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Friday, July 3, 2009

Fathers’ Day

This piece was written for the Patna edition of the Times India and it appeared in its magazine section on 28 June 2009.

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My children had already called me to wish “Happy Father’s Day”, when I was invited to write this piece. I was still wondering about this new convention, awkward as I feel, even accepting birthday greetings. But I guess we must be devoted consumers; must go and buy the greeting cards, flowers, short mail each other messages, Twitter all the time, see and be shown on Facebook. Which is perhaps just as well! It is a good idea to set a day apart for the old man, another one for the dame as well, who is very affectionate but sometimes insistent to the point of being obtrusive. The poor overworked creature, his mind bristling with a multiplicity of agenda, hauling his body from one meeting to another, navigating the traffic, always late on arrival, always late for departure, can not be bothered with filial concerns on a daily basis!

People of my generation - I was born in the 50s - celebrate Gandhi Jayanti, Prohibition Day, Vigilance Day (or week) etc. with the same meticulousness and in the same spirit. We remind ourselves, and each other, that we have not forgotten who Gandhi was, why is it important to shun corruption in public life etc. At the same time we go about our business, recognising that the claims of the real world have to take precedence. The younger generation have different sets of icons and rituals to lift their self esteem. They have their Father’s Day etc. The next generation - produced through IVF and cloned, may be - would perhaps wonder what parents are.

But remember him or not he lives there. The biological memory lurks secretly, in your bones, blood, and grey matter. He is there in every thing that you do, in your failings and your success. Nature and nurture together shape your character. But even otherwise, at the conscious level he is never too far away, and a trip to the ice cream parlour with your children triggers the memories of how it used to be when you were a child. “Memory is the zest of life.” The Nobel Prize winning novelist I.B. Singer once said, “It keeps the years together.”

However the memory that lies stored in the layers of your cerebral cortex is not available simultaneously, ready for instant recall. There are others consigned in some neglected corner in the attic of your brain. Still others are like a subterranean spring flowing just below the conscious stratum but scratch it a little and it breaks forth like a stream undulating and gushing forth.

The years spent with my father – he died early by current standards – telescoped into one brief instant and provided me with a bench mark to judge my own experience as father. Anger, disappointment, frustration, disapproval of the ways of the children as well as undue pride in their achievement, the inclination sometimes to believe in them despite evidence to the contrary, is perhaps generational, and we play these twin roles in succession, speaking almost the same cue lines. My father would never tell me what to do. He was neither direct nor didactic. A trained lawyer who did not practice, he had nevertheless the reasoning skill and persuasive ability of the best in the business. His world of sober reflection and my world of cocky self assurance came into regular clash. He would never take me head on. He was a great admirer of Liddelhart, the British military historian, and followed his strategy of indirect approach. Gradually, insidiously he would immerse me in his moral, cognitive world. Sometimes there were arguments, shouting matches, but at the end of the day I was following his advice convinced that this was what I had wanted all along. I wanted to study Physics. My father said it was my fad; I would do much better in English. Several sessions, later I was wondering how I ever thought I could cope with regular classes and long hours in the laboratory! My father encouraged me to believe that I had taken the correct decision by opting for English.

The scenes were revisited a few decades later. Two of my children chose the career they wanted to pursue. We had as many sessions of discussions, perhaps a few more. There was less heat, more illuminating insights. Children were politely persistent. Their arguments were backed by compelling reasons. They had facts on their fingertips.

At the end of the day my children are doing what they wanted to do, but I am still convinced that they are doing my bidding.

3 comments:

R.SRI KUMAR said...

Ask your parent for permission to view this page, said my computer when I wanted to browse the pages my friend had written. Some Adult content in it, warned the Pop up and advised to have a parent to sign in their approval before I could view his blog spot. My God, said I to myself, my manju bhai has come of age. Talking about generation gaps and cloned children. Well well, haven't we come a long way, from those misty days at Mt Abu. White haired, wise looking, brings back memories of the old days when childish pranks were played and we did not need any ones approval for it. Ahem. I approve your actions. Keep it up. RSK

Ritu said...

Dear Mr Nath

Awesome piece as ever! I quite enjoyed and totally accept your observations about my generation. Its true that we (meaning my generation) tend to identify more with Father's Day , Mother's Day , Valentine's Day rather than Republic day , Gandhi Jayanti etc. I never forget to wish my parents (try my best to post a card as well)on these days. I don't think they particularly dislike being given some importance in this way although it took some time for them to get used to it. I suppose , in this day and age, when children no longer live with their parents (either in metros in India or abroad)small, insignificant gestures (like cards, text messages on the phone) do tend to bridge gaps in some way. What really surprised me was when even my nani actually gently reminded my mum about the upcoming Mother's Day this year (my mum and her sisters had made quite a fuss celebrating the occasion with her last year)!!

As regards to the decline in the importance given to Gandhi Jayanti etc, freedom struggle was too far away in the past for us. The present (and even your generation) of politicians have only helped to corrode that 'golden lustre' of national pride. The other day I had to think very hard about who could be my ideal in today's world (in the Indian socio-political context). Do we even have one person who we can emulate? Your generation would have probably answered Gandhi or Nehru or Marx or JP. I can only think of Barack Obama - he is a hero of the young India but he is not an Indian! Having said this , there are people like Burkha Dutt, Dr Kiran Bedi , Aamir Khan who I admire but they are not a Gandhi or Nehru or even a Obama for that matter.

Trust you had a good Father's Day!

Ritu

ajoyipsbhr85 said...

in the western world, meeting father or fondly remembering him, would be once a year ritual....
we used to live with parents... and had a daily dose of what could be now termed "sermons"....
remembering a father, for those who have lost them, is like reliving the entire childhood.....
but the case of leaving "English" and joining "mediocrity" has not been explained... was this decision also father-guided......
the linguistic marvel continues to dazzle....
when u could have given a lot of competition to the well known authors..... why this mediocrity was preferred, is beyond my comprehension....
i joined this because my father wanted... and i was not brilliant...