
Kosambi visited, among other places, Nepal, Sri Lanka and Myanmar. Photo: Courtesy Dr Meera Kosambi/Permanent Black
A
popular visual metaphor of Indian wisdom is that of a sage meditating in
splendid solitude, in a forest or on a mountain, far removed from the messy
world we live in. Yet there is also a tradition of wise men travelling through
the real world in search of knowledge.
The
first Shankaracharya left what is now Kerala to eventually set up monasteries
in four different parts of the country. Guru Nanak not only travelled through
India but also reached distant places such as Baghdad and Mecca. Swami
Vivekananda wandered through India for almost five years as an impoverished
monk.
What
is true of religious teachers is also true of scholars. The usual image in our
minds is of someone sitting for long hours in a library. But then there is a
special category of peripatetic pundits who have travelled to learn. The two
greatest examples modern India has seen are Dharmanand Kosambi and Rahul
Sankrityayan.
Kosambi
had told his astonishing story in Nivedan, his Marathi autobiography that has
recently been translated into English by Meera Kosambi, his granddaughter. He
left Goa as a young man in 1899, with little money but with a burning desire to
learn more about Buddhism, and to spread its message in Goa and Maharashtra. He
was at the forefront of the Buddhist revival in India in the early 20th
century.
Kosambi’s
travels took him to places such as Pune, Gwalior, Varanasi, Nepal, Sri Lanka
and Myanmar. He learnt Hindi, Sanskrit, Pali and English on the way. With
barely a school education, he ended up teaching at Harvard University and the
Leningrad Academy of Sciences.
Kosambi eventually ended his life by starvation
in 1947, at M.K. Gandhi’s ashram in Wardha, Maharashtra. Gandhi had said that
his ashram had been sanctified by the presence of Kosambi.

Rahul Sankrityayan
Sankrityayan,
born Kedarnath Pandey, left his home in Azamgarh, Uttar Pradesh, in 1910, with
little more than a primary school education. His travels took him to places
such as Varanasi, Ladakh, Nepal, Ceylon, Tibet, Japan and Korea.
He visited the
erstwhile Soviet Union twice, and, like Kosambi, taught for some time at
Leningrad. Besides his native Hindi, he gained mastery over several other
languages such as Sanskrit, Pali, Urdu, Tibetan, Persian, French and Russian.
His
political journey was fascinating as well. Sankrityayan began as a Vaishnav
monk, and then became an Arya Samajist, a Buddhist, a peasant leader and
finally, a Communist. He spent his final years in the hills near Mussoorie. His
literary masterpiece was Volga Se Ganga, a sweeping narrative of human progress
over two millennia, 6000 BC to 1922 AD, told in 19 stories. I have the Marathi
translation in my library, though the English translation by Victor Kiernan
has, unfortunately, been out of print for many years now.
Their
burning passion for knowledge united Kosambi and Sankrityayan; so did the
difficulties they endured at a time when travel often meant walking great
distances. The humane message of the Buddha also unites their unrelated lives.
But reading about their journeys and work tells us a lot else.
First,
they wrote in Indian languages and have perhaps paid a price for this by being
forgotten by the exclusively English-speaking elite of today.
Second,
these were two towering intellectuals who barely had a decent school education
but ended up teaching in prestigious academic institutions. I cannot but wonder
whether they would have been able to do so today, when universities have become
closed shops that shoo away anybody who does not have impressive certificates.
It is hard to believe that either Kosambi or Sankrityayan would have been
invited to teach at a contemporary Indian university.
Third,
they often travelled with barely enough money to eat, yet were supported along
the way by strangers who respected men of knowledge.
In her introduction to
Nivedan, Meera Kosambi points out: “So it was that a young and needy
Marathi-speaking Brahmin student—who was also intelligent, hard-working and
courteous—could find shelter and warm hospitality in many places far from home.
In a way this was an extension of the pan-Indian ethos of honouring holy men
and learning in general, without regard to caste and ethnic background; and it
was not only Maharashtrians who helped Dharmanand.”
Finally,
the journeys of these two men also show that there was an essential cultural
unity in India far before there was a formal political union. It is often
tempting to reach the glum conclusion that there is nothing in India but
warring groups; the very lives of Kosambi and Sankrityayan, perhaps more than
even the lives of more famous political leaders, reveal that there is a common
cultural heritage binding India together over the centuries.
Niranjan
Rajadhyaksha is executive editor, Mint—Live
Mint
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