Despite being discouraged by ever so many people, I went to the Mahakumbh last week. The experience was well-curated by the friend who invited me to accompany her. We did not stay in the tent city but a private hotel in town. So we did not face a traffic jam while getting there. Through the hotel owner, my friend pre-arranged a driver and boatman. Coordinating the two, we went straight for our dip after reaching our hotel.
Instead of going to the busy side of the Ganga, our driver took us to the Yamuna. Our boatman, Bablu, met us on the road and took us to a small, sandy bank of the Yamuna, where his rowboat was moored. Rowboat, not a motorboat. So, it was hard work for Bablu and his helper, and a blissful lack of ugly engine noise for us.
We approached the Sangam by the Yamuna, and it was exhilarating to see how full and clean she was, unlike her miserable plight in Delhi. Unsurprisingly, this queenly river was considered holy by the ancients.
I asked Bablu if he was from Uttar Pradesh, and he drew himself up proudly and said he was a Nishada, “Ramji ke dost”, the friend of Sri Rama. He meant he was a descendant of Guha, chief of the Nishadas, who rowed Rama, Sita and Lakshmana across the river into exile. He was living history. And he was so kind, carrying my bag, helping me on and off the boat, and into and out of the Sangam. The water was clean and flowed fairly fast, and I suffered no after-effects.
On the flight home, I was surprised to see my next-door neighbours, a retired Air Force officer and his very smart wife. They told me why they went to Prayagraj: “The opposition spoke so badly about it that we decided to go. Who are they to tell us what to do?” The lesson seemed evident: don’t push peaceful, live-and-let-live Hindus to the wall like this. The Tamil saying goes, “Sadhu mirandaal kaadu kollaathu”. ‘When the meek turn, there will be havoc’, meaning there will be consequences if a normally soft-natured person is provoked beyond endurance.
But how sweet were these people that, instead of saying or doing something bad, went and offered themselves to the Kumbh in solidarity with other pilgrims? It was a deep cultural response in the spirit of tapasya that they did parishram, and threw themselves like ahuti into the havankund. I respect that response.
The religion teaches believers not to flinch from the truth, which is what opened the door to reforms. But you have to know where critiques are coming from. I would like to go back to the 19th-century Bengali epic Meghnad Badh Kavya in nine cantos, by Michael Madhusudan Dutt. My Bengali friends tell me it’s a brilliant read. In it, Dutt valorises Ravana’s son Indrajit or Meghnad, negatively portraying Rama and Lakshmana. We cannot really blame him for it because our religion was not doing well in the 19th century.
Dutt was a learned, sensitive person. However, instead of fighting for reforms as so many brave Hindus did from within, he took the quickest shortcut to modernity available in his day, the English church. In his new persona, he spurned Rama as a foundational figure of the faith, although it was not God’s fault but man’s that Hindu society mistreated its people. Broke in England, he was repeatedly bailed out by his benevolent reformer friend, Pandit Ishwarchandra Vidyasagar.
Dutt wrote reams in English but literary magazines in England refused to publish him. Finally, it was by writing about Ramayana in his mother tongue, Bengali, that he became famous. Epic grace touched him, although he was a critic, demonstrating the belief of devotees that just thinking about Rama works its own miracles.
As to which, a reader wrote about last week’s discussion on Eklavya, “From childhood, many of us have been brought up demonising Drona and Arjuna in the case of Eklavya, as in the story The Purpose by T P Kailasam.”
From what I’ve read about him, T P Kailasam was wayward and irresponsible, abandoning his wife and daughters. Small wonder that he did not relate to epic values.
However, his daughter Kamala Subramaniam made magnificent reparation to society with her translations of the two epics and the Bhagavatam.
Even though Kailasam is lauded for his contribution to modern Kannada literature, he cannot hold a candle to Valmiki and Vyasa, wouldn’t you say? He could only poke holes in their work.
Moreover, a reader told me that not only had Eklavya sneaked up on Drona, but also Drona noticed that Eklavya had sealed the dog’s mouth with a divya astra, learnt by stealth. It was a serious misuse of a big weapon for a small thing. Drona realised Eklavya had acquired power without responsibility and was a danger to society if let loose. So, his ability had to be reduced.
What Vyasa’s story should concern us the most is what Vyasa himself said about Eklavya––that he joined Duryodhana in the battle of Kurukshetra, espoused adharma, and died there. It was in character.
So, Kumbh critiques must be understood as mainly political, whereas it is cultural and belongs to the people. All our so-called identities dissolved there. My biggest take-home from the Kumbh was the deep unity underlying our diversity and the palpable sense of belonging. Strangers across India smiled at each other like at a big family wedding. It is a unique experience that I am grateful for.
(Views are personal)
(shebaba09@gmail.com)
Renuka Narayanan