The Last Caravan: Van Gujjars in a Burning April

April, 2026

It's burning in April, burning summers, hotter than ever. Do we still need more proofs for global warming? Climate skeptics seem to have leathery, insensitive skin, harder than even crocodiles to call it a hoax. Well, they seem to be different species altogether. 

Summers are getting hotter each season, and still we have global warming skeptics leading the world as the most powerful persons on Earth. They don't believe in climate change, destruction of ecology. All they are interested in is adding to business, more money. They are not bothered about at what cost it comes.

All that matters is just more money, more dollars, more real estate, more weapons sold to stage-managed war crises in different countries, so that the war-material mafia is able to increase its business by selling more and more weapons throughout the world.

In any case, that is the bigger world of bigger people engaged in bigger-than-ever follies that will spell doom for the smaller people like me and you.

Here in this countryside of Haryana, Rajasthani nomads, the migrant cattle herders, walk pensively in soiled whites and big red headgears. You can see them wandering in North Indian states, their famished, big-horned cows clogging the roads, creating traffic hassles.

People get irritated, repeatedly honk, mutter, but they respect cows, thankfully, and somehow digest the loss of precious minutes on the road.

I always welcome a group of cattle on the road because that puts a pause on blindingly running traffic.

And then there is an offbeat sight: a big herd of buffaloes, sleek, not too famished. The invisible citizens with their buffaloes. An unusual caravan passing through the burning countryside. Things aren't definitely ok when the mountain herders are forced to come to the unwelcoming plains. It seems like the last miles of an ancient caravan. Buffaloes, burning roads and the invisible citizens of mother India. The sad sight of Van Gujjars: a culture on its last leg.  

And I am surprised as I come across this big flock of buffaloes lining across the road, covering half of it, moving in rhythm.

It's very surprising. Even shocking. Even sad. 

Van Gujjars in this part of Haryana! Their buffaloes are not famished like the cattle of Rajasthani nomads who come from the desert, where the cattle have to fight for sparse blades of grass.

Van Gujjars, they come from the hills. Their buffaloes are fed on mountain grasses, but it's sad to see them seeking survival on leftover crops in harvested wheat farms.

This is late April, so wheat harvesting is almost complete in this part.

In their traditional pasture lands, the forest department officials turn more and more strict these days, and Van Gujjars are the invisible citizens of India, so they are trying to sneak out a thin trail of survival.

Things are getting worse politically as well. Van Gujjars are Muslims, Muslim herders, and that adds to the challenge that they face.

The old man, he drags his feet with effort, a long hennaed beard. A woman leads the herd. Another woman mans the herd's rear. The man is in the middle, sandwiched for safety.

People will be less rough to the women herders. At least this is what they suppose.

Their carts with cloth canopies, laden with their bare essentials, are waiting a few hundred yards ahead on the road.

Communalism is getting hotter, each mile more challenging, each step more challenging than the previous one.

Van Gujjars are Muslims in name only. What do they know about religion? The Mughals must have forced them to convert. Now there is a counterforce. And here we have a distinct culture taking its last breath.

It's a very sad sight to see this caravan of Van Gujjars with their buffaloes in the scorching heat of the plains, away from the lush, verdant valleys and greens where the buffaloes would eat nourishing, succulent grasses and herbs.

And now here they are, surviving on dried leftover crofts in harvested wheat fields, getting harsh words from passersby.

People are not as lenient as with the cow herders to these buffalo herders; obviously for the reasons that are an open fact now. So there are lots of harsh words hurled at them.

A big car stops while crossing the leading woman herder in front of the caravan, and the young man must have said something very obscene, because I see her touching her ears and saying, “Tauba, tauba.”

A very sad sight.

Forest laws are becoming stricter, and the movement of their buffalo caravan is almost impossible now through reserve forests and national parks.

This distinct culture is on its last leg. Undoubtedly. It's dying. 

I think in the coming decade or so they will be gone. They will be forced to sell their buffaloes, and then they will become labourers because they don't have the skills, they don't have education, they don't have permanent residence.

They are the unknown and invisible citizens of Mother India.

It will be quite challenging for them in the coming days, even if the government does its best to make them settle at a particular locality.

But even there they will find it very difficult to earn a living because they don't have any education or special skills to make a living.

They are just buffalo herders.

Drops of Divinity: The Sacred Is Here and Now

Late March, 2026

The beautiful charm of the small world, of small places, sleepy life in a pause in the countryside of Haryana.

There are unassuming small places, little drops of divinity; but they carry the essence of godliness, just like a drop of the sea has got the entire essence of the sea. Similarly, these places, not so famous on the Indian spiritual map, carry the essence, the significance of divinity in their little, little ways.

They are part of local folklore, local legends, local mythology, and these have been the guiding light for scores of people from the struggling, labouring, farming class, the people that you come across in villages. And they have been keeping the flame alive with their faith, with their belief, with their rituals, with their festival celebrations and annual fairs in commemoration of the spiritual significance of these small places.

These are small just in name, but they are as mammoth and huge in godly essence as any other famous place.

And as I wander around, taking little sips of divinity from these restful portals of energy, it gives me the same feeling as any big spiritual place like Mount Kailash would give.

One such place is at village Chitana in Sonipat. It's near my village, and the Devi of this village is worshipped and is famously known as Chitane Wali Mata.

The story goes like this: about 400 years back, a Brahmin kanya from Chitana village had a dream in which Mata gave her darshan and told her that in the village pond there was an idol of hers.

The villagers dug the pond and found Mother Divine's beautiful statue deep in the mud. The grand idol was extracted with faith, reverence, song, dance and celebration.

After rituals and much celebration, a temple was constructed by the pond and Mother's idol was consecrated there.

Presently, a grand fair is held on Saptami and Ashtami of Navratras. There is a tradition of digging earth seven times from the pond. The pond is named Kamal Talab.

The village temple committee has been very, very efficient. You can just look at the way they have set up the arrangement. It's very impressive, the entire compound, and there is discipline, there is seriousness, which bespeaks their faith and diligence in maintaining the sanctity of this place.

By the temple's back, there is a miraculous imli tree. It is very ancient, this imli tree. It is hollow from inside. It was dead earlier. After the eternal lamp was lit, the tree got new saplings. It sprouted to life.

There is a belief that if someone ties a thread on the tree, it fulfils one's wishes.

As of now, the tree seems to be dead, but it is alive in the hearts of the people who still keep on tying their threads while asking for fulfilment of their wishes.

So faith and myth are fresh, alive and green.

The tree is still worshipped as if it is fresh and green.

The temple is very impressive, well managed, everything in proper order. A regional Shakti shrine, folk sacred character, the sacred trinity: temple with Mata idol, sacred tamarind tree and pond.

The temple has evolved organically with additions and improvements over a period of time. It is a hybrid architecture of folk and Nagara style. Even with its modesty, it has a very tall spire and brick-and-plaster construction, incremental expansions over a period of time.

You can easily guess that people have been spending money on it with the rise in the economy.

The entrance courtyard is spacious, with semi-covered halls for kirtans and the inner core, the sacred chamber where you have Mata's beautiful idol glitters with religious decoration. There are sacred peripheral shrines of Devis and Devtas, and mass devotion during Navratra gatherings. It must be very crowded during the fairs because you can see the railings for managing queues of the devotees.

There is not much carving. Still it's modestly majestic with its painted and tiled surfaces instead of sculpted stones.

