A primer for future managers
by P.K. Vasudeva
Management Principles and Practices by B. Narayanan. APH Publishing, New Delhi. Pages 245, Rs 600.
IN the field of management, principles keep changing with changing situations, and principles of management are not valid for all situations.

In the middle of society
by Kavita Soni-Sharma
The Great Indian Middle Class by Pavan K. Varma. Viking, New Delhi. Pages 232. Rs 295.
THE Indian middle class has a big problem of identity: what it is, how it is and why it is. It does not know and doesn’t make much of an effort to find out either.
Academics and social science researchers have remained blissfully incurious, indifferent and insensitive to the need of studying the middle class.

India caught in transition trap
by Bhupinder Singh

Indian Modernity: Contradic-tions, Paradoxes and Possibilities by Avijit Pathak. Gyan Publishing House, New Delhi. Pages 243. Rs 325.

FROM Nehru’s famous midnight speech that India was "awakening to freedom", we have come a long way when newspapers tell us every morning that far from awakening, we are still going through an agonising nightmare.

Similarly, Nehru’s vision that "dams are the temples of modern India" has been replaced by ideas that question the very relevance of dams built in the country after independence, on the one hand, and place a Ram temple at the centre of Indian nationhood, on the other.

Analysts are seeking to understand and explain this increasing divergence from the idea of modern India that Nehru and the nationalist elite envisaged and the actual direction events have taken during the past half a century. Primarily, two opposing camps can be identified in this venture.

One of them seeks to question the very relevance of modernity for India. "Unlike in Europe, modernity came to India as primarily an external proposal as a theory and an external agenda as practice" (Sudipto Kaviraj in "The Unhappy Consciousness" 1995); the political elite that came to power in 1947 tried to thrust western notions and institutions down the unwilling throat of India that was so unlike the Europe where these institutions were born.

Proponents of this line of thought urge us to find an Indian "essentialism" and "exceptionism". Some of them trace, if not derive, their ideas from Gandhi who, they affirm, not only took on British colonialism in the political terrain but extended his critique to a civilisational crusade.

"Railways, lawyers and doctors have impoverished the country, so much so that we shall be ruined.... Hospitals are institutions for propagating sins... hatred against the English ought to be transferred to their civilisation...", he urged. Gandhi went on to create his own notion of a future India without industry, without railways, without hospitals and without cities.

Those who claim to derive inspiration from such ideas are not Gandhi-capped village workers, but academicians and university dons both in India and abroad. They have raised neo-Gandhism to almost a fashionable intellectual level. Adherents include Ashish Nandy, Bhiku Parikh, T.N. Madan and Vandana Shiva and their collaborators. Grassroot workers trying to appropriate this aspect of Gandhi’s thought include Sunderlal Bahuguna and Medha Patkar. This group can be called anti-modernist.

The post-modernists led by Partha Chatterjee and certain adherents of the subaltern school claim to oppose what they term as Gandhi’s homogenising project. They belong to that sect of the subalterns that has been heavily influenced by the post-modernist approach that celebrates "fragments" and "parts", in contrast to the "universalism" and the "whole" that they accuse the European Renaissance of fostering and the Indian nationalist elite of furthering. Not only the ruling elite, but the communists also get a bashing from them.

The prescription for India’s rejuvenation from this school lies in strengthening the "fragmented responses to the universalism of modernity", as Partha Chatterjee remarked in his influential work, "The Nation and its Fragments".

The modernists, on the other hand, contest that the problems created or exacerbated during the past 50 years of development suffer not from modernisation, but precisely from its incompletion and insufficiency. The task, therefore, lies in strengthening modernity. While the liberalisers, on the one hand, argue for integrating with the western dominated global markets, the Left calls for radicalisation of the process and a more equitable distribution of the gains of modern development to the poorer sections. Both, liberalisers and the leftists, from the point of modernity, belong to the same camp.

Achin Vanaik, in his "Communalism Contested", has emerged as the most serious and articulate proponent for those who would rather put their eggs in the modernity basket. Sunil Khilani ("The Idea of India") has also produced a somewhat milder defence of Nehru’s modernising project.

