#Wayanad.
Acrylic on Canvas Board with Palette Knife.
My first with Palette knife and acrylic. A demanding media requiring quick work. I think I fared all right for a first!
This painting is part of #ArtForACause fundraising series with Dr Sekar Michael and Dr. PA Suresh at ICCONS , #Shoranur for children suffering from #CerebralPalsy ,#Autism and #MovementDisorders
#Art
#Painting
#Fundraising
Wayanad Acrylic on Canvas with Palette Knife #ArtForACause
#Art
#Painting
Delighted to announce an Art Project with Dr. Suresh (Director , Neurologist , ICCONS) , Dr. Sekar Michael ( Pediatric Anesthetist, ICCONS) and Dr. Easwar TR (Pediatric Orthopedic & Spine Surgeon , ICCONS) as fund raising campaign for treatment of children with #CerebralPalsy, Movement Disorders, Chronic Pain and #Autism. This will be an ongoing project.
First day was today. Wonderful experience at ICCONS, Shoranur.
Lovely to see that many of the staff from Speech and Audiology participated as well.
We plan to improve this in the next iteration and pool all the paintings we paint ( Dr. Suresh, Dr. Sekar and myself ) to help build a fundraiser.
We will be holding these painting sprints at frequent intervals.
#
ArtForACause
#Art
#Painting
An afternoon walk across my backyard where there is an old well inspired this. I had just strolled amongst the tall grass which grows and almost kicked the rusted neglected bucket `.
Sudden inspiration followed and I composed this poem about neglect of what was once useful, now neglected, still owned, but not cared or sought after. Its rusted, unused, leaking but we still had not disposed it : much like our old and aged who worked their heart out but are now neglected in their own homes, un-listened to, if I may refer to it that way.
Happiness, as in the context of a Hindu (a cultural, subcontinental cultural expression, rather than a narrow religious term) is something that was thought about my the brightest minds.
Essays,Books, Schools, Religions have been built and nurtured on it’s name. Avatars created, Saints glorified.
Yet, for an average human in present day world with it’s plentiful amenities and material distractions, happiness seems as elusive as before; sometimes more so. The Hindu always felt its something that comes from within, our very nature, its always there, not something that’s got from outside. Our cravings, which trouble our mind and if obtained satisfy it merely gives us temporary mental satisfaction which subsides the waves of restlessness in our Chitta (A yogic term, mind-space would be a close translation) which allows the pre-existing happiness to shine through.
A Hindu, views all material happiness as temporary and bitter sweet since all material pursuits are attaching us with action and thoughts in the direction which opens us up for Karma.
So for a Hindu, happiness is our native state which we have muddled with our desires and pursuits.
Of Happiness
It is a time of churn in India, as anywhere else in the world.
The old secular , leftist and liberal schools which was built learning upon the lessons of The World Wars, the Revolutions of Russia, France, the thoughts of Marx, Mao, Lenin and Stalin gradually had gone stale. What once helped the oppressed people solve their day to day issues had become in some cases initiator of violence or oppression themselves. The Right meanwhile is more appealing to people as it promises to take people back to the Good-Old-Days. It promises the glory days.
For almost 6 decades after independence of India the Left Parties, Leftist policies where popular. Over time, increasing conflicts between the once shunned Right and the ubiquitous Left are common place. Narratives are built with cases of return to old glory in the case of Right and of oppression or class struggle in the case of Left.
The society seems to swing between one form of violence and injustice to another, swinging past the midpoint of peace. While this seems to be a post World War phenomenon, in reality, the fight between thought schools are not new; at least to the South of India. Indian Civilization being so ancient, it has seen similar days in the past. It has lived and survived these to tell its tales.
