Vacation Travel India

The former Wodiyar Maharaja’s huge, fairytale-castle palace (open 10.30am-5.30pm, entrance fee) was built at great cost by a British architect in 1912 in the Indo-Saracenic style. A part of it is still the residence of the current Maharaja. The interior is an amazing medley of striped pillars, stained glass, carved doors (including one made of solid silver) and mosaic floors. The main parts of the palace are open to the public and include an art gallery, a small museum and some temples set in the grounds.

Sri Jayachamarajendra Art Gallery (open 8am-5pm), housed in the Jagan-mohan Palace to the west of Mysore Palace, has paintings dating from the 19^th century, including works of Raja Ravi Varma and traditional Mysore gold-leaf paintings. St Philomenas Church, built in Gothic style during the 1930s, has beautiful stained-glass windows. It is one of the largest churches in India.

Hampi

Among its many sights, the Vittala Temple is noted for its remarkable sculptural details; the Royal Enclosure houses the remains of the Lotus Mahal and the domed chambers of the Elephant Stables.

Aihole, 100 km (62 miles) north of Hampi, is thought to be the cradle of Hindu temple architecture: it has 125 temples. Patadakal, nearby, is another World Heritage site with 10 major temples, and Badami’s fort and cave temples are all worth a visit (25 km/15 miles southwest of Aihole).

The coast

The coast road (NH 17), from Karwar in the north to Ullal in the south, follows a long stretch of white sand and makes for a spectacular journey along the foothills of the Western Ghats. Gokarna is a popular pilgrimage site famous for its temples and shrines; its secluded beaches have begun to draw some of the travellers from Goa. In the south of the state is the pilgrimage town of Udipi, beyond which is the pleasant coastal city of Mangalore.

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North India covers a great swathe of South Asia, seducing travelers with its infinite contrasts.

In the cities of North India boisterous crowds jostle past and newcomers attract plenty of stares. Colors and voices are loud. So are the sound systems of the temples and the mosques. The place can be fascinating and infuriating in turn.

The landscape goes to extremes - sand dunes in the Thar desert compete with glaciers glittering on distant peaks. Craggy Himalayan provinces loom over the plains, and the roads are under constant repair from the onslaught of monsoon rains or searing temperatures. Colonial cities are still slightly haunted by memories of the Sepoy Uprising and the Nawabs. Gung-ho adventure tourists try to tame the rapids of snowmelt rivers while pilgrims seek the source of the Ganga. At Varanasi a multitude swirls away the ashes of its dead in the green waters where blind river dolphins swim like torpedoes.

There are people milling everywhere. Uttar Pradesh (UP), the most populous state, is right in the middle of what is known as the Cow Belt. This is not particularly a cattle-raising zone (though you may often see stolid black water buffalo lolling on the wayside). It is the heartland of the Holy Cow, the conservative Hindu stronghold, as well as being a bastion of Muslim culture.

Punjab, closer to Pakistan, is home to proud Sikhs and prosperous Jat farmers. Radiating around Ladakh and in high Himalayan valleys, refugee Tibetan communities maintain their rituals and traditional dress. India’s elite enrols its children in up-country boarding schools, well away from the distractions of the city.

Despite satellite TV, North India resists an overwhelming sameness. Delhi is grand with monuments and its buzz as the seat of government, as well as its mosques or bazaars. Rajasthan provides a spectacle of camels, veiled women and enormous turbans. Polo is played on elephant-back while peacocks flutter the eyes in their tails.

Jammu and Kashmir’s heartbreaking beauty is defined by lakes, orchards and snowy peaks, while Agra is home to the Taj Mahal, one of the world’s great monuments to love.

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According to a report by the TERI organization for the Indian Ministry of Environment and Forests, the country “holds the dubious honor of suffering from poverty-induced environmental degradation at the same time as pollution from affluence and a rapidly growing industrial sector”.

New Delhi has more than 4 million vehicles, with 200,000 added each year. The air had become so thick with flying ash and particulate pollutants that the city’s administration forced all public transport (including autos) to convert to CNG (compressed natural gas), as well as building a new metro system.