"To have modernity or not to have modernity" therefore is the central issue that the two warring camps are fighting for. In this contest between the two powerful armies of intellectuals and practitioners, Avijit Pathak, the author of the book under review, finds himself at the crossroads. In fact, his intention is to pave a third way. But he is not sure.

He recognises that while modernity does offer bountiful gains, it is also not free from its "discontents". The title of the book seems to suggest that while he accepts the desirability of modernity, he also recognises that it is not a fatalistic state. Its realisation does not necessarily lie in transplanting the Europe-grown modern institutions on India which is not a "clean sheet" of paper. (Mao once described China’s backwardness in capitalism as an advantage as it would be easier for socialism to be implanted on the "clean sheet" that China supposedly was). Still, modernity, the title seems to suggests,, holds a number of "possibilities" of transmutation.

"The idea of emancipation was closely linked with the agenda of modernity," he avers. "Emancipation of man from the tyranny of tradition. But then, it is no longer possible to deny that modernity itself may prove to be a trap. Its mega-structures, bureaucracy and irresistible technology often deny man’s authentic autonomy. Because the story of modernity is not simply the story of well-fed, well-clothed men; it is also the story of intense agony — loss of self and communication and relatedness. The fact is that even when Bacon and Decartes shape my mind, my heart cannot escape Gandhi and Ramakrishna. This is my ambiguity, my contradiction... despite this ambiguity, I am becoming more and more inclined to those who critique modernity." This, however, contradicts what the title indicates.

The result is that while the author has brilliantly managed to bring issues to the fore, he falters in the way of providing answers. His prescription of forging a dialogue between modernity and spirituality, resulting in his call for "spiritualisation of economics" and other such contrived jargon fails to lead the reader anywhere. It is, at its best, eclecticism and at worst a forced marriage of unconnected or even contradictory points of view.

The central, and in view of the present reviewer critical, weakness of the book lies in the near complete indifference of the writer to counter contending schools of thought. Thus there is no attempt to examine, for example, Vanaik’s spirited defence of modernity. Vanaik’s case shows the strong critical trend within modernity. The author at best acknowledges this viewpoint with a dismissive nod, and at worst betrays and attitude that refuses to engage in a dialogue with critical modernity. This is indeed strange since the need to engage in a "dialogic" is the author’s leit motif.

The author has an uncanny ability to come up with penetrating insights and in intellectually echoing the tensions inherent in contemporary society. Yet, his approach lacks the "confident restlessness" that Iqbal once spoke of. Instead his flights of inquiry are rather doubtful and apprehensive. All the same, the restlessness is to be unabashedly welcomed.

One can discern a similar contradiction — if not a dilemma — in Gandhi. It lay in the fact that while Gandhi decried the railways, he made use of the railways more than anyone else. While he idealised an ascetic living, his friend G.D. Birla ruefully grumbled that people did not realise how expensive it was to keep Gandhi in poverty. Finally, Gandhi’s dilemma lay in the fact that it was the champion of modernity — Jawaharlal Nehru — and not any Gandhian, whom he nominated to "speak my language when I am no more". This was nothing but Gandhi’s acceptance of modernity in his own manner.

It was also no coincidence that it was the late P.C. Joshi who paid back modernity’s compliment to Gandhi, when he first called Gandhi the father of the nation. Joshi was then the general secretary of the CPI and Gandhi’s unrelenting critic.

An oral story, with Nobel tag
by Manju Jaidka

Baltasar and Blimunda by Jose Saramago and translated from the Portuguese by Giovanni Pontiero. The Harvill Press, London. Pages 436. £ 6.95

SIX months ago, those who were familiar with the name of José Saramago knew him as just another Portuguese writer, some of whose works had been translated into English. It was the 1998 Nobel Prize for Literature that catapulted him into international recognition almost overnight.

Success did not come for the asking to Saramago, whose first major book, "Baltasar and Blimunda," was published in 1982, when he was 60. This was followed by other successes like "The Year of the Death of Ricardo Reis", (1984), "The History of the Siege of Lisbon" (1989), "The Gospel According to Jesus Christ" (1991), and "Blindness: a Novel" (1995). His most recent work is "All the Names". The first book, "Baltasar and Blimunda", however, is generally taken as his best. It is on this novel that Italian composer Corghi has based his opera "Blimunda".