Examples of how the Jains and Buddhists – The Heterodox systems- had frequent conflicts with Shaivas (Worshippers of Lord Shiva ) and Vaishnavas (Worshippers of Lord Vishnu ) – the Orthodox systems – are detailed in Tamil Scripture of Periya Puranam. There are even descriptions of impalement, immersion in lime, drowning a saint in ocean tied to rope, and several such mass attempts at conversion to a school of thought. Well, if one looks critically at these, convert-or-perish instances of those times, it was no different from the crimes committed by the IS terrorists now where they behead non-Islamists. Yet, these beliefs co-existed, albeit with friction, with royal patronage to a particular school of thought. The Royals were rarely ‘secular’ , to use today’s terminology. Yet, there seems to be times in past where the saints seem to come from all stratas of society and they were respected equally. In Periyapuranam and elsewhere in South Indian history, there are references to a number of saints who have come from humble social backgrounds ( which now belong to oppressed social classes ) and are equally respected – and in some cases more – by the peer saints and followers alike. This does seem strange when we consider that South India actually required a Temple Entry proclamation to allow the commoners from “lower castes” to enter the temples again in 19-20 century. This was about 500 years after the saints from the very same castes were actually venerated. So we really are not sure when the social degradation happened. One thing is certain. Depending on ones ideology – left or right, one can choose to go back to either a past where caste oppression and persecution existed or to one where they apparently did not . I use the word ‘apparent’ because here I have to go by the scriptural records and not actual rock edicts themselves.
[ Some terminologies I use in the poem I am translating here to stimulate further reading : 'Austere Potter' : Saint Thiru Neelakanta Kuyavanar, first saint listed by Saint Sundarar in his list of 63 'Shepherd' : Saint Sri Thirumoolar, composer of Thirumanthiram 'Toddy and fish loving incarnation' : Sri Mutthappan, Kannur, Kerala 'Fearless tiger mounted battlegod of yore' : Sri Ayyappan of Sabarimala, Kerala 'lowly ox' : Ochira Parabrahmam, Ochira, Kerala 'first monist' : Adi Sankara , Kaladi , Kerala composer of Manisha Panchakam ]
Recent rise of right wing in India has witnessed renewed conflict between Left and Right at various levels ; political and otherwise. Some of these have been peaceful, but many especially in the district of Kannur, Kerala State has been especially bloody. The once popular Left movement in India is on the wane as it is losing state after another. The right on the other hand is on the rise. Probably the Left has moved away from the minds of people and Right is occupying the space.
It would be nice if there is no violence and lasting peace. My wish.
Cry of the Zealot
It was a wonderful experience to be part of the team that organised #WorldCerebralPalsyDay event to bring parents, children, caregivers, NGOs, Doctors, Therapists, Counsellors together for a day and have fun and enrich themselves.
The event was organised by Lifecare #Physiotherapy Centre, #Palakkad, Kerala along with #Sevabharathi, #Kerala at Thrupthi Hall in the centre of town.
The choice of centre was superb as it was right in centre of town allowing easy transit for children coming in from rural areas and those with limited mobility.
We assembled at the centre around 10 am and crowd had already trickled in at that time. In another hour about 40 children, parents, caregivers and health care professionals had assembled. The inauguration was a minimal affair with Dr. Sreeram Shankar starting the welcome address with respects paid to the almighty and the parents who had taken time to get here. This was followed by a medical camp by me, a painting competition and a singing competition for the children. There was a talk after that by Dr. Deepa, Psychaitrist, District Hospital, Palakkad which was followed by my parental awareness on treating #CerebralPalsy children.
Cerebral Palsy Event inaugural address by Mr. Kalyanaraman, Palakkad, Sevabharathi
It was a red-alert day in many places for #Kerala because of fear of inclement weather. However, rain stayed away largely apart from slight drizzle. That was a relief.
About 40 children took part in the celebrations, competitions, talks and counselling sessions. It was well appreciated by all, many who are experiencing this for the first time.
Positive vibes which would rub off into the child’s care was the key. Parents took strength from one another and participated in the awareness session. Many misconceptions about Cerebral Palsy, Seizure Disorder, Autism, Global Developmental Delay were cleared.
