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SADEHA 20.m4a

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Collection: Part 1 · VIDEHA MITHILA MAITHILI DISCUSSION CRITICISM SERIES PART 1
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Detected language: en (0.998237)
Duration: 43:25
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0:00–0:30यूआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआ�
0:30–0:32We want our problems to be easily categorized.
0:32–0:33We really do.
0:33–0:38But then, then you step out of the hospital and into the world of culture and identity
0:38–0:42and sociology, and suddenly that X-ray machine is completely malfunctioning.
0:42–0:44Oh, totally.
0:44–0:45The image is just a blur.
0:45–0:46Right.
0:46–0:50The landscape we're looking at today isn't medical, obviously, but the diagnostic muddy
0:50–0:52waters are exactly the same.
0:52–0:56We're looking at an ancient culture trying desperately to diagnose its own modern
0:56–0:59identity, and there are absolutely no clean breaks to be found.
0:59–1:02is when a deeply rooted centuries old culture
1:02–1:06collides head on with the hyper fast,
1:06–1:09relentless machinery of the digital age,
1:09–1:12it doesn't just fracture, it mutates.
1:12–1:13Mutates, yeah.
1:13–1:15It quits these bizarre new fusions.
1:15–1:16It's incredibly messy.
1:16–1:17I mean, you're essentially watching
1:17–1:20a living, breathing organism trying to adapt
1:20–1:22to an alien environment in real time.
1:22–1:25And that is exactly the collision we're exploring today.
1:25–1:27So welcome to the deep dive.
1:27–1:31I want you, listening right now, to picture something with me.
1:31–1:34Imagine an incredibly rich linguistic and cultural
1:34–1:36tradition known as Mathili.
1:36–1:38It's rooted in the Mathila region,
1:38–1:41which is this fascinating geographic and cultural space
1:41–1:44that spans across parts of India and Nepal.
1:44–1:47Yeah, and we're talking about a heritage built on epic poetry,
1:47–1:50profound philosophy, and these intricate folk traditions
1:50–1:52that have literally been passed down orally
1:52–1:54and on palm leaf manuscripts for centuries.
1:54–1:56Yes, centuries of history.
1:56–1:59Now imagine taking all of that ancient heavy cultural weight
1:59–2:02and slamming right into the dial-up internet era
2:02–2:03of the early 2000s.
2:03–2:06It's just a stunning visual contrast.
2:06–2:09You have the rhythm of rural agrarian life
2:09–2:12and ancient scriptures suddenly being digitized
2:12–2:14into like HTML coding and MP3 files.
2:14–2:18It's an evolutionary leap happening in a fraction
2:18–2:20of the time it normally takes a culture to shift.
2:20–2:20Precisely.
2:20–2:23And out of that specific chaotic collision,
2:23–2:25an internet archive was actually born
2:25–2:27way back in the year 2000.
2:27–2:30It was a pioneering effort that eventually evolved
2:30–2:32into an e-journal called Videha.
2:32–2:36And today, we're diving deep into a massive stack
2:36–2:40of source material from an entire issue of this journal,
2:40–2:41Issue 20, specifically.
2:41–2:42And it is massive.
2:42–2:44It's a staggering, comprehensive compilation
2:44–2:48of methodically prose, poetry, cultural critique,
2:48–2:50and sociological analysis.
2:50–2:51It really is.
2:51–2:53So our mission for this deep dive
2:53–2:58to explore exactly how this culture navigates this messy transition into the modern world.
2:58–3:01We're going to examine how they grapple with the commercialization of their music,
3:01–3:05the remarkably dark and petty politics of their academic institutions,
3:05–3:09and some deeply unsettling societal hypocrisies that still exist today.
3:09–3:14But crucially, we're also going to look at how the absolute soul of their culture
3:14–3:20is preserved through these incredible subversive, almost secret folk traditions.
3:20–3:26Yeah, and the underlying current running through all of these different essays and reviews and diary entries in issue 20
3:26–3:30Is this constant churning battle between two specific forces?
3:30–3:32Okay, lay it out for us. So on one side
3:32–3:34You have what we can call scripture
3:34–3:38And i'm using that word in the broadest sense here to mean the rigid
3:39–3:45formalized official rules and hierarchies that society tries to impose right the official rule book exactly
3:45–3:48And on the other side, you have the folk reality.
3:48–3:54That's the fluid, messy, adaptive, and highly practical way that everyday people actually
3:54–3:56survive and live their lives on the ground.
3:56–3:58The tension between the ideal and the real.
3:58–4:01And I want to say to you listening, whether you're a student of cultural anthropology
4:01–4:05and musicology nerd, or just someone who is insanely curious about how ancient human
4:05–4:09traditions survived the digital meat grinder, this collection of essays is an absolute
4:09–4:10goldmine.
4:10–4:11Oh, absolutely.
4:11–4:17It serves as a mirror reflecting the exact same cultural growing pains that happen everywhere,
4:17–4:21just viewed through a very specific vivid lens.
4:21–4:22So let's unpack this.
4:22–4:26The early pages of the journal are heavily dominated by the digital frontier of Mussolini
4:26–4:27music.
4:27–4:32We get this sweeping look at the commercialization and the frantic attempt at preservation
4:32–4:33in this new era.
4:33–4:37Music is almost always the canary in the coal mine for broader cultural shifts, you
4:37–4:38know?
4:38–4:39Mm-hmm, always.
4:39–4:42material, there's a highly detailed breakdown provided by
4:42–4:45Gagendra Thakur. He documents the entire landscape of
4:45–4:48Mothilli CD and DVD albums hitting the market at that
4:48–4:52specific time. Right. The actual physical media. Yeah. He
4:52–4:54lists the artists, the specific albums and the
4:54–4:57recording companies names like Ganga Cassettes and the
4:57–5:00T series that were mass producing this content. But the
5:00–5:03very first thing that Kour notes, which acts as a
5:03–5:05glaring red flag for the entire culture is the
5:05–5:09absolute lack of children's albums. Yeah. I remember
5:09–5:13that he explicitly points out that there is a total void, which is wild because this is a region
5:13–5:19with an incredibly rich centuries-old tradition of folk songs, lullabies, and communal music
5:19–5:26meant to be sung at home. Yet when it comes to producing modern physical media, the CDs and DVDs
5:26–5:31that people are actually buying and putting into their players, there is literally nothing for the
5:31–5:37youth. And we really have to pause here because the implications of that are massive. I mean,
5:37–5:42what happens to a language to a distinct cultural identity when its children are not given media
5:42–5:47in their native tongue? They just don't engage with it. Exactly. If the entire digital landscape,
5:47–5:53every CD in the local shop, every DVD, every early digital download is entirely dominated by adult
5:53–5:58themes, commercial pop, or high-level religious chants, the children are implicitly absorbing
5:58–6:02a very dangerous lesson. They're being taught that their native language is a historical
6:02–6:06artifact. Yes, a historical artifact meant only for adults, not a living, breathing,
6:06–6:11playground for them to explore. I mean, Taghurt does mention a few plays and small educational
6:11–6:15initiatives, but the commercial music industry, the entity with the actual reach and power,
6:15–6:20has completely abandoned the youth. Which feels like cultural self-sabotage, honestly.
6:20–6:25And that self-sabotaging behavior bleeds directly into Dinesh Yadav's essay,
6:25–6:30which focuses specifically on the state of Maitrely music in the Nepal region.
6:30–6:35Yeah, that essay is intense. It really is. The sources paint a picture of a geographic area
6:35–6:40that is practically dripping with musical heritage, but the actual industry is suffocating. It's
6:40–6:47being choked by hypercommercialization, intense nepotism, and what Yadav literally describes as
6:47–6:53a syndicate mentality. And the term syndicate is used very deliberately there. The essay
6:53–6:59reveals that a very small tightly knit handful of powerful individuals have basically monopolized
6:59–7:04the entire infrastructure. Wow. Yeah, they control the radio airwaves, they control the distribution,
7:04–7:09and they control the regional awards, it's the ultimate gatekeeping mechanism. They only promote
7:09–7:14their own people, their own preferred styles, and they completely freeze out new authentic talent.
7:14–7:17And you have to remember the context of the market here, right? Because the regional market is
7:17–7:22relatively small compared to massive national industries. If you get blocked by the syndicate,
7:22–7:27you have nowhere else to go. You're just done. Exactly. You can't just bypass them and upload
7:27–7:33to a million followers back then. Local radio and these specific cultural awards dictate an artist's
7:33–7:38entire livelihood. And the text gives this wildly illustrative almost cinematic example
7:38–7:44of this corruption playing out in real time with the Vigipati awards in Nepal. Oh, I love this part.
7:44–7:50Set the stage for us. Okay, so for context, Vigipati is the legendary cultural icon and poet of
7:50–7:57Missala. His name carries immense sacred weight. So you have this award, a million rupee award,
7:57–8:02which is a life-changing amount of money for a regional artist. Right, huge money.
8:02–8:05It was a sensibly meant to honor the greatest singers in the culture.
8:05–8:12But due to sheer unabashed cronyism, the syndicate decided to give this massive singing award to a translator.
8:12–8:13A translator, not a singer.
8:13–8:17Exactly. A decision that naturally caused an absolute uproar in the community.
8:18–8:22The text highlights the reaction of a legendary Mathili singer named Muralidhar.
8:22–8:27The journal describes Muralidhar as a pioneer, someone whose raw contribution to Methili film,
8:27–8:30music and culture is virtually unmatched.
8:30–8:31And how did he react?
8:31–8:35When this award was announced, Mjodlidhar essentially staged a one-man rebellion.
8:36–8:42He boldly and publicly rejected this million rupee award in protest of the corruption
8:42–8:46and the blatant disrespect shown to the actual working musicians.
8:46–8:49Wait, he was offered the award alongside the translator or later?
8:49–8:54He rejected the entire premise and structure of the awards once the corruption became clear.
8:54–9:00He didn't just quietly decline either. He explicitly called out the people running the
9:00–9:02the cultural scene, referring to them as not warlords.
9:02–9:05Which is a cultural shorthand for famous con men, right?
9:05–9:06Yes, exactly.
9:06–9:07A million rupees.
9:07–9:12To look at that kind of money in a market where artists are literally struggling to survive
9:12–9:16and rejected on pure principle just to defend the integrity of the art form, that tells
9:16–9:21you exactly how deep the rock goes, but also how incredibly passionate the true artists
9:21–9:22are.
9:22–9:23Absolutely.
9:23–9:25But it makes me wonder, you know, why is this cannibalization happening?
9:25–9:30they have this rich culture, why form a syndicate that actively crushes it?
9:30–9:34Well, it's a phenomenon we see globally when a regional or indigenous art form
9:34–9:38tries to rapidly monetize within a modern capitalist framework.
9:38–9:39The money changes things.
