Rajiv Mudgal’s Trilogy: From Sat to the Pole of the Polis
Rajiv Mudgal’s Trilogy: From Sat to the Pole of the Polis
-Narrated by Shaily Mudgal
In Devtaon ka Maun (translated as The Gods Have Gone Silent), the central concern is “Sat.”
“Sat meaning truth, being, or existence is the undeniable presence that precedes all understanding and measurement. This presence is not a matter of belief or interpretation, and unlike symbols or metaphors, which point beyond themselves, Sat requires no explanation. It does not represent something else; it simply ‘is’. Also, this presence is not something we can fragment with the tools of abstraction or thought.” (from The Gods Have Gone Silent, p. 210 PDF)
Scientific methods, like the ones used in science and mechanics, often rely on measurement, which assumes a subject-object relationship. But Sat transcends such dualities. It is the indivisible ground of all phenomena, encompassing both subject and object, existing as the totality within which measurement and division occur. Quantum mechanics, in its pursuit of dividing reality into particles, forces, and mathematical abstractions, risks overlooking this seamless unity. The Upanishadic presence reminds us of the limitations of such reductionism, urging us to perceive the wholeness of existence. To truly understand the world, we must recognize that we are already immersed in truth—in the “is” of existence—and that this “is” precedes and underpins all attempts to measure or understand it. Being, or “isness,” is not a phenomenon that can be dissected or grasped through measurement, for it is the ground of all phenomena.
In Reflections in the River: Kālidāsa’s Letters to Dignāga, the concern shifts to the loss of poetic sight. Reflections in the River: Kālidāsa’s Letters to Dignāga presents a fictional epistolary dialogue between the classical Sanskrit poet Kālidāsa and the Buddhist logician Dignāga, exploring the tension between poetic immediacy—intuitive, holistic recognition—and analytical fragmentation, the logical assembly of reality. Drawing on Vedic poetics, the work critiques structured philosophical systems as self-contained “dramas” that imprison individuals within conceptual loops, advocating instead an unmediated experience of wholeness where reality “just is.”
Mudgal describes such systems as self-referential “dramas” built on imaginative scaffolding, lacking external evidence beyond their own loops. They fragment reality into causes and effects, dependent not on an objective “isness” but on their own conceptual architecture. In RIR, Kālidāsa argues that reality is neither an “external construct” nor a “hidden absolute”; it is immediate and whole, requiring no metaphysical scaffolding. Sat here is not dissected into phenomena—as in the reductionism of quantum mechanics, which Mudgal critiques for overlooking unity—but remains the seamless “is” that underpins all, beyond subject–object division. This Being or “isness” cannot be measured, for it is the totality itself—immersing us, as Mudgal says, in truth that precedes understanding, language and measurement.
He calls attention to the “tyranny of measurement” in modernity, which reduces essence to quantifiable parts, aligning with the drama of self-reinforcing systems. On page 131, Letter 35 dismantles both Buddhism and Vedānta for assuming structural concepts—momentariness or Maya—while poetic sight, he suggests, requires no such scaffolding.
Momentariness, Mudgal concedes, is a philosophical model rather than a dogma—an attempt to explain change, suffering, and the absence of a permanent self, guiding the practitioner toward liberation (nirvāṇa). Yet he interprets it as a speculative edifice: “a theory and a rubbing of it,” likened to entering a constructed universe and observing from within. The theory of momentariness, with its aggregates arising and ceasing in causal chains, becomes a kind of drama—a scaffolding sustained by Buddhist assumptions of impermanence, offering no proof beyond meditative or logical self-reference. Mudgal calls this self-referential. The “strata” that sustain the illusion of continuity—memory, karma—are, for him, imaginative constructions rather than expressions of undeniable Sat.
This recursive self-referencing, he writes, feels like entering a “verse” of illusion. His response is to dismantle the drama and return to unframed presence. No system—just is of isness. Despite overlaps, Mudgal’s approach diverges by treating all systems, including Advaita, as “dramas” built on unexamined scaffolding. He privileges unframed poetic experience over doctrinal frameworks.
