“Jab tak
kuch kho te nahin hai, kuch milta bhi mahin hain” (you don’t get anything until
you lose something). A simple but profound
philosophical observation, stated with a twinkle in his eyes, by an ordinary
looking ascetic of Nath community, at a tea stall in Ujjain. A few minutes ago he came up to me as I was
about to take the first sip and asked me to sponsor his cup of tea (chai
pilaiye). It was easy to dismiss him as
a beggar. But being in my third Kumbh, I
know such requests for food are common- I usually do a cursory two-second scan
of the person and say yes or no. I am
glad I said yes to him. Hailing from an
ashram (hermitage) in Kangaon village near Pune- the place deriving its name
because of the ear-shaped turn taken by the Bhima river- he was narrating to me
his experience of losing his bag with clothes, prayer accessories and money in
a train while going to a temple; his temporary sense of helplessness when he
realized it; and then getting almost same set of things as daan from the temple
which was his destination for the journey.
The observation was his summation of his experience through this and
other life events. The conversation had
started to flow with questions to each other on where we are from. Upon hearing that I am from Kolkata, he asked
a few basic questions on how to reach, and then took an on-spot decision that
after the Kumbh he will first come to Kolkata to visit Kali Temple before going
to Pushkar and finally going back to his base in Pune. I was amazed to see the speed, nonchalance
and conviction of such an ambitious travel plan. I have been thinking of going to Pushkar for over
three years; and was able to come to Ujjain Kumbh after six months of planning
and organization. But then I am not a
traveling ascetic like him; my decisions are clouded by the ““internet” of “things””
that we, urban bred middle class grihi’s, create around ourselves. It is precisely to touch this other world,
“where the mind is without fear and the head is held high, where knowledge is
free, where the world has not been broken up in to fragments by narrow domestic
walls, where words come from the depth of truth, where the mind is led forward
by thee into ever-widening thought and action”, that I go to events such as
Kumbh.
I prefer
to go to such events by train or bus.
The journey to me is as important as the destination. For the Ujjain trip, I had settled for a
practical compromise of flying in to Bhopal and travel the last 100 miles by
train. This 3-hour mid-summer journey in
sleeper class turned out to be the perfect prelude to my 2016 Kumbha Mela
experience. My co-passengers were a
group of very unassuming Vashnav sadhus from Ayodhya who were heading for the
mela. With a “gamcha” wrapped around my
neck, it was easy for me to blend in. One
of them turned out to be delightful when engaged in conversation. I asked him what are some of the significant
religious fairs which as not as publicized as Kumbh. He suggested I go to Arunachal during Makar
Sankranti in January. Why? Because the temple of Lord Parashuram is
apparently located there; in January there is a big congregation of saints in
that area. The kush used for performing
pujas by Brahmin priests apparently come from there. I had no idea such a place existed. I asked him where else among such unusual
places he went to. He told me about a
15-day arduous road trip that sadhus frequently undertake as a group in
Nepal. The track is uninhabited, and all
food and water has to be carried for the journey along the mountains. The destination is a place on the bank of
Gandak river, where the Salgram Shila (a form of stone with smooth and shiny
contour, worshipped as incarnation of Vishnu) is found. He also invited me to events in Ayodhya where
he has his Ashram. I indeed wanted to
go, and noted down his phone number, but to my utter dismay I am not able to
locate my travel notebook which contained this and other precious content. That is one important reason why this blog is
delayed too. But more significantly, I
have no hope of finding him ever. This
film does not have a happy ending L
Upon
reaching Ujjain, I took a rickshaw to “24 Khamba Sherawali Mata Devi ki Gali” from
where, as per instruction of my host, I climbed the “Mahakaal Ghati” (a gentle
slope with roads leading towards Mahakaal Temple). Mr. Alok Rao Gunjal was waiting for me at the
first turn. He took me to his home,
which was a old two storied house with number of rooms around a very small
courtyard. His and his extended family
stayed here. I was taken to a ground
floor room which was part of Mr. Rao’s 2-room dwelling unit. The room had a separate entrance, and
attached bathroom, but one door connected to the room of Mr. Rao’s. The room still had several personal
belongings of the Rao family, and I realized later that they need to come in a
few times in the day to fetch those. His
wife welcomed me warmly, brought glass of water and offered tea. Being used to completely private
accommodations as in hotel, the borderless home stay was initially a culture
shock but after the first hour I started liking it. The camp cot made some noise when I sat on
it, but it did not collapse under my weight and the linen was clean. There were too many openings in to my room,
but I am alone and not carrying valuables.