There is a classical Shastra-based yagyashala, and in front of it hangs a huge brass bell from the entrance archway.

Its vibrations send rhythms of divinity in the air.

It's very surprising to come across such a well-organized temple premises in the countryside. It means the committee and temple trust have been coordinating really well, and so are the donors of money, who have been quite liberal and kind and loving in donating big amounts of money for constructing and managing this beautiful temple, where thousands gather during Navratras when there is a fair held.

It fulfils multiple purposes of giving opportunities to the people to have darshan of Mata. Children come and enjoy the thoroughfare, buy toys, eat sweetmeats. So it is quite entertaining during the Navratras.

Now at this time, when this is off-season and there are not many pilgrims, save a family who have brought their newlywed son with his new bride for fulfilling rituals in front of Mata's idol and taking her blessings.

As I stand here, I just muse over the fact that this place is no less than Mata Vaishno Devi shrine, if you have that particular emotion, that bhav in your heart.

So, of course, even here Mata's blessings are as powerful, loving and compassionate as they are in the Vaishno Devi temple in the hills, provided you are open, you are on that frequency of surrender, full belief and faith.

You can harness the divine energy from any spiritual portal, big or small, it does not matter.

And there comes a stage when each and every part of Mother Nature becomes a living idol of grace, of love, of godliness. When you are on that frequency, you are no longer required to go on pilgrimages to get into that bhav of surrender and faith.

When you are perpetually, constantly on that platform, when you start seeing godliness in each living and non-living part of Mother Nature. When you see the same godliness in a stone as well as in a flower, in a beautiful woman or a handsome man, or a fearsome wild animal, or a reptile like a cobra. When this happens, you meet the essence cosmic unity. 

When you recognize the inherent unity of the same cosmic energy, which is the fundamental base of all living and non-living beings at the quantum level, the same energy manifesting in different forms in this interplay of beautiful Leela, this Maya, this grand illusion, this sweet shower, this ecstatic burst of energy on Mother Earth in myriads of forms.

When you recognize that cosmic inherent unity, then you start feeling godliness at each geographical point, at each spatial unit.

So space and time then acquire a sanctity and nothing moves. Even if everything moves around you and is churning, you are unmoved. You are out of the compulsive boundaries of karma bandhan. That's liberation. 

You are stable with your faith, with your feeling, with your surrender, with your acceptance, with your acknowledgement of divinity at each and every part on Mother Earth.

So as I stand at this beautiful place in the countryside of Haryana, the solitary chiming of the temple bell instantly draws my attention to the very fact that yes, it's here, it's here and now.

Divinity is here and now.

Dear sadhaks, wherever you are, the cosmic grace is available. You just have to recall and be aware of its presence and remember it.

The moment you remember it, it is there.

The only time this portal is shut is when we are not aware of it, when that veil, that separation of ignorance, removes us from this continuity, this everlasting, infinite oneness, the interconnectedness and interrelatedness of each and everything in the cosmos.

Only then do we feel separated, and the moment we feel that separation, there is restlessness, there is that pining, weird feeling, that pain that is driving most of us on Earth, and as a replacement we go for so many pursuits on the material plane, driven by our fears, insecurities and illusions.

But the moment we are aware that yes, it is here and now, divinity, the grace, and I occupy that position where it's present and is enveloping me, embracing me from all sides. That's liberation. That's samadhi. 

It is there where you are at this moment.

It manifests there the moment you are aware of it and feel it.

It just needs your awareness, your focus, your attention.

So the more we try to recall this fact, the more we are on that frequency. The frequency of liberation. 

Barbarik of Chulkana: The Sacrifice That Preserved the Balance

Late March, 2026

This is late in March, and me and my brother are travelling in the countryside around our village, seeking out holy places, places not so well known, but carrying the same majestic, mammoth essence of divinity like any other lofty, popular pilgrimage place on the spiritual map of India.

They provide you the same share of divine prasad, provided you reach them with faith, openness, surrender.

And one such place is Chulkana, Chulkana Dham.

It celebrates the extraordinary life of legendary Barbarik, the grandson of mighty Bhim.

Barbarik was a powerful warrior, possessed three divine arrows given to him by Lord Shiva, and he had taken a vow that he would always fight for the weaker side in a war or dispute.

When the Mahabharata war started, Lord Krishna understood that Barbarik would keep switching sides, because the losing side would appear weaker to him, and in this way he would end up destroying both armies.

So Lord Krishna approached Barbarik in the guise of a Brahmin and asked for dakshina, and the dakshina was Barbarik's head.

Barbarik was a great sagely fellow. Even though a mighty warrior, he was a firm believer in donation and charity to a Brahmin who approaches one's door.

Barbarik agreed to the supreme act of sheeshdaan, donating one's head.

Chulkana Dham is the place where Barbarik donated his head to Lord Krishna.

His head was placed on the top of a hill, from where Barbarik watched the war.

At the end of the war, when Krishna asked Barbarik what he had seen, Barbarik replied, “It was just your chakra doing all this.”

Krishna blessed him that in Kali Yuga he would be worshipped as Khatu Shyam for his supreme sacrifice.

There is a saying, “Hare hue ka sahara, Khatu Shyam hamara.”

In Treta Yuga, Rishi Chunkat had his ashram here.

A sacred tree of peepal, said to possess miraculous power, is worshipped by the devotees who tie a thread to its trunk and branches.

Now this episode of Baba Barbarik shows that one ideology pointing to one extreme isn't good for cosmic balance.

Even a noble vow of ever supporting the weaker side, if followed without adjustment, would wreak havoc, because the position of strength and weakness keeps shifting.

And standing in this impressive shrine in commemoration of supreme sacrifice by this saintly warrior, I am wonderstruck at the spiritual power of ancient Indians, who could make such supreme sacrifices of even donating their head willingly without any protest.

There are larger meanings in these mythological sayings, and according to me, one meaning is that Mother Nature is impartial.

It's not about good or bad; it's about maintaining the balance.

Lord Krishna knew very well that at the individual level Barbarik is giving a supreme sacrifice, and that might make it look like this is not a good act, but in the overall scenario, when we look at the way the war proceeded between the forces of good and evil, between light and dark, this sacrifice was essential.

Because his one-sided, rigid adherence to the cause of the weaker side at any cost, without adjusting for the situation, would have wreaked havoc, and the war would have continued, because Barbarik would have continued switching sides, and only he would have been left at the end of it, with both sides decimated.

So it's a great spiritual experience to pay homage to this mighty sagely warrior.

Baba Jindanath: The Living Fireplace of Faith

Late March, 2026

About 250 years back, a boy was born in village Moi on the 14th day of the Chaitra lunar month. Born in a farmer family, he was named Jaspal.

The family kept cattle and buffaloes. It was normal for the boys to take the buffaloes and cows for grazing in the surrounding scrub forest and pastures around the village.

Boy Jaspal had a spiritual attitude to life right from the beginning.

One day Baba Mastanath met him while the boy was preparing to return to his village with his cattle. Baba Mastanath said to him that he wanted to eat kheer.

Being respectful towards ascetics, Jaspal said he would go back to his house and return with kheer because it could not be prepared in the forest, as there was no rice and no milk.

But the Baba said, “If you are a true devotee of God, you will prepare kheer here itself.”

Jaspal explained helplessly that none of the buffaloes was lactating at the time, and moreover there was no rice or sweet to make kheer.

Baba pointed to a buffalo that had never calved, had never given a calf.