9:39–9:40It always does.
9:40–9:44As soon as regional music tries to transition from a communal folk
9:44–9:48practice into a product to be bought and sold, it fell prey to corporate
9:48–9:51gatekeepers who only care about margins, not heritage.
9:51–9:58Furthermore, Yadav's essay points out a massive looming identity crisis happening at the exact same time.
9:58–10:05There is a heavy, overwhelming influence of Bollywood and Boche-Perry styles bleeding across the borders.
10:05–10:07Okay, tell us about the Boche-Perry influence.
10:07–10:16The Boche-Perry music, for context, is a neighboring regional style known for being very high energy, very commercial, and often heavily synthesized.
10:16–10:17Catchy club music, kind of stuff.
10:17–10:18Right.
10:18–10:23new Mathili artists aren't just fighting a syndicate of old gatekeepers, they're fighting
10:23–10:29an identity crisis. They're being explicitly told by the market that their authentic, nuanced
10:29–10:33Mathili flavor doesn't sell. They're told they need to dilute their music, pump up the
10:33–10:39tempo and sound like a generic Bollywood or Bhojpuri knockoff just to get a minute
10:39–10:40of airplay.
10:40–10:41Wait, hold on. I want to push back on this a little bit.
10:41–10:42Go for it.
10:42–10:46Because we're using words like diluting in knockoffs. But if you're a local musician
10:46–10:50in Nepal and you're trying to put food on the table for your family, isn't this just basic
10:50–10:51survival?
10:51–10:52I see what you're saying.
10:52–10:56Like, you don't have the budget to hire a 20-piece live orchestra to record an authentic folk
10:56–10:58masterpiece.
10:58–11:02If the syndicate controls the traditional routes, and the only way to get hired for
11:02–11:07a local wedding or a radio spot is to turn out a catchy, synthesized tune that sounds
11:07–11:11like the latest Bollywood hit, aren't they just doing what they have to do?
11:11–11:16Is it fair for these essayists to critique them for just trying to survive?
11:16–11:21That is a highly valid counterargument, and it's the exact tension that defines the modern
11:21–11:22regional artists' dilemma.
11:22–11:23Yeah.
11:23–11:27Using cheap synthesizers and borrowing popular melodies is absolutely a survival tactic
11:27–11:29in an underfunded market.
11:29–11:34But the authors and the source material are deeply concerned with the long-term existential
11:34–11:37cost of that survival tactic.
11:37–11:42The question they pose is, if you survive by completely erasing the unique identifying
11:42–11:45markers of your culture, what exactly have you saved?
11:45–11:48Oof, yeah, that's a heavy question.
11:48–11:53You've saved the individual's bank account perhaps, but the culture itself goes bankrupt.
11:53–11:59This exact tension is explored in microscopic, uncompromising detail when the journal transitions
11:59–12:04from these broad industry overviews into reviewing specific modern albums.
12:04–12:05Oh, the reviews?
12:05–12:06Yes.
12:06–12:11Critiques are absolutely skating and they perfectly illustrate why this cheap survival method
12:11–12:13is destroying the art form.
12:13–12:18Let's get into those specific critiques because the music criticism in this journal is fascinating.
12:18–12:23The text features a review written by Pradeep Pushpa of an album called Sana Hia which
12:23–12:26is performed by the singer Kunjibihari Mishra.
12:26–12:28Now the reviewer doesn't just attack the whole thing blindly.
12:28–12:30He praises the vocals.
12:30–12:34He says Kunjibihari Mishra's singing is genuinely great and the lyrics are written
12:34–12:36in this intricate Ghazal style.
12:36–12:42And for anyone unfamiliar, a gazale is a poetic form with Arabic origins that is deeply romantic,
12:42–12:46often melancholic, and relies on very nuanced poetic delivery.
12:46–12:51Exactly. So Pushpa says the lyrics and the vocal performance are full of deep emotion.
12:51–12:56But the musical production behind those vocals, it gets absolutely shredded.
12:56–13:02Shredded is an understatement. Pushpa meticulously notes that the album relies almost entirely on
13:02–13:05cheap synthesizers and electronic dolac machines.
13:05–13:06The Dolac machine.
13:06–13:10Yeah, the Dolac is a traditional two-headed hand drum that provides the heartbeat to so
13:10–13:13much South Asian folk music.
13:13–13:17It relies on the human touch, the slight variations in strike, the dampening of the skin.
13:17–13:19It breathes with the song.
13:19–13:20Right.
13:20–13:24But here it's replaced by a sterile, pre-programmed loop.
13:24–13:28Pushbell points out the painful lack of any live acoustic instruments.
13:28–13:33There's no real tabla, the more complex tuned hand drums and no life flute.
13:33–13:35It's all just plastic sound.
13:35–13:38The reviewer highlights this massive jarring disconnect.
13:38–13:44You have a singer pouring his absolute soul into these complex romantic gazelle lyrics,
13:44–13:48but the backing track sounds like it was generated by someone holding down a demo button on a
13:48–13:49discount Casio keyboard.
13:49–13:50That's a perfect way to describe it.
13:50–13:54There's a fundamental disconnect between the organic soul of the lyrics and the sterile
13:54–13:56robotic nature of the production.
13:56–14:01It's the audio equivalent of serving a beautifully complex slow-cooked heirloom recipe on a
14:01–14:03flimsy styrofoam plate.
14:03–14:04Oh, I love that analogy.
14:04–14:08Yes, and the journal makes it clear that this isn't just an isolated incident with one
14:08–14:10unlucky album.
14:10–14:15The text pulls in another heavily critical essay by Manish Ka, who writes under the pen
14:15–14:16name Buabhai.
14:16–14:18Yeah, Buabhai.
14:18–14:23He laments that there is a severe, systemic lack of original music directors and composers
14:23–14:25in the current Mothili scene.
14:25–14:29Instead of having composers who actually sit down and write new music tailored to the
14:29–14:34specific phonetic nuances and cultural rhythms of the Mothili language, singers are just
14:34–14:40taking a massive shortcut. They're literally just taking pre-existing, highly popular Bollywood
14:40–14:45tunes, stripping up the Hindi, and cramming Mothili lyrics into the exact same melodic structure.
14:45–14:50It's a total Frankenstein approach to songwriting. It treats the native language
14:50–14:53not as an instrument with its own inherent musicality,
14:53–14:56but as cheap wallpaper to be pasted over someone else's house.
14:56–14:59That is so depressing. And Bolapai points at another technological
14:59–15:04crutch that is ruining the authenticity, the rampant overuse of what he calls detone, which
15:04–15:08is essentially early auto-tune or pitch correction software.
15:08–15:09Love the detone.
15:09–15:10Yeah.
15:10–15:13His argument is that the market is suddenly flooded with new singers who haven't put in
15:13–15:19the years of grueling vocal training or discipline required to sing classical or complex folk
15:19–15:21arrangements on key.
15:21–15:22Right.
15:22–15:23They just fix it in post.
15:23–15:24Exactly.
15:24–15:29Instead of training, they rely on detone to retroactively mask their vocal deficiencies.
15:29–15:33So if we look at the landscape they're describing, you have stolen Bollywood melodies, played
15:33–15:39on sheet synthetic drum loops, sung by untrained vocalists whose voices are being robotically
15:39–15:41corrected by a computer program.
15:41–15:43That is the grim reality of it.
15:43–15:46And the cultural consequences of this are devastating.
15:46–15:50If we connect this to the bigger picture, when music ceases to be a collaborative,
15:50–15:55artistic effort involving skilled composers, trained instrumentalists, and dedicated
15:55–15:56singers.
15:56–15:57And instead becomes what?
15:57–16:01It just becomes nothing more than a cheap fast vehicle for a single singer's personal fame.
16:01–16:04The entire cultural ecosystem starts to die.
16:04–16:05Think about the logistics.
16:05–16:10If production companies refuse to hire live tabla players because a drum machine is cheaper,
16:10–16:15the centuries-old tradition of tabla playing in that specific region withers.
16:15–16:17The masters have no students.
16:17–16:20Because the students know there's no money in learning the instrument.
16:20–16:24If you don't hire original composers, the unique musical language of the culture
16:24–16:26stops evolving.
16:26–16:28It gets frozen in time, replaced by imitation.
16:28–16:30And what about the audience?
16:30–16:31This is what I was thinking about
16:31–16:32while reading these reviews.
16:32–16:36What happens to a listener's ear over a decade of this?
16:36–16:37That's a great question.
16:37–16:38Right.
16:38–16:40If you, as a listener, are only ever exposed
16:40–16:42to synthesized, recycled tunes
16:42–16:45with mathematically perfect but emotionally flat,
16:45–16:48auto-tuned vocals, your cultural palette
16:48–16:49completely flattens.
16:49–16:50Oh, absolutely.
16:50–16:52You literally lose the neurological ability
16:52–16:55to appreciate the subtle acoustic nuances
16:55–16:59of a live wooden instrument, or the micro tones and slight,
16:59–17:02beautiful imperfections of a truly trained human voice.
17:02–17:06It's exactly like only ever eating hyper-processed fast food.
17:06–17:08Eventually, your taste buds are rewired,
17:08–17:10and you forget what a complex, home-cooked meal
17:10–17:11actually tastes like.
17:11–17:14That is a brilliant way to conceptualize it.
17:14–17:17The cultural palate is being actively flattened
17:17–17:20by the expediency and commercialization of the syndicate.
17:20–17:23However, the writers in Vedea aren't just complaining.
17:23–17:25No, they're definitely looking for answers.
17:25–17:27They aren't just wallowing in despair.
17:27–17:29They actively look for solutions
17:29–17:31and they highlight specific examples
17:31–17:33where the industry is getting it right.
17:33–17:36They recognize that what is desperately needed
17:36–17:38is a combination of two things,
17:38–17:41establishing foundational cultural standardization
17:41–17:43and proving that high budget,
17:43–17:46high effort, modern production is actually possible.
17:46–17:49Which brings us to the essay by Yogendra Pathak
17:49–17:51who goes by Vyogi.
17:51–17:52He brings up a highly specific
17:52–17:56but incredibly relatable problem regarding standardization.
17:56–17:57And it revolves around the most famous
17:57–18:01Mathili prayer song, Vidhipati's Jai Jai Paravi.
18:01–18:03Jai Jai Paravi is not just a song,
18:03–18:06it's a foundational cultural anthem in Mathila.
18:06–18:08It's a prayer meant to invoke blessings.
18:08–18:10And it's traditionally supposed to be sung
18:10–18:12at the beginning of major public events,
18:12–18:14cultural gatherings and ceremonies.
18:14–18:16Kind of like an invocation.
18:16–18:17Exactly.
18:17–18:19It's supposed to be the ultimate unifying moment
18:19–18:20for the community.
18:20–18:23But Viogi points out a deeply chaotic reality.
