SNOWBOUND ! (Part 4)

SNOWBOUND !   (Part 4)

Darkness was approaching and despite a herculean effort it took quite some time to reach a comfortable place. The group convinced Panchiram that they would not reach the designated spot that day.

“We’ll be right there in the morning!” Srikantia shouted back to him.

Taking the shelter of a large boulder they prepared a bivouac in the snow. By midnight it started snowing again. The officers took every precaution to protect their maps from getting wet. In an attempt to retain a cheerful spirit they began relating anecdotes from slices of their lives – a broken love, a betrayal, another adventure in a field work in a forested terrain, a ghost story etc. Though there was snow all around, they had not a drop of water. Swallowing handfuls of snow they eagerly gazed at the eastern horizon.

It was a grey and dull morning the next day and their feet were painful and swollen. They continued the trek and reached the banks of the Chandra River around 9 0’Clock. Panchiram, the faithful tehsil peon was there and he guided the group a further distance upstream where the river had a shallow stretch. The wary porters mustered up courage and slowly waded through the shivering waters. They carried one end of a nylon rope and promised to return to help the others who remained behind after depositing their luggage on the opposite bank. However once across the river, they were in an indecent haste to push their way ahead. Without losing nerve, the rest of the group securely fastened the other end of the rope to a boulder with the first end being held robustly by Panchiram.

Stripping their clothes and tying them around their necks, they waded through the chest deep, swiftly flowing Chandra River, locked arm in arm. The cook lost nerve and had to be carried across. Once they were across the river, the peak of the ordeal was behind them. Safely stationed on the other bank they gave vent to their feelings and tensions of the past five days.

They next joined a human caravan that was moving along a narrow track. They came to know of thousands who were affected by the disaster. The route bore the marks of a large exodus. Carcasses of mules that had died of hunger and four human bodies that were frozen to death were also seen. It was night when they all reached the Chotadhara Rest House further downstream. Resting for two days there they dragged themselves to Chattaru where they rested for another day and reached Khoksar on the evening of 30^th September.

Once in Khoksar they all flashed messages of their safe return to their homes and the headquarters of their office. Peripheral neuritis owing to overexposure to freezing conditions caused several sleepless nights to several of them. The group next moved to Kulu, the administrative seat of the district.

The entire group led by Srikantia, R. N. Padhi (another geologist) and Biswas, a surveyor together with other supporting staff was warmly felicitated by the Chief Minister for their courage and grit in facing life-threatening dangers and their great sense of duty.  The events were also widely covered by the press and the group felt thankful for their lives being spared.

                                                                                 (Concluded)

SNOWBOUND ! (Part 3)

SNOWBOUND !   (Part 3)

The morning of September 22^nd saw the first rays of the sun making its way through the slits of their tents. “Gosh! The Sun is out !” shouted Srikantia getting out of the sleeping bag. Gaps of blue were seen in the horizon. All familiar landmarks had disappeared in the white expanse which was nine to ten feet deep. Donning sunglasses they came out of the tents one by one. Pangs of hunger gnawed in their guts but they refrained from eating, lest their supplies run out. Retreating to their tents they decided to chalk out a strategy for escape.

“We can’t risk another day here. Another bout of snowfall and we’ll all have a white funeral!” mumbled Biswas glumly. The porters were demoralised. They too were running out of rations. The group realised it was impossible to remove and carry the tentages and other equipment and also the geological specimens they had collected. Yet they were not too sure whether to abandon everything and scoot. Hence they decided to risk staying a while longer.

The next day too (September 23^rd) was a fairly clear day. The leader Mr. Srikantia had hopes that the snow would gradually melt and aid them in their return journey. The transistor radio was the only contact with the outside world and other than film songs, they never heard a word about their plight nor any news about the heavy snowfall in the news bulletins. Dwindling rations brought the group to their feet. It was the fourth night without sleep.

The morning of September 24^th had a porter peer into Srikantia’s tent and announce “Sahib, it has started snowing again and we can’t risk remaining here any longer!”

“Collect all the maps, vouchers, cash and other valuables” Srikantia announced. “Let’s leave immediately !”  

With stoic detachment they abandoned everything at the site save geological maps that was the fruit of the labour of three months.

