Parable of the deviant rose

One hot afternoon, the master was in the mood for a discourse on the mysteries of life. “Is it wrong to take life”, he asked. A deep puff, a halo of smoke over his head, he set the plot as I looked on. “If it’s wrong to kill a cow”, said he, “is it wrong to kill a plant?. They say plants can’t feel. No?”. “But master”, said I, “plants have no pain - I have read, they have no nerves, they have no feelings”. The master looked at me and smiled, and then crushed out his cigarette. He rose and walked and I followed. The lair, full of smoke, shafts of sunlight streaking in. He stepped into a small patch of weeds and shrubs. Solemnly he knelt and motioned me to do the same. The rose with the dark red flowers stands next to a citrus plant. The leaves on the rose looked strange. They looked - lo and behold - like the leaves of the citrus. Somehow, by living near the citrus, the rose had become a little bit like the citrus.

“Sympathetic behavior”, the master announced. “And you say, plants have no pain, they can’t feel?”. For just a moment, I had visions of screaming trees from Dahl’s Sound Machine. With a twinkle in his eyes, he went on. “Rocks and trees and rivers, fish and cows and you. They are all alive - or all dead”.

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The late Dr. E Vijayan Nair was a professor in the Mechanical Engineering Department. He was brilliant and honest. He took some interest in me, probably seeing my tendency to not fall in line, and I am grateful to him for this. Of the little that I learnt in college, a good chunk came from this great teacher.

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