LPG, Charkha, and the Spider...



'The gas cylinder'- that is how I commonly refer to the  natural gas/LPG container stored in a locked cabinet outside the house. A pipe connects it to the two-burner stove in the kitchen. It is the lifeline of the culinary excursions I launch myself on, on a daily basis for both sustenance and gastronomical purposes; myself and millions of middle-class populace in this part of the world. While 54 percent of India still uses firewood/charcoal/ cowdung for cooking, the urban middle class India relies mainly on LPG, with 60 percent of it being hauled in from Qatar and 40 percent generated locally. In fact,  80,000 tons of LPG, loaded on two freight ships, escorted by 6 navy ships, risked everything to reach India on 17th of March. It was just enough to meet the country's one-day demand! The import of such a basic commodity as that of cooking fuel vis-à-vis the numbers, statistics and geographical constraints it entails is mind-boggling. And, this was brought home to me only recently following the attacks by the U.S. and Israel on Iran and the successive war that has ensued, resulting in the indefinite closure of the Strait of Hormuz for commercial shipping. 

I am reminded of my ancestral home in Punjab which I last visited as a little girl in the eighties. The delicious smell of daal makhani being cooked on an earthern stove burning a mix of cowdung cakes and coal still lingers somewhere within the smouldering embers of memory and traps me in its nostalgic aroma...only to be jettisoned out of it by the rude, vociferous sound of the rufus treepie. "How could nature have created something so guttural and harsh as this bird?" I ask to no one in particular. Outside, stretched between the pillar fronting the porch and the cashew tree, fine glistening threads bouncing off rainbow colours catch my eyes. On closer inspection, they are met with a silver-backed 'signature spider' in the centre of a humongous web, reigning over her gossamer abode. Josie the cat too has fixed her gaze at this incredible display of beauty and twining prowess. Reeling, reeling, reeling under the dappled space, catching the sunbeams and the shadows...spinning in a spatial dimension a spectre of the future. Perfection is what defines it: a cosmos unto itself, it stores within its artistic soul the vision of the most magnificent edifice. An epitome of self-sufficiency, the matrix of its complex creativity is what's wanting in human civilization, however advanced we might be on the spiraling echelon of evolution. Is it a mere coincidence that Mahatma Gandhi chose Charkha, the iconic spinning wheel as an emblem for self-reliance,  dignity, and empowerment? In the years leading to India's independence, the act of spinning was not only representational of a silent protest against the foreign rule, but a way to unite the nation, using only simple, local tools. Charkha  became the 'spider web' to bind a nation together in a self-reliant unit, capable of meeting its own basic needs. 

As is inevitable, the capitalist model  with its emphasis on globalisation, has been slowly gnawing away at the local economy. However, the recent LPG/petroleum crisis  has underscored the urgency of a new paradigm to spur the nation's growth towards greater self-reliance,  at least vis-à-vis its rudimentary needs.  It is about time that India recognised and addressed the  requirement for large-scale implementation of biogas plants, the first prototype of which was successfully designed and built way back in 1957 by the pioneering scientist Dr  Ram Bux Singh. According to a recent report, compressed biogas projects comprise of 132 plants nationwide and have a total production capacity of 920 tonnes per day. This is less than 1 percent of India's estimated potential.  

...the  spider, still as the stabilimentum  it has neatly calligraphed at the center of its web, watches the bee as it gets entangled in its quasi invisible orb. At peace with its surrounding and in sync with its innate wisdom, sweetly it dangles, knowing  that its meal is taken care of.

Notes

stabilimentum: 
a conspicuous silk structure included in the webs of some species of spiders. 

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