Subhash Kak ☀️ Profile picture
Nov 9, 2021 3 tweets 2 min read Read on X
Battle-flag of Maharaja #Ranjit Singh of Punjab (1780 - 1839) had images of Devi दुर्गा Durgā with हनुमान् Hanumān and #लक्ष्मण Lakṣmaṇa. Image
A picture of the flag from Sotheby's auction: Image
कौमारी Kaumarī the power of Kārtikeya, the commander-in-chief of the devas is also on the flags, as is वाराही Vārāhī, the power of Varāha, the boar-headed form of Vishnu.

Kaumari rides peacock, holds spear etc.

Maharaja Sher Singh 1842, by Alexis Soltykoff, British Library Image

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More from @subhash_kak

May 17, 2022
Shiva is Universal Consciousness (Bhagavad Gītā 5.29 calls the inner Self “Maheśvara”, the Great Īśvara, another name for Śiva) and Nandi is the individual who keeps vigil, & the gaze unites the two.

Nandi is patient.

Nandi in Kashi got to see Shiva again after 353 years.

1) Image
The land was in darkness, but Nandi remained steadfast in faith.

Shiva is Pashupati & the individual (paśu) is in bondage (pāśa) to embodied nature. For freedom, one needs the equivalence with Pashupati, which is celebrated as the deep experience of Śivoham.

Prakāśa dawns.

2)
Nandi shows the way to Shiva.

3)
Read 4 tweets
Mar 22, 2022
In the theatre where I saw Kashmir Files, a tall young American man a few rows down from us, let out a terrifying scream near the end of the movie and ran out.

He was crying he couldn't take the pain, but he must have crept back in for I saw him again as the movie ended.

1)
A different movie that captured deep pain is Ingmar Bergman’s Cries and Whispers, a movie on the horrors of emptiness, of betrayal of oneself.

This one captures the naked faces of evil, deceit, and betrayal, all hidden under the mask of ordinariness.

2)
If this movie has captured the public imagination, it is also because it is a contrast from the mostly vacuous and shallow stuff Bollywood produces.

For a long time, the Indian audience has been patient with shallow, cleverly-packaged stories good to kill couple hours.

3)
Read 6 tweets
Mar 21, 2022
I just saw the amazing Kashmir Files in Miami this afternoon.

It is a great movie not only because it speaks truth to power in ways not done in cinema for a long time; it exposes layers of deceit within the echo-system of Indian media, academic, and power establishments.

1)
The horror of the cultural and physical genocide of Kashmiri Hindus is a searing story.

Compared to the genocide and sexual-slavery of the Yazidis, it is more terrifying psychologically, because while the Yazidis have returned home, the Kashmiri remains in perpetual exile.
2)
And in a diabolical twist, media accounts of the exodus made it out as if the Kashmiri Hindus had brought the tragedy upon themselves.

As one who grew up in Kashmir, I can say that this was a system that normalized public and private humiliation and insults to them.

3)
Read 7 tweets
Mar 11, 2022
Western experts are shocked by the election results in India, because their contacts in the Indian Anglosphere (IA) had assured them this won’t happen.

The IA after 75 years of political independence is clueless and in a bubble, seeing India through the colonizer’s eyes.

1)
This view of India is racist, and false, and bizarrely, the IA has embraced self-hate.

The British destroyed India’s education and economy, stole 35 trillions dollars worth of wealth, precipitated devastating famines, and somehow convinced Indians it was all their fault.

2)
The IA speaks of patriarchy in India but doesn’t speak about the est. 3-5 million executed as “witches” in Europe from the 15th century on; women who resisted for the sake of own livelihood.

It considers Indian culture regressive and ridicules Indian customs and festivals.

3)
Read 4 tweets
Feb 11, 2022
It really bothers me that Indian history books don't speak of how Raja Bhoja and his ally Rajendra Chola ruled over most of India.

Bhoja was the most brilliant king of history with 84 books

His armies went as far as Kabul.

He was a great builder.

link.medium.com/zYJu3xfBpnb
कहां राजा भोज कहां गंगू तेली is corrupt form of कहां राजा भोज कहां गंगेय तेलंग

Gangeya Telang was king of Telang country who was his ally sometime and also a rival.

This saying indicates that Bhoja was absolutely incomparable in royalty and achievement.
Also the story of Raja Bhoja and Kalidasa is like a novelistic thing in a play (because they didn't belong to the same time) quite like A Connecticut Yankee in the Court of King Arthur.
Read 4 tweets
Feb 5, 2022
To understand the jibe by an MP in the Indian Parliament who called Hindus go-mutra drinkers, note that India may have gained political independence but it remains intellectually colonized.

It is under the heel of Anglosphere-sepoys of European racism.

1)
The racism is perpetuated using language and colonial ideas that are so embedded in the school and media narratives that they are taken to be the truth.

The sepoys say:

-Hindus are not mature enough to run their temples

-their festivals are profane and noisy

2)
-their languages are judged not fit for the courts

-it is all right for people to mock their gods and their manners, but if they reply in kind they are put in jail

-they are told that they should accept insults in silence and just work hard

3)
Read 5 tweets

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