“Go and milk that one,” the Baba said.

The Baba gave him his kamandal and asked Jaspal to milk the barren buffalo, which had never given a calf in its life.

Miraculously, milk came out of the udder of a buffalo that had never been pregnant even once in its life.

Baba Mastanath then asked Jaspal to prepare kheer.

Jaspal said he would have to go back to his village to get rice and gur, jaggery.

The Baba then picked a bone and dropped it in the milk, and as it was boiled on fire, kheer was prepared.

Baba Mastanath told him that he had come to make him enlightened, like Gopichand and Bharthari.

“Eat this kheer and turn immortal,” Baba said.

But Jaspal hesitates. He doesn't feel like eating the kheer because Baba Mastanath had dropped a bone in the milk to prepare it. For courtesy's sake, he says that he doesn't eat a sadhu's food; instead, we offer them something.

Despite repeated requests, Jaspal doesn't eat the kheer.

Lastly, the Baba himself served kheer on the leaves and ate it and left the place after some time.

Strangely Jaspal got terribly hungry after the Baba left and could not help eating. He licked the leaves on which the Baba had eaten, and it triggered disenchantment with worldliness in the boy.

He followed the Baba to his Math at Asthal Bohar. He repents and asks him to bestow liberation upon him.

Baba made him his disciple.

He asked him to do tapasya at the place where they had met.

“On the 14th of Asoj, Mother Earth will embrace you in her divine lap and you will take a living samadhi, a jinda samadhi. You will be famous as Baba Jindanath.”

Jaspal returned and performed tapasya at the place for many years.

The said day arrived.

On this occasion mother Earth parted and took him into her maternal lap for a living samadhi, jinda samadhi.

As he was entering Mother Earth, a Brahmin saw him. He ran to inform his family.

Jaspal's sister-in-law cared for him like she was a mother and he a son. When she came to know that her son-like brother-in-law was taking samadhi, she came running to the spot and requested him to come back to their house.

Jaspal asked her if she also wanted liberation, she was free to accompany him to the real home, the abode of God.

And without hesitating, without thinking twice, she also jumped into samadhi.

Both of them entered samadhi while completely alive and conscious.

Now, to commemorate this great spiritual event, a big fair is organized twice a year, on the 14th of Asoj and the 14th of Chaitra month.

Farmers offer jaggery and brooms at the samadhi temple to seek the Baba's blessings. On this occasion, about 20,000 quintals of jaggery and a big mound of brooms collect at the site, so that gives an indication of how many devotees throng the temple shrine on the holy occasion.

The temple is a Siddha Mandir, a samadhi memorial of Saint Baba Jindanath.

It has an open courtyard. The renovated temple has imposing carved pillars and domes and arches. The garbhagriha has Baba Jinda's samadhi. There is grand stonework in the interior.

From earlier brick and lime paste, now it is extensive stonework in russet brown on the outside and marble inside.

And as me and my brother stand in this grand monument of sacrifice and thirst for divine love, which drew Baba Jindanath into a living samadhi, driven by the divine unquenchable thirst, unless and until one meets with the cosmic Father of ultimate realization, it showers joy and blessings on us.

Standing here, sitting here, absorbed in the beautiful carved stones, recalling the great spiritual happening that occurred two and a half centuries ago, it's a wonderful feeling in this March, when the wheat crop around in the surrounding fields is acquiring ripening colours.

It's like being at any other holy place, the lofty spiritual places like Badrinath, Kedarnath, Gangotri, Yamunotri.

That is small-time India's charm, spiritually redolent with its local saints and sages who graced Earth and did tapasya for the beneficence of the local people, the farmers, the poor people in the countryside.

They guided them. They still keep inspiring millions.

On the days when the fair is held in commemoration of the great spiritual happening of Jaspal turning into Baba Jindanath by going into a living samadhi, the farmers and poor people come here with faith, open-heartedness, honesty and simplicity, and offer jaggery and brooms, the simple things that they can afford, and seek blessings for the welfare of their cattle and their family.

It's a living fireplace of faith and blessings that still spreads kindness, love and healing for the people around.

The Wild Rose and the Other Shore

March 4, 2026

Met her after almost 12 years.

It was in Delhi when we had met last time. We had a few months of sweet intimacy and then drifted away. We seemed to be following almost antipodal forces, and it was a beautiful transitory convergence when we crossed each other's path, sweetly embracing each other's presence without expectations, without rigidities and insecurities, without possessiveness.

It was a kind of relationship that is not bound by any conceptual expectation in a typical man-woman relationship, where there are expectations and needs at both ends, and that kind of builds up a contract, call it social contract, even if it is not written or formalized. But still there are unwritten rules of the game, with its clauses, do's and don'ts. So this type of relationship is basically defined by a framework.

But here it was something completely different.

She, a wild gust of breeze; me, a gentle, disciplined soft breeze blowing through a so-called civilized alleyway.

She, unbothered by what people think or say, following her own path, facing challenges, enjoying beauties of absolute individual freedom and free will, side by side paying big costs very dearly for not becoming a part of collective institutionalized security with its social norms, moralities and other standard rules of the game.

Basically, she was a rebel.

Me, on the other hand, expected by others as well as by my own self to follow social mores, norms, become successful, respected, always expected to be in line, to toe the line and stay a good man, always bothered about what others think, say or opine. She was exactly opposite. 

It was an exciting intermingling in the buffer zone, where contrasting impulses commingled.

For those rocking few months, me, the anchored one, enjoying the freedom of untethered free wind in the uncustomized sea of our existence; she, the bottomless, endless sea, coming to the stationary safe cove of my being on the shore.

She then receded, as the waves are supposed to, and both of us moved away.

No hard feelings, no quarrels, no heartburn, no blame game, no feeling of guilt, no feeling of victimization, no feeling of either dumping or getting dumped.

It was quite mysteriously peaceful. Taken so naturally by both of us as we take the end of a day. 

She had a few lovers before that and has had a few after that as well. But she could never get in touch with a man who could provide a reasonably safe anchor to the restless, heaving boat of her existence.

A German man of Kashmiri origin seemed to promise some anchor, but then he let her down, leaving her broken, the only time in her life when she felt caged in the beautiful tentacles of a relationship, feeling possessive about the man, and also yearning to be possessed by him.

And when he let her down, she crashed down from the peak of absolute freedom.

She attempted suicide, was in a coma for a few weeks, and returned to life when the doctors had all but given up hopes for her survival.

They say near-death experiences open up spiritual portals. It has definitely done so in her case. She has met death, so she knows a lot more about life than most of us do. 

A spiritual diva she became after that: exotic hair braids, extensive tattoos on her very fair, almost milky-white skin, body piercings, an absolutely exclusive style of wearing her clothes in a way that she would appear as a standout beacon from the normal mass around.

And all these give her a Roman gypsy kind of look.

She would pass as a hippie from the '70s if she doesn't speak and give a hint about her Indian roots: a nose ring from the middle at the base of the nose, a tattoo of Ma Kali covering her entire back, exquisite religious and astronomical symbols on arms, hands, chin. Almost everywhere. 

Her beautiful face has little freckles, a weather-beaten, wind-lashed look of a rose, a wild rose that has seen the open fury of Mother Nature, that has been caressed by a bright sun smiling from the azure blue skies, that has been shaken by cold breeze, that has seen torrential rains and snowfalls, that has tasted the sips of agony and ecstasy in utmost solitude, that has felt terribly lonely, that has felt amazingly full as well. And agonizingly empty also. 

