There is an interesting parable attributed to Swami Vivekananda (1863–1902), which reportedly sprang from an incident in real life. The swami once went on a tour of the Himalayan foothills and Kashmir with a party of friends, which included his American disciple Sister Nivedita.
She kept a diary and noted that they stopped by the lake town of Nainital. They were invited to dinner by the Raja of Khetri, who greatly admired Vivekananda. The swami came to know that the raja had invited a dancing girl to perform for them. Being a monk, he disliked the plan but went along out of politeness. However, the dancing girl came to know of his objection and presented a deeply spiritual song. When he heard its unmistakably high-souled content, the swami was greatly struck and realised that one had to look beyond a person’s appearance to their nature and character.
The parable that he apparently shared later, which I would like to retell here as a story, recalls that real-life encounter:
Not far from Mathura-Vrindavan on the banks of the Yamuna, was a little village whose chief claim to anything was that it lay not far from the king’s highway. Pilgrim parties and wandering minstrels did not know of it but any number of travelling salesmen and traders would look forward to a detour there.
They always left some money behind in the village. Not only were sweets and snacks required but also betel leaf and the occasional services of the blacksmith, cobbler and tailor for repairs to their carts. The visitors went straight to the headman’s house and after an exchange of courtesies, strolled out of his back gate towards the river. The path there spared them a public parade down the main street past respectable folk and innocent children at play.
They made their way to a small, neat house by the river, in which lived an attractive young lady who received them with a smile. No noisy, vulgar revels or brawls ever disturbed the peace because of the visitors. The sound of anklets on dancing feet could be heard every day from the little house.
The young lady lived very quietly otherwise and the villagers never troubled her. Every year on Janmashtami, she would visit the village temple and offer Sri Krishna nritya seva or worship through dance. She was a dancing girl, the daughter of a dancing girl who had been the daughter of a dancing girl, going back a hundred generations. But her father had been the village priest with no children by his wife who had died of a miscarriage. All his paternal feelings were invested in this daughter, the chance result of a youthful indiscretion in Mathura. When he fell gravely ill, he begged the village headman to let his daughter, whose mother was dead, live in the village and earn her living in the only way she could.
“She is alone in the world and will be torn to pieces in the city, even if she works as a maid. She is a good girl and will only entertain a select clientele so that she has an income. Please let her live safely in your midst, it would give my soul peace,” he besought with tears in his eyes.
The headman had put it to vote with the village men and though startled at first, they had no real objection. They were moved by the priest’s agony and made their families understand that an orphan daughter of the village, though a dancing girl, deserved their protection.
And so, Punita, for that was her name, came to live in her father’s village and became the best-kept secret on the king’s highway. She was pretty without being outrageously beautiful, dressed modestly and spoke politely. The village accepted her presence well.
Only Nityanand, the sanyasi by the riverside, disliked Punita. He considered her a sinner because she was a single working woman. He kept a fretful note of her doings and spoke roughly to her every day. Used to living on free food, he had no appreciation for those who worked hard for survival.
Nor did he consider that Punita sang and danced about the same god on whom he occasionally delivered a discourse at the temple. But when he threatened that he would complain to the authorities in Mathura, the headman called his bluff.
“Do that. And you need not come back,” he said witheringly. “Punita belongs to this village. You don’t. You just came along one day and decided to live on our charity. She had no choice in her profession. But she earns her living honestly and helps others earn, too. In the view of this village she is more ‘normal’ and better behaved than many so-called respectable people. Don’t you recognise character when you see it?”
“You will burn in hell with her, sinners!” cried the sanyasi and stormed off.
Thirty harsh, unrelenting years passed this way. When Punita grew too old to dance, she lived thriftily on her savings, thinking more and more about God.
Punita and Nityanand died within days of each other and awaited their fate as pretas or bodiless souls. But two very different troops of beings seized them. A group of ghouls took hold of Nityanand while a band of angels held Punita’s hand.
“Wait!” cried Nityanand. “Why am I, a holy man, being taken to hell while this sinner is going to heaven?”
The angels looked pityingly at him. Finally, an angel spoke.
“You may have been a sanyasi but you were unreasonably obsessed with sin. You spent all your time thinking hateful thoughts about this woman. We become what we think, sanyasi. Her soul is far cleaner than yours. That is why she goes with us to the light. But you, because you thought only of sin and always spoke cruel words, must join the sinners.”
Nityanand had no answer to that and the heavenly band, casting him a compassionate look, vanished with Punita into the light.
Renuka Narayanan