CHENNAI: Dejected by the inauspicious tag that the conch shell trumpet has always had, a group of city residents has taken up a unique endeavour to assert that the conch is not blown only at the ‘end of things’.
The handful of residents assemble every Sunday evening at the Kasimedu fishing harbour to practice conch shell blowing as they believe the trumpet has not just spiritual, but medical and psychological qualities as well. “Vibrations from the trumpet are so healing that many of the participants say they feel relieved of stress and have gained much self-confidence,” says advocate Siva Jagasundari, who is one of the active proponents of the instrument.
Mainly inspired by the Saivite tradition which gives much prominence to the conch trumpet for religious reasons, the group members say they want to dispel the myth that the conch shell trumpet is a symbol of a bad omen. “Nowadays people in Tamil Nadu associate the trumpet only with a death procession. So it is widely associated as inauspicious. But the truth is that the trumpet is a very auspicious and a form of Omkar sound. In Hindu tradition, the trumpet is used not just at death processions, but also during birth of a child and marriage,” says Siva Balamurugan, president of the Vavivudaimanikkam Sangnatha Trust, formed for this cause. She says that the trumpet finds a place not just among Hindus, but in several other religions. Mostly spread through word of mouth, Jagasundari says they have trained a hundred people so far. “I’ve been suffering from a wheezing problem for two years,”says Manimozhi, a city resident, who took up practising the trumpet over the last one month. Now she tells us,”I feel like my wheezing problem has reduced immensely.”