A big basket of experiences.

And that makes her a gypsy exotica.

Her style makes her stand out in any type of crowd. Everything she wears, from stole to shoes, stands out as a mark of freedom and independence, an assertion of her own concept and idea of life.

The women look at her with jealousy. The men, of course, like spellbound black bees. Watermouthed. 

We had no clue to each other's course of life after that exciting encounter about a dozen years ago.

Then about two and a half years back, I received a mail. It was some abstract comment in the form of a question on one of my blog posts. The sender hadn't introduced himself/herself, but just looking at that small phrase, I knew it was her.

We shared our current phone numbers, started interacting.

She is about 11 or 12 years younger to me, but the way she now spoke left me surprised. A mature woman with deep thoughts in spiritual and philosophical realms.

She was running a homestay in partnership with a friend near Manali. They were planning spiritual retreats there. She wanted to meet. In fact, invited me to stay at her place and be a part of the meditation retreat plans.

I have never felt easy about becoming a part of any type of system, so I kept dilly-dallying. I was busy in solo travelling and writing books.

Before long, it was two and a half years since we were communicating, and she keenly and I casually talked about meeting someday.

On her free journey and open relationships, she spends a lot of time at Rishikesh as well. I also go to Rishikesh regularly; still our paths did not cross.

This time when I informed her that I would be in Rishikesh for a week or ten days, she said she would be there on one of these days.

“Great, let's have chai on the banks of Ma Ganga,” I quipped.

She seemed very excited to meet me after all those long years.

“Coffee on the banks of Ma Ganga,” she said with nostalgia.

On the appointed day, I am standing near the entryway to Parmarth Niketan Ashram, the place where we are supposed to meet. She will be coming over from the other side of Ma Ganga, from Tapovan side. I am staying in a hotel on this side.

Now it is about half past eleven at noon. The usual crowd of tourists and pilgrims.

I am looking at murals on the sidewalls. There are so many saintly eyes looking at the throng of people.

And then there she comes. I see her after 12-13 years here on the banks of Maa Ganga. The wild gust coming to meet the anchored shore. Excitement in the air as two different types of winds meet again. The beautiful gypsy walks to the anchored man. A brief convergence after more than a dozen years. 

I see her from a little distance. She walks gently with loads of warmth and comes into my arms.

Her presence felt almost the same.

After more than twelve years! A lot has changed. She has grown, evolved. She is in the second half of her 30s, and one can see signs of it on her beautiful face and exotic features, style and carriage.

The same exotic deportment in combination with her looks, style, clothes, tattoos.

She is a head-turner in her typical way. Walks with aloof majesty. An exotic spiritual diva. 

Beyond all this attractive cloud of exclusive femininity, I see traces of fatigue, weariness, a sort of exhaustion, which is inevitable if you have been floating on your own path of absolute freedom without any collective securities or assurances.

It is like constantly flying against the wind.

She walks with me. Many eyes follow her movement.

Women yoked into conventional safety of family and routine relationships look at her with jealousy. That is palpable. That is clearly discernible. They know their partner's eyes will follow her till the point it is possible.

When she appears, the majority of men can't help but look at her with eyes full of desire.

I become very conscious while walking with her.

We walk to a café. It is a nice little eatery overlooking Ma Ganga's broad current, visible through a glass front. We occupy a table near the window to enjoy the holy river's flow.

The café is just opening. They are still cleaning and arranging things.

Over big cups of cappuccino, we fall into conversation.

Her logic is sharpened. She is sweetly aggressive in defending her point.

I know she has been judged very harshly for her efforts to defy the conventional stream.

I used to be her idol philosopher when she was growing as an adolescent girl. Now it is a schoolgirl's fancy to prove a point to an old professor whom she meets after a long time.

The last time when we met, she told me that she was in love with me since the age of 13 ... her first love.

Now when we differ over something, there is a risk that she might take it as if I am judging her and finding fault with her. So I have to balance it out by putting things in a general way, so that she doesn't feel targeted or judged.

She is in her own zone, very solidly, assertively.

Lots of energies are flying through her psychosomatic system. That makes her a unique type of diva whom men can't help but follow with covetous eyes.

The discussion takes the direction of the recurring pattern in her life, the pattern of betrayals in relationships and business partnerships. The same discontentment and disappointment with people.

Despite all the exclusive finery of her appearance, she is a very, very simple girl, with an open and frank and honest approach to life. She isn't tricky like women usually are while dealing with men, using secrecy, shrewdness and coquetry to deal with male superiority in physical strength.

The simplicity and honesty leave her open to be used by selfish men.

It has happened repeatedly in her life.

There is a pattern.

So we are talking of recurring patterns.

It's a general experience with all of us that there develops a pattern, either positive or negative, making us feel either lucky or unlucky in our life.

The pattern gets established like a runnel of rainwater on an open field, a definite channel decided by the flow of events and happenings. The same proclivity of an individual destiny to get entangled in similar situations, relationships, events, challenging circumstances, making them mostly disappointed.

Now if you aren't satisfied with the pattern in your life, instead of blaming others and destiny, the onus is on oneself to try to break that pattern.

I have heard her gently cribbing about disappointment with people in terms of personal and professional business relations.

“Don't you think there is a pattern in this?” I ask, and she feels I am judging her on moral and social values, that I am blaming her for all that has happened.

“See, a pattern is not good or bad,” I clarify. “It just exists in Mother Nature. What I mean is that if you are not satisfied or happy about patterns in your life, you should try to break their recurrence and repetition in your life. It's not at all about a pattern being morally good or bad,” I emphasize.

We keep chatting over big mugs of coffee.

All along this time, a fat woman is eyeing our table with palpable greed. She has already asked us once if we are done, even though there is still coffee left in our mugs.

People have started coming. There are empty tables where she can enjoy coffee, but she wants this particular table, right next to the glass front, overlooking the broad sweep of Ma Ganga below.

Taking pity on her, I decide to get up.

She giggles slightly over the woman's schoolgirl's fancy for a particular seat. The woman runs to grab the prize the moment we get up.

We leisurely walk in the narrow, pleasantly congested bazaar street.

I have to buy her a gift, and books are my favourite items.

We enter the bookshop in the market. I feel very safe ensconced among books.

I propose to buy her multiple books. She keeps saying no to all my suggestions.

Finally, she settles for an Osho book which is displayed outside in a glass rack by the entry door. There is just one copy. The shopkeeper has to open the rack by removing the cello tape, get the book and re-tape it. It is showcased. What else can you expect from her? Even the book has to come from a sealed showcase. 

That is so typical of her, an exclusive free choice not bound by suggestions and limiting circumstances.

She says she wants to sit somewhere among the trees, so we start walking to the east towards the wooded hills.

It's noon and pretty hot. The deciduous forest with thick undergrowth of bushes and ferns doesn't sound welcoming.

So, walking on the road cutting across Rajaji National Park, we take a turn to the right and walk to Chaurasi Kuti, the famous Beatles Ashram.

She isn't interested in the famed spiritual ruins.

We sit in front of a large crumbling structure on a makeshift bench of plank supported over stones at each end and fall into deep conversation.

When you meet after more than a decade, you have hundreds of topics to talk over.

We keep talking for almost two hours.

It is already afternoon when our tongues need a bit of rest.

As we walk outside, she has to cover her head under a stole.

“My cellular structure cannot bear direct sunlight,” she says. “I feel like I'm melting and being drained of all my energy.”