The porters revolted and refused to carry any luggage excepting a few of their blankets. It was quite understandable – they had their own stuff. The adventurers donned on as many warm clothes as they could fit into and they all looked quite bloated. Due to the heavy load the porters could hardly move through the fresh snow. Srikantia ventured to stay in the lead and make a track for others to follow. All foot tracks were obliterated and there was a danger of stepping into a crevasse. Quite often the foot would get jammed between crevices and the painful march was unending. At one place they had to cross three branches of a glacial stream, as crossing a glacier with crevasses was too risky. They removed their shoes and crossed the icy waters that bit into their flesh. Some people lost their gloves during the crossing. Their feet and hands were becoming numb and sensationless. It was snowing throughout as the trek continued without respite. Even after a trek of six hours the group had barely covered two miles. They later heard the drone of a plane and learnt later that it was on a run to drop food packets for the party. The outside world had got to know of their plight through P.W.D engineers who were working in other parts of the valley.

 They were still a long way from Batal a small town where they hoped to rest and assuage their hunger. The visibility had improved and could espy the other bank of the Chandra River. Towards evening they were pleasantly aroused to hear a shrill shout from the distant right bank of the river. A tiny lonesome figure stood there gesticulating wildly! From loud shouts traded across the river they realized it was Panchiram. Braving the snow and slush he had single-handedly made his way to guide them to safety. He guided the group to a particular spot down the river. It was his intention that they cross the river immediately.

                                                                                      (To be continued…)

SNOWBOUND ! (Part 2)

SNOWBOUND  (Part 2)

The leader of the expedition Mr. S. V. Srikantia, a geologist who hails from Karnataka, had sent the tehsil peon Panchiram to Manali to fetch a pack of mules to transport luggage on their return journey. The fateful day of the 20^th September began with anticipation that the mules would be heading for the camp. The drizzle of the wet afternoon turned to excitement as they saw the first hints of snowflakes gently settling on the earth. It was their first experience of snow. Inch by inch the snow started piling up. Gradually the visibility reduced and the first feelings of nervousness began to stir in. The sun had set and the darkness of the night took over. By about 9 p.m. about two feet of snow had accumulated. The thick blanket of snow reduced the area into a trackless terrain and the camp had become an icy trap which was cut off from the rest of the world. The food supplies were barely sufficient to last a day or two and the kerosene supplies were also running out. The possibility of Panchiram reaching the camp with the mules seemed to be ruled out.

As a first step to face the grim altered circumstances, it was decided to restrict themselves to only one meal a day. The snow piled on incessantly and the temperature began to drop drastically. Babu Ram, the cook, who was laying down the dishes for dinner suddenly collapsed to the floor with a thud! The party realized that he had fainted due to the extremely low temperature and revived him with a swig of brandy. Still tottering, he was stuffed into a sleeping bag and shifted to a warm corner. The rice was icy cold and almost impossible to swallow. That was the last dinner they were to have for the next few  days.

As the snow kept on piling up, they began to discuss strategies for escape. Fuel and food shortage was in fact quite precarious. It was past midnight as the party began to fear the possibility of tents collapsing under the weight of the snow. Donning gloves and warm socks and footwear, the party members embarked on digging trenches and shovelling the snow around the tents. The silence of the night was rudely punctuated by the thundering noises of avalanches and snow-slides.

“In the morning (September 21^st) when I opened the tent I was confronted by a snow wall,” says Srikantia reminiscing about that morning. Extricating himself, he saw a misty expanse of snow. It was still snowing and the camp was almost buried and the visibility was very low. Heating snow to generate water and thence heating it further to boiling, the party refreshed themselves with some black coffee. Trenches were re-dug and soon they were almost ten feet deep. They tuned on their transistor radios to find out if the world was aware of their fate. “They still don’t know about the snow blizzard here,” remarked Padhi, another geologist from Orissa. At noon Ramnath, a technical bearer cooked some boiled rice. Mixing it up with some spicy powder or the other the expedition party had a frugal repast. Babu Ram was recovering speedily. “I should be o.k. by tomorrow,” he said reassuringly. More snow was cleared in the evening. The blizzard was continuing unabated. The noise of avalanches were heard all through the night. Luckily the party had selected the camp site with prudence or else they would have been swept away. Soon the tents, already fully soaked, began leaking and the sleeping bags became wet. With the shrill winds and the noise of snow-slides sleep was impossible throughout  the night.

                                                                                                                         (To be continued …)

SNOWBOUND ! (Part 1)

SNOWBOUND!  (Part 1)

by

S. V. Srikantia & Deepak Bellur

It was exactly fifty years ago that this awful incident happened. Way back in September 1962 (20^th September to be precise) a group of hardy geologists and surveyors of the Geological Survey of India were snowbound in a remote part of what is now called Himachal Pradesh and were in terrible risk of losing their lives.

