Jyoti Sabharwal’s biography of Dr Kapila Vatsyayan is an insightful and glorious chronicling of the erudite’s life. She takes ANANYA BORGOHAIN through the journey of creating this magnificent project
With a track record of three decades as a journalist and publisher, Jyoti Sabharwal is among the pioneers of celebrity writing. Her latest work is the biography of Dr Kapila Vatsyayan, prominent scholar of Indian classical dance, art, and architecture, and who has also been Vice Chairman, Sangeet Natak Akademi; Additional Secretary, Department of Culture; Member Secretary and Academic Director, Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts (IGNCA); life Trustee and President, India International Centre; Secretary to the Indian delegations to UNESCO, and so on. In an interaction, the writer talks about how Dr Vatsyayan is an institution in herself.
Tell us about the unique title of your book.
Needless to say, Dr Kapila Vatsyayan and cognition are synonymous, and hence I looked at this work as a ‘cognitive biography’. She is one of those iconic scholars who treaded the path of knowledge in such a seminal way. Imagine, she coveted the Barbour Fellowship and went to University of Michigan in 1948 after securing a first class in Masters in English literature. This is where she became conversant with the writings of Ananda K Coomaraswamy and Heinrich Zimmer. It dawned upon her that she was grossly unaware of her own cultural roots and heritage. Finding a new calling, she had to satiate the burning curiosity. The fire in her belly made her beat a retreat even though one of her professors at Hindu College had told her brusquely that unless she had a PhD from the West (even if it was in boot-polishing), her work would not be acknowledged or validated.
That was an era when America was known to be a ‘land of golden opportunities’, but she went against the tide and followed her instinct. It was her most courageous decision. This fellowship was awarded to select women from the Orient and she had earned it. So, when she left the scholarship midway, it showed her sagacity, deep perception, and clarity of mind. But in those two years she spent in America, she went beyond the academics. Having been a disciple of the Kathak maestro, Achhan Maharaj, she delved into modern dance, and travelled with her Hungarian dance teacher Juana de laban, who also facilitated her access to other renowned dancers ranging from Martha Graham, Bela Bartok, Hanya Holm, Alwin Nikolais to la Meri. later she sat at the feet of stupendous scholars in Banaras Hindu University, to accomplish her doctorate.
As for the title, Afloat a lotus leaf, it was suggested by Dr Vatsyayan. Therein lies another tale. Her mother, Satyawati, was quite an adventurous soul; rowing, horse-riding, trekking, boating, and all else. Kapila would collect lotuses while rowing in Dal lake. And her mother asked one day: “Khali kamal hi ikathe kar rahi ho. Zindagi ko kamal ke patte ki tarah jeena hai.” What she conveyed through this analogy was that in life one has to rise above the muck, and yet, blossom magnificently, just like the lotus. And thus, right through her life, she stayed afloat with dignified silence and her head held high, amidst all the crucial controversies.
She was born in an intellectually inclined family. Didn’t that also play a vital role in moulding her mindIJ
We all are products of our environment. The right kind of nurturing can hone any skill and channelise aspirations. Dr Vatsyayan certainly belonged to a family that was both artistically and academically inclined. Her maternal grandmother had set-up the first non-sectarian, non-purdah school for girls in Srinagar, which celebrated its centenary in 2010. Her father held a double Masters in Mathematics from St Stephen’s College and also a degree in law from lahore. Her mother was extremely supportive of creative arts, and in her formative years her house in Calcutta was more like a hub for litterateurs, thinkers, intellectuals, and artists of all shades and hues.
As a child, she had the privilege of being in close proximity to Pt Banarsilal Chaturvedi, Hazariprasad Dwivedi, Kamaladevi Chattopadhyay, Prithiviraj Kapoor, Madeleine Slade (associate of Mahatma Gandhi), among others. Accompanying her parents to Santiniketan, she not only recited poems to Gurdev Tagore, learnt how to hold a painting brush from the legendary Nandalal Bose, but also observed remarkable women, like the Austrian-German art scholar Stella Kramrisch, Hungarian painters Sass and Elizabeth Brunner. Even at that nascent an age, she registered all these encounters and the multiple insights that came along.
