And what do you think to be the main goal of the Indian cinema, Grisha?
I think that cinematograph is the basis of religion in India. When we discussed the absence of the category “concept” in the Ancient Atlantis we didn’t raised the questions of religion and worldview. One can say that the origins of Indian cinema culture lay in the Ancient Atlantis. And the modern Hollywood is a pitiful imitator of the Indian cinematograph. Look at American films – a simple row of images, bright and catchy, but not a single thought, not a concept, not a dialog touching a people’s soul. Ask any spectator, who has exited from the cinema after an American film, what did its character speak of? He will look t you as if you are mad and answer that American guys don’t speak but act. The same is happening in the Indian cinema, but there are more exquisite images, more colours, dances, and music. I.e. it’s the well-designed languages of images. And it’s not surprising that many people look at Yankees like at rich monkeys. India in Indian films is like a peculiar advertisement – charming-beautiful, musical and full of puritanical love. But the saddest is that many people, and not only in India, like this “cinema- ersatz-life”. And now compare what you’ve seen in the real life with the cinema and with what has Efremov written about the inferno. You will understand that “I didn’t dream of Indian fascism”.
At this moment somebody knocked the door and Prakash appeared.
Sorry, Mr, Holmes, for I’m late. There are only two flights from Puttaparthi to Bombay a week – on Wednesday and Sunday. And you are to be in London on October 13. I was trying to get know about the variants with train or car trips, when in the ashram administration I was secretly told that today in the morning a plane with some delegation had come from Bombay. It will fly back at four p.m. After I had shown the requisites of our firm they promised to take us on board, if the administration would not object. I’ve just get the permission and immediately ordered you a ticket for the flight “Bombay – Frankfurt am Main – London” that takes off at two a.m. October 13. I hope that everything goes all right and you will land in Heathrow on Saturday morning. We have two hours before leaving for the airport.
Thank you that everything goes so well, Prakash. And does your brother really live in Russia?
Yes, Mr. Holmes, he really lives in Russia and occupies the tourist business. My elder brother went to Switzerland long ago and successfully works in the field of medicine. Our father dreamt that the middle brother lived and worked in Switzerland too since he had got the medical education as well. But our family had a protector – our teacher – who especially liked my middle brother. He recommended him strongly to live and work in Russia after his studies would have been finished.
It’s interesting, Prakash. Why even in Russia, if the life in Switzerland was much more calm and rich?
He told that in the next century all the important events would happen in Russia, and in Indian they should understand what would really happen there.
And has your teacher ever been in Russia?
No, but he has always said well about this country and told that Russia will show the true way to India.
And how long have you brother being lived in Russia?
For more that ten years. His children have grown up there; they study in some Russian school. And when they come with their parents for holidays I see that in spite of their Indian appearance they are Russians by their way of thinking, behaviour and habits.
And what is to be a Russian? Prakash, what do you think?
Oh, Mr. Holmes, we’ve told much about it with my brother. Russia is a multinational state and he visited many of its regions. He understood who were Georgians, Tatars, Armenians, Uzbeks and even Hebrews. However he used to complaint to our teacher, when he had been alive yet, that he wasn’t able to understand who were Russians. The teacher calmed him and promised that one day he would meet a man in Russia and he would explain who Russians were. But to be able to understand his easy explanations my brother was to speak Russian very well. The teacher even described how that man would look. My brother was always looking for him. And when my brother had come on holidays last year we noticed that he had greatly changed. I can hardly explain what changed particularly, because it didn’t refer to his appearance. It was inner changes. That time he at the first time told that he had understood who Russians were. All of us asked him to tell how had it happened and if he had really met the man described by our teacher.
One day, – he began his story, – I travelled on a train from Moscow to Petersburg. And a man looked like that whom our teacher had given notice of travelled in the same roomette. I was anxious and wanted to talk to him very much to check the predictions given to me. However I didn’t know how to start the conversation for a long time. Evidently he felt it and talked first. After some time when our discussion had become quite easy I asked him the disturbing question. He smiled and answered that everything was very easy, because I understood Russian though I was an Indian. He asked me to listen thoroughly the combinations of words he was going to pronounce. I concentrated and he started to pronounce very distinctly. – (Here my brother began speaking the Russian language and then translated with the explanation). – Армянский человек, французский человек, татарский человек, американский человек, чеченский человек, еврейский человек, – and at last after a pause he slowly pronounced: русский человек[88]. After his words it naturally became clear for me, who Russians were, and I told about it to my neighbour. “What have you understood?” – he asked me. And I answered: “Russians is the future name of the whole humanity”. “Do you see how easy it all is?” – he said and added: “Dostoevsky tried to tell the world about it more than hundred years ago. But only few understood him that time, because the concept of mutual enclosing of phenomena and processes was not developed yet. Russian is the enclosing concept concerning other nations. That’s why the mind takes easy such concepts as (here he spoke the Russian again): “русский американец”, “русский немец” and even “русский китаец”[89]. But it would surely be nonplussed seeing the senseless combination: “американский русский”, “немецкий русский”, “китайский русский”[90]. And the matter is not in population of this or that nation, but in the fundamentally new concept, which encloses all the nations. And Russian “nationalism” is so “dangerous” not because it really exists, but because in perspective it’s able to unite all the nations according to the completely different moral principles, which would be alternative to ones dominating today in the biblical culture.
And what else did you brother tell about Russia? How do you think what has Sai Baba meant when he spoke about a need to help your brother in affairs of Russia and India? – Holmes asked.
The matter concerned some conception, alternative to the Bible. Brother told that they discussed it about all night long. That Russian left him some books and promised to help with mastering the new conception.
And did your brother tell about this conception?
Yes, he tried, but that time I didn’t understand everything, because he told quickly and was very anxious. If I’m right it was told there about some new credit-financial system, in which should not be the speculative market of securities; should not be the predatory extortionate loan interest, with the help of which all countries of the third world and India as well had become entirely dependent on International Monetary Fund. The new morality and the new credit-financial system begotten by it will form the new economy. In it the demographically grounded needs (food, clothes, habitation, education) will be satisfied primarily, and the degraded parasitic ones (luxuries, all kinds of drugs including alcohol and tobacco) will be satisfied on the residual principle – in contrary to the modern civilization where the demographically grounded needs are thus satisfied.