It was a grey, wet afternoon in a place called Bara Shigi in the snowy heights of Lahaul Valley of what was then referred to as Punjab Himalaya. Back in those days the network of roads was just incipient and not as well developed as today. They had to cross the 13,050 foot altitude Rohtang Pass -  a fairly easy task now because of fairly well laid out roads, but was a daunting task back then. This group of earth scientists had been assigned the task of geological mapping along the steep slopes of Bara Shigi. Some parts of the area, especially between the altitudes of 13,000 to 16,000 feet was a geologically virgin terrain and they were engaged in the task of mineral exploration.

Let me begin from the beginning. The group had left Shimla on 16^th June 1962 on an expedition after collecting their tentages, sleeping bags, maps, geological and surveying equipment and provisions for their daily upkeep. At Manali they engaged a fleet of mules for transporting their luggage. Having crossed the Rohtang Pass by trekking on the 25^th of June they reached a village called Khoksar in the Lahaul Valley. The muleteers were a recalcitrant lot often vanishing from sight and reluctant to take risks which was inevitable while crossing rivers and glaciers. But with a great deal of persuasion the group established a camp at Bara Shigi at an altitude of 13,400 feet.

The terrain here, in contrast to the greenery of Lesser Himalaya, is a bleak one with not one green twig of a tree seen anywhere nearby. The valley is surrounded by majestic snowy peaks and mountain ranges. The casual visitor here is warned of rolling boulders that slide down the slopes and of dangerous avalanches. The barrenness of the area and the absolute absence of any traces of civilisation and human contact over a long duration of over two months and fierce icy cold winds that blow along the valley start telling on the nerves. The weather is very unpredictable.

Their world consisted of a few tiny threadbare alpine tents where the group would struggle to fit in after a hard day’s work. Gin Rummy was the only diversion. Some buried themselves in thick bound volumes of story books. It is a common thing that in these circumstances tempers are easily frayed. The work proceeded quite smoothly without any major glitches, and according to their itinerary they were due to close camp by September 21^st, well before the onset of winter.

                                                                                                           To be continued …

My Thoughts on God & the problem of Evil

I saw a girl wailing for help in Yahoo! Answers as follows : “I think I have to be the worst philosophy student alive! Lmao. I think I must (have) read Meditations over a thousand times and I still don't get it this one part. I even went to a weekend workshop that (sic) how bad I am. But all they did was read it over but (never) really explain (sic) it in detail. Which is what I need. So I'm asking all you smart people here on Yahoo Answers. You helped me name my son and decorate my new bedroom apartment so why not this? Lol.
“Anyway can someone explain to me Descartes proof of God's in his 3rd and 5th mediation. I'm just little unclear. I understand to a point but not enough that I can participate in any class discussion's (sic) without feeling like I'm making a fool out of myself. And I'm a honors student here! :(
Thanks in advance. I really appreciate it. “

Well! I also must have read something about it in Bertrand Russell’s ‘History of Western Philosophy’ and have come across the theme several times, but I confess nothing sticks to my mind. It is like Teflon! Each time I come across the word ‘Ontological’ I keep running back into the dictionary to find out what it means. The dictionary defines ‘Ontology’ as follows :-

— n
1.	philosophy the branch of metaphysics that deals with the nature of being
2.	logic the set of entities presupposed by a theory

As to the first definition given above it may be useful to add :

      It is the branch of metaphysics that studies the nature of existence or being as such.

Further something that ‘IS’ is said to exist and is called a being. And many argue that God is a Being.
In the light of these considerations and definitions of the word ‘ontology’, Descartes offered an Ontological argument that God exists.  To briefly sum it up (as he discusses in his book ‘Meditations’)

Because Descartes had the IDEA of God, there must be a God to receive that idea from. So God exists! The definiion of God at such point of writing was "That greater than which cannot be conceived."  In other words, it is something greater than whatever you can imagine. Descartes probes various ideas about God's 'objective reality'--the representational qualities and content that makes up the idea of God : -

God is generally conceived and explained to be infinite, independent (was not created), supremely powerful, supremely beneficent, supremely intelligent, and the creator of everything. All six of these qualities added up to be the idea/concept of "Perfection". (As a curious aside I draw the attention of readers to the god ‘Kartikeya’ also called ‘Muruga’ in South India or even as ‘Shanmukha’ or six-faced which is supposed to reflect six potencies of his divine nature)

This brings us back to the Ontological Argument, also often referred to as the "Inheritance Idea".

God exists--->God is perfect--->God is not a deceiver--->Therefore the Light of Nature (God) can be trusted.