She is known to be media shy, how difficult was it to get through to herIJ
I happened to be the very first person to have interviewed her way back in 1989, when she was the Academic Director of IGNCA. She had categorically turned down the request, but I suppose, one charmed her to give some glimpses of her erudite mind. Fortunately, I managed to keep in touch with her over the years. It was a long chase and eventually I succeeded in convincing her that it was imperative her life and times should be documented for posterity. She has breathed knowledge and has been privy to the turbulent history of pre and post-independent India. She broke fresh grounds in cultural diplomacy and put Indian culture on the global map when the country was widely known as the land of sadhus and snake charmers. So, this biography is a must-read for the young aspirants of post-modern India. In the course of writing over these four years, not once did she interfere with the editorial content, let alone asked any portion to be altered.
India’s first education minister Maulana Abul Kalam Azad had a strong influence on her.
That’s because she had this incessant urge to keep learning and became largely instrumental in implementing Maulana Sahab’s vision of ‘soft diplomacy’. He did not want political expediency to be an explicit arm of diplomacy. He was not only deeply committed to Indian heritage but also wanted Kalidasa’s Abhijnanasakuntalam to be translated in Arabic or Katha Upanishad in Persian, and distributed in West Asia.
This is a trajectory of relentless search and research, for Dr Vatsyayan even pursued the fathomless Gita Govinda for 50 years! And the way she handled the XXVI International Congress of Orientalists in January of 1964, the maiden Oriental discourse in India, is an eye opener. Until then, the West had defined and dictated what the Orient or Orientalism were all about. She establishes that culture always sustains itself: “It lies in what the essence is when all else is lost…”
Please tell us about how she handled bureaucratic controversies as an administrator of art and academic institutions.
Given her perspicacity, she chose to follow what she deemed to be the correct path. Even when she was shifted from the External Cultural Relations Bureau, travelling extensively and signing numerous cultural exchange programmes around the world, and given the charge of a hoary department of languages and Sanskrit studies, she made the best of this opportunity and set-up the Central Institute of Higher Tibetan Studies in Sarnath with due guidance and benevolence of His Holiness The Dalai lama, and also worked on the revival of Sanskrit studies. For, many such initiatives taken by Pt Nehru and Maulana Sahab were languishing. Irrespective of bureaucratic blocks and a rigid steel-frame, she continued to make strides as an advisor to various Governments.
The reason why many academic institutions and cultural centres in the West are able to safeguard and maintain their autonomy no matter which Government comes and goes, is, because they enjoy financial autonomy by raising their own funds too. And their systems are well in place, which cannot be flouted by the whims and fancies of people in power.
Does she see sense a serious disconnect between education and culture todayIJ
Yes, of course, she feels quite disturbed about this disjunction. And her candid views in the chapter, ‘The Arts as a Pedagogical Tool’, would render worthy guidelines for the educationists. There’s a growing chasm between aspiration and awareness, and disharmony between the goals and the means. Perhaps, that might explain why youngsters today are detached from their roots and facing an identity crisis. Instead of creating a cosmos of culture, there has been globalisation of culture. She firmly believes in blending the socio-economic with artistic dimensions.
As a biographer, which facet of her life appeared most striking to youIJ
For me personally, it was her Almora sojourn, as she visited the Himalayas seeking refuge from bureaucratic hassles. She went to meet Sri Krishna Prem (Gopal da). He was a British fighter pilot, Ronald Henry Nixon, who came to India during the First World War, and decided to stay on. He turned a Vaishnavite as the disciple of Sri Yashodha Ma. Now completely transformed, Gopal da was settled in this ashram, Mirtola. This meeting was beyond any quest for power and attention, beyond what is national and international. It was the beginning of another journey at the deeper levels of consciousness that enabled her to stay afloat like a lotus in murky situations, deflecting darts from all quarters, and yet, retaining that equilibrium to be at peace with oneself.
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