Sept_13

Etcetera
AT LARGE
Thank you
In a tribute to her grandparents, Dr Sudha Murty recalls the
lessons of compassion and empathy she learnt from them
I
was very fortunate to have grown
up with my grandmothers on either
side and grandfather on my
maternal side. Both grandmothers
lived in villages and had completely
different personalities. My maternal
grandmother, Krishna, was popularly
known as Krishnakka; she was
intelligent and sensitive. My paternal
grandmother, Amba, was called Ambakka.
She was quite the daredevil,
yet practical and accommodating. My
maternal grandfather was a schoolteacher
and lived in a village called
Shiggaon. Called Shiggaon Kaka, he
was an idealist.
As I grew up mostly with my maternal
grandparents, their influence was
more evident in me. I used to call my
grandmother Avva, which in Kannada
means ‘mother’. We had a farm that
had mango and tamarind trees and
jowar crop.
Once Avva took me to the farm during
summer to show me ripe fruits
hanging on the trees. She gave orders
to the helper, “Pluck the mangoes and
tamarind fruits, but leave one branch
on each tree untouched.” I was surprised
by her decision. I asked, “Avva,
the branches you are leaving out have
a lot more mangoes and tamarind
fruits than other branches. Will it not
be great to get all those mangoes and
tamarind fruits home? As there are
13 of us [grandchildren], each one of
us will get more fruits.”
Grandmother just smiled and did
not reply. She made me sit under
the shade of a mango tree in the
scorching heat. With the cool breeze
blowing gently, I felt good. She gave
me a glass of water first and then a
glass of lassi. I pressed for an answer
again. “Avva, you did not reply to my
earlier question.”
She said, “You might have seen the
rivulet that flows next to our land.
Does it drink its own water?”
I can never forget the best
lesson I learnt from my
maternal grandmother,
an ordinary housewife
who had never been to
school; that the human
body is meant to
serve others
“No!” I replied to her ‘foolish question’,
or so I thought.
“The lassi you drank now came from
where?” she asked me.
I smelt her ignorance and said, “Cow.”
“Does cow drink her own milk?”
I laughed and said, “Never. I have seen
the cow eating grass always.”
“Have you seen the mango or tamarind
trees eating their own fruits?”
I laughed and said, “They never eat
their own food. They require water
and manure to grow.”
Then she smiled and said, “Tell me
whom does this land belong to?”
“Of course, it belongs to Ajja and you.
I have seen the papers you have kept
in the drawer.”
“Before that it belonged to whom?”
asked my grandmother.
“Maybe your parents or his parents.”
“And before that?”
“I don’t know the answers to all
these difficult questions Avva. But
I guess, long ago this area would have
been a forest and later it might have
been converted into a farm to grow
edible things. Avva, you have not answered
me and are talking irrelevant
things instead.”
“My child, you have already found
the answer to your question. Yes, this
land was a forest once upon a time
and many animals and birds lived
here. They owned this land the way
we own now. As we can talk and express
ourselves, we made a paper in
our name and they could not. We cut
the trees and built our homes where
once they had their homes. We cultivated
their land without their permission.
That is the reason I don’t take
all the mangoes and tamarind fruits
and jowar from a part of the land.
I particularly want the birds to get
their due share of fruits, flowers and
jowar. The insects should get their
dues. Butterflies and honeybees
should get their flowers. And I want
to tell you one more thing. We should
not be too selfish. The rivulet that
flows does not drink its own water,
the cow that gives us milk does not
drink its own milk and the trees that
bear the nectar like fruits never eat
them. So as a human being, we should
72 harmony celebrate age september 2013