Steady population growth puts pressure on resources, and Indians cope with polluted air and an alarmingly diminishing water table. The sacred rivers teem with bacteria. Development schemes and environmental control measures are often at odds, and legislation is difficult to enforce.

Timber, paper and mining industries have depleted the forest cover. The Chipko activists, tree-hugging Adivasi women who put themselves in the way of saws and axes to stop the loss of their forests in the Garwal Himalayas in 1973, inspired green protests across the planet. The forest protection measures that followed may now be bearing fruit. Between 1999 and 2006 forest cover grew from 19.39 to 20.64 percent of the country.

The damming of rivers and flooding of valleys continues to be a focus for eco-activists, who oppose the dam projects on the Narmada river, the dam at Tehri in Uttaranchal, a region prone to earthquakes, as well as the Sardar Sarovar project in Maharashtra. Tourism has also taken its toll. Many trekking routes in the Himalayas are vertical rubbish heaps, particularly from plastic bottles used for water. In Ladakh local projects have been set up to provide clean, boiled water to visitors. Ancient marble monuments such as the Taj Mahal show erosion due to chemical emissions.

Unenforced regulations in industry and official and management callousness have led to environmental disasters. In 1984 more than 3,500 People were killed in their sleep when toxic methyl ico-cynate leaked from the Union Carbide factory in wopal, Madhya Pradesh. The first fire in the Jharia coalfields in Bihar started in 1916 and there are currently around 70 still burning, causing asthma, cnronic bronchitis and skin and lung diseases. Mercury poisoning is becoming a huge problem. Dumping of the highly toxic chemical by multinational companies such as Unilever (which makes thermometers for the US market in Kodaikanal, Kerala) causes birth defects, tumors and damage to the central nervous system, lungs and kidneys. The North Koel river in Bihar has up to 700 times above the permissible level of mercury.

Soft drinks multinationals are also culpable. The Coca-Cola plant at Plachimada, Kerala, was using up to 1.5 million litres of ground water daily until it was banned from doing so by the State Government. It has also been dumping toxic waste, high in heavy metals, on farmland. In 2003, both Coca-Cola and Pepsi Cola were found to have “shocking” levels of pesticides in their bottled drinks.

Fightback is occurring: the Narmada Bachao Andolan are particularly active as is the more radical Mumbai Resistance. And when the French aircraft carrier Clemenceau, riddled with asbestos and due to be broken up in Alang’s shipyard in 2006, was recalled to France in a wave of protests worldwide, many saw this as an opportunity for India to improve conditions for its shipyard workers.

On a more practical level, India practices recycling on many levels - ragpickers sort rubbish so efficiently that plastic bags, paper and wire are sold off by weight - providing social institutions from which sustainable systems can develop.

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Also known as “tribals”, the Adivasi (indigenous/aboriginal) peoples of India are found from the Nilgiris to the Himalaya, and from asthan to Arunachal Pradesh. This blanket term refers to a hugely diverse selection of societies and cultures and is used as a catch-all for peoples who are not easily categorized in terms of India’s dominant groups or ideologies.

Many Adivasi peoples, particularly those living in a forest belt that stretches across Central India, from Orissa and Bihar, to Madhya Pradesh, may be the descendants of the first inhabitants of South Asia. Linguistically and culturally distinct from the peoples that make up the majority of India’s population, it is thought their presence in South Asia predates the two waves of immigration from the north and west that brought the now-dominant groups of the North and South.

As these new peoples moved in through the passes of the northwest they displaced the existing inhabitants, forcing them into the hills and forests where there was less pressure for land. Over time there was interaction between these different groups, but due to their relative isolation in sparsely populated regions many Adivasi peoples have retained highly individual identities.

The northeastern states have, after Madhya Pradesh, Chattisgarh and Orissa, the highest concentration of Adivasis. The groups who live here have more in common culturally and linguistically with peoples living in Burma (Myanmar) to the east, than they do with, say, the Todas or Kotas of Kerala and Tamil Nadu. Even within the state of Arunachal Pradesh, one of the very few areas of India where Adivasis have any control over their affairs, there are over 60 distinct groups.

