And here is another: Eklavya! The round earth. A steel lever in my hand. But no leverage? O Eklavya, You ideal disciple! Give me the finger you cut off; That will be my fulcrum.6 In the realm of social action, too, Ekalavya lives on. There are Ekalavya educational foundations in Ahmedabad and Hyderabad. The Ekalavya Ashram in Adilabad, a northern district bordering on Maharashtra on the banks of the river Godavari, is a non-profit, tribal welfare 144/45
facility established in 1990. Run by people from the local business community, it serves underprivileged tribal people who cannot afford to educate their children. There is also an Ekalavya cricket team. The ancient story lives on in a new and liberating form.
Endnotes 1. Parts of this essay have been adapted from my book The Hindus: An Alternative History (Penguin, 2009) and from an essay published in Tarikh: The History Journal (2008-9, Special Issue on Myth and History, St Stephen’s, Delhi), 34-6. 2. Mahabharata (Critical Edition, Poona), 1.123,10-39. 3. From Hemavijayagani, Katharatnakara, Banasakantha: Omkarasahiyta Nidhi 1997, story no 163, ‘The Story of the Bhilla’, 185-6. 4. Gail Omvedt, Dalit Visions: The Anti-caste Movement and the Construction of an Indian
Identity (Orient Longman, 1995), 78, quoting an untitled poem by Waman Nimbalkar (called ‘Just Poem’), translated by Graham Smith, Vagartha 12 January 1976. 5. Gail Omvedt, Dalit Visions, 98, citing Shashikant Hingonekar, ‘Ekalavya’, Asmitadarsh, April/May/June 1989; translated by Gail Omvedt and Bharat Patankar.
The Book of Aleph