Feline fables in Indian culture

The Indian Cat: Stories Paintings, Poetry, and Proverbs

Author: B N Goswamy

Publisher: Aleph

Price: Rs 1,299   Pages: 240

The author, who passed away recently, was universally acknowledged as one of the leading authorities on Indian art. This, the last book he ever wrote, is a departure from his usual oeuvre. It is an examination of the feline factor —the cat motif — that runs through art and literature in our syncre–tistic nation.
 

Although Professor BN Goswamy claims he wasn’t extraordinarily fond of cats as a species, he was obviously more enamoured of them than he was willing to admit. In his preface he says he was struck by the fact that many of his friends across the art world were committed ailurophiles and some even possessed clouders of cats. He was also fascinated by the idea of cats and how they popped up everywhere and the cultural differences in the ways people interacted with them.
 

The book is, as one would expect, deeply scholarly and permeated with the gentle humour that characterised  Goswamy. The subtitle is pretty much a complete description of the content. There are stories drawn from the traditions of various religions. There is art drawn from every kind of Indian source. There is poetry, and there are proverbs and parables. 
 

There are Buddhist fables from the Jatakas, Islamic tales of cats beloved of the Prophet and his followers, references to them in Sanskrit, Prakrit and Pali, and the Egyptian deification of these little hunters. The book also dwells on the horrific persecution of cats in Europe during the Dark Ages. 
 

Egypt is generally reckoned to be the first place where cats were domesticated, though any cat fancier knows that five millennia later, even the most housebound and domestic of cats is still just one leap away from going feral. 
 

According to legend, when ancient Egypt faced famine due to a plague of rats raiding granaries, the cats saved the day. 

This is why they were raised to the pantheon. 
 

Incidentally, Chicago has a highly successful “working cat” programme — strays are relocated into breweries, restaurants, and supermarkets to undertake 21st century versions of the task they performed in Egypt.
 

While Hinduism doesn’t deify cats, they are the vehicle of the Goddess Shashti and by and large, treated affectionately.  Many religious parables and proverbs do deal with a persistent cat stereotype — a sleepy, peaceable cuddlesome creature which can, with one twitch of its whiskers, transform into a deadly, remorseless hunter.
 

Cats often feature in the Jatakas where they display this dualism. This is frankly an unfair anthropomorphic label. Cats are completely non-vegetarian. When they’re not hunting, they sleep a lot, husbanding their energy. They can be very affectionate and lazy when their stomachs are full. It’s an evolutionary trait.
 

There are several Sanskrit expressions which make philosophical cat references. One such is the Marjara Vrata — the cat-disciple. Marjara is one of the Sanskrit words for cat — there are several others including Mekura, which is used in East Bengali dialects. As in the dualism referred to above, the Marjara Vrata is a conspicuously religious individual who has apparently taken vows (vrata) to abjure violence and embrace vegetarianism, until the instant he or she doesn’t. Versions of this have descended into languages like Bengali where bidal tapaswi describes such hypocrites.
 

Another phrase — Marjara Nyaya — was coined to describe one of the ways in which a disciple may develop a relationship with the divine. You may have noticed how mother cats pick up their kittens by the scruff of their necks and move them around.

The kitten goes limp and passive while it is being carried. Bhakts who surrender completely to the divine are 

Marjara Nyaya in their attitude. 
 

Islam and Islamic cultures have always loved cats — probably because the Prophet was fond of them. There is a story about the time he heard the Azaan and discovered his cat Muezza was asleep on the sleeve of his robe. So he cut off the sleeve and put on the mutilated robe rather than disturb his cat. On another occasion he publicly admonished a follower who treated her cat badly.
 

This brings us to the section of the book where I was personally disappointed. Goswamy put together 58 rare Illustrations featuring cats from all sorts of sources and annotated them. The annotations are delightful and the pictures form an extraordinary collection. The issue is inadequate quality of paper and poor reproduction that makes the details in many of these impossible to discern — I went to the extent of looking for high-resolution versions.
 

There’s also a “missing section”. I do wish Goswamy had looked at the cat in modern art and literature and indeed, I’m sure he could have been persuaded to do so, in an expanded edition, if he had still been around. I hope this book is re-issued in a more high-quality format as a tribute to his memory. It would find pride of place on my coffee table for sure.