18:23–18:25Because the culture has never established
18:25–18:28a standardized official melody, tempo, or rhythm
18:28–18:30for this specific anthem.
18:30–18:33Every time it's performed at a public event,
18:33–18:35the hired singer treats it as an opportunity
18:35–18:38for personal ego-stroking.
18:38–18:40The text describes how these singers will get up on stage
18:40–18:42and stretch this simple prayer out
18:42–18:44into an endless performance.
18:44–18:48They add these incredibly complex classical vocal riffs,
18:48–18:50They jump octaves, they completely alter the tempo,
18:50–18:53slowing it down to a crawl and then speeding it up.
18:53–18:55And you have to look at the collateral damage
18:55–18:56of that choice.
18:56–18:57What happens to the audience?
18:57–18:58They just stand there.
18:58–18:58Right.
18:58–18:59The audience who knows the words
18:59–19:02and wants to participate absolutely cannot sing along.
19:02–19:04They are forced to transition from being active
19:04–19:07participants in a communal prayer
19:07–19:09into passive, silent spectators
19:09–19:11watching a vocal gymnastics routine.
19:11–19:13I was reading this and I immediately pictured
19:13–19:14being at a massive stadium.
19:14–19:17Imagine you're at the Super Bowl or the Olympics.
19:17–19:21The announcer asks everyone to rise for the national anthem.
19:21–19:24You stand up, put your hand over your heart,
19:24–19:26take a breath to sing the first line,
19:26–19:28and the singer on the field decides to launch
19:28–19:33into a 10 minute avant-garde jazz vocal improvisation.
19:33–19:34Oh, that would be agonizing.
19:34–19:35It would.
19:35–19:37They're hitting notes you didn't know existed,
19:37–19:40changing the time signature every five seconds.
19:40–19:41You would just be standing there awkwardly,
19:41–19:43shifting your weight, clutching your drink,
19:43–19:44wondering when it's gonna end.
19:44–19:46Yeah, you wouldn't feel unified at all.
19:46–19:49No, you wouldn't feel a swell of national pride.
19:49–19:52You'd feel alienated and slightly annoyed.
19:52–19:56Why hasn't a culture with such deep ancient roots
19:56–19:59established a baseline, singable melody
19:59–20:00for its most unifying song?
20:00–20:04That is the exact question Vyogi is screaming into the void.
20:04–20:07He argues passionately that the community must come
20:07–20:10together and create a standardized,
20:10–20:13simple, accessible tune for Jha Jha Paravi.
20:13–20:16Exactly like how a national anthem is structured.
20:16–20:23The priority of this specific song needs to be collective participation, not individual artistic ego.
20:23–20:29A standardized tune would allow an entire crowd of thousands to sing in a massive unified chorus.
20:29–20:34That act of communal singing is what fosters a sense of shared identity.
20:34–20:35It makes perfect sense.
20:35–20:45It's a powerful call for the scripture of the music, the formal agreed upon rules, to finally serve the folk, the everyday people, rather than just serving the elite performers on stage.
20:45–20:50But the text also goes out of its way to show that when the industry does organize itself,
20:50–20:56when it puts real budget, thought, and collaborative effort into production, the results are phenomenal.
20:56–20:58They aren't doomed to cheap synthesizers forever.
20:58–20:59Not at all.
20:59–21:03We see this vividly in the journal's review of a video album called Arapan.
21:03–21:08The review of Arapan, written by Cheresh, is presented almost as the antidote to the
21:08–21:11cheap synthesized music we just discussed.
21:11–21:15is a beautifully produced, high-budget DVD containing nine distinct songs.
21:15–21:17And it sounds like they really went all out.
21:17–21:20They did. And the production details matter here.
21:20–21:23It wasn't shot against a green screen in a cheap studio,
21:23–21:26it was filmed on location in the stunning hills of Kathmandu.
21:27–21:31Crucially, the producers utilized a professional Nepali film crew,
21:31–21:35intentionally blending the visual aesthetics and technical expertise of the hill cultures
21:35–21:39with the deeply rooted, Mephili musical traditions.
21:39–21:42It wasn't just a singer standing in front of a microphone.
21:42–21:47The review details how they use multiple camera angles, professional editing techniques, and
21:47–21:50actual narrative thought to tell a story visually while the music played.
21:50–21:51Right.
21:51–21:55The review even enthusiastically notes that the album features the first ever
21:55–21:56Mathili Rocky song.
21:56–21:57Yeah, that's huge.
21:57–22:03Rocky, or Rocksha Bontan, is the major festival celebrating the bond and duty between brothers
22:03–22:07and sisters. To have that specific cultural moment filmed in a highly relatable,
22:07–22:11cinematic high quality way is a massive milestone.
22:11–22:14Ari Pan serves as a crucial proof of concept.
22:14–22:16It proves that the Mathila music industry
22:16–22:19is not inherently doomed to low budget imitation.
22:19–22:22When there is genuine collaboration,
22:22–22:24cross-cultural respect with their Nepali neighbors,
22:24–22:26and a willingness to actually
22:26–22:28invest financial resources into the art,
22:28–22:30they can produce modern media that honors
22:30–22:32the ancient traditions while looking
22:32–22:34and sounding completely contemporary.
22:34–22:36It's a blueprint for the future.
22:36–22:37Exactly.
22:37–22:40RE-PIN represents modern production success.
22:40–22:42It shows the technical heights the industry can reach
22:42–22:43when it tries.
22:43–22:46But the sources are very clear.
22:46–22:49To truly understand the emotional peak of Missile music,
22:49–22:52to understand the absolute soul of it,
22:52–22:54we have to look away from the modern DVDs
22:54–22:55and look at the legend.
22:55–22:56The real masters.
22:56–22:56Right.
22:56–22:58The people who didn't just use technology,
22:58–23:00but who masterfully blended raw folk tradition
23:00–23:03with high-disciplined art.
23:03–23:04We need to talk about Shraddusina,
23:04–23:06and then we need to talk about the absolute
23:06–23:09infuriating tragedy of Professor Chen Deshore-Chah.
23:09–23:10Yeah.
23:10–23:13Sherida Sinha is a towering monumental figure
23:13–23:14in this culture.
23:14–23:17The journal features a glowing, deeply reverent review
23:17–23:21by Ira Malik of Sinha's album, Viva Geet,
23:21–23:24which translates directly to wedding songs.
23:24–23:27Now, to understand why this album is considered a masterpiece,
23:27–23:29you have to realize it's not just a collection
23:29–23:32of catchy tunes to play at a reception.
23:32–23:35It is a 16 track meticulously curated,
23:35–23:38psychological documentary of the human experience.
23:38–23:40The review highlights how this album
23:40–23:43literally walks the listener through the entire life cycle
23:43–23:46and the profound emotional roller coaster
23:46–23:48of a traditional Mothili wedding
23:48–23:50told entirely from the bride's perspective.
23:50–23:51It preserves everything in Amber.
23:51–23:53It captures the specific cultural etiquette,
23:53–23:55the inside jokes shared among the women,
23:55–23:57the playful teasing of the groom's guests
23:57–24:00and ultimately the deep gut-wrenching sorrow of the bidai,
24:00–24:03the moment the bride leaves her childhood home forever.
24:03–24:05And the genius of Sharda Sinha
24:05–24:07as described in the text, is that her voice
24:07–24:10literally carries the soil of Mithla.
24:10–24:13She doesn't need heavy synthesizers or detone
24:13–24:14to convey emotion.
24:14–24:17Her rigorous classical training is perfectly wedded
24:17–24:20to the raw, unpolished, guttural emotion
24:20–24:22of the folk tradition.
24:22–24:25When she sings, listeners aren't just hearing a song,
24:25–24:26they're being transported.
24:26–24:29They're reliving their own cultural memories,
24:29–24:33smelling the incense, feeling the humidity of the monsoon.
24:33–24:37It's the perfect elusive synthesis of high artistic skill
24:37–24:40and deep grounded folk reality.
24:40–24:42It sounds incredibly beautiful,
24:42–24:44but the journal doesn't let us sit in that beauty for long.
24:44–24:46It abruptly shifts gears,
24:46–24:49and the mood of the source material gets incredibly dark,
24:49–24:51highlighting the institutional rot
24:51–24:52that threatens these exact traditions.
24:52–24:54Yeah, this part is rough.
24:54–24:55We're introduced to a deeply moving
24:55–24:59and frankly enraging tribute to Professor Chandeshwar Jaa,
24:59–25:01written by Dr. Kailash Kumar Mishra.
25:01–25:05Professor Cha was an absolute giant in the field of folk music preservation.
25:05–25:07He wasn't an armchair academic.
25:07–25:08No, not at all.
25:08–25:13The text details how he didn't just sit in an air conditioned library analyzing texts.
25:13–25:16He physically traveled from village to village.
25:16–25:21He walked the dusty rural roads of Mithla for years sitting in courtyards and personally
25:21–25:25collected over 1500 authentic undocumented folk songs.
25:25–25:271500, that's a life's work.
25:27–25:32He was a singer, a meticulous researcher, and a walking breathing archive of a disappearing
25:32–25:33world.
25:33–25:36But his story is framed as a massive tragedy.
25:36–25:41Because despite his undeniable genius and his tireless work, he was tormented, obstructed,
25:41–25:44and ultimately hindered by his own employer.
25:44–25:49He worked at Lulliden Narayan-Mythala University, an institution explicitly named after the region
25:49–25:51and tasked with preserving its knowledge.
25:51–25:56Yet, the text explicitly states that Professor Ja was a victim of the most petty, jealous,
25:56–25:58academic politics imaginable.
25:58–25:59It's infuriating to read.
25:59–26:07His colleagues in the University Administration driven by fragile egos, professional jealousy, and sheer spite actively blocked his research grants.
26:07–26:12They ruined his projects, denied him resources, and basically made his daily life miserable.
26:12–26:20Dr. Mishra's tribute is filled with this palpable sorrow, because Professor Ha was uniquely, perhaps supernaturally gifted.
26:20–26:26gifted. He had this extraordinary psychological empathy that allowed him to sing from the emotional
26:26–26:31perspective of a woman. Wait, really? Explain that a bit more. Yeah, the text specifically
26:31–26:35mentions the type of morning song called the Prati. These are songs traditionally sung
26:35–26:40by women at the break of dawn, filled with specific female anxieties, devotions, and perspectives.
26:41–26:46Dr. Mishra notes that when Professor Ha sang a Prati, he didn't sound like a man doing an
26:46–26:47imitation of a woman.
26:47–26:48It wasn't a caricature.
26:48–26:49No, not at all.
26:49–26:54Through sheer empathy and deep cultural understanding, he completely blurred the lines between the
26:54–26:58male performer and the internal female psychological experience.