"Baltasar and Blimunda". If Lewis Carroll’s Alice were to leaf through this book, she would not like it. She would wonder how anyone could possibly read a book with no pictures and no conversation. How dull it must be! Alice would toss the novel aside and go looking for more interesting fare. True, this masterpiece by Saramago, does not have any dialogues, any pictures, or anything spectacular. And yet it has an epic quality that raises it above the ordinary.

The novel begins with the story of King Joao V and his spouse Dona Maria, earnestly engaged in nightly rituals to produce a successor. Their efforts are rewarded only after the king makes a vow to build a convent in the town of Mafra. This is the backdrop against which the story is told: Portugal in the 18th century. It is a superstition-ridden country peopled by masses who still believe in miracles. These are times when theological standards are unbending and any deviation from the accepted norm is labelled as sorcery; when scholarship or research is respected only if it is restricted to the realm of the known; when all that is unknown is taken as witchcraft. In this world and time, inquisitions, auto-da-fés, and burnings at the stake are not unfamiliar events.

A soldier returns home from war to such a milieu. A quiet and unobtrusive return: there is no fanfare, no flowers strewn in his path, no people gathered on rooftops. Nothing to commemorate the occasion.

The one who returns is not a conventional war-hero riding home in triumph. He is maimed, having lost his left hand in the war – a hand that is replaced by a metal hook or spike which he carries in his bag constantly. Baltasar is just another nameless, faceless soldier who has fought for the country and paid a price for his loyalty. Or rather, he would have been nameless and faceless if José Saramago had not chosen to give a name to him and narrate his story, showing us how even the seemingly insignificant unknown soldier may live a life filled with extraordinary events.

Baltasar is an unusual name that reminds one of the biblical Balthazar or Belteshazzar, another name of the wise Daniel. But the similarity between the biblical character and Saramago’s protagonist ends here, for the latter does not seem destined for anything but a humble and simple existence.

He seems to represent Everyman living a life of quiet dignity, pushed around occasionally by circumstance, cherishing little joys and comforts with his consort, Blimunda. The binding force of the story is the tender relationship between Baltasar and Blimunda, a love that needs no words to express itself, a love that does not wane as the years roll by.

Blimunda is gifted with the extraordinary power of seeing into the insides of people when she is fasting, an uncanny ability inherited from her mother who, being taken for a witch, had been burnt at the stake.

A third character in the novel, Padre Bartolomeu Lourenco, is called the Flying Man because he had once constructed balloons that could fly and now nurtures the dream of flying one day. (The translator’s note tells us that Lourenco was a historical figure in the reign of Joao V of Portugal, remembered as a pioneer of aviation, who invented an instrument "that could travel through the air over land and sea." He had constructed a rudimentary airship that was called "La Passarola".)

Like Blimunda, Lourenco is simply different, living on a plane far above the normal. While Baltasar and Blimunda are comparable to Mary and Joseph, wandering from place to place, often on a donkey and often shown in a stable, the biblical overtones are reinforced by Lourenco, who completes this Trinity.

Lourenco, Baltasar, and Blimunda are brought together by a dream that seems impossible – the dream of constructing a flying machine. Where would it get its energy from? From "human wills" which Blimunda, with her extraordinary powers, would gather. This is an idea hard to explain in contemporary times, but in Saramago’s fictional world it seems perfectly logical and valid.

The vision of the three characters takes shape slowly as they construct the Passarola on a remote estate, away from inquisitive eyes. When, however, the task is completed and the three take their first test flight, an anti-climax follows: fearing an Inquisition (in times when flying is synonymous with witchcraft), the priest flees the country and Baltasar and Blimunda disappear into anonymity, returning to Mafra, Baltasar’s parental home.

At this point the story of Baltasar and Blimunda merges with the other story running parallel through the novel: Joao V’s construction of a shrine in Mafra to thank the high heavens for granting him a successor. Baltasar takes on a labourer’s job at the site where the shrine is being built but makes periodic visits in secrecy to the Passarola which rests on a secluded mountain top, camouflaged by thick foliage. He keeps the machine in good order and repairs the damages caused by wind and rain.