We are planning sessions throughout this month and hopefully improve the quality and participation of these events in the next iteration.
#WorldCerebralPalsyDay is afoot. Like last year, I am planning to conduct month long events across Palakkad and Shoranur to raise parental awareness on treatment of #CerebralPalsy.
Most of the parents who come for care of their children come late, unfortunately with joint contractures, hip subluxations, alteration in knee mechanics and foot deformities. Aside from these the problems these children have with upper limbs, hands and doing activities.
Many of these children have uncontrolled seizures, terrible difficulties communicating, speaking out their issues apart from ambulation. Ambulation may in fact be least of their issues. This sad fact goes to show how important early referral is and how important it is to enroll the child under a care of a Pediatric Neurologist, Pediatric Physiotherapist who can then co-ordinate care with their colleagues in Pediatric Orthopedics, Pediatric Medicine, Occupational Therapy, Speech Pathology, Audiology etc ..
Cerebral Palsy care is a great team effort. No part of the team is greater than other, but the role of the General Practitioner / Pediatric Medicine Doctor, Pediatric Physiotherapist is central, at least in India. They determine the sole referral entity, a person with whom the parents spend their maximum time and trust with. They are the ones in whom they confide most of their issues with.
World Cerebral Palsy Day is a wonderful concept to reinforce these simple care giving principles. Parent education and empowerment being central to the cause of care of these children. Like 2017, we are organising activities across the district of Palakkad – in Palakkad town and neaby rural areas and Shoranur town to educate parents and also conduct early detection and intervention camps to identify children who need care.
World Cerebral Palsy Day – at Palakkad and Shoranur, 2018
These activities would be done throughout Ocotober 2018 under aegis of the Cerebral Palsy Clinic at Rajiv Gandhi Cooperative Hospital & Research Centre and ICCONS, Shoranur
Contact Numbers for Clinic bookings and more information:
Had a lovely day at @PySangamam where I presented my experiences developing @aushadha_emr #ElectronicMedicalRecords or #EMR . Attaching below are some pictures of the event. https://t.co/hJteYzw822
I was pleasantly surprised on how open the crowd and organisers were to a talk delivered by a developer who’s primarily a doctor. It was organised beautifully and thanks specially Mr. Vijayakumar , Mr Abhishek and his team for all the encouragement.
Looking forward to #pysangamam next year at #Coimbatore , my home town
My Presentation : Creating Pluggable Electronic Medical Records
Git Hub : AuShadha Open Source Electronic Medical Records
https://www.linkedin.com/feed/update/urn:li:activity:6443989732329394176
India’s tryst with Yoga is deep rooted in symbolism and runs deep into its spiritual classics, poetry, theory, ritualistic practice, grand-mother story telling and visual art forms. The pervasive, repetitive and at times outwardly silly, unreal, mythical symbolism is probably one of the factors that has prevented the pillages, marauders and missionaries from destroying what India now offers to the world. They probably thought its too silly to be having anything worth annihilating.
Breath, the Monkey mind are common symbolisms in the epic written by sage Valmiki – The Ramayana. Hanuman, the ‘monkey God’, is literally Hanu (kill) and Man (mind). He is the symbol of Yoga and since he is the son of Wind ( Vaayu-Putra) . He is also the symbolism for halting the mind, going beyond it by practicing breathing techniques and meditation which enables the union of estranged devotee ( the Sita, literally born of earth) and eternal soul (Rama, The God, literally one who charms) held apart in an Island by the forces of darkness ( habits of body, mind and the Ego )
All observing non-changing soul bound is thus dipped into the erroneous identity with the body by the chord of breath. This identity can be reclaimed by tracing its origins back via the breath, the Hanuman, and killing the mind enables the realization that one is nothing but the never changing, unborn, undying unary eternal soul.
This is union we seek. This is the union that brings peace.