26:58–27:02He channeled the specific emotional resonance of the women of Mithila in a way that effortlessly
27:02–27:05bypassed all the rigid gender norms of the society.
27:05–27:09He possessed this transcendent empathy that allowed him to preserve the female voice
27:09–27:12in a deeply patriarchal society.
27:12–27:18And how did his institution, the university, reward him for this monumental cultural service?
27:18–27:19By suffocating him.
27:19–27:20By suffocating him.
27:20–27:26I have to ask you as the listener to think about how often we see this exact dynamic
27:26–27:29play out in our own lives.
27:29–27:33Institutions that are literally designed, funded, and mandated to protect, study, and elevate
27:33–27:39culture end up suffocating their absolute brightest stars because of middle management
27:39–27:40jealousy and fragile egos.
27:40–27:42It happens so often.
27:42–27:46It's exactly like a museum guard, entrusted with protecting the world's greatest paintings,
27:46–27:50locking the front doors and throwing away the key just so no one else can look at the
27:50–27:55art purely because the guard wants to feel like the most important person in the building.
27:55–28:01That's a devastating indictment of institutional failure, but it's completely accurate.
28:01–28:04It shows what happens when the scripture of academia, the bureaucracy, the official
28:04–28:08titles, the grant committees, the departmental hierarchies becomes more important than
28:08–28:13the folk reality of the actual living art being preserved.
28:13–28:15The culture just bleeds out on the floor.
28:15–28:20And Dr. Mishra makes it painfully clear that Professor Ja died without ever receiving the
28:20–28:25accolades, the national recognition, or the institutional support he so richly deserved
28:25–28:29entirely because of this systemic localized jealousy.
28:29–28:35And this theme, this deeply destructive power of fragile male egos, systemic injustice,
28:35–28:40institutional hypocrisy, the source material reveals that this is not just an isolated
28:40–28:43problem in the ivory towers of academia.
28:43–28:44No, it's everywhere.
28:44–28:49It's a dark, pervasive rot in the bedrock of the society itself, which leads us to what
28:49–28:54is, without a doubt, the most harrowing, difficult, and sociologically dense essay in this entire
28:54–28:55journal.
28:55–28:57It really is a profound shift in tone.
28:57–29:02I think a clear content warning is appropriate here as we are going to discuss systemic
29:02–29:04domestic abuse and societal cruelty.
29:04–29:05Definitely.
29:05–29:11The text features a deeply unsettling sociological piece analyzing a very specific tragic societal
29:11–29:14role in mythola, the peritacta.
29:14–29:15This translates to the abandoned wife.
29:15–29:20Now we need to be clear, this is not about divorce in the modern legal mediated sense.
29:20–29:22Right, there's no mediation here.
29:22–29:27This is about a deeply patriarchal rigid society that allows men to simply discard
29:27–29:33their wives, forcing these abandoned women to live a life that the author explicitly
29:33–29:35describes as being worse than widowhood.
29:35–29:37It is a brutal, unflinching read.
29:37–29:41The author argues that when a woman is widowed by the death of her husband, society at least
29:41–29:44provides a recognized script for her grief.
29:44–29:49There are official rituals, there's a recognized status, and while it's a highly restricted,
29:49–29:53often oppressive life, there is a baseline of communal sympathy.
29:53–29:57But the peridacta, the woman whose husband simply packs up and discards her while he's
29:57–30:04still alive, legally married but entirely absent, she carries an immense, crushing social stigma.
30:04–30:09The community views her with deep suspicion. She's invariably blamed for her own abandonment like,
30:09–30:13what did she do to make him leave? And she's treated as an absolute pariah.
30:13–30:17And the brilliance of this essay is that the author traces this modern cruelty
30:17–30:19all the way back to the culture's foundational myths.
30:19–30:21This is where it gets really dark.
30:21–30:25This is where the sociological critique becomes incredibly razor sharp.
30:25–30:31The essay meticulously unpacks the historical and mythological roots of this behavior.
30:31–30:36It brings up a Halyah, who in the epics was tricked and then turned to stone as a punishment,
30:36–30:41abandoned to the elements. It brings up Sita, the ultimate symbol of female devotion,
30:41–30:46who is famously abandoned in the forest by Rama despite proving her absolute purity through
30:46–30:52a trial by fire. And it brings up a historical figure named Farati. Farati was the wife of
30:52–30:58a revered ancient philosopher named Vachaspati. The text details how Vachaspati essentially
30:58–31:03used his wife's labor, care, and silent devotion for years just so he could have the peace and
31:03–31:07sustenance required to write his famous treatises. And then what does he do?
31:07–31:11The moment he finished his great work, he abandoned her. The author's core argument
31:11–31:16is that these aren't just old stories, harmless myths, or ancient history. They are structural
31:16–31:21blueprints. They're teaching tools. Yes. The modern patriarchal society uses these revered
31:21–31:28texts and stories to implicitly justify and normalize the modern exploitation and abandonment
31:28–31:29of women.
31:29–31:35The logic is, well, if the gods and the great philosophers did it, why can't a modern man?
31:35–31:39The essay is arguing that the scripture is actively knowingly weaponized against the
31:39–31:40folk.
31:40–31:44And to prove that this isn't just an abstract historical theory, the author provides these
31:44–31:48incredibly chilling, vivid, real-life anecdotes.
31:48–31:50Yeah, these anecdotes are tough to read.
31:50–31:55These stories prove that this cruelty is happening right now, today, among the so-called educated,
31:55–31:56progressive elite.
31:56–32:02The first anecdote the author provides involves a famous, wealthy, highly regarded modern literary
32:02–32:05man the community views him as an intellectual leader.
32:05–32:09This man deliberately goes out of his way to marry a traditional, uneducated girl from
32:09–32:11a rural village.
32:11–32:14Then when she's trapped in his home, he brutally abuses her, both physically and
32:14–32:18mentally, claiming she isn't modern or sophisticated enough to fit his elevated
32:18–32:19lifestyle.
32:19–32:22forces her out of his home entirely severing support,
32:22–32:24turning her into a perityakta.
32:24–32:27And what makes this anecdote so utterly insidious,
32:27–32:30so hypocritical, is that this exact same man
32:30–32:33then goes on to write award-winning progressive literature,
32:33–32:36championing women's rights and feminism.
32:36–32:37You've got to be kidding me.
32:37–32:39And his intellectual peers,
32:39–32:41the people who grant him these awards,
32:41–32:44cheer him on, fully knowing exactly
32:44–32:45what he did to his own wife.
32:45–32:47Wait, is this just the ultimate PR spin?
32:47–32:49Because looking at it from the outside,
32:49–32:52it feels like this man is using his status,
32:52–32:55his literary awards, his progressive vocabulary,
32:55–32:57his wealth as an impenetrable shield.
32:57–32:58Exactly.
32:58–33:00It gets to write feminist poetry on stage,
33:00–33:02get applauded by high society as a visionary,
33:02–33:05and then go home and act like an absolute tyrant
33:05–33:06behind closed doors.
33:06–33:07And the society allows it
33:07–33:09because he says the right words in public.
33:09–33:10It's disgusting.
33:10–33:12I wanna be very clear to the listener here.
33:12–33:14We are looking at these sociological critiques
33:14–33:16exactly as the author laid them out.
33:16–33:18We are impartially reporting the text
33:18–33:21to understand how this specific society operates.
33:21–33:23But the author is shining a glaring,
33:23–33:25uncompromising spotlight on these individuals
33:25–33:28and the hypocrisy of the society that enables them.
33:28–33:31And the text provides a second anecdote
33:31–33:32that is just as cold,
33:32–33:34proving it isn't just the literary elite,
33:34–33:36it spans the corporate world as well.
33:36–33:38The author describes the corporate manager,
33:38–33:40a man of means and modern education
33:40–33:43who marries an innocent, simple woman.
33:43–33:45After merely seven months of marriage,
33:45–33:47he abandons her entirely.
33:47–33:48The reason.
33:48–33:50Simply so he can turn around
33:50–33:51and marry her slightly younger,
33:51–33:53supposedly more attractive sister.
33:53–33:55That is just so cruel.
33:55–33:57And the most damning, horrific part of this story
33:57–33:59isn't just the man's actions,
33:59–34:01it's the societal reaction.
34:01–34:03The text emphasizes that the man's family,
34:03–34:05his parents and the broader society around him
34:05–34:07fully support his cruelty.
34:07–34:08They facilitate the second marriage.
34:08–34:09They help him do it.
34:09–34:10Yeah.
34:10–34:12The abandoned wife is left with absolutely nothing.
34:12–34:14Her reputation and life effectively
34:14–34:19ruined by societal dictates, while the man suffers zero social or professional consequences.
34:19–34:22The hypocrisy is absolutely staggering.
34:22–34:26The very men who write the rules, who define the scripture of modern success, who hold
34:26–34:31the power in academia, literature, and corporate life, are the ones perpetrating the most
34:31–34:37archaic, devastating forms of abuse, and they use the ancient myths as their permission
34:37–34:38slip.
34:38–34:42Which brings us to a vital, existential crossroads for the culture.
34:42–34:47I mean, if the official upper-crest society, with all its wealth, its literary awards,
34:47–34:53its universities, and its foundational scriptures, is this hypocritical and this inherently dangerous
34:53–34:56for women, how do women actually survive?
34:56–34:57That's the real question.
34:57–35:01If the rulebook is designed to crush them, where do they find actual practical lived
35:01–35:06wisdom to navigate a world that is so heavily stacked against them?
35:06–35:09That is the perfect pivot because the journal doesn't just outline the oppression, it
35:09–35:11actually answers that exact question.
35:11–35:12It does.
35:12–35:17The answer is found in the final major theme we're exploring today, subversive folk wisdom.
35:17–35:22The text provides this deeply fascinating, almost secretive cultural analysis of the
35:22–35:23Matthu Shravani Festival.
35:23–35:28What's fascinating here is that the Matthu Shravani Festival is a highly specific cultural
35:28–35:33event that takes place over 15 days during the heavy monsoon season.
35:33–35:37It involves daily rituals and it's primarily observed by newlywed brides.
35:37–35:39Okay, so just the new brides.
35:39–35:48The core activity of this festival involves older married women gathering the young brides together to tell them a series of traditional oral stories
35:48–35:53But the author of this essay points out something extraordinary about the content of these specific stories
35:53–35:55They focus heavily on the goddess Gaudi
35:56–35:58But this is not the perfect submissive
35:58–36:03Sanitized eternally devoted Gaudi that you find in the official patriarchal scripture
36:03–36:09Not at all. The stories told during Matusharani depict the goddess Gowri as completely flawed,
36:09–36:12incredibly fiery, and fiercely human.
36:12–36:13Yeah, very human.
36:13–36:18The essay outlines how, in these specific folk tales, Gowri is shown actively learning
36:18–36:23witchcraft and dark magic out of sheer jealousy. She is depicted trespassing and stealing
36:23–36:26eggplants from a farmer's field because she is hungry and wants them.
