Science and Philosophy in the Ghats
The novel is set in the sleepy town of Mudigere where resides the eponymous scientist Karvalo, a Mangalorean catholic which is somewhat of a rarity in these parts. He talks in the crisp Kannada of his native Mangalore peppered with generous English phrases like ‘My dear young man’ and ‘Yes yes’. A brilliant scientist he is somewhat of a mystery to the townspeople who cannot understand why a man of his talents is wasting his life in this decrepit town.
The answer is revealed by Karvalo himself in the middle of the Novel. The scientist is in search of a ‘Flying lizard’, a mysterious creature belonging to the age of the dinosaurs which has survived unscathed through the ages but also considered to be extinct by the scientific community now. Recent sightings of a similar creature inside the jungles has aroused the interest of the scientist.
Equipped with this knowledge the scientist and his assorted band of unlikely explorers set out to the jungles to capture the creature. This merry band includes the narrator and his dog curiously called Kivi (“Ear” in Kannada), Mandanna , the local bee keeper and Karvalo’s trusted lieutenant , Prabhakara an assistant of the scientist specializing in photography and the eccentric Biriyani Kariyappa who specializes in cooking “hot foods”.
This bunch of explorers roam the forests in futility it seems in the beginning enduring hardships and along the way ruminating about such things as the nature of God, evolution and man’s relationship with nature. In the end the creature is indeed sighted and is caught on camera but it has one final trick up its tail!
The novel impresses you with its humanity and its concern for nature that man is now hell bent on destroying. Considering that the novel was written in 1980 it does come across as remarkably prescient. Tejaswi continues the humanistic tradition of his father the great writer Kuvempu who created the philosophical concept of ‘Aniketana’ – the universal man who is at home everywhere in the world and is one with nature.
In one vertiginous passage Karvalo is chided by one of the townspeople for mixing with the lowly Mandanna who with his low caste and sparsely educated background the townspeople see as a bit of an upstart and a rascal who is indulged by Karvalo. The scientist retorts back dismissing labels like ‘Scientist’ or ‘Uneducated’ assigned by society and instead urges them to see the true self of any person and in this case Mandanna who is a born naturalist in his eyes thereby compelling us to slice through the smoke screen of society in order to approach the real truth of human existence.
In another passage when the explorers are spending time in the forest the narrator asks the scientist if he believes in God to which Karvalo being true to his scientific self replies that he trusts nothing without evidence and when proffered with ‘evidence’ for God’s act on earth he tersely replies that only the acts are real but the proofs are all illusions. How many of us who think ourselves as 'scientific' can be true to ourselves and reply with this clarity without fear of society?
Evolution too is dealt with in the novel where the scientist gives an explanation of the mechanics of evolution and the role of historical chance. Of how man due to some chance broke from his ape siblings and descended to the ground resulting in his weak arms due to which he developed tools and weapons hence kicking off our civilization whereas his ape siblings delayed their decent a bit longer – thousands of years in evolutionary scale - hence missing the chance to create civilization.
The essence of the evolutionary process is caught perfectly in the last paragraph of the book where the narrator seeing the flying lizard in flight notices that its wings were evolved from the rib cage and not the forearms as with birds thus reasoning its stunted growth through the ages hence concluding that it took a bad evolutionary turn when compared to birds who ‘won’ the evolutionary battle. When pointed this observation Karvalo simply sighs saying there is no right or wrong in evolution and the evolutionary process never ends. How true.
This is a remarkable novel which needs to be read for its humanity and scientific temper, both attributes sorely going amiss in today’s world.
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