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Reconnecting old dots

‘Oh! You are from Ludhiana,” greets this young couple ever so often during their travels in India. “No, no we are from Lithuania,” they explain, but phonetically the country is mistaken in India for the industrial town in Punjab.

Reconnecting old dots

Lithuania Ambassador Laimonas Talat-Kelpsa and wife Alina Taluntyte at the Golden Temple. File photo



KV Prasad

‘Oh! You are from Ludhiana,” greets this young couple ever so often during their travels in India. “No, no we are from Lithuania,” they explain, but phonetically the country is mistaken in India for the industrial town in Punjab.

Such conversation continues to add flavour to life for both Ambassador Laimonas Talat-Kelpsa and his wife Alina Taluntyte in India, equally at home with spicy food.

At months short of 40, Ambassador Talat-Kelpsa is surely one of the youngest diplomats to head a mission in New Delhi and is among the few old hands here since 2013 with an expanding portfolio to include Bangladesh and Sri Lanka.

India-Lithuania connection is deep, according to the Ambassador, and central to it is the link to Sanskrit, a language with which Lithuanian shares many words. For instance, back home they say “Dievas” when appealing to God; “Labas” while wishing each other wealth and prosperity; “Sapnas” for dreams and visions; or “Ugnis” for fire. As a measure of the age-old ties, last year the Ambassador presented Prime Minister Narendra Modi with a specially published Sanskrit-Lithuanian dictionary.

The belief is their national language Lithuanian originates from Sanskrit and is the closest surviving sister of Sanskrit in Europe. As a mark of first documented contact in 1625 with India, a memorial stone was unveiled in old Goa a couple of summers ago, the Ambassador told The Tribune.

In1992, India established diplomatic ties with Lithuania, now part of the European Union, after the breakup of the erstwhile Soviet Union. Since his posting as the second ambassador to India, Talat-Kelpsa’s endeavour is to re-establish those ties.

In 2015, Lithuania unveiled a statute in Rusne of Mahatma Gandhi and his close Lithuanian-born Jewish friend Hermann Kallenbach. The Lithuanians view it as a monument to celebrate friendship of two individuals and two nations.

With a view to expand the study of Lithuania, last year a Centre for Baltic Culture and Studies was inaugurated at Dev Sanskriti University, Hardwar, the first of its kind in South Asia and 48th Centre worldwide where Lithuanian studies can be conducted.

When not on diplomatic work, Alina and her husband enjoy travelling in Delhi in the ubiquitous auto-rickshaws and are familiar with its infamous faulty metres. Initially they were not sure of being charged the correct fare but now do not need any map to negotiate the city lanes and bylanes, including old Delhi, to know what the ride costs. Yet the warmth of Delhi denizens was most pronounced when the neighbourhood grocer and vegetable vendor offered credit when “notebandi” affected everyone.

Alina, a journalist by training, is refraining from reporting aware of the sensitivity of being an Ambassador’s wife but does not rule out doing a book later. For the present, she often becomes a tour guide, taking relatives and friends from Lithuania on frequent trips to Agra, Jaipur, Gwalior, Orcha; and nurses fond memories of Amritsar sojourn, its food and the Retreat at Attari-Wagah border.

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