ABSTRACT
This chapter is about Basavaṇṇa, the distinguished vacanakāra, the one who wrote Vachana, a kind of free verse, who confronts us suddenly in the 12th century. Vachana also means promise and assurance. Suggesting that he probably cautioned and sought to prepare India when it was on the verge of foreign invasion, the chapter seeks to answer the difficult question: could India have retained its originality and identity and made greater creative contributions had it received the egalitarian Basavaṇṇa as he well deserved?
The term śaraṇa, by which Basavaṇṇa and all the followers of their movement refer to themselves, is probably a literal translation of the word ‘Islam’. The chapter does not tread into the controversial territory of what forces his movement was pitted against. It is mainly concerned with explaining how he tried to caution and inject creativity into a hierarchical society which had lost its dynamism: his stress on creativity is rooted in equality. This is a reading of India’s socio-cultural reality, suggesting that the country is not ready yet to affirm dynamism and creativity and that many of its difficulties spring from this unwillingness. It is an equally bitter truth that most Indian languages are yet to arrive at such a reading of their situations.
