The other day I was watching an indie
movie wherein they celebrated Chomsky’s birthday instead of Christmas and were ready
for a discussion with anyone who ridiculed! Chomsky has aged considerably with his
post pandemic Santa beard. It is quite saddening to see him shriveled in recent
online talks, he is 92 but remains as always amazingly measured and insightful.
Chomsky is one the very few living person who have had a considerable influence.
I recall (it was probably in 1997) when I encountered “manufactured consent”,
next few months was reading Chomsky. There were also some discussion groups in
JNU that I occasionally dropped in where Chomsky was hot and anyone who didn’t know
about Chomsky’s work could be murdered. He still is popular in campuses across
the world. Ofcourse now there are younger Chomsky videos online. It was in
2001 after 9/11 when he was on a visit to India that the craze really picked up. I
recall we were in stampede to listen to him (one fellow even caught a flight to
Chennai to listen to him, ofcourse those were pre-internet era indulgences). There
are few things one may disagree (I factor in as white patronizing the mysified other. Also,
it is insisted that religion cannot be and will not be allowed to define identity
nor meaning and significance of minority. Cannot pander herds nor authenticate herd
controllers, these are done by cunning manipulators) but his views makes one
think. He is brilliant.
During those days I was under the influence of, apart from other thinkers (mostly western, Indians don’t really measure up despite valiant effort by likes of Amartya Sen, though advaita of Shankaracharya is compelling thought but comes enveloped in muck, and yes Buddha can hardly be referred to as Indian since his enlightened thoughts were decimated from the mainland by monster mullahs and caste cannibals), Nietzsche, later existentialist like Sartre, Camus –his early impetus on writing fiction with much aid from Gogol, Chekov, Dostoevsky, Kafka so on and guidance from Dickinson, Tagore, Whitman, Rilke, Thoreau so on . Much later I shifted to Spinoza. In between there was an interlude with Derrida. Now Derrida’s deconstructionism had a powerful influence but I worked it into an idea for my requirements. It even influenced me to pick up a name! Not many people know about this nor have I explained. It was while I was travelling on a night train from Allahabad to Delhi (in 1997, I guess) that I started working on names. Deconstruction was on the mind. So I took De, and then something that should suit Indian condition for name but meaningful. Palan in Hindi/Sanskrit/Malayalam means “to follow”, and follow I was not going to! Hence depalan. Previously it was confined to contributing articles or literary gatherings but now it is official! Many times people use de as in day then I have to insist with much pleasure 'de as in deconstruction'. Unfortunately at one place (while I worked as copywriter) they shortened it as de as in day, located in Bangalore with mostly south Indians these precariously dangled on derogatory, it was a valiant effort to keep it from slipping.