From one such trip, however, Baltasar does not return. As the result of an accident, the binding ropes are loosened and the great mechanical bird breaks free, soaring into the sky, taking the maimed soldier along. A tearful Blimunda is left behind, searching high and low for her husband. And when she does find him one day, he is at a bonfire, being publicly burnt for sorcery.

This is what the book is about: a haunting love-story in a particular time and place. But, coming back to Alice’s unanswered query – "And what is the use of a book without pictures or conversations?" – one is faced with the same question on reading "Baltasar and Blimunda". The story is narrated in an unconventional manner, without any dialogues and sometimes without even punctuation marks. There are long and rambling sentences, unannounced changes in the narratorial voice, and sudden shifts of perspective. What, then, is so special about the book or about the author? Why are they rated so high?

In the first place, Saramago takes on the traditional role of a story-teller and tells a story without being clever or fantastical: a plain, simple story without any artifice, without any superfluous embellishments. It is this simplicity and honesty that goes straight to the heart and lingers on. The narrative seems to flow as in the oral tradition, one long rambling tale, winding in and out, flowing from one episode to the next.

The author does not pause to indulge in verbal pirouettes or stylistic gymnastics. Nor does he gloss over metaphors and similes to conjure elaborate conceits out of them. Story-telling, for Saramago, is not a private or whimsical affair that the novelist may indulge in, which critics may subsequently spend a lifetime deciphering. For him, apparently, a tale must be narrated in the simplest, most comprehensible manner.

Therefore, Saramago borrows several features from the oral tradition. "Baltasar and Blimunda" is a stringing together of several loosely related episodes and incidents, yet there is a structural circularity in the whole. The narratorial voice remains more or less consistent even though it keeps changing from first person singular to plural, often addressing the reader/listener directly, at times pausing to offer a comment or two on the story that is being told. The tone is at times easy and conversational when focused on specific incidents, at other times it has an incantatory quality. Sometimes it slows its pace to describe the mire and filth through which the characters must toil; on other occasions it soars high into the skies with the Passarola.

At all times, however, the writer remains in control. He does not allow the tale to carry him away. There is no hysteria or unbalanced sentiment in his narration. In fact, one could speak of a distancing: like the traditional bard who can see the past, present, and the future, Saramago writes from a perspective which enables him to see the whole of his partly fictional/partly factual world. Such are the strengths of the author’s craft.

The story of Baltasar and Blimunda seems to get its power from the rhythms of the cosmos which it invokes constantly. The two main characters are nicknamed after the sun and the moon. There are repeated references to the wind, the rain, to cyclical motions of time, to the earth, the heavens and the sky. The characters, too, are almost literally suspended between earth and sky, either daring to construct a shrine that attempts to rise high above the earth into the heavens, or building a flying machine that would dare to take them into the limitless blue skies.

In the attempt to fly into the skies one may detect the Lucifer motif or, more appropriately, the Icarus pattern: human aspirations daring to dream, foraging into the unknown. And, of course, paying a price for the dream. Baltasar’s fate reminds us that such is man’s lot. All the while the heavens remain unperturbed, always beckoning, always tempting man to soar higher and higher. That man’s reach should exceed his grasp or what else is the heaven for? This is what the author seems to suggest.

After putting the book aside, the reader is left with a lingering impression of a pair of lovers wrenched apart: he flying high somewhere in the mysterious spaces above, she roaming the world aimlessly, weeping, wailing, searching for a lost love.

In the middle of society
by Kavita Soni-Sharma

The Great Indian Middle Class by Pavan K. Varma. Viking, New Delhi. Pages 232. Rs 295.

THE Indian middle class has a big problem of identity: what it is, how it is and why it is. It does not know and doesn’t make much of an effort to find out either.

Academics and social science researchers whose bounden job is to investigate questions about social formations have remained blissfully incurious, indifferent and insensitive to the need of studying the middle class. This is not to say that the university-based social scientists research any other subject of social importance!