36:26–36:28I love that detail.
36:28–36:33Right. And she is shown playfully, boldly flirting with a lowly boatman who, in
36:33–36:37the twist of the story actually turns out to be her husband, Lord Shiva, in disguise,
36:37–36:39testing her fidelity.
36:39–36:43The brilliance of this oral tradition requires a deep dive into human psychology.
36:43–36:48I mean, why would these older, respected women intentionally spend 15 days telling
36:48–36:52newlywed bride's stories about a revered, divine goddess behaving badly?
36:52–36:56Why tell them stories of jealousy, theft, and flirting?
36:56–37:01The essay argues that this is a highly calculated underground syllabus of subversive feminist
37:01–37:02wisdom.
37:02–37:06The older women know exactly what the scriptural rules of the outside society demand.
37:06–37:13They know society demands that a wife be absolutely perfect, utterly submissive, silently self-sacrificing,
37:13–37:14and devoid of personal desire.
37:14–37:16And they know how dangerous that is.
37:16–37:20And they know, as we saw with the Parachakta essay, that this is an impossible fatal standard
37:20–37:24that men will inevitably weaponize against women to discard them.
37:24–37:31So by portraying the goddess Gaudi, the ultimate divine feminine, as flawed as someone
37:31–37:36who makes mistakes, gets jealous, breaks the rules, gets angry and has independent desires,
37:36–37:41these older women are essentially providing a masterclass in practical, real-world marital
37:41–37:47survival. They're looking at these terrified young brides and saying, look, even the divine
37:47–37:51mother of the universe isn't perfect. She gets jealous. She makes mistakes. Do not
37:51–37:56let this society or your new husband crush you with impossible standards of perfection.
37:56–38:01Precisely. It is about emotional survival. Take the story of Galerie flirting with
38:01–38:07boatman. When it's revealed that the boatman is Shiva testing her, it leads to a complex confrontation
38:07–38:12in a dialogue between husband and wife. The lesson hidden in that story isn't about blind obedience,
38:12–38:16it's about navigating boundaries, dealing with marital temptation, and understanding that trust
38:16–38:22in a marriage is a shared, constantly negotiated responsibility. It is not a scriptural mandate
38:22–38:28of blind, one-sided female obedience. This folk wisdom deeply acknowledges human psychology.
38:28–38:34It's realistic, it's forgiving, and it's deeply aware of the messy nature of human relationships,
38:34–38:41which stands in stark, subversive contrast to the rigid, punitive rules of the official patriarchal
38:41–38:47scripture. It's literally a secret underground syllabus for surviving a patriarchal marriage
38:47–38:53passed down orally from generation to generation of women, completely hidden under the unassailable
38:53–38:57guise of a pious religious festival. The men think the women are just praying,
38:57–39:01But the women are actually teaching each other how to survive the men.
39:01–39:02It's incredibly empowering.
39:02–39:03It is incredibly empowering.
39:03–39:06But there's a massive caveat here that we have to address.
39:06–39:11The author raises a critical heart-breaking question at the very end of this piece.
39:11–39:15If this Madhu Shravani festival is so profoundly empowering and its lessons are so deeply
39:15–39:21realistic and vital for a woman's psychological survival, why hasn't it spread?
39:21–39:22Yeah, that's the tragedy.
39:22–39:26The text notes that this festival has remained strictly isolated to the Brahmin cast,
39:26–39:32the upper caste in mythola. Why wouldn't these women share this incredible tool for female
39:32–39:38empowerment with all communities across all castes? That is the tragic paradox that the author leaves
39:38–39:43us to wrestle with. It perfectly illustrates how intersecting systems of oppression function in
39:43–39:49reality. The Brahmin women have brilliantly carved out a safe space to subvert the patriarchy
39:49–39:54through these folktales. But the deeply ingrained rigid rules of the caste system,
39:54–39:59the ultimate scripture of social hierarchy. Prevent them from sharing that vital survival
39:59–40:06knowledge with women of other lower castes. Class and caste barriers act as impenetrable walls,
40:06–40:10containing the wisdom and preventing a broader unified cultural evolution.
40:10–40:12So they subvert one system but uphold another.
40:12–40:17They subvert the patriarchy but they uphold the caste system. It proves that even in moments of
40:17–40:20brilliant subversion, the scripture still finds a way to divide the folk.
40:20–40:24Wow. Okay, let's take a deep breath and zoom out because we have covered an incredible
40:24–40:28amount of ground in this deep dive into issue 20 of the Vedea e-journal.
40:28–40:28We really have.
40:28–40:31We started by looking at the messy digital struggles of
40:31–40:35Mathiliam musicians in Nepal, fighting off monopoly syndicates,
40:35–40:38and the desperate allure of cheap synthesizers just to survive.
40:39–40:44We looked at the tragic reality of academic jealousy suffocating brilliant empathetic minds
40:44–40:46like Professor Sandeshwar Haar.
40:46–40:50We faced the harrowing hypocritical reality of the abandoned wives,
40:50–40:55the Parisiachta, and the modern men who use ancient myth to justify their cruelty.
40:55–41:01And finally, we uncovered the secret subversive feminist wisdom hidden in the monsoon festival
41:01–41:05stories of Mother Trevonni and the caste barriers that keep that wisdom locked away.
41:05–41:08When you synthesize all of these incredibly diverse texts,
41:08–41:12it connects directly to everyone listening right now, regardless of your specific cultural
41:12–41:17background or where you live. Hell. Because we all navigate this exact same tension
41:17–41:22every single day of our lives. We all live caught between the scripture of our lives,
41:22–41:26the official rules, the societal expectations, the corporate ladders, the religious dogmas,
41:26–41:31the Instagram perfect standards we are told to follow, and the folk reality of how we actually
41:31–41:36survive, how we adapt, how we subvert those impossible rules, and how we manage to find joy
41:36–41:42and identity in the messy reality of being human. That is beautifully said. And as we wrap up this
41:42–41:48deep dive, I want to leave you, the listener, with one final provocative thought to mull over.
41:48–41:52It's inspired by a very quiet set of diary entries found in the text, written by a man named Ravi
41:52–41:57Bhushan Pathak. Oh, Pathak's diary, yes. In his diary, Pathak writes about a psychological trap
41:57–42:03that I think almost all of us fall into. He notes how we constantly, unconsciously project our own
42:03–42:08regional, cultural, and personal insecurities onto our local artists. He writes that we treat
42:08–42:12our musicians, our writers, our local heroes, exactly like sports teams.
42:12–42:14Yeah, we attach our ego to them.
42:14–42:21If a local Mathili singer wins on a national stage, we feel like our region wins, like we win.
42:21–42:26If they lose or if they're ignored, we take it as a personal insult. We feel like we lose.
42:26–42:31And it makes you wonder when you are listening to a local artist, or when you're aggressively
42:31–42:37championing a hometown hero in any field, are you really truly appreciating their art for the
42:37–42:41vulnerable thing that it is? Or are you just desperately looking for a validation of your
42:41–42:46own identity? Are we actually supporting the artist or are we just using them as a proxy
42:46–42:51to prove our own worth to the rest of the world? It's a profound question about the nature of
42:51–42:56fandom and cultural pride. Exactly! It's something to seriously think about the next time you find
42:56–43:01yourself blindly rooting for the hometown kid. Remember that broken x-ray machine we talked
43:01–43:06about at the very beginning of this conversation? Society isn't binary. Culture is not a clean
43:06–43:10break. The next time you look at your own culture, your own traditions, or your own hometown,
43:10–43:14don't just look for the clean, white, easily diagnosable lines. Look for the mud. Look for the
43:14–43:19mud. Look for the messy fusions, the hypocrisies, the cheap synthesizers trying to survive,
43:19–43:24and the secret subversive wisdom hiding in plain sight. Thanks for joining us on this deep dive.

