The theme of revenge comes from The Mahabharata and that of reconciliation from Buddha and Mahavira. A panel discussion on the book's theme was held at India International Centre here, today.

One question came to fore: do revenge and reconciliation hold true in the present context, especially in wake of the Kargil conflict? While revenge is easy to relate to, reconciliation is apparently a far-fetched idea today.

social psychologist and cultural analyst Ashis Nandy said violence today is devoid of revenge and reconciliation. ``If one looks back, the most striking feature will be the number of human lives lost in violence, which adds to 200 million people. We have been the makers of carnages,'' he said. The tonal quality of violence has changed, said Nandy. ``Our historical past dignifies violence for people died as martyrs. They were killed for a larger cause.'' In contrast, violence today lacks passion. Deaths have simply become statistics and unlike The Mahabharata, today's epic is dispassionate and an industrial assembly of killings, he said.

Violence is illegitimate and it is the people in the mainstream who try to legitimise the issue, perceived Mrinal Pande. Acknowledging the book as a great piece of literary work, Pande said: ``History has taught us the futility of revenge. Yudhistra and Mahatma Gandhi have reiterated that indulgence in violence is unimportant.'' Professor Amrik Singh candidly rejected Rajmohan's perception on Partition.

``Confrontation of India and Pakistan goes back to about 100 years and it is not possible for the two countries to reconcile." The discussion ended on an optimistic note from the author himself: he wished India would use the reconciliation theme to build up its killer instinct, so as to ``win cricket matches and disallow any intruder to enter the country.''