Voice of the Wild | Blogs

🌿 | Deciphering Ramayana | 🌿

♠️DECIPHERING RAMAYANA♠️
Written by - Shraddha_1D

Part 1: Introduction & Set up

P.S.: No religion, community, or any section of society has been disregarded, disgraced or dedicated through this passage. We support and respect every religion, caste and section. Discrimination is a serious crime.

Stumbling upon the volumes of Ramayana, the one thing that crosses our mind is 'Why?'. Why should we read Ramayana? Why should we read the monotonous epic of a kidnapping, revenge and war? Why intellectuals praise this masterpiece every now and then, from the ages beyond?

Well, before I answer these questions, we are all well aware of the stories of Ramayana. It is rare to find Indians who have not heard the basic infrastructural story of Ramayana. If you are, it is a shame. Please read that book, it will help you throughout your life. Growing up, I have read it in many stages and means: as a toddler, I heard them from Grandma, and read comics, as a middle schooler I read what in Bengal we call 'Krittibasi Ramayana' and as a high schooler, I am reading the parallels and thesis papers like Ram Chandra Series by Amish Tripathi, Vishnu by Devdutt Pattanaik, Valmikir Ram O Ramayan by Nrisingha Prasad Bhaduri. But every means of reading has opened up a new way of thinking to me. And I can assure you that it will do the same for you.

Now, to answer 'Why?', I must say Ramayana is nothing but the world of ours and the world inside of us. Science and common sense both say that without the tiniest part or unit of something, nothing can be created. That is an atom is the smallest part of the matter. In the same way, Ramayana has described the world within and around us. It has described not only the lifestyle or the difference between civilized and uncivilized culture and human psychology but also taught us what being human means.

Ruffling through the pages of the history, we get to know that Aryans had invaded Indus Valley Civilisation twice. On the first time, a segment of Aryans and Indus Valley Civilisation mingled up and formed Dravidians. These Dravidians migrated further South of the Indian Peninsula, i.e., Dandakaranya which is situated below the Godavari. These Dravidians are now the natives of Southern India.

The second invasion again caused a major split of Indus Valley people into Adivasis and Indo-Aryans. The Adivasis migrated towards the present the Madhya Pradesh while Indo-Aryans dominated 'Meluha', Northern India and North Eastern Pakistan. Other than these clans, existed Proto-Australoids or Proto-Melanesian.

Now, we all know that Ramayana was written by Valmiki. But history had never found any person named Valmiki. Rather existed a school of intellect Indo-Aryans named Valmiki. These Valmikis were often described as white-skinned, wise men and women who remained calm in every situation. This clan wrote the Ramayana and featured one of them as the protagonist of the epic that is 'Ram'.

Nationalism i.e., the idea of the superiority of the clan, community or nationality of that person existed from time immemorial. So, while Indo-Aryans made 'Ram' their hero, similarly the islands of Sumatra, Bali and Southern Indonesia made 'Ravana' their hero. The 'Rakshasa' defined in Ramayana is none other than these Dravidians. The clash of clans in history, their past, their differences in thought, and another perspective of life had made them enemies.

Other than these two, existed another clan: 'Ba-nars' which in modern Hindi we call 'Bandars' i.e., monkeys. But, actually there were no monkeys. 'Ba-nars' were those mutated Homo Sapiens those had an extension of vertebral column in the form of tail. They were just a part of Human Evolution. But their tails were their pride. From the name itself we can get, 'nar' i.e. men and 'ba-nar' i.e., men-like.

To be continued...
Stay tuned with Indian Legion for the next month's entry Part 2: Character Understanding.
Signing off,
Jhaaru Wali.

Love and hugs.
⚫️⚜️⚫️⚜️⚫️⚜️⚫️⚜️⚫️⚜️⚫️
August 17, 2020 (Monday)