The Times of India
Ban on Ramanujan’s essay shameful: URA
TNN | Nov 2, 2011, 04.58AM IST
BANGALORE : Kannada litterateur UR Ananthamurthy has soundly criticized Delhi University's decision to remove AK Ramanujan's essay, 'Three Hundred Ramayanas: Five Examples and Three Thoughts on Translation' , from its undergraduate History syllabus.
The essay has been in the eye of a storm in the otherwise sleepy ac ademia and has forced academics and students to take to the streets in protest against what they see as a blow to the diversity of Indian thought and scholarship.
"The old orthodox India would never have done this. It made room for so many variations. It is only the modern India of communalism and extreme nationalism that finds itself unable to deal with plurality and diversity,'' Ananthamurthy told TOI. "It is an utter shame. It is intolerable.''
In 2008, ABVP activists charged into the office of the then head of DU's department of history, Prof SZH Jafri, and demanded that the essay be withdrawn. The academic council later referred the essay to an expert committee which was to decide whether it should remain on the syllabus or not. Although three of the four experts on the committee recommended that the university keep the essay on its syllabus, the council voted to drop it.
According to Ananthamurthy , ancient texts are often to be found in one or many of the following forms: 'shruti' , 'smriti' and 'purana' . While 'shruti' refers to the oral version of texts, 'smriti' refers to remembered accounts and 'purana ' to the written ones. "There is no end as to how many versions there can be. Only very limited people can claim that there must be only one version," he said.
Illustrating how intertextual ancient epics can take shape in their telling and retelling over centuries, Ananthamurthy laughingly recounted a certain version of the Ramayana performed in a rural area, in which Sita is denied permission to accompany her husband on his forest exile: She says, "How come all the other Sitas are allowed to go with Rama while I am not?''
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