What does unite many of these peoples, however, is the degree of discrimination they have suffered and continue to face. Where Adivasis have had close contacts with the dominant Hindu population their place within the caste system has been considered extremely low, working as agricultural labourers or undertaking menial tasks (often those believed to be “polluting” by high-caste Hindus).

Traditionally, land-ownership patterns among ™ivasi groups tend to be collective and not governed by individual ownership laws, making it easy for unscrupulous politicians and landowners to appropriate Adivasi lands. This process of appropriation accelerates as the general pressure for land increases, and those areas where the Adivasis are relatively protected from exploitation become fewer and fewer.

Some of the worst offences of this kind have been committed by the state. Many large dams, such as the controversial Narmada projects, have flooded areas populated by Adivasis, and provide power and drinking water to urban areas while handing out pitiful, or no, compensation to the people they displace. Land reform programmes in states such as Kerala, while laudable in many respects, redistributed land that had traditionally supported Adivasi groups practising low-level rotational agriculture and hunter-gathering. Logging has decimated many of the forests previously inhabited by Adivasi groups, and areas such as Jhark-hand, which are rich in mineral wealth, have seen the displacement of many people, as well as widespread pollution of their lands.

Southern Bihar is now the new state of Jharkhand, and eastern Madhya Pradesh is now the state of Chattisgarh. Both have large Adivasi populations and, in theory, the Adivasis themselves should be able to lobby the state governments more efficiently than before. How far these new states will go towards protecting the interests of the Adivasis, however, remains to be seen.

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Instead of car rental India offers a wide selection of railways which is a more interesting way to travel across the country.

The age of steam

Steam locomotives are officially on the scrap-heap. (Rumour had it that the constant pilfering of coal was a major factor in the fate of steam.) Luckily, one famous route has been reprieved, that of the line to Udhagamandalam (Ooty) in the Nilgiris. The famous line up to Darjeeling in the Himalayas has recently been converted to diesel traction but still occasionally runs steam engines. Tweed and Mersey (1873 vintage) unfortunately no longer get up steam each winter to cart sugar cane on the metre gauge east of Gorakhpur in Uttar Pradesh. However Tipong Colliery in Assam still runs two narrow-g gauge steam locomotives, and the Riga sugar ) mill in Bihar sometimes uses a metre-gauge, steam engine to haul sugar cane.

There seems to be a change of heart at the railway ministry as they realize the tourist 3 potential of running steam services (particularly on the popular hill services). There are plans to resume steam traction on the Matheran railway near Mumbai, and as well as “specials” there are the yearly steam-hauled Royal Orient and Fairy Queen luxury tourist trains.

Prime lines

Not all progress is forwards. Until 1994 the traveler could cover the entire subcontinent by one gauge, but since then the metric has been sacrificed to a broader option that does not (nor probably ever will) have such extensive coverage. However, the broad-gauge network stretches from Ledo in eastern Assam to Bhuj in western Gujarat, a journey of 3,776 km (2,346 miles); and from Kanniyakumari in the south to Jammu Tawi in the north, 3,581 km (2,225 miles). The journeys take you through some startling changes of scenery: from the lush rhino tracks of the Brahmaputra, through the rice paddies of West Bengal and the wheat fields of Uttar Pradesh, to the flat desert of the Rann of Kutch; or, from tropical Kerala, over the high Deccan Plateau, down to the Ganga Plain, and then up, through the foothills, to the edge of the Himalayas.

The coasts on both sides of the subcontinent offer some fine scenery but the Coromandel leading to Chennai is more impressive. With the new length of Konkan Railway from Mumbai to Mangalore, a fabulous stretch of coastal scenery has opened up. Probably the most sensational coastal run of all is to Ramesvaram, on the isle of Pamban. Until a storm obliterated it in 1965, this line ran another 20 km (12 miles) along a narrow spit of sand to Danushkodi.