She has turned pink in the heat.

Many people stare.

She holds my hand from the elbow, a very friendly and caring proximity. I am comforted by her touch. It feels very natural, honest, like the brace of warm sunrise on a cold morning.

We walk into a restaurant in the narrow congested bazaar street. Eyes follow her with curiosity, lust. jealousy, even suspicion.

She can be taken as anyone: Iranian, Arabic, East European, European or Latin American.

A white man is eating lunch with his partner. He gives her a comprehensive look, much to the unease of his partner.

She wants to eat typical street food, so orders aloo puri. I order a paratha, strawberry lassi we both order.

The aloo sabji does not match her street-food expectation. It is bland.

“Do you like it?” I ask.

“Not at all,” she says.

In any case, she finishes her plate.

We walk to the riverside and sit on a stone bench just near the water current going swiftly, just a step down from the stone-paved platform.

There again we keep talking into the evening.

Then she has to leave.

We walk to the other side, walking over the new Janaki Bridge, from where she has booked a Rapido bike taxi to go to Tapovan, two-three kilometres away, where she is staying at a friend's place. Her friend owns a spiritual yoga shop involving yoga, retreats and herbal massages.

She embraces me and gives a long, warm kiss at the side of my neck, below the right ear; a long, lingering, well-meant kiss, soft, full of love.

She clings tightly to me for a prolonged hug.

The bike cabby is smiling as she performs this loving goodbye ritual.

Her touch is personal, warmer than a formal friendly hug, slightly colder than a burning passionate clasp of a lover. Balanced. Bordering on unconditional love. 

A warm, respectful touch and acknowledgement of my significant image in her mind and heart.

I walk back over the bridge, not knowing whether we will meet again or not.

And in this way, the girl whom I met after more than a decade melted into the mystery like she had arrived suddenly ... so symbolic of our different paths.

I am walking towards the other shore of Ma Ganga, and she is going on the other.

I know she has immensely evolved over these years in the furnace of bitter experiences, but she has retained her individuality, her sense of absolute freedom.

She asserts her right to lead her life on her own terms without any compromises, and for this I really salute her for maintaining the sanctity of her concept of freedom, life and living.

A Yellow Sunflower Among Saffron Marigolds

March 2, 2026

The Buddhist monk, the sole yellow robe among the sea of saffron-clad sadhus.

He seems ageless, hasn't changed a bit in the last one year. He has arrived to take his usual spot at a corner in the narrow street buzzing with tourists and pilgrims.

Before that, he bows down to Ganga Ma and each and every idol or image of gods, goddesses, saints and gurus which are visible from the point he is standing at.

After this, he will stand meditatively at the corner in the crowded street, a shiny brass bowl held in a piece of cloth slung across his torso, holding the bowl over his belly, his hands at opposite corners. A slow nod of the head if someone drops a note or coin in it.

I don't disturb him this time.

I accost him the next day when he is walking in the bustling narrow bazaar.

His lump on the Ajna chakra is gone. I think he got it operated.

But he says, when I point it out to him, “It came out of its own.”

“But why did you get it operated?” I say still not getting the point.

“No, no, not that operation. It burst of its own and cleared up,” he clarifies.

“Do you remember me?” I ask.

“Yes, I do. You are Wakil Sahib, who had arranged a scooty for me to take me to the hospital for injections against dog bite.”

He remembers, but I don't know how come he calls me Wakil Sahib. I have never said so. It is his own guess about my profession.

I don't say anything on this.

“How much money have you collected for making a little Buddha temple at your village?” I ask.

“Not much, just fifty thousand rupees,” he says with a sad but peaceful smile.

“So much money!” I gush with feigned joy and ask where it is. “I would take it.”

“No, no, no, I don't keep it with me. I have a bank account. I keep it safe,” he laughs.

I add fifty rupees to his collection.

So this Buddhist Baba is the sole yellow-robed sadhu from Buddhism that I see during my pilgrimages to the holy town, and he stands out like a yellow sunflower among saffron marigolds.

There are sometimes very exciting sparks when the edges of Buddhism rub against the multitudes of Hindu edges carried by numerous mendicant friars and Babas around him.

But that's what makes it quite interesting.

It's a very lovely feeling to watch him when he bows down to Ganga Maata, when he folds his hands in front of Hindu idols of devis and devtas and gurus that are visible in the ashrams and temples around.

So basically, this is what Sanatan Dharma is about.

In my opinion, Buddhism is just one part of the great bedrock of human faith, Sanatan Dharma. And there are big parallels between the two.

In fact, Buddhism came out as a social reform movement against casteism and other negativities that had cropped up in Hinduism at that time.

So when I look at Buddhism, I just look at it as a part of Sanatan Dharma, and there is so much of commonality that Buddhism and Hinduism share.

Whatever differences the main priest-keepers of both sides claim to be there, it is just to maintain their position.

In reality, more or less, it is just another stream of faith and enlightenment flowing on the landscape of Sanatan Dharma.

Sanatan Dharma is the overall landscape on which these little streams, like Buddhism, Sikhism and all forms of Hindu belief systems, be it Shaivites, Vaishnavites, and I would say even Bhakti saints of Sufi order, they are also the offshoots of this beautiful, majestic, comprehensive landscape of Sanatan Dharma.

These are little streams sparkling with joy and contentment, with means and possibility of taking one to Om, the utmost restfulness of biggest realization.

The Angry Sadhu and the Contented Dog

March 1, 2026

Suresh, the tea seller, harks my attention in the busy narrow bazaar street passing in front of Parmarth Niketan Ashram.

He is a happy, dark-coloured man, smiling face, elegant manners, soft words. He is at peace. I cannot see the hard edges of restlessness in him.

I ask about his pet, Sweetie.

“She died a few months ago,” he says sadly, the female dog whom he loved so much.

The loss is visible on his face.

“She died due to kidney failure,” he adds.

His son is sitting nearby on a bench.

“We have another pet now,” his son informs me. “It's a Rottweiler named Jack.”

That's how life moves—losses, then new additions, change. There is nostalgia about the past, but then something new in the present to cling to.

I am having tea at his stall.

The tea man Suresh is now in conversation with a sadhu who is standing across the grills separating the narrow path from the riverside platform.

“What day is it today?” the sadhu asks the chaiwala.

“It is Wednesday.”

“Is it Wednesday?” he asks.

This query triggers a strong reaction in a woman passing through the street. She stops and starts shouting at the sadhu, a middle-aged woman beaten down by circumstances. She is draped in a worn-out shawl and carries a bag made of sackcloth.

“What did you say? You don't know how to behave with a woman? I will report you to the police,” she shouts.

The sadhu also gets angry.

“She is mad, a mad woman, okay! I challenge you to take me to the police. What would they even think about a mad woman's antics? She is a mad woman. She broke her daughter's head. She is a wandering lunatic. Her family has turned her out. Of course, the reason is her madness. Mad, mad.”

The sadhu is giving counter-punches.

“All of us are mad in our own ways,” I mutter under my breath.

“You should not get angry like this, Sadhu Maharaj,” I say.

The woman has walked on, but the sadhu is carrying on in the same angry pitch.

“Why shouldn't one get angry? One has to get angry in such situations. Otherwise, how will one even survive?” he justifies his anger.

He cites scriptures to defend his right to be angry under such provocative circumstances.

“Yes, I agree, it is natural to be angry.”

He is mollified slightly by my acceptance of his right to be angry.