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यूआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआआ� We want our problems to be easily categorized. We really do. But then, then you step out of the hospital and into the world of culture and identity and sociology, and suddenly that X-ray machine is completely malfunctioning. Oh, totally. The image is just a blur. Right. The landscape we're looking at today isn't medical, obviously, but the diagnostic muddy waters are exactly the same. We're looking at an ancient culture trying desperately to diagnose its own modern identity, and there are absolutely no clean breaks to be found. is when a deeply rooted centuries old culture collides head on with the hyper fast, relentless machinery of the digital age, it doesn't just fracture, it mutates. Mutates, yeah. It quits these bizarre new fusions. It's incredibly messy. I mean, you're essentially watching a living, breathing organism trying to adapt to an alien environment in real time. And that is exactly the collision we're exploring today. So welcome to the deep dive. I want you, listening right now, to picture something with me. Imagine an incredibly rich linguistic and cultural tradition known as Mathili. It's rooted in the Mathila region, which is this fascinating geographic and cultural space that spans across parts of India and Nepal. Yeah, and we're talking about a heritage built on epic poetry, profound philosophy, and these intricate folk traditions that have literally been passed down orally and on palm leaf manuscripts for centuries. Yes, centuries of history. Now imagine taking all of that ancient heavy cultural weight and slamming right into the dial-up internet era of the early 2000s. It's just a stunning visual contrast. You have the rhythm of rural agrarian life and ancient scriptures suddenly being digitized into like HTML coding and MP3 files. It's an evolutionary leap happening in a fraction of the time it normally takes a culture to shift. Precisely. And out of that specific chaotic collision, an internet archive was actually born way back in the year 2000. It was a pioneering effort that eventually evolved into an e-journal called Videha. And today, we're diving deep into a massive stack of source material from an entire issue of this journal, Issue 20, specifically. And it is massive. It's a staggering, comprehensive compilation of methodically prose, poetry, cultural critique, and sociological analysis. It really is. So our mission for this deep dive to explore exactly how this culture navigates this messy transition into the modern world. We're going to examine how they grapple with the commercialization of their music, the remarkably dark and petty politics of their academic institutions, and some deeply unsettling societal hypocrisies that still exist today. But crucially, we're also going to look at how the absolute soul of their culture is preserved through these incredible subversive, almost secret folk traditions. Yeah, and the underlying current running through all of these different essays and reviews and diary entries in issue 20 Is this constant churning battle between two specific forces? Okay, lay it out for us. So on one side You have what we can call scripture And i'm using that word in the broadest sense here to mean the rigid formalized official rules and hierarchies that society tries to impose right the official rule book exactly And on the other side, you have the folk reality. That's the fluid, messy, adaptive, and highly practical way that everyday people actually survive and live their lives on the ground. The tension between the ideal and the real. And I want to say to you listening, whether you're a student of cultural anthropology and musicology nerd, or just someone who is insanely curious about how ancient human traditions survived the digital meat grinder, this collection of essays is an absolute goldmine. Oh, absolutely. It serves as a mirror reflecting the exact same cultural growing pains that happen everywhere, just viewed through a very specific vivid lens. So let's unpack this. The early pages of the journal are heavily dominated by the digital frontier of Mussolini music. We get this sweeping look at the commercialization and the frantic attempt at preservation in this new era. Music is almost always the canary in the coal mine for broader cultural shifts, you know? Mm-hmm, always. material, there's a highly detailed breakdown provided by Gagendra Thakur. He documents the entire landscape of Mothilli CD and DVD albums hitting the market at that specific time. Right. The actual physical media. Yeah. He lists the artists, the specific albums and the recording companies names like Ganga Cassettes and the T series that were mass producing this content. But the very first thing that Kour notes, which acts as a glaring red flag for the entire culture is the absolute lack of children's albums. Yeah. I remember that he explicitly points out that there is a total void, which is wild because this is a region with an incredibly rich centuries-old tradition of folk songs, lullabies, and communal music meant to be sung at home. Yet when it comes to producing modern physical media, the CDs and DVDs that people are actually buying and putting into their players, there is literally nothing for the youth. And we really have to pause here because the implications of that are massive. I mean, what happens to a language to a distinct cultural identity when its children are not given media in their native tongue? They just don't engage with it. Exactly. If the entire digital landscape, every CD in the local shop, every DVD, every early digital download is entirely dominated by adult themes, commercial pop, or high-level religious chants, the children are implicitly absorbing a very dangerous lesson. They're being taught that their native language is a historical artifact. Yes, a historical artifact meant only for adults, not a living, breathing, playground for them to explore. I mean, Taghurt does mention a few plays and small educational initiatives, but the commercial music industry, the entity with the actual reach and power, has completely abandoned the youth. Which feels like cultural self-sabotage, honestly. And that self-sabotaging behavior bleeds directly into Dinesh Yadav's essay, which focuses specifically on the state of Maitrely music in the Nepal region. Yeah, that essay is intense. It really is. The sources paint a picture of a geographic area that is practically dripping with musical heritage, but the actual industry is suffocating. It's being choked by hypercommercialization, intense nepotism, and what Yadav literally describes as a syndicate mentality. And the term syndicate is used very deliberately there. The essay reveals that a very small tightly knit handful of powerful individuals have basically monopolized the entire infrastructure. Wow. Yeah, they control the radio airwaves, they control the distribution, and they control the regional awards, it's the ultimate gatekeeping mechanism. They only promote their own people, their own preferred styles, and they completely freeze out new authentic talent. And you have to remember the context of the market here, right? Because the regional market is relatively small compared to massive national industries. If you get blocked by the syndicate, you have nowhere else to go. You're just done. Exactly. You can't just bypass them and upload to a million followers back then. Local radio and these specific cultural awards dictate an artist's entire livelihood. And the text gives this wildly illustrative almost cinematic example of this corruption playing out in real time with the Vigipati awards in Nepal. Oh, I love this part. Set the stage for us. Okay, so for context, Vigipati is the legendary cultural icon and poet of Missala. His name carries immense sacred weight. So you have this award, a million rupee award, which is a life-changing amount of money for a regional artist. Right, huge money. It was a sensibly meant to honor the greatest singers in the culture. But due to sheer unabashed cronyism, the syndicate decided to give this massive singing award to a translator. A translator, not a singer. Exactly. A decision that naturally caused an absolute uproar in the community. The text highlights the reaction of a legendary Mathili singer named Muralidhar. The journal describes Muralidhar as a pioneer, someone whose raw contribution to Methili film, music and culture is virtually unmatched. And how did he react? When this award was announced, Mjodlidhar essentially staged a one-man rebellion. He boldly and publicly rejected this million rupee award in protest of the corruption and the blatant disrespect shown to the actual working musicians. Wait, he was offered the award alongside the translator or later? He rejected the entire premise and structure of the awards once the corruption became clear. He didn't just quietly decline either. He explicitly called out the people running the the cultural scene, referring to them as not warlords. Which is a cultural shorthand for famous con men, right? Yes, exactly. A million rupees. To look at that kind of money in a market where artists are literally struggling to survive and rejected on pure principle just to defend the integrity of the art form, that tells you exactly how deep the rock goes, but also how incredibly passionate the true artists are. Absolutely. But it makes me wonder, you know, why is this cannibalization happening? they have this rich culture, why form a syndicate that actively crushes it? Well, it's a phenomenon we see globally when a regional or indigenous art form tries to rapidly monetize within a modern capitalist framework. The money changes things. It always does. As soon as regional music tries to transition from a communal folk practice into a product to be bought and sold, it fell prey to corporate gatekeepers who only care about margins, not heritage. Furthermore, Yadav's essay points out a massive looming identity crisis happening at the exact same time. There is a heavy, overwhelming influence of Bollywood and Boche-Perry styles bleeding across the borders. Okay, tell us about the Boche-Perry influence. The Boche-Perry music, for context, is a neighboring regional style known for being very high energy, very commercial, and often heavily synthesized. Catchy club music, kind of stuff. Right. new Mathili artists aren't just fighting a syndicate of old gatekeepers, they're fighting an identity crisis. They're being explicitly told by the market that their authentic, nuanced Mathili flavor doesn't sell. They're told they need to dilute their music, pump up the tempo and sound like a generic Bollywood or Bhojpuri knockoff just to get a minute of airplay. Wait, hold on. I want to push back on this a little bit. Go for it. Because we're using words like diluting in knockoffs. But if you're a local musician in Nepal and you're trying to put food on the table for your family, isn't this just basic survival? I see what you're saying. Like, you don't have the budget to hire a 20-piece live orchestra to record an authentic folk masterpiece. If the syndicate controls the traditional routes, and the only way to get hired for a local wedding or a radio spot is to turn out a catchy, synthesized tune that sounds like the latest Bollywood hit, aren't they just doing what they have to do? Is it fair for these essayists to critique them for just trying to survive? That is a highly valid counterargument, and it's the exact tension that defines the modern regional artists' dilemma. Yeah. Using cheap synthesizers and borrowing popular melodies is absolutely a survival tactic in an underfunded market. But the authors and the source material are deeply concerned with the long-term existential cost of that survival tactic. The question they pose is, if you survive by completely erasing the unique identifying markers of your culture, what exactly have you saved? Oof, yeah, that's a heavy question. You've saved the individual's bank account perhaps, but the culture itself goes bankrupt. This exact tension is explored in microscopic, uncompromising detail when the journal transitions from these broad industry overviews into reviewing specific modern albums. Oh, the reviews? Yes. Critiques are absolutely skating and they perfectly illustrate why this cheap survival method is destroying the art form. Let's get into those specific critiques because the music criticism in this journal is fascinating. The text features a review written by Pradeep Pushpa of an album called Sana Hia which is performed by the singer Kunjibihari Mishra. Now the reviewer doesn't just attack the whole thing blindly. He praises the vocals. He says Kunjibihari Mishra's singing is genuinely great and the lyrics are written in this intricate Ghazal style. And for anyone unfamiliar, a gazale is a poetic form with Arabic origins that is deeply romantic, often melancholic, and relies on very nuanced poetic delivery. Exactly. So Pushpa says the lyrics and the vocal performance are full of deep emotion. But the musical production behind those vocals, it gets absolutely shredded. Shredded is an understatement. Pushpa meticulously notes that the album relies almost entirely on cheap synthesizers and electronic dolac machines. The Dolac machine. Yeah, the Dolac is a traditional two-headed hand drum that provides the heartbeat to so much South Asian folk music. It relies on the human touch, the slight variations in strike, the dampening of the skin. It breathes with the song. Right. But here it's replaced by a sterile, pre-programmed loop. Pushbell points out the painful lack of any live acoustic instruments. There's no real tabla, the more complex tuned hand drums and no life flute. It's all just plastic sound. The reviewer highlights this massive jarring disconnect. You have a singer pouring his absolute soul into these complex romantic gazelle lyrics, but the backing track sounds like it was generated by someone holding down a demo button on a discount Casio keyboard. That's a perfect way to describe it. There's a fundamental disconnect between the organic soul of the lyrics and the sterile robotic nature of the production. It's the audio equivalent of serving a beautifully complex slow-cooked heirloom recipe on a flimsy styrofoam plate. Oh, I love that analogy. Yes, and the journal makes it clear that this isn't just an isolated incident with one unlucky album. The text pulls in another heavily critical essay by Manish Ka, who writes under the pen name Buabhai. Yeah, Buabhai. He laments that there is a severe, systemic lack of original music directors and composers in the current Mothili scene. Instead of having composers who actually sit down and write new music tailored to the specific phonetic nuances and cultural rhythms of the Mothili language, singers are just taking a massive shortcut. They're literally just taking pre-existing, highly popular Bollywood tunes, stripping up the Hindi, and cramming Mothili lyrics into the exact same melodic structure. It's a total Frankenstein approach to songwriting. It treats the