Inland, the hill railways of India are famous for their character and quaintness. Not far from Mumbai is the climb to Matheran by tiny narrow-gauge stock. Darjeeling’s toy railway is well known. Ooty’s also is widely loved but, contrary to popular notions about its “rack” (which only runs as far as Coonoor), this is not a narrow-gauge railway but metric. Whereas the Darjeeling engines were Scottish, those that push up the Ooty train are Swiss, with an extra set of pistons to work the rack mechanism. While the hill line to Simla is famous for its 103 tunnels, a better view of the Himalayan Peaks can be had from its sister narrow-gauge line that runs through the Kangra Valley.

The world’s highest broad-gauge track is notable for the triple-headed trains that carry iron ore for export from Kirinul to the port of Visakhapatnam in Andhra Pradesh, a modern engineering triumph of Indian expertise. A daily mixed train from Vizag runs up this line and over the Eastern Ghats to the Adivasi capital of Bas-tar. Other impressive crossings, this time of the Western Ghats, are from Tenkasi to Quilon and the newer and more dramatic alignment from Mangalore to Hassan. Yet another memorable ghat line is over the Aravalli range from Jodhpur to Udaipur in Rajasthan, past craggy forests and the highest point on the Western Railway.

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Instead of car rental India offers a wide selection of railways which is a more interesting way to travel across the country.

Indian Railways is a huge state-run conglomerate, the world’s largest employer. It moves 14 million passengers a day yet still remains remarkably efficient and uniquely poetic. There is no better way to get the pulse of South Asia than to view the changing scene from a carriage window. Incidentally, a window in the non-air-conditioned sleeper class comprises several layers to keep out the sun, dust and tick-etless travellers.

British colonialists laid most of the 63,140 km (39,230 miles) of track, and left sturdy Victorian relics - clocks, scales and benches - on platforms across India. Things have moved on since then, however, and now the fast track inter-city services, known as Rajdhani and Shatabdi, run to various state capitals and major cities from Delhi and other centres. In the 1990s, the overnight switch of political power from North India to the constituencies of the South resulted in the conversion of metre gauge to broad gauge, a decision that had been considered unrealistic under North Indian prime ministers.

Yet in spite of political interference the working of the railways is impressive. Serving under the Rail Minister is the Railway Board, whose chairman is invariably a railway engineer. The system is divided into nine zones, which derive in part from the reach of the imperial private companies. For example, today’s Central Railway has inherited the extent and style of the Great Indian Peninsular lines. Zonal profiles vary considerably, with the southern states profitably in command of their assets (borne out by the smart livery of both rolling stock and rail-waymen), while those in the north and east wilt under the burden of saturation.

Reservations are now computerized at most stations of any size and special quotas are available for foreign tourists. Indrail Rover Tickets, bookable in India and abroad, can be very convenient for the frequent rail traveler.

Luxury service

Service on specialty trains such as the Palace on Wheels through Rajasthan is unrivalled, with two turbaned valets for each carriage. For the luxury of service, if not for speed and fittings, the first-class air-conditioned compartments of Indian Railways are as good as any in the world.

When you compare what the railways give you for about the comparable price of a plane ticket with all the delays and charmlessness of airports, then you travel more meaningfully by train. Following a relaxed journey, you arrive in the middle of town. Budget travelers can also go by second class in an air-conditioned or three-tier air-conditioned sleeper coach so that the heat and dust is filtered out.

On board, there are rules and there are rules. Officially, no drinking is allowed, but those most likely to benefit from abstention are the least troubled by warnings. Just as first-class passengers are generally free to indulge, so are they allowed to take their pets on board.

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In Punjab, the entrance hall of so many invasions, the impact of Islam was strong and deep. Here, Hindu dress disappeared. The sari was dropped in favor of the Islamic salwar kamiz, the modest tunic worn over drawstring pants. The rivalry between the stitched clothing of the Muslim and the unstitched draped garments of the Hindu was an expression in daily life of competing notions of civilized propriety. A new Indian identity evolved. It is epitomized in the linguistic amalgam of Hindi and Urdu, which is spoken across much of North India.

