Stone for Dharwad....

 They say in Sanskrit "Janani janmabhoomischa swargadapi  gariyasi". Dharwad is not only my birthplace, it is also my 'karmabhoomi', in the sense that it was there that I spent my most formative years. Although now I live five thousand miles away in England , it is only a stone's throw away in my mind. Perhaps even nearer, as it takes a fraction of a second for me to travel back there in time and space. (Doesn't that remind you of 'Yaksha Prashna' in Mahabharata, where Yudhishtira has to win back the lives of his dead brothers' lives by answering a few questions? Among them "What is the fastest thing?" A: Mind) In my mind the Dharwad of late fifties and early sixties will remain forever with a magical and romantic glow! Before you guys take out your calculators and frantically press the buttons -- for I don't know if mental arithmetic is still taught in schools!-- let me myself admit that I am a green fifty going on fifteen!

Those days Prof. R Y Dharwadkar (so aptly named. Probably he wouldn't have got the principal's job his surname was say 'Vijapurkar'!) used to say how Dhaewad was full of retired people  and poets that 'if you stood on top of JSS mount- I don't know what that college(JSS) or the hill now called , perhaps a correspondent will enlighten me- and throw a stone, it will land either on a poet or a retired person!'. My grand father was a celebrated poet and a retired school teacher. He in fact was did teach him (R Y) at school, although not throwing stones, one hopes! So there would be two stones destined for my house in Saptapur! (My brother still lives there).I remember listening to him and many other literary figures talk at the Vidyavardhk Sangha in the evenings. I am pleased that after many years' neglect the Sangha is revived. The last time I went there was to listen to a debate on Human Rights the day before the public celebration of the 80th birthday of our revered headmaster Shri S G Nadgir, to which I had specially flown from here. It was a grand occasion, the following day when many celebrities attended the function at Kala Bhavan. But some things never change, like power failure in the middle of the function!

My street in  Saptapur is often dark thanks to someone throwing a stone to smash the streetlight. Or did someone try to test Prof. Dharwadkar's hypothesis?