I could put a lock on the iron door but the latch was short and the door
would open with the lock intact when pushed!
Everything was very different from what I am used to in my normal life;
everything was exactly like what I came to experience in Kumbh. So I let go of my fear and inhibitions and
embraced the situation. This was anyway intended
to be my city camp where I would keep my luggage and rest occasionally. I had intended to stay in a tent in the camp
of a Dandi Swami who had hosted us in the Kumbh Mela in Allahabad. The idea of a backup accommodation served me
well, since I later discovered that due to internal politics among saints over
camp site allocation, my Maharaj’s camp was shifted out to a zone which was far
removed from the core area of the Simhasth.
So my centrally located home stay accommodation turned out to be a
savior. Mr. Rao is a well-informed local
resident who provided me with local newspapers full of Simhasth news and gave
me valuable insights over the next four days.
Next day, one thing in my to-do list was to see the pre-Kumbh processions, called Peshwai. The leading Akharas take out processions to demonstrate their grandeur and importance. The one scheduled on that day was of the Kinnar Akhara (commune of Bisexuals/Transexuals). There is interesting background information about this. There are 13 officially recognized Akharas. These Akharas are granted recognition and official status in the Kumbh Melas by the Akhil Bharatiya Akhara Parishad (ABAP), which is an apex body of Sikh and Hindu saints. The concept was propounded by the 8th century philosopher Adi Shankaracharya who first set up seven Akharas to strengthen the Hindu religion and unify devotees practicing varied rituals and customs. ABAP plays an important role in various religious discourses such as Ram Janmabhoomi issue and interface with the government administration regarding important decisions for Kumbh melas. Kinnar Akhara was formed in October 2015 with transgender rights activist Laxmi Narayan Tripathi as their spiritual head ('Mahamandaleshwar'). ABAP had denied recognition for the newly formed Akhara. Another all-woman Akhara which created quite a flutter in 2013 Allahabad Kumbh and was allotted land by the Ujjain administration in the 2016 event also met with the same fate in being denied permission by ABAP for Shahi Snan (joining the elite group of Akharas in royal bath). Trikal Bhavanta, the woman seer and head of the Pari Akhara announced a dramatic plan for self-burial in protest and dug a 10 ft pit for the purpose. She however ended up being arrested. Nonetheless, the Kinnars (eunuchs) decided to go forward with the plans, including setting up their own camp and holding their own Peshwai on the day before the first Shahi Snan. An image of Ardhnarishwara- an amalgamation of the male-female form in Lord Shiva- reportedly formed the backdrop for the Kinnar Akhara’s main stage in their camp. They put forward several arguments in support of their stance- the transgenders are saints in real sense of the term because of ingrained asceticism, free from belief in caste, and are mentioned in Hindu scriptures with positions of dignity. Indeed, the transgenders were once mainstream in Indian social system but lost it in course of time. In Ujjain, the devotees flocked to see the Peshwai of the Kinnars and also to their camp seeking blessings, indicating that at the core there is still social and religious sanction about the community. This article by Devdutt Pattanaik provides a deeper insight: http://scroll.in/article/809995/how-a-new-akhara-of-transgendered-people-stole-the-spotlight-at-the-ujjain-kumbh
When I reached the precincts of the Mahakaal Temple, the excitement in the crowd about the approaching Kinnar Akhara procession was palpable. The police looked tense, and none had authentic information about the exact route of the procession. I learnt later that the reason of their hassle was that the procession was unauthorized, and they were throwing coins en route which resulted in huge crowd surge, raising fear of a stampede. The police administration was trying to prevent the procession from coming near Mahakaal temple and Harsiddhi Chowk where a huge crowd was waiting for the procession with eager anticipation. A member of the audience made a tongue-in-cheek remark that such interest is not seen in the procession of big religious leaders. I spend half an hour trying to obtain information from police and public regarding the route of the procession, and finally climbed up a watch tower which was set at Harsiddhi Chowk for CRPF for a bird’s eye view. Soon, there was a flurry of activity and the head of the commune was seen being escorted past the crossing amid heavy police protection. The rally had been disbanded. It was an exciting beginning of the 2016 Kumbh mela experience for me.