Then he talks with ease, opens up, shares his story.

“What do we have? We have these dogs and cows for our family,” he says.

He then tells me the names of all the stray dogs roaming around.

“One of them bit me the other day.”

He shows me his middle finger.

“He bit me by mistake, not intentionally. He was thrashing a little puppy like a bad bully. I intervened to save the tiny puppy, and he bit me out of instinct.”

He points to the dog that had bitten him.

“But the next day when I fed him, I could see that he was very sorry about his behaviour. I could read this in his eyes.”

The sadhu is from Juna Akhara. Bhagwan Dattatreya is their patron guru.

Bhagwan Dattatreya had 21 gurus, he tells me, and one of them was a dog.

“Why a dog?” I ask.

“Because a dog is santoshi, contentment personified. A very contented being. Suppose you are eating from a plate on the ground, and a dog comes to sit nearby, keeps looking at you eating your food. If you don't offer it even a single morsel and finish your food, pick your plate and walk away, the dog will still have something to get contentment from. It will come and inhale the smell of your plate on the ground and draw some pacification and contentment from it. Even this much is sufficient to pacify its hunger”

He lovingly looks at the stray dogs whom the sadhus have given lovely names.

The sadhu listens to Osho ... on his smartphone, of course.

Phone is a must these days. Only very poor Babas don't have a smartphone.

“Osho is full of knowledge,” he says. “Osho tells very interesting things, but still he can't know the ultimate truth, because for that you need to have a guru to see you through.”

He says we ascetics give our guru the bigger place, even more than God.

“But Osho had life and living itself as his guru,” I say.

“Yes, but that is not as good as having a real guru.”

I want to say that Osho himself is guru to millions, so will his disciples get enlightenment?

But I don't say it.

The sadhu has regained his kind posture. He is smiling lovingly. Why spoil this by falling into arguments?

I think it is better to keep mum over points that might bruise someone's conception of life. Fight with your own opinions if it pays you in your career. Otherwise, it is a wastage of lung power and precious energy.

One need not carry weapons of oral armory in small talks within families, nukkads and bazaars.

A Grenade on My Conscience: Gandhi Jayanti in a Violent World

October 2, 2026

The birthday of the prophet of nonviolence—the Gandhi Jayanti national holiday.

So ironical.

The Mahatma is almost a prophet now. His philosophy and principles are almost otherworldly, distant, unrelatable and impractical for this violent world. His talk seems suitable only for heaven, while we earthlings are busy fabricating our own multiple hells using violence, distrust, lies, deceit and mad competition in order to win at any cost.

So the great man looks distant like gods. His legacy vaporizing to rise to the dimensions of mythology and merge with the ancient greats. And when that happens, we earthlings just worship that great persona through statues. We garland the pictures and pay lip service through preachy talks.

Violence and wars have become the norm now.

The United Nations is practically defunct. The poor institution looks on helplessly as countries break all international norms of sovereignty and boundaries of their neighbouring states or even distant countries and launch wars.

The words of measured caution and disciplined arguments are obsolete. The heads of state now talk quite loosely, freely venting out their anger and hate like people on street corners.

As if American hegemony wasn't enough, now we have China as the new superpower aspirant. There will be lots of friction and sparks as their respective sharp edges graze past each other, bruising their egos. The smaller countries will become the cannon fodder for the two super bulls to score goals over each other in the international arena.

All in all, it’s a super-violent world.

Violence is sprouting in various forms—in the form of a crumbling ecosystem, poverty, the haves and have-nots, the unsurpassable chasm between beggars and the super-rich, civil wars, communal flares, genocides, land grabs, ranging from countries attacking each other to take away more chunks of land to oligarchs grabbing land in pristine forests and turning them into dead land after mining.

I think we are going to embed all this violence in the algorithms of artificial intelligence.

It is an unprecedentedly powerful tool, but its mechanical soul is driven by our poisoned mind. It has the potential to make a heaven for us. But for that, you need a sweet collective heart in the driving seat in the form of governance, collective responsibilities, responsible institutions, humane corporates prioritizing rules and regulations, checks and balances, systematic pause.

But that is impossible.

We are intrinsically made to use a resource as a tool or as a weapon to surpass others. And such a powerful tool like artificial intelligence will open the avenues for unprecedented harm to humans at many levels.

Let us see where this unprecedented capacity for violence takes us in the short, immediate future.

We can no longer talk of the medium future. So forget about the distant future.

Chronic uncertainty will lie or linger just weeks away now, or even days. Aeonic shifts in the shortest of times will put the stage on a very, very shaky platform where the characters, the plot, the theme will be vibrating with drastic uncertainty.

Drastic overhauls, stormy somersaults, blizzards of change in situations, views, opinions will become the norm. These bursts of massive shifts within no time will eat away the still remaining traces of stability and pause.

When change becomes so short-spanned, it will speed up the element of entropy to such an extent that human civilization will get heated up, running fast to a burnout.

Violence in digital form is a byproduct of violence in our minds.

I stand helplessly on this day when we celebrate the prophet of nonviolence.

As we pay lip service to him through a holiday and garlands to his statues, making speeches full of lies, every word a white lie, because those words are impractical in such a violently competitive world.

As I walk in my garden, I see the imprints of my own unconscious violence: the prints of a few hairy caterpillars that crawl at night and were squashed under my foot during my night walks, the pulp of a few slugs, the numerous ants I step on daily, the yellow mark of a broken egg on the bricked yard, dried but still visible—the mark of my version of putting things in order.

The trees had overgrown during the monsoon season, hardly leaving any sky visible in my small yard garden.

As I pruned branches, plop comes down the egg.

It fell like a grenade on my conscience.

A frozen moment.

A dove's egg, broken on the ground.

And there I stood, shell-shocked, with my pruner in my hand.

I felt like the harbinger of violence, so symbolic of what we humans are doing to other species on Earth.

The more we think we are putting our house in order, the more we are destroying the little homes and nests and habitation of other species.

The poor thing, the dove, can't even angrily shout like most other birds when either a human or a predatory bird destroys its nest.

It just coos, and even in agony, it sounds as if it is chuckling, because it's a laughing dove. We have named it a laughing dove on the basis of the notes the bird makes.

That is the irony of being human.

Whether we intend it or not, we end up being violent in one form or the other, and there doesn't seem to be a way out.

That makes it most ironical, a pinching irony, at least for a poetic heart, on the birth anniversary of the great man, the Mahatma, the prophet of nonviolence.

I stand helplessly looking around in all directions, trying to get some assurance that things will be peaceful, that it will no longer be a violent world.

But alas, there doesn't seem to be any clue.

Things look destined for a darker face.

One More Step, One More Tap: A Pilgrimage Through the Tired Hills

Late February 2026 — Rishikesh

More people, more heat, less water in the holy river, more rituals, more pollution and garbage and plastic waste on the Neelkanth track.

The forest doesn't look and feel fresh even in the early morning. Nature seems tired, having overworked itself to keep absorbing the dirtying deeds and maligning needs of her children.

Less water in the brooks on the way, more plastic waste dotting the foot track. Fewer birds, fewer bird songs—a wailing call of some bird echoing through the valley, a very sad call, coming as the dying songs of the birds.

No elephant poop near the track. They have retreated further into the hills for food and free movement.

Just one creamy butterfly, even though it is still the season of spring in these Himalayan foothills.

Little groups of greenish, sparrow-sized birds—they are still maintaining a healthy population.