native language not as an instrument with its own inherent musicality, but as cheap wallpaper to be pasted over someone else's house. That is so depressing. And Bolapai points at another technological crutch that is ruining the authenticity, the rampant overuse of what he calls detone, which is essentially early auto-tune or pitch correction software. Love the detone. Yeah. His argument is that the market is suddenly flooded with new singers who haven't put in the years of grueling vocal training or discipline required to sing classical or complex folk arrangements on key. Right. They just fix it in post. Exactly. Instead of training, they rely on detone to retroactively mask their vocal deficiencies. So if we look at the landscape they're describing, you have stolen Bollywood melodies, played on sheet synthetic drum loops, sung by untrained vocalists whose voices are being robotically corrected by a computer program. That is the grim reality of it. And the cultural consequences of this are devastating. If we connect this to the bigger picture, when music ceases to be a collaborative, artistic effort involving skilled composers, trained instrumentalists, and dedicated singers. And instead becomes what? It just becomes nothing more than a cheap fast vehicle for a single singer's personal fame. The entire cultural ecosystem starts to die. Think about the logistics. If production companies refuse to hire live tabla players because a drum machine is cheaper, the centuries-old tradition of tabla playing in that specific region withers. The masters have no students. Because the students know there's no money in learning the instrument. If you don't hire original composers, the unique musical language of the culture stops evolving. It gets frozen in time, replaced by imitation. And what about the audience? This is what I was thinking about while reading these reviews. What happens to a listener's ear over a decade of this? That's a great question. Right. If you, as a listener, are only ever exposed to synthesized, recycled tunes with mathematically perfect but emotionally flat, auto-tuned vocals, your cultural palette completely flattens. Oh, absolutely. You literally lose the neurological ability to appreciate the subtle acoustic nuances of a live wooden instrument, or the micro tones and slight, beautiful imperfections of a truly trained human voice. It's exactly like only ever eating hyper-processed fast food. Eventually, your taste buds are rewired, and you forget what a complex, home-cooked meal actually tastes like. That is a brilliant way to conceptualize it. The cultural palate is being actively flattened by the expediency and commercialization of the syndicate. However, the writers in Vedea aren't just complaining. No, they're definitely looking for answers. They aren't just wallowing in despair. They actively look for solutions and they highlight specific examples where the industry is getting it right. They recognize that what is desperately needed is a combination of two things, establishing foundational cultural standardization and proving that high budget, high effort, modern production is actually possible. Which brings us to the essay by Yogendra Pathak who goes by Vyogi. He brings up a highly specific but incredibly relatable problem regarding standardization. And it revolves around the most famous Mathili prayer song, Vidhipati's Jai Jai Paravi. Jai Jai Paravi is not just a song, it's a foundational cultural anthem in Mathila. It's a prayer meant to invoke blessings. And it's traditionally supposed to be sung at the beginning of major public events, cultural gatherings and ceremonies. Kind of like an invocation. Exactly. It's supposed to be the ultimate unifying moment for the community. But Viogi points out a deeply chaotic reality. Because the culture has never established a standardized official melody, tempo, or rhythm for this specific anthem. Every time it's performed at a public event, the hired singer treats it as an opportunity for personal ego-stroking. The text describes how these singers will get up on stage and stretch this simple prayer out into an endless performance. They add these incredibly complex classical vocal riffs, They jump octaves, they completely alter the tempo, slowing it down to a crawl and then speeding it up. And you have to look at the collateral damage of that choice. What happens to the audience? They just stand there. Right. The audience who knows the words and wants to participate absolutely cannot sing along. They are forced to transition from being active participants in a communal prayer into passive, silent spectators watching a vocal gymnastics routine. I was reading this and I immediately pictured being at a massive stadium. Imagine you're at the Super Bowl or the Olympics. The announcer asks everyone to rise for the national anthem. You stand up, put your hand over your heart, take a breath to sing the first line, and the singer on the field decides to launch into a 10 minute avant-garde jazz vocal improvisation. Oh, that would be agonizing. It would. They're hitting notes you didn't know existed, changing the time signature every five seconds. You would just be standing there awkwardly, shifting your weight, clutching your drink, wondering when it's gonna end. Yeah, you wouldn't feel unified at all. No, you wouldn't feel a swell of national pride. You'd feel alienated and slightly annoyed. Why hasn't a culture with such deep ancient roots established a baseline, singable melody for its most unifying song? That is the exact question Vyogi is screaming into the void. He argues passionately that the community must come together and create a standardized, simple, accessible tune for Jha Jha Paravi. Exactly like how a national anthem is structured. The priority of this specific song needs to be collective participation, not individual artistic ego. A standardized tune would allow an entire crowd of thousands to sing in a massive unified chorus. That act of communal singing is what fosters a sense of shared identity. It makes perfect sense. It's a powerful call for the scripture of the music, the formal agreed upon rules, to finally serve the folk, the everyday people, rather than just serving the elite performers on stage. But the text also goes out of its way to show that when the industry does organize itself, when it puts real budget, thought, and collaborative effort into production, the results are phenomenal. They aren't doomed to cheap synthesizers forever. Not at all. We see this vividly in the journal's review of a video album called Arapan. The review of Arapan, written by Cheresh, is presented almost as the antidote to the cheap synthesized music we just discussed. is a beautifully produced, high-budget DVD containing nine distinct songs. And it sounds like they really went all out. They did. And the production details matter here. It wasn't shot against a green screen in a cheap studio, it was filmed on location in the stunning hills of Kathmandu. Crucially, the producers utilized a professional Nepali film crew, intentionally blending the visual aesthetics and technical expertise of the hill cultures with the deeply rooted, Mephili musical traditions. It wasn't just a singer standing in front of a microphone. The review details how they use multiple camera angles, professional editing techniques, and actual narrative thought to tell a story visually while the music played. Right. The review even enthusiastically notes that the album features the first ever Mathili Rocky song. Yeah, that's huge. Rocky, or Rocksha Bontan, is the major festival celebrating the bond and duty between brothers and sisters. To have that specific cultural moment filmed in a highly relatable, cinematic high quality way is a massive milestone. Ari Pan serves as a crucial proof of concept. It proves that the Mathila music industry is not inherently doomed to low budget imitation. When there is genuine collaboration, cross-cultural respect with their Nepali neighbors, and a willingness to actually invest financial resources into the art, they can produce modern media that honors the ancient traditions while looking and sounding completely contemporary. It's a blueprint for the future. Exactly. RE-PIN represents modern production success. It shows the technical heights the industry can reach when it tries. But the sources are very clear. To truly understand the emotional peak of Missile music, to understand the absolute soul of it, we have to look away from the modern DVDs and look at the legend. The real masters. Right. The people who didn't just use technology, but who masterfully blended raw folk tradition with high-disciplined art. We need to talk about Shraddusina, and then we need to talk about the absolute infuriating tragedy of Professor Chen Deshore-Chah. Yeah. Sherida Sinha is a towering monumental figure in this culture. The journal features a glowing, deeply reverent review by Ira Malik of Sinha's album, Viva Geet, which translates directly to wedding songs. Now, to understand why this album is considered a masterpiece, you have to realize it's not just a collection of catchy tunes to play at a reception. It is a 16 track meticulously curated, psychological documentary of the human experience. The review highlights how this album literally walks the listener through the entire life cycle and the profound emotional roller coaster of a traditional Mothili wedding told entirely from the bride's perspective. It preserves everything in Amber. It captures the specific cultural etiquette, the inside jokes shared among the women, the playful teasing of the groom's guests and ultimately the deep gut-wrenching sorrow of the bidai, the moment the bride leaves her childhood home forever. And the genius of Sharda Sinha as described in the text, is that her voice literally carries the soil of Mithla. She doesn't need heavy synthesizers or detone to convey emotion. Her rigorous classical training is perfectly wedded to the raw, unpolished, guttural emotion of the folk tradition. When she sings, listeners aren't just hearing a song, they're being transported. They're reliving their own cultural memories, smelling the incense, feeling the humidity of the monsoon. It's the perfect elusive synthesis of high artistic skill and deep grounded folk reality. It sounds incredibly beautiful, but the journal doesn't let us sit in that beauty for long. It abruptly shifts gears, and the mood of the source material gets incredibly dark, highlighting the institutional rot that threatens these exact traditions. Yeah, this part is rough. We're introduced to a deeply moving and frankly enraging tribute to Professor Chandeshwar Jaa, written by Dr. Kailash Kumar Mishra. Professor Cha was an absolute giant in the field of folk music preservation. He wasn't an armchair academic. No, not at all. The text details how he didn't just sit in an air conditioned library analyzing texts. He physically traveled from village to village. He walked the dusty rural roads of Mithla for years sitting in courtyards and personally collected over 1500 authentic undocumented folk songs. 1500, that's a life's work. He was a singer, a meticulous researcher, and a walking breathing archive of a disappearing world. But his story is framed as a massive tragedy. Because despite his undeniable genius and his tireless work, he was tormented, obstructed, and ultimately hindered by his own employer. He worked at Lulliden Narayan-Mythala University, an institution explicitly named after the region and tasked with preserving its knowledge. Yet, the text explicitly states that Professor Ja was a victim of the most petty, jealous, academic politics imaginable. It's infuriating to read. His colleagues in the University Administration driven by fragile egos, professional jealousy, and sheer spite actively blocked his research grants. They ruined his projects, denied him resources, and basically made his daily life miserable. Dr. Mishra's tribute is filled with this palpable sorrow, because Professor Ha was uniquely, perhaps supernaturally gifted. gifted. He had this extraordinary psychological empathy that allowed him to sing from the emotional perspective of a woman. Wait, really? Explain that a bit more. Yeah, the text specifically mentions the type of morning song called the Prati. These are songs traditionally sung by women at the break of dawn, filled with specific female anxieties, devotions, and perspectives. Dr. Mishra notes that when Professor Ha sang a Prati, he didn't sound like a man doing an imitation of a woman. It wasn't a caricature. No, not at all. Through sheer empathy and deep cultural understanding, he completely blurred the lines between the male performer and the internal female psychological experience. He channeled the specific emotional resonance of the women of Mithila in a way that effortlessly bypassed all the rigid gender norms of the society. He possessed this transcendent empathy that allowed him to preserve the female voice in a deeply patriarchal society. And how did his institution, the university, reward him for this monumental cultural service? By suffocating him. By suffocating him. I have to ask you as the listener to think about how often we see this exact dynamic play out in our own lives. Institutions that are literally designed, funded, and mandated to protect, study, and elevate culture end up suffocating their absolute brightest stars because of middle management jealousy and fragile egos. It happens so often. It's exactly like a museum guard, entrusted with protecting the world's greatest paintings, locking the front doors and throwing away the key just so no one else can look at the art purely because the guard wants to feel like the most important person in the building. That's a devastating indictment of institutional failure, but it's completely accurate. It shows what happens when the scripture of academia, the bureaucracy, the official titles, the grant committees, the departmental hierarchies becomes more important than the folk reality of the actual living art being preserved. The culture just bleeds out on the floor. And Dr. Mishra makes it painfully clear that Professor Ja died without ever receiving the accolades, the national recognition, or the institutional support he so richly deserved entirely because of this systemic localized jealousy. And this theme, this deeply destructive power of fragile male egos, systemic injustice, institutional hypocrisy, the source material reveals that this is not just an isolated problem in the ivory towers of academia. No, it's everywhere. It's a dark, pervasive rot in the bedrock of the society itself, which leads us to what is, without a doubt, the most harrowing, difficult, and sociologically dense essay in this entire journal. It really is a profound shift in tone. I think a clear content warning is appropriate here as we are going to discuss systemic domestic abuse and societal cruelty. Definitely. The text features a deeply unsettling sociological piece analyzing a very specific tragic societal role in mythola, the peritacta. This translates to the abandoned