BENGALURU: What The Peshwa: The Lion and the Stallion, completed in 2013, and the period film have in common is that they both draw from Bajirao’s history but don’t promise to stay true to all facts. In fact, when descendents of the less-known warrior hero reportedly objected to the release of the blockbuster because of the filmmaker had taken creative liberties, author Ram Sivasankaran, contacted by the Indian media, is quoted as saying, ‘We are novelists, not history textbook writers.’
And though he loved history right from school, believes they fail to develop in children an interest in historic figures like the Maratha general Bajirao Ballal Bhat. “Historical accounts often talk of a person’s achievements but leave his character traits to the imagination of a dreamer like me,” he writes in an email to City Express.
Nor are history textbooks entirely objective, he thinks. He writes: “I recently read a book that quotes S L Bhyrappa (a prolific Kannada writer) who spoke of a committee created in 1969-70 to foster ‘national integration through education’. The committee was entrusted with removing ‘thorns’ and ‘useless episodes’ of well-documented acts of atrocity and brutality committed by tyrants as it was feared that talking of such things will ‘hurt the sentiments’ of sections of society as also ‘sow poisonous seeds in the minds of children’.”
History, good or bad, needs to be taught with complete candidness. Children across all sections of society so, with guidance from parents, can learn from the mistakes of people from the past, he thinks. “German children are taught about the holocaust. The Germans do not fear that their children’s minds will get poisoned. Quite to the contrary, Germany has become one of the most liberal and all-embracing countries in the world,” he says.
In India, history books see an ‘overemphasis’ on dynasties like the Mughals, Tughlaqs and Khiljis whereas ‘equally splendid rulers like Hemraj (Hemu), Rana Pratap and Rana Sanga are sidelined, he says. “These men were not only spectacular warriors but powerful administrators and brilliant rulers who should have been spoken of in contexts greater than their conflict with their adversaries. Bajirao is one such hero almost lost to the sands of time and barely even spoken of in many formal, national history textbooks.”
Even for his research, the history enthusiast had to go beyond encyclopedia articles, which gave him an insight into timelines and highlights of the 18th century war strategist’s achievements, to what he calls ‘artistic sources, even as simplistic as an Amar Chitra Katha comic and cartoons portraying Bajirao’s life’. “I desperately looked for an English translation of N S Inamdar’s Rau because my ignorance of the rich Marathi language let me down,” he confides. Interestingly, Bansali’s film is based on this fictional account.
This done, he began to flesh out his protagonist, create a storyline. “I inject or reject characters (some very significant) and events to fit in the high level storyline or plot I had created to tell the story in a particular manner,” he writes. “I may move a battle forward by a decade, keep an emperor up in power for longer than he actually was to maintain continuity in the story and delete or exaggerate a character because I want to tell their story a particular way.”
He compares his work to a ballad, which stays true to the esteem the hero is held in rather than historical facts. And it would gladden him if his book interested his readers enough to read up the history of the Peshwas, or visit sites associated with him. Of the latter, he particularly recommends Shaniwar Wada, a dwelling built during Rao’s time.
The debutant novelist has been asked several times over if his work, readied in 2013, resembles the Ranveer Singh starrer. To this, he has constantly replied that his book is ahead in the timeline, before the Peshwa meets Mastani. It begins with an 18-year-old Rao picking up tactics and strategies, riding to battle alongside his father and predecessor of the Peshwa title, Balaji Ballal Bhat.
Sivasankaran, however, is working on a sequel. So how will this compare to Bajirao Mastani? While Bhansali’s film focusses on Bajirao and Mastani’s love story, Sivasankaran’s sequel will ‘will continue to focus on Bajirao’s heroics and military achievements and his constant battle with enemies both external and within himself’. But it won’t be lacking in romance, he says.
“There are many artistic impressions of the love affair between Bajirao and Mastani and they may truly have been in love but one cannot undermine the fact that their wedding was to solemnise the strategic alliance between the Marathas and Chhatrasal (Mastani’s father) of Bundelkhand. The old king was constantly being harassed by the Mughals and the Marathas were reticent to come to his aid as Chhatrasal had refused to become a vassal of the Maratha Empire,” he writes, detailing facts he came across while researching.
“He wrote a heartfelt and poetic letter to Bajirao I, beseeching him to intervene. Bajirao answered his call, saying that Chhatrasal was like a father to him. After crushing the Mughal nemesis, Bajirao was wed to Mastani, Chhatrasal’s daughter through a Muslim wife. This is seen as a great and progressive move for those days as Bajirao, a staunch Brahmin, married outside his religion.”
Sivasankaran first came across Bajirao three or four years ago in an article comparing him with Napolean Bonaparte, whom he has been fascinated with since school. After reading up more on the Maratha, however, he concluded he was the greater of the two.
Nevertheless, he sees several parallels between the two warrior leaders. “Both leaders perfected the art of blitzkrieg cavalry tactics to annihilate larger enemy armies. Both were pioneers of sophisticated military tactics to bait formidable enemies into traps and bring them to their knees. Most of all, both men were epitomes of incredible panache and fierce ambition. Despite their regal positions, they were one with their men, the soldiers who fought by them,” he says.
He includes Vijayanagara emperor Krishnadeva Raya, another ‘hero who sends shivers of ecstasy down my spine’, among others he would like to make subjects of his books. “He is a son of Karnataka who deserves a larger-than-life recognition. The way he held the Vijayanagara Empire and broke the Bahaman Sultanate in four is a tale I would like to tell. In some ways, the Great Raya is like Bajirao. Uncannily, they were undefeated in battle but they died young, almost exactly at the same age!”
Sivasankaran blogs about ‘Hindu history, philosophy and mythology based on extensive reading and research of writing and lectures from various authorities on these subjects’. He straddles what he describes as several full-time jobs: a writer, a product manager, a husband and a son are all full-time jobs. “I wish I had fifty-hour days!” he says.
On his influences
The Prince and the Pauper - Mark Twain In this remarkable piece of historical fiction, Mark Twain explores the life of Tom Canty, a young urchin who finds his miserable life exchanged with that of Edward Tudor, son of Henry VIII, under a remarkable set of circumstances. Experiencing each other’s lives, the boys realise how different they are even while building a lifelong bond of friendship and loyalty.
The Children of the New Forest - Frederick Marryat For heavier readers. The four orphan children of a slain British Cavalier who fought on the side of the deposed King Charles I in the English Civil War are taken under the wing of the kindly Jacob Armitage. The children grow under their newfound guardian while they try to seek their places in the new world, for England shall never be the same again.
I am also a huge fan of all of Dan Brown’s works. The amount of research he puts into his books is nothing short of astounding.