To the Monkey Mind and quietening breath which kills it then ,
It has been a tough month for the home state of Kerala, which is grappling with the worst flood in a century. It has been a testing time for humanitarian work, for beliefs, for politics … for everything. Theories abound as to what caused the floods ranging from human disruption of natural ecosystem, divine wrath, Solar Minimum year, weak El-Nino/a effect, a mix of these and several other variations of these theories.
I distinctly remembered on morning in #Palakkad as it rained. This was before the floods. The first day of several that were to follow that first drenched and then drowned the state. As I drove from Coimbatore, a border city of Tamil Nadu to Palakkad, Kerala for work at about 8 am. As I drove past the western ghats I saw that the rain clouds hung so low and it was an eerie drive to say the least. Never in my memory have I seen clouds so low. I knew something was amiss. I called my wife and told her something was not right. Nothing however prepared me or my state for what was to come.
The rains started barely minutes after I drove into Palakkad. It had been drizzling the night before, but it just got heavier and heavier. Pounding continued for 2 days and flooded north Kerala first. Then it subsided for a day over Palakkad on Saturday leaving it in floods, something that the natives bragged they’d never seen.
But still nothing prepared Kerala for the destruction they were about to witness in the coming week. Rain pounded Kerala (especially middle Kerala) in coming days and left it battling floods, death and destruction.
In midst of the destruction speculation emerged that this maybe a divine wrath (specifically of Sabarimala deity Ayyapan) and other exhorting people to ‘pray for Kerala’. Needless to say, the non-believers camp rejected these with their own rebuttals and even some going to the extent to labelling prayer as useless. Their argument being that prayer at this hour of crisis is useless. What is required is working hands at ground zero.
Of course, these arguments represent a variant of the believer non-believer clash that has been there since time immemorial. At times of crisis like this where any argument of a merciful divine force does not appeal with rampant, apparently unreasonable destruction all-around, it is a time to reflect on ones belief.
These lines were penned before the flood, on the day of heavy rains in Palakkad that preceded the flood. Even just seeing the rains it was amply clear that something was grossly wrong. These rains were not normal. I knew it as going to be trouble. The lines was also partly meditative, as I prayed for rain to ease.
These lines are a tribute to the constant tug of war in nature and in spirit that tests our beliefs : whether it be theistic or atheistic. Man constantly asks God, but…
This was also penned before, this a tribute to the my home state.
It was late in the day, i was standing at driveway gate turning off the lights to my clinic. I just glanced across the road where the indoor stadia is. This is where young college kids are working round the clock , selflessly for the flood victims. They receive relief materials sent across the border and sort it. Authorities are scant, but I’m told the work is supervised.
I was struck how a fracturing society had gelled by a near cataclysm.
My two lines worth were penned then
I titled it my kerala (ente keralam )
My Kerala
I am happy to inform as promised earlier that AuShadha 2.0, which is a complete rewrite of AuShadha using Python 3.x, PostreSQL, Django 2.x and Dojo1.1x has been started and first major commit pushed.
Please find the repository at https://github.com/dreaswar/AuShadha2.0
AuShadha 2.0 will use GNU-GPL Version 3.0 License.
I’m excited to participate at #PySangamam the first Python Conference in Tamil Nadu at chennai Next month to talk on AuShadha EMR
via #Townscript https://t.co/xipWgkYQDF via @townscript
#Python
#Django
#webdevelopment
@aushadha_emr
#IFSBHCON2018
#SPINABIFIDA
#hydrocephalus
#spinabifidafoundation
Lovely conference and lovely to see the so many families and patients viewing life with such a positive attitude https://t.co/eXqZWmuhoa
Dr. Santhosh Karmakar and Spina Bifida Foundation deserve credit for bringing together different professionals -doctors, physiotherapists and families, together for this event
Boy are we joyous !
Our MITRA Medical Trust is now 4 years old.
This August 5th we are marking this event with the first public function at #Palakkad, #Kerala with dignitaries and beneficiaries.
We started on this journey 4 years ago, just a little band of friends who managed to get together after 20 years of separation after high school thanks to the newly emerging social networking services of Orkut, Facebook and Whatsapp.