wife. Now we need to be clear, this is not about divorce in the modern legal mediated sense. Right, there's no mediation here. This is about a deeply patriarchal rigid society that allows men to simply discard their wives, forcing these abandoned women to live a life that the author explicitly describes as being worse than widowhood. It is a brutal, unflinching read. The author argues that when a woman is widowed by the death of her husband, society at least provides a recognized script for her grief. There are official rituals, there's a recognized status, and while it's a highly restricted, often oppressive life, there is a baseline of communal sympathy. But the peridacta, the woman whose husband simply packs up and discards her while he's still alive, legally married but entirely absent, she carries an immense, crushing social stigma. The community views her with deep suspicion. She's invariably blamed for her own abandonment like, what did she do to make him leave? And she's treated as an absolute pariah. And the brilliance of this essay is that the author traces this modern cruelty all the way back to the culture's foundational myths. This is where it gets really dark. This is where the sociological critique becomes incredibly razor sharp. The essay meticulously unpacks the historical and mythological roots of this behavior. It brings up a Halyah, who in the epics was tricked and then turned to stone as a punishment, abandoned to the elements. It brings up Sita, the ultimate symbol of female devotion, who is famously abandoned in the forest by Rama despite proving her absolute purity through a trial by fire. And it brings up a historical figure named Farati. Farati was the wife of a revered ancient philosopher named Vachaspati. The text details how Vachaspati essentially used his wife's labor, care, and silent devotion for years just so he could have the peace and sustenance required to write his famous treatises. And then what does he do? The moment he finished his great work, he abandoned her. The author's core argument is that these aren't just old stories, harmless myths, or ancient history. They are structural blueprints. They're teaching tools. Yes. The modern patriarchal society uses these revered texts and stories to implicitly justify and normalize the modern exploitation and abandonment of women. The logic is, well, if the gods and the great philosophers did it, why can't a modern man? The essay is arguing that the scripture is actively knowingly weaponized against the folk. And to prove that this isn't just an abstract historical theory, the author provides these incredibly chilling, vivid, real-life anecdotes. Yeah, these anecdotes are tough to read. These stories prove that this cruelty is happening right now, today, among the so-called educated, progressive elite. The first anecdote the author provides involves a famous, wealthy, highly regarded modern literary man the community views him as an intellectual leader. This man deliberately goes out of his way to marry a traditional, uneducated girl from a rural village. Then when she's trapped in his home, he brutally abuses her, both physically and mentally, claiming she isn't modern or sophisticated enough to fit his elevated lifestyle. forces her out of his home entirely severing support, turning her into a perityakta. And what makes this anecdote so utterly insidious, so hypocritical, is that this exact same man then goes on to write award-winning progressive literature, championing women's rights and feminism. You've got to be kidding me. And his intellectual peers, the people who grant him these awards, cheer him on, fully knowing exactly what he did to his own wife. Wait, is this just the ultimate PR spin? Because looking at it from the outside, it feels like this man is using his status, his literary awards, his progressive vocabulary, his wealth as an impenetrable shield. Exactly. It gets to write feminist poetry on stage, get applauded by high society as a visionary, and then go home and act like an absolute tyrant behind closed doors. And the society allows it because he says the right words in public. It's disgusting. I wanna be very clear to the listener here. We are looking at these sociological critiques exactly as the author laid them out. We are impartially reporting the text to understand how this specific society operates. But the author is shining a glaring, uncompromising spotlight on these individuals and the hypocrisy of the society that enables them. And the text provides a second anecdote that is just as cold, proving it isn't just the literary elite, it spans the corporate world as well. The author describes the corporate manager, a man of means and modern education who marries an innocent, simple woman. After merely seven months of marriage, he abandons her entirely. The reason. Simply so he can turn around and marry her slightly younger, supposedly more attractive sister. That is just so cruel. And the most damning, horrific part of this story isn't just the man's actions, it's the societal reaction. The text emphasizes that the man's family, his parents and the broader society around him fully support his cruelty. They facilitate the second marriage. They help him do it. Yeah. The abandoned wife is left with absolutely nothing. Her reputation and life effectively ruined by societal dictates, while the man suffers zero social or professional consequences. The hypocrisy is absolutely staggering. The very men who write the rules, who define the scripture of modern success, who hold the power in academia, literature, and corporate life, are the ones perpetrating the most archaic, devastating forms of abuse, and they use the ancient myths as their permission slip. Which brings us to a vital, existential crossroads for the culture. I mean, if the official upper-crest society, with all its wealth, its literary awards, its universities, and its foundational scriptures, is this hypocritical and this inherently dangerous for women, how do women actually survive? That's the real question. If the rulebook is designed to crush them, where do they find actual practical lived wisdom to navigate a world that is so heavily stacked against them? That is the perfect pivot because the journal doesn't just outline the oppression, it actually answers that exact question. It does. The answer is found in the final major theme we're exploring today, subversive folk wisdom. The text provides this deeply fascinating, almost secretive cultural analysis of the Matthu Shravani Festival. What's fascinating here is that the Matthu Shravani Festival is a highly specific cultural event that takes place over 15 days during the heavy monsoon season. It involves daily rituals and it's primarily observed by newlywed brides. Okay, so just the new brides. The core activity of this festival involves older married women gathering the young brides together to tell them a series of traditional oral stories But the author of this essay points out something extraordinary about the content of these specific stories They focus heavily on the goddess Gaudi But this is not the perfect submissive Sanitized eternally devoted Gaudi that you find in the official patriarchal scripture Not at all. The stories told during Matusharani depict the goddess Gowri as completely flawed, incredibly fiery, and fiercely human. Yeah, very human. The essay outlines how, in these specific folk tales, Gowri is shown actively learning witchcraft and dark magic out of sheer jealousy. She is depicted trespassing and stealing eggplants from a farmer's field because she is hungry and wants them. I love that detail. Right. And she is shown playfully, boldly flirting with a lowly boatman who, in the twist of the story actually turns out to be her husband, Lord Shiva, in disguise, testing her fidelity. The brilliance of this oral tradition requires a deep dive into human psychology. I mean, why would these older, respected women intentionally spend 15 days telling newlywed bride's stories about a revered, divine goddess behaving badly? Why tell them stories of jealousy, theft, and flirting? The essay argues that this is a highly calculated underground syllabus of subversive feminist wisdom. The older women know exactly what the scriptural rules of the outside society demand. They know society demands that a wife be absolutely perfect, utterly submissive, silently self-sacrificing, and devoid of personal desire. And they know how dangerous that is. And they know, as we saw with the Parachakta essay, that this is an impossible fatal standard that men will inevitably weaponize against women to discard them. So by portraying the goddess Gaudi, the ultimate divine feminine, as flawed as someone who makes mistakes, gets jealous, breaks the rules, gets angry and has independent desires, these older women are essentially providing a masterclass in practical, real-world marital survival. They're looking at these terrified young brides and saying, look, even the divine mother of the universe isn't perfect. She gets jealous. She makes mistakes. Do not let this society or your new husband crush you with impossible standards of perfection. Precisely. It is about emotional survival. Take the story of Galerie flirting with boatman. When it's revealed that the boatman is Shiva testing her, it leads to a complex confrontation in a dialogue between husband and wife. The lesson hidden in that story isn't about blind obedience, it's about navigating boundaries, dealing with marital temptation, and understanding that trust in a marriage is a shared, constantly negotiated responsibility. It is not a scriptural mandate of blind, one-sided female obedience. This folk wisdom deeply acknowledges human psychology. It's realistic, it's forgiving, and it's deeply aware of the messy nature of human relationships, which stands in stark, subversive contrast to the rigid, punitive rules of the official patriarchal scripture. It's literally a secret underground syllabus for surviving a patriarchal marriage passed down orally from generation to generation of women, completely hidden under the unassailable guise of a pious religious festival. The men think the women are just praying, But the women are actually teaching each other how to survive the men. It's incredibly empowering. It is incredibly empowering. But there's a massive caveat here that we have to address. The author raises a critical heart-breaking question at the very end of this piece. If this Madhu Shravani festival is so profoundly empowering and its lessons are so deeply realistic and vital for a woman's psychological survival, why hasn't it spread? Yeah, that's the tragedy. The text notes that this festival has remained strictly isolated to the Brahmin cast, the upper caste in mythola. Why wouldn't these women share this incredible tool for female empowerment with all communities across all castes? That is the tragic paradox that the author leaves us to wrestle with. It perfectly illustrates how intersecting systems of oppression function in reality. The Brahmin women have brilliantly carved out a safe space to subvert the patriarchy through these folktales. But the deeply ingrained rigid rules of the caste system, the ultimate scripture of social hierarchy. Prevent them from sharing that vital survival knowledge with women of other lower castes. Class and caste barriers act as impenetrable walls, containing the wisdom and preventing a broader unified cultural evolution. So they subvert one system but uphold another. They subvert the patriarchy but they uphold the caste system. It proves that even in moments of brilliant subversion, the scripture still finds a way to divide the folk. Wow. Okay, let's take a deep breath and zoom out because we have covered an incredible amount of ground in this deep dive into issue 20 of the Vedea e-journal. We really have. We started by looking at the messy digital struggles of Mathiliam musicians in Nepal, fighting off monopoly syndicates, and the desperate allure of cheap synthesizers just to survive. We looked at the tragic reality of academic jealousy suffocating brilliant empathetic minds like Professor Sandeshwar Haar. We faced the harrowing hypocritical reality of the abandoned wives, the Parisiachta, and the modern men who use ancient myth to justify their cruelty. And finally, we uncovered the secret subversive feminist wisdom hidden in the monsoon festival stories of Mother Trevonni and the caste barriers that keep that wisdom locked away. When you synthesize all of these incredibly diverse texts, it connects directly to everyone listening right now, regardless of your specific cultural background or where you live. Hell. Because we all navigate this exact same tension every single day of our lives. We all live caught between the scripture of our lives, the official rules, the societal expectations, the corporate ladders, the religious dogmas, the Instagram perfect standards we are told to follow, and the folk reality of how we actually survive, how we adapt, how we subvert those impossible rules, and how we manage to find joy and identity in the messy reality of being human. That is beautifully said. And as we wrap up this deep dive, I want to leave you, the listener, with one final provocative thought to mull over. It's inspired by a very quiet set of diary entries found in the text, written by a man named Ravi Bhushan Pathak. Oh, Pathak's diary, yes. In his diary, Pathak writes about a psychological trap that I think almost all of us fall into. He notes how we constantly, unconsciously project our own regional, cultural, and personal insecurities onto our local artists. He writes that we treat our musicians, our writers, our local heroes, exactly like sports teams. Yeah, we attach our ego to them. If a local Mathili singer wins on a national stage, we feel like our region wins, like we win. If they lose or if they're ignored, we take it as a personal insult. We feel like we lose. And it makes you wonder when you are listening to a local artist, or when you're aggressively championing a hometown hero in any field, are you really truly appreciating their art for the vulnerable thing that it is? Or are you just desperately looking for a validation of your own identity? Are we actually supporting the artist or are we just using them as a proxy to prove our own worth to the rest of the world? It's a profound question about the nature of fandom and cultural pride. Exactly! It's something to seriously think about the next time you find yourself blindly rooting for the hometown kid. Remember that broken x-ray machine we talked about at the very beginning of this conversation? Society isn't binary. Culture is not a clean break. The next time you look at your own culture, your own traditions, or your own hometown, don't just look for the clean, white, easily diagnosable lines. Look for the mud. Look for the mud. Look for the messy fusions, the hypocrisies, the cheap synthesizers trying to survive, and the secret subversive wisdom hiding in plain sight. Thanks for joining us on this deep dive.

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