Book review: Chanakya’s Chant

Chanakya’s Chant is Ashwin  Sanghi’s second novel after The Rozabal Line. It revolves around the life of a Pandit who emerges as a modern day Chanakya.

The style is similar to his debut, linking modern events to those that occurred two millennia ago. We have seen this style many times, flipping between two parallel events – only here, the parallel events are from long ago.

A Pandit from Kanpur with financial banking from a merchant and manpower from a Muslim strongman manages to unite the people of the city and assume political power. He makes his disciple becomes the most powerful woman in the country, just as Chanakya enthroned Chandragupta Maurya. As he develops the plot, Sanghi touches upon many issues in modern India – religious friction, corruption and the like. He is clearly inspired by real world events such as the tussle between the Ambani brothers, cash for votes, the fodder scam and the 2G scam(yes, that one too!). There are several instances where the media is cleverly used by devious politicians – #MediaMafia, anyone?

The description of Uttar Pradesh, I cannot comment upon for  I have confined myself to Tamil Nadu most of my life. However, the unhygienic conditions and the slum might very well fit into any large town in India. One could draw parallels between the two central characters and the BSP in Uttar Pradesh too. A minor quibble I see is that Sanghi has portrayed the Keralite as talking English with a funny accent. He cannot be further from the truth here – I know many Keralites who have a neutral accent; I haven’t seen a person speak with the accent he writes. There are several quotes that are wrongly attributed to Chanakya, but the Acknowledgements & References section makes this clear.

I do not have a large appetite for historical thrillers, and so I cannot compare this work with many others. It might seem at the outset that Sanghi is developing into a desi Dan Brown, given his penchant for history. I hope we can expect a deviation from this genre in his future work.

There is a lot of gore – and not all of it is blood. There are several descriptions of coitus and mutilations that are not really necessary – just page filling material. There is too much profanity on show too. The book could have been shorter by a fifth, and even then I doubt it’d have been a gripping read. However, it is a pleasing way to pass a lazy Saturday afternoon. It is quite entertaining and the history is not as wrong as in many other in its genre. I was expecting better, especially after The Rozabal Line, but Sanghi has not disappointed either.

Plus: A decent plot, Nice real-life parallels, Enjoyable

Minus: Too much narrative  (which sometimes gets boring), Stereotyping

Rating: 7/10

Final Word: Good to read on a  Sunday after lunch

Solution to Crossword No. 2

Solution to Crossword No. 2

The Kogul Phenomenon

“Kogul” is one of the hashtags that was pretty popular in India, specifically down South. Here’s the reason behind this hashtag frenzy. Tamil is a phonetically limited language.  There are 18 consonant sounds, however if you look closely there are only ten major consonant sounds. There are three ‘na’ sounds, two for ‘la’ and the sounds ‘zha’, ‘gna’ and ‘nga’ are rarely used. Even if they are used, very few people properly pronounce them. The majority of the Tamil speaking population cannot distinguish between most of these consonant groups. This might have been the rationale behind our state being named ‘Tamil Nadu’ instead of the phonetically proper ‘Thamizh Nadu’. (Even some politicians who extoll the virtues of Tamil do not say ‘zha’ properly.)

Coming back to Kogul, this is a play on the inability of many Tamil speakers to differentiate between the similar sounding consonant groups. Listen closer to conversations in a crowded shop on Ranganathan Street or in a crowded MTC bus, and you’ll know why. Kogul is a corruption of Gokul, however it is only one of the cases of discordant consonants.

G and K; P and B; D and T; G and H; J and Ch; P and F(Fants, anyone?) are among the frequently confused sounds, sometimes giving the word another meaning altogether. This phenomenon can be attributed in part to Tamil’s lack of phonetic equivalents to most common consonants in other languages.

A few samplings:

• Mound Roat
• Jeerial Bulp
• Probational Korier
• Gangrats
• Plight (flight)
• Kaambus
• Gidnab
• Log the door
• Ragul Travit
• Lady Kaka
• Eskaladder
• Plowervaas
• Darren Cough
• Pogemian Rasapodi (That’s Bohemian Rhapsody by Queen)
• “Do you know Gopal?” (He meant COBOL!)
• And how can we forget the famous “Ek gaam mein ek kisaan raghu thatha” in Indru Poi Naalai Vaa.

There’s a whole world of funny kogulized words out there. Search for #kogul on Twitter and join in the fun.

Update: Corrections made after @oligoplot’s comments on some inaccuracies. The real reason lies not in the language, but the speakers of the language. Of course, English is an alien language, but I do find it funny when people rip it apart with their own pronunciations.

Crossword No. 2

Crossword No. 2

CLUES:

ACROSS	DOWN
1 An annoying bug (12)	1  A King’s money noisily spent (11)
3 Changing triangles (8)	2 Do less hard work? (6)
5 The dark one in every two suits (9)	4 Mexican décor has its own faults (12)
8 Varnished oration (7)	6 Grasp your coffee (6)
9 They do stone their homes (10)	7 A beautiful woman can prevent it (7)
10 Teethless to talk (10)	9 Dog’s greed for a pie (8)
13 A South Indian thorny bush (8)	11  Wears a shirt that covers fully (11)
14 Across little water bodies (11)	12 A smelly dog? (9)
17 A French fish at the end? (3,2,6)	15  A hollow fellow with no concern (8)
20 A saint’s tree? (9)	16  A fishy fool (8)
23 Animals at the beginning of autumn? (9)	18  Clean up around the sticks (11)
26 Don’t lie about Hitler (9)	19 Not so fortunate (11)
27 Angry and tearful (8)	21 Measure with grace (11)
28 A quaky giant (12)	22 Complete a large meal (10)
	24 Get wet and cosy (7)
	25 Enjoys the sea breeze (7)