Yet, we need to be thankful to the lazy dons because their inactivity saves us the bother of reading the rather tedious, uninspiring, uninformative and unreliable prose that comes out of university departments. It is in this context of academic indifference that Pavan Varma’s book on the middle class is doubly welcome. One, because it gives us some information about a class which has become dominant in India today. And two, because it is very readable, unlike the texts of university-based researchers.

Varma certainly realises that he is from the middle class, is also aware that this class seems to dominate our society today. He is also sensitive to the numerous problems faced by the people, society and nation. Following from this, he comes to the rather easy conclusion that the problems are those created by the middle class and that it is for the middle class to solve them.

Such self-flagellation, of course, is part of the syndrome witnessed during war where the survivor of a battle blames himself rather than the war for not having been able to help his comrades survive.

Given the fact that the Indian social reality at the moment is full of problems and the fact that the middle class seems to be doing rather well, or at least better than other social classes, despite the problems, there comes a tendency to blame the middle class for the problems themselves. For not having done enough to solve the problems.

The point to note is that Varma’s conclusion is widely shared by many other members of his class, including the media. The conclusion itself may be incorrect and partial, but its popularity remains.

But then it should be noted that Varma deals with a difficult subject. His is a pioneering work. Scholarly analyses of Indian society have virtually ignored the existence of the middle class while studying the social, political and economic aspects of society. Either this class is dismissed for being of no consequence, or its presence is presumed almost unquestioningly.

Admittedly the middle class emerged as the result of the spurious tertiarisation of the economy in colonial times and tended to dominate the government. Mabye that is why it earned considerable scholarly disdain.

Hence with the exception of Professor Misra’s writing, there is very little to go by directly on the history and nature of India’s middle classes though a substantial amount of information can be gained from works which address general matters of politics, economics and society.

As it is, it has never been easy to define what class is. At the same time, popular belief persists that anyone with a sharp sense of society would be able to identify class. As an identifier of social division, this word comes from antiquity where the people of Rome were divided into divisions, classis (plural classes), according to property.

In its analytical sense the word "class" was first used in the 17th century when animals and plants were put into classes. It was in the 19th entry, subsequent to the writings of Karl Marx, that "class" came to acquire an analytical sense vis-a-vis human society.

Development of class in its modern social sense with relatively fixed names for particular classes (lower class, middle class, upper class, working class and so on) is said to belong essentially to the period between 1770 and 1840, which is also the period of the industrial revolution and the decisive reorganisation of society that happened as a consequence.

The essential history of the introduction of class, as a word which would supersede older names for social divisions, related to the increasing awareness that social position was made rather than merely inherited, in the sense of people obtaining social position through their own efforts rather than the efforts of their ancestors.

Social classes were de facto rather than de jure groups; they were relatively open, not closed. Their basis was indisputably economic but they were more than economic groups. They were characteristic groups of industrial societies which had developed since the 17th century.

Considerable difficulties rose when an attempt was made to specify the number of social classes or to define their membership precisely.

The problem of identifying the middle class was even greater because its analytical existence seemed very elusive to analysts. Neither income, nor professional, nor social criteria could be easily identified to give a face to the middle class. And yet one could feel its tangible existence.

Perhaps the only two common elements about those coming from the middle class were that they were neither manual workers or peasants nor aristocrats. Also that almost all of them were educated, many of them with an English language education. Beyond this, there was no visible, tangible commonality. And yet these two elements of commonality were enough to make it possible to feel the middle class.

Now, at a time when the size of the Indian middle class is growing with more and more people from the non-middle class joining it as part of their own upward mobility, Varma is unnecessarily getting worried that a revolt against the middle class may be in the offing.

A major social change certainly seems to be round the corner but the nature of change is much different from what Varma considers it to be, and it is primarily reflected in the embourgeoisement of Indian society rather than in the rising social and income disparities.

But to explain all that one would have to write a book contending Varma’s argument. It is precisely for this reason and the fact that Varma has opened up a serious discussion on the role of the middle class in India that his book is a welcome addition to anyone’s study.

A primer for future managers
by P.K. Vasudeva

Management Principles and Practices by B. Narayanan. APH Publishing, New Delhi. Pages 245, Rs 600.