A foreigner in a white T-shirt and grey cargoes, making the most of what this deciduous forest has to offer. He takes shortcuts, going up steep hillsides, along dry water channels. He is clicking pictures with a boy's enthusiasm.

I see him appearing and disappearing as I move slowly, steadily, attuning myself to the rhythm of the tap-tap-tap sound of the crooked stick I hold.

The stick taps with a measured friendliness.

One more step, one more tap.

The wood and the sound it makes turn friendlier as I move on.

Tiny groups of youngsters come rushing from behind and pass me with a swag. But all of them I meet resting on the way, upslope, after some time.

The smartphone seems to have sapped their energies, making them dull and less imaginative, habituated to instant gratification. Their calf muscles and lungs and hearts don't seem to sustain a steady, relaxed, joyful walk on a forest track, on small rolling hills.

A tiring restlessness seems to be toying with them.

I again meet the foreigner about a kilometre from the temple. The path forks into two and he is confused about which one to take. I point out the correct one from a little distance.

He is clicking the little arched gateway and the bell dangling from the top.

When I arrive, we start talking as we walk to the holy shrine.

He is Alex from Brazil, works in the Amazon forest in a department dealing with the natives. He lost his son five years back.

“I was suffering terribly. Then I came here and Bhagwan Shiva and Lord Hanuman enabled me to bear the pain, took me in their blessed, caring charge,” he tells me.

With his faith, he seems to have overcome grief and accepted the reality of his loss.

A man in his sixties, full-faced, with a white beard, he is now walking to the place where Bhagwan Shiva consumed poison, as he says, after the churning of the seas by the gods and daityas.

We take prasad from a shop near the temple. He gets late in arranging things. I move along the little line of pilgrims and I am lucky to have darshan before the gates are closed for an hour for performing rituals in the sanctum sanctorum.

It is off-season and few pilgrims stand in the queue to have darshan of the holy lingam.

I whisper a prayer in the ears of Nandi in front of Shiva.

The Shiva lingam, the black, ancient-looking form, is loaded with flowers and bel-patras. As I approach the holy lingam, I pour holy water on the brass lingam, the water flowing through a brass runway to fall on the tiny fragment of rock placed in the middle of the shrine chamber.

I am just out of the shrine when he comes with his puja thali.

He has to wait for one hour to have darshan.

He asks for a suitable place where he can meditate. I think he was lucky in spending one extra hour at the holy place.

On the way, he had picked a small trident-shaped crown of a weed and said, “Even this is Shiva.”

He spoke at length about deforestation in the Amazon.

“The wild animals don't attack women as they do the men because men pose a threat. They attack with guns,” he says.

“Yes, world over, it is we men who have been unleashing wars and blood,” I say. “I think the world government should be handed over to women for some time. There will be fewer bloody wars, even though there will be more noise and gossip among the heads of states,” I say, and we laugh.

The legend of Neelkanth Mahadevji, according to Shruti, Smriti and Purana, draws its origin to the times of Samudra Manthan, the churning of the Ocean of Milk by demons and gods.

Fourteen jewels were produced during the churning, Kalakuta (poison) being one of them.

As a kind of fatherly figure, Lord Shiva consumed the poison. To soothe the flame of poison in his throat, he meditated for sixty thousand years under a Panchparni tree near the confluence of the Madhumati and Pankaja rivers.

Before going back to Kailas, the mighty Lord consecrated a Kantha-shaped lingam for the welfare of the people.

They say it is self-manifested.

I move on to cross over to the other hill on the way to Hanuman Temple, about two kilometres away, leaving Alex behind in a meditative mood, waiting for his turn when the shrine doors will open again after an hour.

The Hanuman Temple is a big one, and it stands on the top of a steep hill overlooking Neelkanth.

The pujari at Hanuman Temple has grown very old during the last year. But he still goes through all the rituals needed to keep the purity of the idols in the sanctum sanctorum. His disciple has to help him in getting up and moving around. So much changes in one year. Just a year back, he had quipped with the innocent mischief of an adolescent.

“You can have siddhis if you follow a few rituals and ceremonies that I suggest,” he told me, as I opened my eyes in the temple after meditation.

There are certain things which the energy does to one's head, and maybe he guessed, or he had this opinion about my energies because he put his hand on my head, on my Ajna chakra at the back of my neck, and then quipped this—that you can have siddhis. You are already there.

I believe in the siddhi powers of yogis. It is practically a science of yantra, mantra, tantra at the subtle energy level, but somehow, even though keenly interested in spirituality, I have never felt drawn towards attaining siddhi powers, either through tapasya or a guru's blessings.

I somehow find it to be unnatural, even unethical.

After paying my respects to the old priest and making a little donation, and after praying in front of the majestic Durga Mata idol and Lord Hanuman's idol, I start walking towards Maa Parvati Temple, two or three kilometres away.

And then I recall Alex, the Brazilian gentleman.

I remember him telling me that he really respects Mahatma Gandhi, the prophet of peace, and then he had asked me, “Do you know Mother Teresa? She was from Brazil,” he says proudly. Then we talked about her charity works.

“Modi has gone to Israel,” he says.

“Lula just came to India,” I reply.

Then we talked about powerful people who are wreaking havoc on Earth.

Now, it is hot noon as the remnants of these talks do very lazy rounds in my head.

The noon is building up really hot as I move on the trail.

Maa Parvati Temple is situated on the top of a little hill about three kilometres from Hanuman Temple. I am the only one on the path. The woods are pale, without any charm. The sun is bright.

Maa Parvati Temple is surrounded by a small hill-top hamlet. Little prasad shops line the path passing through the small hill houses.

One of the shops is owned by an old woman. Season or no season, pilgrims or no pilgrims, she is always there in front of her shop. I don't recall a single instance when I haven't seen her at her post.

The small temple is empty.

I approach Mata's lovingly decked-up idol across the hall. I walk gently and don't strike the bell.

The priest is dozing with sleep in front of Maa's idol. From the entrance to the hall, it seems he is soundly asleep.

As I stand in front of Maa Parvati's graceful idol, I find him busy scrolling his smartphone. Phones have taken possession of modern-day life even in remote peaceful hill temples.

Paying my respects and disturbing the priest's social-media session, I walk across the narrow passage through the hamlet towards the famous Jhilmil Caves, where many rishis, including Guru Gorakhnath, Sage Jhilmil and Dhruv Bhagat, did tapasya in the past.

They say even the Pandavas had taken shelter here during their agyatvas, the time during exile when they were not to be recognized by anyone.

The sun is hot, the grass beaten by the winter just gone, a depressive lethargy wailing in the small wooded valleys.

The cave is on Manikoot Parvat, the abode of many enlightened souls. It looks very ancient, and it feels plausible that it hosted mythical sages in its blackened grooves, natural arcs, recesses and stalactites. There is a natural skylight in the roof at the back. It makes it airy and well-ventilated.

There is light.

It's a living environment.

As I pass the cave, I stand near the entrance, fold my hands and move on further to visit Ganesh Gufa, about one kilometre onwards.

A sadhu from Jhilmil Cave is busy on the phone. It seems a serious issue.

Ganesh Gufa is on the other side of Manikoot Parvat, towards the back side overlooking another deeply wooded valley.

There are frequent warnings about elephants, leopards and bears.

The few shops that dot the final stretch to the gufa are locked. Not many people come here. The Shravan pilgrims may trickle up this far after visiting Neelkanth.

One shop is open.