I had
reached two days ahead of the Shahi Snan with the objective of exploring the
mela ground in advance. The size and
scale of these events are so huge that it is impossible to have a good
experience on the main day if the layout of the place is not explored in
advance. Waking up early, I had walked a
few kilometers from my accommodation in to the mela ground, when an old sadhu
asked me for directions of Puri Shankaracharya camp. He was old and frail, and a Dandi Swamy
too. Another such chance encounter with
a similar sadhu in Haridwar in 2010 had charted my festival experience destiny;
so I do not take such chance encounters lightly. I had passed by the huge Govardhan Math camp
of Puri Shankaracharya Swami Nischalanada Saraswati early on in my route that
day. It would have been ideal for me to
give him some cursory direction and let him find the rest of his way, but in
the Kumbh spirit of sacrifice and brotherhood, I decided to walk back with him
to show him the place. He told me he
came from a small ashram of Uttar Pradesh, and had been wandering around since
early morning. He walked slowly with a
slight limp, in obvious pain, and kept muttering “bhangwan dekhenge (God will
look after me)”. I offered him some
food, but he said he cannot accept food from any and everyone. I was allowed to buy him some dry raisins,
and he blessed me profusely.
I spent
the rest of my day walking around the city, mela premises and river bank,
soaking up the ambience of the event. I
saw a large commune of foreigners queuing up to enter the Mahakaal Temple. I learnt that they are all followers of www.yogaindailylife.org which was
founded by Swami Maheshwarananda Puri of Panchayati Maha Nirvani Akhara in
Vienna. Since 1970 he has been living
and working in Europe, and has a large number of disciples. I saw a dwarf saint who was seating under a
tree and many people were coming in to touch his feet. People we clearing seeing in him the fifth
incarnation of Lord Vishnu as a dwarf Brahmin- the Vamana Avataar. I saw a skinny guy in tight jeans, dancing on
the street in a trance without any music anywhere, seemingly high on
hallucinating drugs, and then suddenly walking away with sure and steady steps. I saw innovative water dispensing systems
catering to the pilgrims. I saw free and
delicious food being distributed. I
witnessed first-hand the elaborate cleanliness drive of the administration
(notwithstanding reports in Times of India about strike of conservancy
workers). I saw disciples huddled
together with their Gurus, listening to their spiritual guidance in various
camps. I walked in the Vikram Teela
(hillock) where the famous throne of Ujjain’s legendary King Vikramaditya of 1st
century BC is believed to be buried.
Madhya Pradesh government has re-created Vikramaditya’s courtroom at
this site with a mammoth 26-feet statue of the king seated in his throne, along
with life-size statues of his courtroom scholars collectively called nine gems
and 32 Apsaras. I walked by the Kshipra
river and was amazed at the elaborate arrangement the administration has put in
place in preparation for the mela. 16
bathing ghats were constructed spread over 8.5 km- enough space for 5.8 million
people to bathe in a day. The water flow
was augmented by pumping in water from Narmada river, and water quality in core
bathing areas was further boosted by series of aerators working tirelessly to
oxygenate the water. Water quality
parameters were being displayed real time in electronic board in Ram Ghat. State disaster management team was keeping a
watchful eye from their speedboats, reinforcing the strict vigil being
maintained by police and paramilitary force on land. A real karma-yagna was on in the city. The people and the administration were ready
for the once-in-12-years tryst with destiny.
This is the interval of the celestial alignment when Sun is in the
zodiac sign Aries and Jupiter in the zodiac Leo, during which the event is held
at Ujjain (Simha in Sanskrit, hence Simhastha Kumbh Mela).
I also
curiously observed the visible presence of Muslims in the periphery of the
Mahakaal Temple, which is outside of the mela zone but is a central area for
congregation of pilgrims. Two of them
were seen selling Mahakaal temple literature and photos. Both were from Bohra community. I talked to another member of the same
community in the market area- his shop was selling bags printed with Mahakaal
pictures. He spoke of the communal
harmony that existed in the place, and that the spiritual leader of the Dawoodi
Bohra community has explicitly instructed community members to devote
themselves to the success of the event and welfare of the pilgrims. I also walked in to the Islamic Information
Centre set up by the local unit of Jamaat-e-Islami-Hind and talked with the
members therein. They explained how they
are supporting and assisting the event, including advising their community
member transport operators not to over-charge pilgrims.
With a few hours of rest in my room that night, I was all ready to take another deep dive in to the ocean of experience that is Kumbh Mela in the wee hours of next morning. I will write about that in the Part 2 of my travelogue.