IN the field of management, principles keep changing with changing situations, and principles of management are not valid for all situations. It is better to use the term "guidelines" rather than "principles". They are two sets of useful generalisations about those factors which make for success in management. Managers always clamour for the latest information and appropriate guidelines to help solve problems which arise in day-to-day working. Management principles or guidelines help them in decision making, solving problems, designing processes or resolving behaviour conflicts.

The author has offered a number of definitions of "management" right from the work of Henry Fayol at the turn of the century, which he says are not adequate. He has evolved a comprehensive definition. "The process of allocating an organisation’s inputs (human and economic resources) by planning, organising, directing and controlling for the purpose of producing outputs (goods and services) desired by its customers so that organisation objectives are accomplished. In the process, work is performed with and through organisation personnel in an ever changing business environment." Some management teachers may not like this definition, but it does include the essential features of the management school.

In chapter "Development of Management Principles and Practices", the author has traced the process right from Egyptian Papyri, Christianity, the Catholic Church, to modern management. He starts with scientific management, functional management, human relations management, behavioural science management, quantitative approach systems and contingency approaches to management. All these approaches to management have been discussed threadbare.

In "Management: theory and practice", the author has dealt with in detail the functions of management — planning, organising, staffing, leading and controlling. Thus, the concepts, principles, theories and techniques are organised around these functions. Though other management experts do not use these classifications, the author’s classification has the advantage of being comprehensive, divisible into parts to permit logical analysis, and in the way most perceptive managers see them. It also sharply distinguishes managerial tasks from non-managerial ones, such as finance, production and marketing and permits concentration on the basis of the job of managers as managers. The author has also explained the principles of casual relations in a realistic manner.

The system of controlling has assumed great importance in management, hence there is a separate chapter. Controls are the reverse side of the coin of planning. First, managers plan; then plans become the standards by which the desired actions are measured. This simple truth means several things in practice. The author had given three basic steps in the control process: (i) establishing standards, (ii) measuring performance against these standards, and (iii) correcting deviations from standards and plans.

In the chapter "The nature of planning", the author has highlighted four major principles: contribution to purpose and objectives, primacy of planning, pervasiveness of planning and efficiency of plans. On plans, the author gives reasons as to why they are not successful, because the mission of the managers is not clear. For example, the mission of business is generally production and distribution of economic goods and services. The mission of the state highway department is the design, building and operation of a system of highways. The mission of the courts is the interpretation of laws and their application. The mission of a university is teaching and research. In case these missions are not kept in view while carrying out the tasks, the whole plan will go haywire.

On the "Nature of organising", the author talks of formal and informal organisations and explains them in detail. He finds that the essence of formal organisation comes into focus when persons (i) are able to communicate with one another, (ii) are willing to act, and (iii) share a common purpose. Bernard regarded as informal organisation any joint personal activity without a conscious joint purpose, even though possibly contributing to joint results.

"The human factor in enterprises " plays a significant role in the management field. The author says individuals are much more than merely a productive factor in management/manager’s plans. They are members of social systems of many organisations; they are consumers of goods and services and thus vitally influence demand; they are members of families, schools and churches; and they are citizens. In these different roles, they establish laws that govern managers, ethics that guide behaviours and a tradition of human dignity that is a major characteristic of our society.

The chapter on "Future development of management principles and practices" the author has laid emphasis on the changes in public opinion, in government-business relations, in organisation and management, and an approach to improve management practices and changes in work force management. All these changes have been discussed in detail by the author.

This book will give management practitioners an insight into management roles and approaches in other areas as well.

Home rule according to shastras
by M.L. Sharma

Vaastu by Sashikala Ananth. Viking/ Penguin India, New Delhi. Pages 195+xi. Rs 295.

VAASTU, the classical Indian science of architecture and design, has gained wide acceptance in recent days. It is a philosophy of building which cares most for the natural environment and physical, emotional and spiritual needs of the people occupying a house.

Shashikala Ananth believes that the order of the inner self manifests as the outer order and this, in turn, shapes those who come in touch with it. She says, "the inward and outward balance of energy results in a serenity of the inner self of the individual and a harmonious symbiotic flow with nature in the outer consciousness".