It is kind of a bad argument. This argument is weak because together with the ideas about the existence of God, there are also many theories about the non-existence of God. If God exists and He is not a deceiver, then how do these theories arise?  Since we know that they have arisen, how can it be proved that they are wrong?

There is also the explanation of the problem of Evil. If God is Omnipotent, and if God is supremely ‘Good’ and if God is also ‘Just’,  then how does Evil arise?  Is there something that is Supremely Bad that balances out the Supremely Good? Is such a thing a necessity?

Descartes denies the existence of Evil by arguing that:  If God is supremely benevolent and supremely powerful, then He would want there to be no evil, and SO there is none.
I draw the reader’s attention to the Indian tradition where there is a widely held view that there is no evil in this world. There are only errors. These errors are due to false judgments. These wrong judgments arise due to ignorance. Also these false judgments arise because of God’s desire to provide Human’s with Free Will. Mistakes are false judgments, and free will allows mistakes. Just imagine a world in which it is proved that God Exists, and further, that orders are given that such and such codes of behavior and conduct are to be followed. I would say that such a world would be a very bleak place! Each man and woman would be reduced to a beast of burden and forced to ‘carry his or her cross’ till death! So I argue that God in His wisdom chose to only give ‘revelations’ at random just to indicate the directions in which the Good lies and left it to humans to judge for themselves. In other words ‘good judgments are indicated by God through revelations’. Each human is free to choose which rules he or she would like to follow and the consequences of your choices are there for you to reap.  However much I wish the previous sentence to read friendlier, I am afraid I cannot make it more user-friendly!   :-)  :-)

Modern Man has of recent years perhaps been displaying many errors of judgments. My theory is that perhaps this has led to a dangerous increase in mental diseases like depression, manic-depressive psychosis and schizophrenia. Ask any psychiatrist who has examined a host of these cases and they will probably tell you that the main errors of the sufferers are ‘errors in cognition’ or ‘cognitive errors’. I pick up from the Wikipedia the description of cognition as :

“In science, cognition is a group of mental processes that includes attention, memory, producing and understanding language, solving problems, and making decisions.”

The various cognitive errors that occur in Modern Humans are briefly given below (source Wikipedia):
Many cognitive distortions are also logical fallacies.

§  All-or-nothing thinking (splitting) – Conception in absolute terms, like "always", "every", "never", and "there is no alternative". (also "false dilemma" or "false dichotomy".)

§  Overgeneralization – Extrapolating limited experiences and evidence to broad generalizations. (also faulty generalization and misleading vividness.)

§  Magical thinking - Expectation of specific outcomes based on performance of unrelated acts or utterances. (also wishful thinking.)

§  Mental filter – Inability to view positive or negative features of an experience, for example, noticing only a tiny imperfection in a piece of otherwise useful clothing.

§  Disqualifying the positive – Discounting positive experiences for arbitrary, ad hoc reasons.

§  Jumping to conclusions – Reaching conclusions (usually negative) from little (if any) evidence. Two specific subtypes are also identified:

§  Mind reading – Sense of access to special knowledge of the intentions or thoughts of others.

§  Fortune telling – Inflexible expectations for how things will turn out before they happen.

§  Magnification and minimization – Magnifying or minimizing a memory or situation such that they no longer correspond to objective reality. This is common enough in the normal population to popularize idioms such as "make a mountain out of a molehill." In depressed clients, often the positive characteristics of other people are exaggerated and negative characteristics are understated. There is one subtype of magnification:

§  Catastrophizing – Inability to foresee anything other than the worst possible outcome, however unlikely, or experiencing a situation as unbearable or impossible when it is just uncomfortable.

§  Emotional reasoning – Experiencing reality as a reflection of emotions, e.g. "I feel it, therefore it must be true."

§  Should statements – Patterns of thought which imply the way things "should" or "ought" to be rather than the actual situation the person is faced with, or having rigid rules which the person believes will "always apply" no matter what the circumstances are.Albert Ellis termed this "Musturbation".

§  Labeling and mislabeling – Limited thinking about behaviors or events due to reliance on names; related to over-generalization. Rather than describing the specific behavior, the person assigns a label to someone or himself that implies absolute and unalterable terms. Mislabeling involves describing an event with language that is highly colored and emotionally loaded.

§  Personalization – Attribution of personal responsibility (or causal role or blame) for events over which a person has no control.

Such cognitive errors frequently appear in a patient who has been generally making false Judgments of errors out of ignorance. Perhaps it may be true that one of the solutions to this problem is to obtain a balanced view of God, religion and spiritualism. (from personal experience I would be tempted to say that it is the main solution, but that too would be a cognitive error of ‘Over-Generalisation’, and a probable error of ‘Labelling’, and of ‘Emotional reasoning’).

