I went to meet with Arun Pathak. He lives at the monastery for the 23rd Jain Tirthankar’s birthplace, which was a detail Nandan had not mentioned until we arrived. I first read about Pathak in 2005 before I ever even made plans to visit India. This was in relation to his Deepa Mehta Water protest. Nandan told me that he had been working with him for the sake of Irene’s widow research.
Arun Pathak is a gentleman and is more cordial and engaging without trying to be so than most people can be when trying their best. Nandan and I talked with him for about two hours about a lot of things. We share a lot of common interests and I would be interested in exploring working with him on a number of projects.
One problem of his which I fixated on is that his work naturally attracts the attention of foreign people yet he does not seem to have many foreign business associates or personal relations people. I think that if he had these things he could be a great negotiator for making agreements between people and organizations in Benares and foreign agencies. He seems to be well-meaning and passionate about what he does. In addition to activism he formally plays politics at the city level, I should say. He is especially interested in fighting corruption and promoting education.