"Shilpam" (sculpture) is the creation of form within space as form can evolve by the movement of energy in space, and the vehicle for the expression of such an energy is obtained from the rhythmic vibration of numerical and orderly effort.

The author defines architecture (prasada) as a shilpam (sculpture) containing space and an ultimate expression of numbers. Vaastu pertains to physical, psychological and spiritual order of the built environment, in consonance with the cosmic energies.

It is this blending and mingling of personal energy, discipline (sadhna), attentiveness (shradha), taala or timing (order), rasa or enjoyment, anubhava (experience) and beauty which shape a form so sublime as to attract attention. Rythm and balance in the design create an effect of a poem, unfolding just as in Srirangam temple in the south.

In the second chapter, "Design concept", she deals with the psyche of the designer as in all aspects of Vaastu the personal serenity of the designer is communicated in his work and he is able to bring a remarkable change in the consciousness of the occupants.

A house, she says, built with a meditative response, out of a sensitive understanding of the environment and the inner order, will certainly sustain and benefit the users in their own life.

In the chapter, "Philosophies and practices of Vaastu", she explains that in every design the stillness of "Shivam" and the manifesting energy of "Shakti" have to be equally present. Every occupant in a properly built house experiences both the stillness and the movement. The central axis runs through every building and when left unbuilt and open on ends, this brings about prosperity to and the well-being of the occupants.

The chapter, "Design methodology", deals with the building plans and the author feels that the proportion of the rectangle is most significant. The door is a symbol of the psyche of the occupiers and by making it ornamental, we can create a magical effect. As he crosses the door, a visitor is transported to the inner universe of the family unit. That is why in the past the entrance door was treated with great sanctity.

A simple house, she says, can be made unique by adding ornamental elements using readily available materials like glass pieces and white clay and this will add a personal aesthetic touch.

The book is well produced, written in chaste English, supplemented with fine illustrations and may prove to be of immense value to Vaastu consultants and architecture students alike.

* * *

"Reiki" by Paula Horan is another in a series of good books produced by Full Circle to enlighten the lay man with the principles of this science. As the second title of the book suggests, Reiki is a dependable guide to the users for a lifetime.

Horan gives answers to 108 questions relating to Reiki practice. Already well-established as a writer on Reiki, she has a specific objective in writing this book. "In this book," she says, "I hope to help a broader public by dispelling a lot of disinformation that I am confronted with in my own Reiki classes."

In answer to the question, "What is Reiki", she observes that it is the fundamental nature or substratum of the universe and the "Usui" method of natural healing is an easy way of giving back to yourself more of what you already fundamentally are: universal life force energy. "You literally recharge yourself with that, which at the deepest level, you have always been."

Reiki aims at freer vibrations of energy because denser vibrations make us experience discomfort or disease. By the laying of hands obstructions are removed, paving the way for a free flow of vibrations.

Answering another question, she says every position on the body is a possible Reiki hand position, so there are no set rules of what can and cannot be treated. Reiki energy will always be drawn where it is most needed in the body so there is no need to worry about putting your hands on a "wrong" position.

She follows Ms Takata in her Reiki practices. She generally starts her treatment by placing her palms over the eyes and at the same time covering the sinuses and the "third eye" or pineal gland. Then she places her hands on the temples, ears and occipital lobes at the base of the skull. By placing one hand over both occipital lobes and the other over the forehead, headaches, stresses and tensions are removed. In an interesting way, she responds to a question by observing that Reiki can be given to a car or boat or computer to keep it in good shape.

Paula Horan believes that the more you use Reiki, the more you raise your life force energy. As one is able to raise the vibratory frequency of one’s physical and etheric bodies, dense or "negative" vibrations cannot enter. She believes that there is no "good" or "bad", "right" or "wrong" people. There are only conscious people and unconscious ones. Evil deeds are done by those who are fast asleep.

She feels that daily practice of Reiki helps one become a more loving, "heart-centred person" and Reiki also helps in meditation by quieting the mind.

In an appendix running into 25 pages she covers such topics as full body treatment and its effects on the endoctrine system.