The Hindu Business Line : Footprints of a community

Faced with dwindling numbers the Chitrapur Saraswat community, which boasts of talent ranging from Guru Dutt to Nandan Nilekani, gets together to record its illustrious history.

Every evening on his way home, Mahesh Kalyanpur, a 41-year-old senior systems manager at Mumbai's Shamrao Vithal Cooperative Bank, spends a few hours at the Kanara Saraswat Association (KSA) office religiously sifting through correspondence, making telephone calls and making sense of a sea of disparate data. In faraway Bangalore, Lalit Rao, noted vocalist of the Agra gharana, and tabla maestro Gourang Kodikal, both past 60, are painstakingly chronicling the contribution of musicians like Chidanand Nagarkar, K.G. Ginde, Dinkar Kaikini, Devendra Murdeshwar, Nityanand Haldipur and H. Taranath.

Despite demanding professions, the Bangalore musicians and the Mumbai engineer exult on finding a rare audiocassette of renowned vocalist S.C.R. Bhat narrating his childhood experiences; or unearthing the works of painters like P.G. Sirur and Shantaram Badakere; or piecing together video footage of Gokulashtami bhajans and Rathotsav celebrations.

Going forward, their research will encompass Guru Dutt, Shyam Benegal, Bhaskar Chandawarkar, Kalpana Lajmi, Girish Karnad, Raghuveer Nadkarni, Nandan Nilekani and Prakash Padukone, to name a few. Other glowing names on their agenda are B.N. Rao, who chaired the committee that drafted the country's Constitution in 1950, and B. Rama Rao, former governor of the Reserve Bank of India.

What connects all these people is the fact that they hail from the community of Chitrapur Saraswat Brahmans. And many like Rao, Kodikal and Kalyanpur are working to archive information about their community. Foremost among their concerns is the fact that like the Parsis and Kutchi Dassa Oswal Jains, Chitrapur Saraswats — or Amchis as they are popularly known — are dwindling in number and faced with the spectre of extinction. But instead of meekly resigning to their fate, Amchis have embarked upon a valiant six-year Project Amchis (Archival Mission of Chitrapur Saraswats) to document, record and preserve for posterity the community's culture, heritage and variegated accomplishments.

Upstaged from prominence in the Kanara regime of Nagar in Mysore (1560-1768), the Smartha Saraswats were mocked for lacking a spiritual Guru. They faced marginalisation until a sanyasi at Kotitirtha became the community's Guru. Formed thus was the Chitrapur Saraswat sect owing allegiance to the Shri Chitrapur Math based at Shirali, Karnataka, which will celebrate its tri-centenary in 2008.

Over the years, Chitrapur Saraswats have evolved into one of the best-educated communities in the country with a near 99.43 per cent literacy rate, and an illustrious history of contribution to cooperative movements, judiciary, movies, theatre, arts, music, sports, IT and other disciplines. But a diminishing population now threatens to consign it all to history.

Although the number of Chitrapur Saraswats stands at 22,498 according to KSA's 2001 census, up 7 per cent from 20,932 in 1971, the disconcerting reality is that the 0-19 age group, its veritable future, has shrunk from 33 per cent to an alarming low of 18 per cent and the 20-44 age group has also gone down from 38 per cent to 34 per cent. The greying, 45-plus age group, has climbed from 29 per cent to a whopping 48 per cent. "This trend indicates that the community will vanish in the years to come," fears Kalyanpur, coordinator, Project Amchis.

Interestingly, women outnumber men in the community (11,385: 11,113) with a sex ratio of 1025 that is among the best in the world. "This community is progressive in thought and behaviour," reasons Sadhana Kamat, writer and former professor. "Girls aren't discriminated against in nurture, education or employment incentives. There's no dowry problem and women enjoy equal status with men."

But the problem stems from a sharp fall in the birth rate, a drop in sex ratios in the key marriageable and childbearing age groups, and a sharp surge in the proportion of single males and females aged 36 and above, hinting at late marriages. The single-child or no-child norm has resulted in a family size of three or less across 39.46 per cent of the community. The growing number of nuclear families has made it stressful to rear children, and spawned stress ailments due to constricted support systems. While children are increasingly distanced from community festivals and celebrations, a sizeable section that stays in the US, UK, Australia and West Asia (practically every second or third family has children abroad) can't speak the mother tongue Konkani.

Apart from instilling community pride in the youth and driving home the need for at least two children per family to sustain the population, Project Amchis aims to record in words, sounds and images the community's contribution, its language, mythology, deities, rituals, marital patterns, genealogy, sartorial and culinary traditions, careers, and much more of their physical, spiritual and ideological existence.

A critical part of the exercise would be recording the oral history on migration, lifestyle modifications and etymological evolution. Since Konkani doesn't have a script, there are plans to compile a Konkani thesaurus, lullabies, proverbs, spoonerism, songs, poetry and fiction using Devnagari and Roman scripts in interactive audio-visual formats. UNESCO too has evinced interest in the project.

A beginning has been made with a souvenir on the contribution of over 400 Chitrapur Saraswats in the services. Executed by Lt Gen Prakash Gokarn and released in October 2004, this souvenir is being followed up with others about the community's accomplishments in medical and paramedical areas, music and dance, and banking and finance. "We will simultaneously publish a directory as a database of people from those fields," says Kalyanpur.

Amidst mounting geriatric concerns, KSA has tied up with the Jaslok and Santacruz General Hospitals in Mumbai to provide quicker, cheaper medical services to the community elders and similar arrangements are nearing finalisation in Pune and Bangalore. A tie-up with an insurance company has enabled community members to avail of Mediclaim benefits at a concessional premium. Also in the offing is a senior citizens' recreational centre in Talmakiwadi, Mumbai's oldest Amchis ghetto. As of now, Kalyanpur sees funds as the only major hurdle. "Ours isn't a business community. Most of us are in white-collar jobs with limited surplus funds to donate."

The Chitrapur Math has played a pivotal role in binding the community together under the guidance of the present Mathadhipathi Shrimat Sadyojat Shankarashram Swamiji. "Three centuries ago, the community promised the Guru that it would run the Math," says Dr Prakash Mavinkurve, chairman of the Math's publication committee. "This is done by way of the Vantiga, a token subscription that takes care of the Math rituals and administration while instilling a sense of duty among the members." Myriad initiatives such as Vedic, Sanskrit and regular schools, youth camps, old-age homes and water projects have helped the Math connect with the people and elicit their involvement.

So how does the community view its future? To Sadhana, the future appears bright. "Although a gradual extinction may appear inevitable with falling birth rate, spectacular scientific progress has made the distant future completely unpredictable. We need to concentrate on the present and the immediate future," she avers.

"We don't see any `extinction' in terms of a loss of identity," says Dr Mavinkurve, adding that smaller, educated and liberal families living in a modern society have made cross-community, inter-caste marriages more of a rule than an exception. "However," he adds, "the educated and broad outlook of the spiritual leadership, which accepts outsiders marrying into the community, will slow down this `numeric' extinction."

Shailaja Ganguly, author and former deputy editor of Femina, is a case in point. Married to a Bengali, she had lost touch with the Math until a chance meeting with the Swamiji left both her and husband Pradeep Ganguly yearning to get into the Math's fold. They actively participate in the Math's activities. "It's a very intellectual, sober and accepting community," says Ganguly, a consultant with a French oil company. He is now one of many wishing Project Amchis all the success!

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