Mudgal’s boldest claim is that all structured thought—Buddhism, Islam, Christianity, or modernity—is a self-contained drama rather than reality itself. Dignāga remains within the Buddha’s scaffolding, refining perception without ever challenging the fundamental tenets of suffering, impermanence, and non-self. Similarly, Islamic revelation, Christian salvation, and scientific materialism each presuppose their own foundations, building self-reinforcing loops that never step beyond their conceptual boundaries. Christianity, for example, centers on sin, failing to perceive a purity that requires no redemption. Mudgal insists that reality needs no system at all—when one feels wind as nourishing breath rather than measurable air pressure, one encounters its unframed, immediate essence.
For Mudgal, Dignāga’s epistemology is possible only within the structure the Buddha established. Though he refines the processes of perception and inference, he never questions the Buddhist premise that suffering, impermanence, and non-self define reality. His philosophy thus remains within the Buddha’s scaffolding, reinforcing it through logical precision. Likewise, Islamic scholars remain within the framework of revelation and submission, Christian theologians within that of salvation and sin, and modern scientists within materialism and empirical measurement. Each assumes its own foundation as absolute, constructing worlds upon unexamined premises. Islam and Christianity structure reality around salvation—centering on sin, obedience, and divine authority—while modernity constructs one around progress, demanding perpetual motion even when it leads to devastation.
The Light of Light responds to the political, social, and spiritual crises of a fragmented world, proposing a way to live and govern within it. Reflections in the River, by contrast, diagnoses the root cause of that fragmentation: a deep, historical “clash of knowing” that has fundamentally altered human perception. As Mudgal writes, “Just as fire is the pole of the ritual—its luminous centre—the inner awareness or Sat as the ‘Light of Light,’ must be the pole of the polis: the living axis around which laws, institutions, and human fellowship revolve. Without this inner pole, politics becomes procedural—an orbit without a sun. Thus, every true society must keep alive the fire at its centre—the pole of the polis—lest its institutions circle an absence: a ritual without radiance, a fire without warmth. The Light of Light is not merely personal illumination; as Indra, it is the pole of the polis—the unseen axis that gives democracy its soul. Without that inner light, freedom decays into noise and ritual into routine.” (from The Light of Light, p. 13)
Further, the Light of Light identifies the problem as anṛta (disorder) stemming from a “dimming of inner light.” Its solution is socio-political: the establishment of a “Polis of Light” centered on a spiritual axis (the “pole of the polis”) and guided by enlightened leadership (rājadharma).
Reflections in the River goes a level deeper. It argues that the “dimming of inner light” is a direct consequence of a civilizational shift in how we know what we know. The political problems in The Light of Light are a direct result of the epistemic failure detailed in Reflections in the River.
Fragmentation of Reality: Reflections warns of a future where “industrial intelligence rises… slicing language into data, dissolving thought into calculations”. This leads to a world where “forests crumbling into statistics, rivers dissolving into commodities”. This atomized, Dignāga-like worldview is precisely what creates the conditions for the crises in The Light of Light. When a river is seen merely as a “water resource” and not a living presence, it becomes easy to pollute it, leading to the ecological and spiritual collapse that The Light of Light seeks to address.
Both texts use the powerful allegory of a runaway train, but they focus on different aspects of the crisis, which highlights their relationship.
In The Light of Light, the focus is on the train’s direction and purpose. The problem is that the train is in “aimless motion,” hurtling forward without a spiritual destination. The solution is to re-anchor the track to a “pole of the polis” to give it a true and stable direction.
In Reflections in the River, the focus is more fundamental—it is on the passengers’ perception. The problem is not just that the train is moving without a destination, but that the passengers are joyfully inside, consumed by the mechanics of the train (“measurement,” “data,” “logic”). They have forgotten how to look out the window and see the world as a whole. The train is propelled by “pure momentum” precisely because this inner capacity for recognition has been lost.
The solution in Reflections is therefore more radical. It is not enough to simply re-route the train; one must shatter the illusion that the train is the only reality. It calls for a return to “poetic sight” to remember “that the ground was always beneath us”.
In conclusion, Reflections in the River diagnoses the epistemic roots of fragmentation that The Light of Light addresses socio-politically, urging a reclamation of holistic “poetic sight” before any societal reform.
