Editor's Mail -  From Prof  Somnath Dhar

Prof Somnath Dhar  

Sir,

Years ago, in early fifties, when I was on the editorial staff of the Hindustan Times, Sudhir Dhar was the cartoonist. I would at times enter his room to have a chat with him. Watching his cartoons adorning the walls, I would tease him with what I called the Dhar Syndrome. The argument ran along the line: why do you call yourself 'Dar'. Dar rhyming with 'Tar' (the same sound) is a Muslim surname in Kashmir. "You should spell it 'Dhar' would be my advice", one that he did not would not accept. Since then he shifted to another paper but he continues to spell his surname the same way. This methinks is dogged persistence !

Let me share with the reader the story of the Dhars. The Doors are not original Kashmiris but hailed form Darbhanga in Bihar, on the border with Bengal. They were imported by the Sultan rulers of Kashmir, who were looking for trustworthy Peshkars (revenue collectors), as they did not trust the local Hindus, who were hand in glove with the local farmers, dilly dallying in the payment of the yearly revenue. Local folk-lore reflects social realities. As the Dhars spreadeagled into several clans, vying with one another in affluence, Kashmiris came out with a saying: "Dhar baja, mulk beja; mulk baja, Dhar beja" ("when the Dhars are prosperous, the country is starving-but when the country is prosperous, the Dhars are starving.") That is/was the Dhar syndrome. The adage persists among the older folks. It is they who preserve the folklore everywhere..

My Dhar surname, conveniently abridged by me to Dar, helped me, as is exemplified by this episode. I was travelling by train from Rawalpindi to Karachi, then capital of Pakistan. It was a 4-berth compartment I was occupying an upper berth. The three others were a Karachi businessman, an Air Force captain and a professor. After dinner, when we were preparing to rest for the night, the talk drifted to India-Pakistan relations. The PAF captain said, "We forced an Indian Air Force pilot to land when he was about to overfly the border."

"The trespassing captain is safe with us and so is the plane. Indians are persistently asking about the pilot and the plane. Our response so far is studied silence. So, the blasted Indians are in a soup. I had thus adventitiously got vital information to which our M.E.A. had no clue whatsoever.

I was about to rest when, all of a sudden, I remembered that my suitcase was positioned below the lower berth. My visiting card, inserted in the designated slot, read, "Somnath Dhar, First Secretary, High Commission of India, Karachi ''. I experienced some very uncomfortable moments until I softly climbed down and removed the card that would have caused me untold trouble, had it been spotted. (I had said that my initial 'S' stood for Subhan)

Reverting to the Dhars, they were good-timers. There was a Persian saying-they were adepts in Persian "Subah Dhar-Bagh-i-Nasim, Shyam Dhar Bagh-i-Nishat, Shalimarolal-zaroo saiy-1-Kashmir asto bast" (In the morning, Nasim Bagh is the pleasure garden of the Dhars; in the evening it is Nishat Bagh; as for the Shalimar Bagh, it is the ultimate resort for pleasure". Their love for the good things included the famous Kashmiri cuisine. The hospitality of Mahanand Dhar was famous; the only snag was that the dishes took a long time in coming.

The other day, a contemporary had a news item, head-lined, impishly, "Dar(n) good", quoting "the leading cartoonist" Sudhir Dar, that he "wished he was half as talented" as his father Krishna Prasad Dar was. Basically, a publisher, he had published some of Jawaharlal Nehru's earliest works, and some of Gandhi's. His culinary talents were legendary", Sudhir is quoted. He adds, "During Indira Gandhi's marriage, Nehru entrusted the Kitchen to him". He recorded his recipes in the book, published two decades ago. Dar concludes, "Now that Penguin has published this book, with recipes that are so precise and simple to follow, so can you and I". Amen!

Prof. Somnath Dhar

(We cannot convince ourselves about the correctness of the same unless some proof from history is provided. Incidentally it is not Dharbanga but Darbanga-which means doorway to Bengal. So there is no link between Dhars and Dharbanga. The surnames Dhar, Nath, Lal are said to have been adopted from the second word in the maiden names like Shridhar, Somnath, Jawahar Lal etc.-Editor)

DISCLAIMER:                                                                                                                                                                                               

The views expressed in the Article above are Author’s personal views and kashmiribhatta.in is not in any way responsible for the opinions expressed in the above article.                                                                  Courtesy:   Koshur Samachar, November, 1996