A further tragedy is that such cognitive errors makes a person lose his or her gratitude for the divine and he fails to see its munificence. This lack of gratitude leads to a sort of disgruntlement with life and thence on to a dismal world view and becomes a self-fulfilling monstrous cycle. In my case it turned towards atheism and I began looking for rational reasons for the denial of existence of God.  But the overall effect atheism had on me was one of lost hopes for the future and dark pessimism ultimately leading to psychological disorders.

I add that God may prefer to have it this way (and for disbelievers I would add ‘If God Exists!’) leaving the choice of actions to individuals. . In my own case a remarkable healing was effected by a scrupulously careful reading of books affirming the existence of the divine tempered with proper and watchful actions and conduct that lifted me from the morass of despair to normalcy. I however assert that there was a showering of 'Grace' before I embarked on this path. It is still true that I seem to commit quite a few of these cognitive errors but there is healing before it is too late.

Source:  Self in  http://www.Speakingtree.in/    and certain parts of the text from Wikipedia.

My Thoughts on a Sunny October Morn

Background information : -

1. The site adjacent to my house is a vacant plot of land. There was once a house on this land that was demolished by a merchant who seems to have bought it as an investment.

2. Ever since the Bangalore city civic authorities appointed contractors to collect the garbage of the town and dispose it, these contractors who are not accountable to the public opinion select the most convenient spot where the garbage cleaners of a few roads are advised to dump the garbage. The garbage truck visits these spots after a few days when sufficient garbage has accumulated and evacuate the stinking mess.

3. The footpath adjacent to the vacant plot has been selected as one such site, and despite my efforts (letter to Chief Minister, Local political representative, Corporation Commissioner) to get the point shifted to another location, it has not yielded any results.

4. I feel like accusing Muniyappa, a friendly scavenger who despite my protests, dumps the garbage next to my house.

5. A crucial drainage channel of my house was blocked today. This has happened due to the burrowing of bandicoots. I was informed about this by my maid servant who advised me to seek the help of Muniyappa.


With this background information I proceed ahead with the story.

It so happened that my hackles are being raised by Muniyappa who stubbornly pushes the large garbage wheel-barrows to the footpath adjacent to my house. Today morning my fury knew no bounds when I found the garbage wheelbarrow just beside the gate to my house. It was loaded with garbage and was a stinking mess and was quite heavy too. The barrow was moved close to my gate because the Sewerage Board is laying new concrete pipes and mechanized trench digging is taking place. He could have kept it in the niche on the road on the opposite side without it being close to any house. I was wild. I had decided to verbally abuse Muniyappa and even was prepared to slap him when he came nearby.

As my thoughts were going on thus, my maid informed me about the drainage channel block. So I found that I needed Muniyappa's help because, I being a middle-class retired government officer, do not have the willingness to stick my arm deep into a dirty and stinking sewage channel. So I found that I could not really attack Muniyappa and was forced to be nice to him. If you go to see, much of human pleasantness in society has a basis similar to this idea.

It was at this time that a rather deep realization struck me. If I had the willingness to stick my hand in the drainage channel, I would have had the guts to fight with Muniyappa. So I end up being nice to him. Then my thoughts began probing deeper. The middle-classes and the rich who have sufficient money wouldn't mind throwing a few rupees to get someone to do your dirty job. The medium of money that is paid strips the value of the effort involved in the work. It is not only the physical work that I am referring to, but also the mental shackles and limitations that we have tied ourselves with.  Since we have easy money, we toss a few rupees without examining the processes that are happening. If you were to correlate the twenty rupees with all the physical and emotional ramifications that the menial task involves, we would realize the value of money.  With easy money not only does one miss out thinking about these deeper aspects, we also develop contempt for the so called menial class who we get to do our dirty jobs.  We are debasing another human being, who like you, is also a child of the universe, and all that without feeling grateful to him for doing your dirty work, but rather shockingly, holding him in contempt.

The medium of money is making humankind unconscious of the value of their actions. This is what makes money dangerous! With the development of the spiritual side in me I seem to be more conscious of these things. There was a time when I was a youth when I felt that I preferred socialistic ideas. It is a truth if I say that there was in me a desire for justice and also a desire to see the gap between various classes eliminated. But while I was conscious of these facts to a certain extent I never seemed to have the consciousness to examine and probe each thought and strong emotion like I am doing these days at certain times. I would like to be more conscious but I now think it is largely a GIFT!

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