. This restoration was not, however, immediately successful on the practical level, and British administrators were appointed in 1831. A succession of dedicated Englishmen ran the State efficiently for the next half-century, until the Wadeyars again took over, this time proving not merely competent but brilliant rulers. During the 1930s Gandhi described Mysore as ‘a model state’. More than any of their princely rivals, the Wadeyar Maharajas fulfilled the immemorial Hindu ideal of Kingship – which was fitting, since the history of Mysore is inextricably interwoven with the legends of the Ramayana and Mahabharata.

  In the business of government the Maharajas were assisted not only by British political agents but by a number of distinguished dewans, many of whom were Muslims – though none the less loved and trusted by their Hindu masters on that account. Yet the man now generally regarded as ‘the maker of modern Mysore’ started off as a poor Hindu village lad. His name was Dr M. Visvesvaraya and he is known as ‘the Engineer-Statesman’ because he organised the building of an astonishing number of dams, canals, factories, hospitals, schools and colleges – including India’s first polytechnic. Already I have several times been told the story of his two fountain-pens. So determined was he to give a good example that he used separate pens for personal and official work and bought the personal one, and the ink to fill it, out of his own pocket. To such obsessional behaviour does India reduce honest men.

  During its final princely period, Mysore attracted many scientists, artists and musicians. The Maharajas – fine scholars themselves – were generous and perceptive patrons of every form of creative endeavour and Jayachamaraja Wadeyar, the last Maharaja, is a composer of distinction. But now he can no longer afford to subsidise young musicians and I find this very sad.

  However, one must not wax too sentimental/romantic/monarchist. Of the 562 ‘native princes’ left theoretically in control of two-fifths of India in the autumn of 1858, hundreds were ineffectual and dozens were downright nasty. When Queen Victoria made further annexations of territory impossible, by announcing that the Raj was to replace John Company, most old Company hands were outraged and Lord Elphinstone – a nephew of the incomparable Mountstuart Elphinstone – foretold that the princely states could be useful only as ‘sinks to receive all the corrupt matter that abounds in India’. The following century justified his cynicism, in many cases, though it is wildly misleading to generalise thus about ‘princely states’ when some consisted of only a few acres and others of more than 80,000 square miles.

  Had the mutiny been delayed for a decade, John Company might well have secured that remaining two-fifths of the subcontinent – or most of it – and thus the government of a new Indian democratic Republic would have been spared the embarrassment of coping with old Indian undemocratic princes. For their own reasons, the princes had consistently opposed the idea of an independent India, in which they would no longer enjoy British protection. However, thanks to the combined efforts of S. V. Patel, Lord Mountbatten and Pandit Nehru, they proved less intractable than had been expected. Most were concerned with the trappings rather than the realities of power and so were easily enough brought to heel when Mr Nehru – temporarily, and not for the last time, neglecting his pacific image – brusquely declared that any princely state which chose to stay out of the new India would be treated as ‘hostile’. Two years later the states had all been absorbed into the Republic and their rulers soothed with promises that they and their heirs forever would receive annual pensions (‘Privy Purses’), and be allowed to retain their private property, honorary titles, personal flags and the various other princely perks to which so many of them attached such importance.

  Unfortunately, however, that is not – could not be, in modern India – the end of the story. Anti-Congress politicians saw the concessions granted to the princes as useful ammunition since public opinion, throughout what had been British India, was in an understandably anti-prince mood. Typical of the criticisms made by secularised agitators was the accusation that the princes had insensitively flaunted loads of precious stones in public while their people starved around them. This taunt ignored the fact that the wearing of as many jewels as could possibly be fitted on to one man’s person was often part of a Hindu ruler’s duty. In Mysore, most of the Maharaja’s subjects believed jewels to have magic properties capable of spreading beauty, abundance and security throughout the land if – but only if–the jewels were worn by him whose body symbolised the people of the state.

  After years of wrangling the government gave way to the agitators in 1971 and withdrew the princes’ pensions and privileges – though the saving was negligible in an all-India context. At least where Mysore was concerned, this seems to have been a blatant example of ‘democracy’ enforcing the will of an articulate minority at the expense of an inarticulate majority, who even today remain deeply attached to their ex-ruler.

  In 1956, when many of India’s state boundaries were redrawn – generally on a linguistic basis – Mysore was doubled in area and almost doubled in population by the inclusion of much of the old states of Bombay and Hyderabad, and what had been the separate province of Coorg. This new geographical entity – last month renamed Karnataka – has an area of 74,000 square miles and a population of 30 millions, out of whom some 17 millions speak Kannada, Karnataka’s official language. Other languages spoken by significant numbers are Telugu, Urdu, Marathi, Tamil, Tulu, Konkani, Malayalam, Banjari, Hindi and – in Coorg – Kodagu. Kodagu and Tulu – the language of South Kanara – both use the Kannada script but each of the other languages has its own script though Old Kannada and Tamil are so alike they were once thought to be dialects of the same language.

  The ancient Karnataka–Vijayanagar kingdom, of which the state of Mysore was the residue, lost its identity in the mid-seventeenth century during the Muslim conquest of the Karnatic. Previously, it had stretched from the sacred River Godavari to the even more sacred River Cauvery and for three centuries its rulers had dedicated themselves to preserving their ancient Hindu society from destruction by Islam. Frequently their armies were beaten but the fact that one now finds South India so different from North India is a measure of their success on other and ultimately more important battlefields.

  Although Karnataka has been designed to approximate in area and ethnic content to the old Vijayanagar kingdom, the majority of modern Kannadigas naturally cannot feel towards their new state as they did towards Mysore under the Wadeyars. For almost 3,000 years, while empires waxed and waned, the small Hindu kingdom remained a constant feature of Indian life, especially in the south, and from the peasants’ point of view a secular democratic state is a poor substitute. Despite long periods spent under the suzerainty of various imperial powers the rulers of South Indian kingdoms usually retained considerable local control and their mere presence ga
ve emotional stability to the social structure, however inept or corrupt individual rulers might be. In theory, Indians should feel much more secure these days, when they can choose at the polls the sort of rulers they want, but for the people of a caste-dominated society a feudal overlordship of some kind is more psychologically comfortable than parliamentary democracy. Several years ago Dr Radhakrishnan wrote, ‘…caste… today has become a political evil; it has become an administrative evil. We are utilising caste loyalties for the purpose of winning our elections or getting people into jobs, exercising some form of favouritism or nepotism.’ The recent abrupt political Westernisation of India has probably been the most traumatic single event in the whole history of the subcontinent and a growing number of Indians believe the process should somehow have been accomplished more gradually.

  I felt acutely aware of the past as we entered the sumptuous though now desolate-feeling Sajje Hall, where the Maharaja used to give audience to his people every September, during the Navaratri festival. Rachel was greatly taken by the throne, which is made of fig-wood overlaid with ivory, plated with gold and silver and carved with innumerable figures from Hindu mythology.

  On our way out of the fort, when I turned aside for a moment to try to get a photograph of the zenana wing, a poorly dressed elderly man emerged from a distant doorway and came running towards us, angrily shouting and gesticulating. At first I, too, felt angry, for we had been much plagued, in and around the palace, by aggressive pseudo-guides demanding rupees. But then I noticed something different about this shabby little man who was pointing to the ornate zenana windows while vigorously shaking his head and trying to talk English. He did not want rupees: he simply wanted us to go away.