Muslims are outnumbered, almost 10 to one, yet India ranks as one of the largest Islamic populations on earth, with 110 million people. Consequently, Indian airports are overcrowded during Haj (February-March), the time of pilgrimage to Makkah.

Family terms

Extended family life in a densely populated country can be fraught with problems of privacy. Most societies in India are patriarchal and a daughter must leave her parents to set up a household with the groom’s family.

There are a bewildering number of terms for family relationships. It can sometimes seem that everyone in a room is distantly related in some fashion. “Bahu”, the daughter-in-law, and “Sas”, the mother-in-law, are important adversaries in the Indian family and a focus for conflicts about duty, obedience and respect.

Brother, “Bhai”, and older sister, “Didi”, are affectionate and respectful terms of address, even for people outside the nuclear family. It is even more common to call a visitor “Aunty” or “Uncle”, and older people may call you son, “Beta”, or daughter, Bed”. “Mata” and “Pita” are terms for mother and father (often with the respectful lag, ji, added), and there are many other names for relatives that show the birth order and branch of the family.

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It is difficult for any newcomer to be accepted until the locals can slot the person into a category. The inevitable grilling, “What is your native place?” is not just some tiresome gambit to keep a conversation from flagging. The responses are of intense interest, for the name of someone’s village, town or locality reveals a great deal to the knowledgeable.

Being able to pigeonhole a newcomer in the social hierarchy eases tensions between strangers. Indians are open and noticeably un-neurotic because they are confident that their social responses are completely correct. If a guest is not shown proper respect, it is taken as a deliberate insult towards his or her group, and the onus is upon the insulted to figure out why. Such caste concerns meant that the adoption of orphans with unknown origins was quite rare until the late 1990s. Now, more couples dare to adopt an abandoned child, usually a girl.

Converts to different religions, particularly Christianity and Buddhism, often maintain their caste links and sometimes never entirely relinquish their Hindu beliefs. Modern-day Mazbhis of Punjab, adherents of the Sikh faith, recognize the primacy of their caste origin (sweeper) in intermarriages with sweepers who converted to Christianity. Though the bride wears white, a vermilion spot on her forehead symbolizes her married status in a traditionally Hindu way.

Religious order

Schisms and sects combined with caste to complicate India’s religious order, even across religions that claim to have transcended caste, such as Islam.

Buddhism and Jainism were early religious and social movements that revolted against a strict caste structure and against the Brahmanical rigidities of Vedic ritual sacrifice. Buddhism was perceived as an assertion of Kshatriya power against Brahman supremacy.

Pali, the language of early Buddhist texts, became a vehicle of protest against elitist Brahmanical Sanskrit. Jainism found support among the trading caste. Neither movement completely severed its links with Hinduism and in turn lost much support with the rise of bhakti, devotional Hinduism.

Modern movements, the rationalist philosophy of the Brahmo Samaj and the evangelical fervour of the Arya Samaj’s shuddi conversions, may be seen as Western and Christian in inspiration. However, explanation was also sought from within Hindu philosophy - a characteristic accommodation of new ideas and influences.

Even today, language represents power and access to knowledge. Riots erupt if regional languages are seen to be snubbed by the English- and Hindi-speaking elite. When television newscasts were broadcast only in Hindi, Tamil Nadu erupted in violence. This was a grassroots refusal to accept the tongue of the conqueror, and some South Indian politicians are actively lobbying for Tamil to be ranked alongside Hindi and English as an official language for government documents.

Proselytising religions, particularly Islam and Christianity, encountered resistance at first, but both could offer concepts of immediate salvation to the dispossessed and, more crucially, both were associated with ruling powers of long tenure. Caste Hindus sometimes resent any favouritism shown to these groups by government authorities.

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You can choose from several India tour packages but one of the most important parts of your travel must be getting to know the Indian people.