The joy of getting back together about 20 years after out 10th class was marked with a reunion function and post-reunion, we sublimated the camaraderie by resolving to form MITRA, a medical trust to help poor people with treatment.
MITRA stands for Medical Intervention Treatment and Rehabilitation Assistance. Our goal is to lend a helping hand via our internal contributions (as much as possible) to the needy for medical treatment and/or rehabilitation.
Overtime, with the grace of almighty, love of our well wishers we could achieve this and much more. We have been blessed to have the good fortune of delivering help to almost 75 poor patient across a range of diseases disbursing as much as 24 lakh of Indian Rupees. No mean effort considering most of this was from our own internal donations.
A celebration was in order !!
This is then the first ever public function of the Trust. Mr. P.R.Seshadri , MD, Karur Vysya Bank , Mr. M. B. Rajesh MP, Mr. Shaif Parambil MLA, Ms. Pramila Sasidharan, Municipal Chairperson, Palakkad and Father Paul Thekkiniyath will grace the function.
Had a wonderful #CerebralPalsy and #PediatricOrtho #medical #camp at #Palakkad #Kerala organised by wonderful people at #SevaBharathi . It was well attended with parents and children braving the heavy rain.
@sevakeralam
@sevabharathitn https://t.co/Z3FT9C6RVO
AuShadha Electronic Medical Records at https://github.com/dreaswar/AuShadha has been seeing very slow development mostly due to pressures on my personal and professional front.
I could get back to development past few days and I have pushed a commit to master after some gap.
The Prescription App for Outpatient visits is ready.
Next stop is to implement Outpatient Reports.
Do check it out and let me know what you think.
You will need #Django1.7.2, #Python2.7x, #Dojo #Javascript Toolkit 1.13
I’m conducting a free medical camp for #Childrens #Orthopedic #Disorders and #BoneDiseases , #LimbDeformities and #CerebralPalsy at #Palakkad ,#Kerala . Event is organised by #SevaBharathi .
The event will be held in the premises of Life Care Cerebral Palsy Clinic which is in centre of Palakkad town enabling easy transport to the venue.
Patients and relatives are advised to bring all old records while seeking opinion. All old x-ray, other scans and will also be needed for evaluation.
Phone number for Booking :+91-80759-21075
Contact the phone on last line of notice for appointment.
(Notice is in #Malayalam, local language of Kerala )
Free Medical Camp for Pediatric Orthopedic Disorders and Scoliosis
With the acquisition of Github by Microsoft, regardless of the promises made now, I thought it would be best to move my repos somewhere else. That somewhere right now seems to be GitLab. Im #MovingtoGitLab.
All my repos across GitHub and BitBucket have been moved there and I intend to continue development there.
AuShadha (Au) which I had worked on for so long had taken a back set for some years now as pressing personal and professional commitments caused interruptions.
ICD 10 parser, ICD10 PCS parser, FDA DrugBankCa medication list parser have all been moved there.
Three variants of AuShadha are being tried by me as I recode Au. These pertain to choices of the front end. All there are embryonic and will continue to remain so until I find more time.
When I started it in 2009 things were a lot different and Django was supreme choice in Python world. Things have gone more Javascript way with a confusing profusion of frontend frameworks , especially ones that play well with NodeJs but don’t play well or needs rewiring to play well with Django. Dojo which was my intial choice also has moved on from 1.7 when I started to 1.11 now and looking ahead at 2.0 with TypeScript usage.
I’ve chosen Dojo 2.0, EmberJS, Polymer as the three front ends to try and hang my hat on at the moment. The old Au with Django 1.7 and Dojo 1.10 would be kept but I don’t plan to update it to new the library versions as it’s too laborious.
I’ve moved Django to 2.x and Python to 3.5. This is a full rewrite. Infact if Django doesn’t play well with JS framework I am open to changing it some other backend.
To those who were wondering about Au and it’s fate -watch this space.
