Is There An Indian Way of Thinking? by A.K. Ramanujan - Part 2 - Summary and Analysis

 Ramanujan’s exhaustive yet comprehensive essay, “Is There An Indian Way of Thinking” is a remarkable commentary on what makes India’s position in the overwhelming emergence of modernity so unique and incomparable.

                       In the second part of the essay, Ramanujan explores the inconsistency between tradition and modernity by providing examples from his personal life. He gives an example of his father who was traditional and modern at the same time. To back his argument, Ramanujan presents several instances where his father perfectly managed to find a balance between tradition and modernity.

                      Consistency, according to Ramanujan means strict adherence to only one – in this case, it is either religion or science.

                      Then, Ramanujan begins telling the reader about his father and the inconsistencies that used to fascinate him. Ramanujan’s father was a south Indian Brahman and as a south Indian Brahman, he used to wear dhotis in traditional style. But, quite contradictorily, he also wore English jackets over his dhotis.

                     This amalgamation of the Indian and Western culture is apparent throughout the essays in various instances. In another instance, Ramanujan narrates that his father wore tartan-patterned socks and leather shoes when he went to go to the university but he removed them before entering the inner quarters of the house.

                      Here, we see the perfect assimilation of two different sets of values and ways of life. On the one hand, Ramanujan’s father is wearing leather shoes which is clearly a product of European influence but we also see the same man remove his shoes when he is entering into the inner part of the house. Because many Hindu communities prohibit (or avoid) wearing shoes inside the house.

                      Similarly, Ramanujan adds that his father was a mathematician, astronomer, and also a Sanskrit scholar and expert astrologer. Theoretically, all these professions are quite contradictory to each other and yet his father was excellent in each of these fields. Ramanujan narrates that on one hand American and English mathematicians used to visit his father and on the other, local pundits and astrologers also visited him.

 

                     Ramanujan further adds how his father used to read Bhagavad Gita religiously every morning after taking a bath and he would also talk about Russell and Ingersoll with the same amount of passion. Here, Bhagavad Gita is of course a religious text and Russell and Ingersoll are the men of science, logic, and philosophy. This unusual combination was a mystery for Ramanujan which always fascinated him. He could not figure out such an inconsistency. But, to his surprise, his father appeared to neither think nor care about any sort of consistency.