Hindu scriptures predict a time of chaos and deprivation when the Code of Manu will be forgotten, and the caste structure will come crashing down. Some claim these bad times, called kaliyuga, are here already. Unemployment has forced many Hindus to desert the old village ways in order to eke out a living in contemporary India. Originally, the needy could approach sympathetic members of their own jati, who would provide a meal, a job or shelter. The traditional division of labor is breaking down, albeit slowly. K.R. Narayanan was born a Dalit and had to fight convention for an education. Following years as a high-profile lawyer and diplomat, he was President of the Republic between 1997 and 2002.

In India’s big cities, people from different castes often end up as neighbors and can’t help rubbing shoulders on the bus or in cinema halls. Unlike in the villages, where caste groups tend to live in segregated areas and traditionally only eat with their own caste members, there is some leeway for intermingling in the cities. Living in such close proximity occasionally sparks confrontation between different caste groups, especially those jockeying for position. Attempts to prove status are as crucial for career advancement as for family alliances. Opportunities, whether through quotas or connections, hinge on an Indian’s caste and community.

Although banned by the Indian constitution for 50 years, atrocities against the lowest castes occur daily. In the early 20th century Mahatma Gandhi insisted that everyone must take turns cleaning the toilet, and renamed outcastes (then known as “Untouchables”) the Harijans (”Children of God”). But many now prefer the less patronizing term Dalit (literally “the oppressed”), which is more forthright than the bureaucratic acronym SC & ST (Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes). This terminology comes from the Indian constitution, written by B.K. Ambedkar, an early Dalit campaigner and brilliant lawyer, who converted to Buddhism in protest at what he saw as the divisive Hindu veneration of caste.

When New Delhi tried to implement an affirmative action plan to set aside half of all federal jobs for the officially underprivileged - which make up 85 percent of India’s population -dozens of middle-class students burnt themselves alive to protest at their loss of opportunities. These so-called “caste martyrs” contributed to the overthrow of Prime Minister V.P. Singh, and reservation continues to be a controversial issue in many areas of the country.

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India’s caste system is based on the twin concepts of dharma and karma, the duties one must fulfill in this life and the effects one’s actions will have on any future lives. These, coupled with the principle of hereditary occupation and strong concepts of pollution, produced a highly stratified society which, due to its flexibility, was one that could absorb new peoples with little trouble.

The Laws of Manu (circa AD 150) spell out codes for life in a multiracial society. Each individual is born into a particular jati or caste that predetermines both profession and status, regardless of the wealth of the parents. These castes are said to fall into four basic divisions, or varna. The Brahmans are intellectuals and priests - the link between mortals and millions of Hindu deities. Kshatriyas are rulers and warriors, in charge of justice and administration. Both Brahmans and Kshatriyas are considered “twice-born” and display their status with a sacred thread worn over the shoulder. Below them are the Vaishyas, merchants or traders, and the Shudras, agriculturalists. However, the most menial tasks were reserved for the outcastes, in practice the peoples conquered by higher castes and considered unworthy to be part of the system. These jobs include cleaning latrines, sweeping the streets, scavenging, burning corpses and gathering dead animals (which extends to working with leather, making shoes and playing drums at funerals or weddings).

A wedding, the ultimate family occasion, will bring out latent caste differences even in liberal-thinking modern professionals who have earned degrees for jobs forbidden them by birth. Every Sunday, classified advertisements in Indian newspapers list brides and grooms available for arranged marriages under specific headings of caste. Only occasionally - if the bride is over 30 years old, for example, or the groom is HIV-positive - will these “wanted” advertisements say “Paste no bar”.

There are thousands of subdivisions possible within the four major caste divisions, and these jati really matter. They determine the degree of superiority within society’s pyramid. Caste is not something that can be easily lied about. It may be encoded in a surname - one reason why traditional families still insist on an arranged marriage. A child will inherit the caste of the father, so inter-caste marriages are tolerated by the bride’s relatives if it is the groom who marries down. For consenting to such a match, a bigger dowry is demanded by the groom’s family.

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