I can see bottles of cold drinks and packets, pouches and sachets of chips, namkeen and biscuits on a small metal rack. A curtain is half drawn across the little door frame.

I don't see anyone and go down the steps towards the gufa.

“Kindly close the door after having darshan” is written on the grilled iron gate to the shrine.

I go in and put my head on the cemented floor of the small cave.

Lord Ganesha is painted with vermilion. It's a natural idol, a rounded stone looking like the auspicious God with his prominent trunk.

I strike the bell hanging from the chain.

The sound is answered by a shouty, “Who is there?”

It must be the shopkeeper, I think.

I don't answer the first time, but then he asks again.

“I am a yatri seeking darshan,” I say.

There is a very old wooden chair at the back of the wall facing Lord Ganesha's naturally manifested idol. I sit on it and chant the Ganesh mantra.

After meditating and chanting, I come out slowly, close the cave's gate as instructed and go to the tiny shop by the cave side.

The man must be in his early sixties.

I take a water bottle and a little Sprite cold drink.

As I drink the cold drink, sitting on a little mud bench overlooking the valley below, the shopkeeper comes and sits nearby.

The people in the hills would love to talk to a stranger. They have all the time for talks. 

“You must be feeling lonely. Hardly anyone comes this far, save during the Shravan pilgrimages, when some pilgrims venture this far after having darshan of Neelkanth Mahadev,” I say to him.

He says yes it's lonely but good to be left alone. 

I am not carrying much money—the bliss and bane of digital payments.

He points to a scan code hanging at the end of a string from the shed roof.

I scan the payment code. The camera catches the code—twing—the money is safe in his account.

He is happy.

He points to a place on the opposite hill across the valley.

“That is my village,” he says.

He is the purohit of the cave.

“Even though I am not decked up like a priest,” he says unapologetically.

He is wearing a well-worn plain shirt and trousers of a householder.

He points towards the cave, meaning to indicate Jhilmil Cave on the other side, and says, “They are monks in name only. They make easy money without doing anything. They smoke weed, get lots of respect and reverence. They just pay lip service to dharma, a mere formality. The cave is a property to them.”

He is clearly against the monks in Jhilmil Cave.

“This is a holy mountain, this Manikoot Parvat. It is the abode of many holy souls. They may come in front of you in the form of an animal or a beggar or a madman. You have to be conscious of your behaviour or reaction. They appear in front of you to test you.

“All this political talk about danger to Hinduism from Islam is an eyewash. I know many Muslims. They are poor, harmless people, working hard to survive. It is we Hindus who have put Hinduism under danger. We pay lip service only. Our faith has grown hollow. Even Christians have more faith in Hinduism, more than us. In fact, they are keeping more faith for our gods.”

I am listening to his narration as he speaks out his views frankly, honestly, without any filter.

He must have spent many lonely days here near the holy cave.

He seems set for a long chat, but I have to go back to Jhilmil Cave, meditate for some time and then walk down the hills to Rishikesh.

So I get up again and transfer one hundred and one rupees to his account as dakshina, because he has said that he is the pujari here.

I take leave.

He keeps shouting, still continuing with his conversation.

I walk back to Jhilmil Cave.

The ancient-looking, rugged, blackened niche of divinity in the mountain's stony ramparts.

The walk inside is a stepped one. You go up as you go into the cave, and once you have reached the uppermost platform, you stand under the broad circular opening in the cave's roof from which plenty of sunlight pours down.

I sit in front of Baba Gorakhnath's idol at the cave's back, on the platform where they say the powerful and miracle-showing Baba had meditated for years, many centuries back.

I sit in silence.

I have a theory of how to be at such powerful energetic places.

One just needs to be openly aware of the sanctity and importance of a holy place and just open with the self, without questioning, without trying to do something special to harness blessings from the place. Just be there with ease, open up, and whatever is needed for you in this and subtler dimensions gets accomplished naturally, of its own.

I sit in silence, in humility, in acceptance of my shortcomings, my pursuit for a stable self. I feel the play of energy when I open my eyes after an hour or so.

I see three or four young men are also trying to meditate. Some of their friends are enjoying weed smoke with the resident Babas on the platform down there by the entrance to the cave.

I take leave of the holy place.

I am tired. The afternoon sun is very hot.

About a couple of kilometres from Neelkanth, I see a figure.

She seems like a bundle of soiled clothes in an inversion, a place where the path passes through a depression, so it is a descent from both sides.

I see her once in a year.

The old woman is about 90.

“So you are still giving a tough time to Yamaraj,” I laugh as I approach her.

She grins, recognizing me.

“What to do, beta?”

“It is easy,” I say. “Just take the Lord's name, stop breathing and go out,” I joke.

She chuckles.

“It's not that easy,” she says.

Her husband is also alive. He is in the second half of his nineties.

Now the most important issue: she expects big charity from me.

Whenever I come here, she expects nothing less than 500 rupees, and even if I come multiple times on one particular trip, she expects that I pay her every time we meet.

She brings notes of suffering into her tone, shows me her hands, “got needles,” she mumbles, and then says something about it costing money.

I give her 500 rupees.

She is happy and blesses me by putting both her hands on my head.

“I hope to see you next year,” I say as I take leave.

She has tears in her eyes again.

I can hear her blessing words as I ascend and move ahead on the path.

A bit further, on a wayside bench under the shade of the slope, I see the old Baba.

I had met him the year before last. He was very old even than. When I didn't see him last year, I thought maybe he had shed his body.

It feels good to see him still around.

He has grown very-very old, and the good thing is, he has been on pilgrimages to Manimahesh, Chitrakoot, Banaras and other places during these two years.

He knows many sayings, parables, the kind which convey big meaning in just a couple of lines.

I don't have even a single paisa to offer him as dakshina.

When he sees that I am genuinely missing making this donation, he takes out a small phone, the ones which one sees rarely these days.

“Charge it for one month,” he says.

The phone is time-worn, donated a long time back by someone near Narmada in Central India.

Smartphones have turned us quite dull to the basics of such old base models.

He doesn't know his number.

His phone has no talk-time value in it; it means I can't even make a missed call to my phone to know his number.

The Baba remembers his chela, Sonu. He says he is a nice boy in Uttar Pradesh.

I call him, but he does not pick up.

“Call his wife,” the Baba says, and gives me another number from memory.

I'm surprised that he remembers long-digit phone numbers, that too multiple ones of his followers, but he is not aware of his own phone number.

So as I call this second number, a woman picks up, but the call is immediately taken up by her husband, Sonu.

The Baba asks his chela to give me his—that is, Baba's—number, so that I can recharge it.

The chela gives a number.

I confirm it twice.

I go into phone recharge on my phone and check out the plans available for the number.

I pick out a plan of 489 for three months.

“Why waste so much money?” the Baba says.

He says it from the heart and means it.

But I proceed to recharge it.

The recharge-successful bell twinkles, but there is no recharge message on Baba's phone.

I call back a few times on the number we have recharged.

Nobody picks up.

Then it is switched off.

Suspecting something fishy, we call back Sonu.

He is adamant that it is the correct number he has given. He raises a theory about something being wrong with Baba's old phone.

I give up.

I know the chela has duped me.

I hope he didn't give his girlfriend's number for a free recharge.

I am slightly upset that the intended charity got somewhere else, into someone's purse whom I don't know.

The Baba is calm and at peace.

“Don't worry, all is well. The donation is forwarded from your side with pious intentions. It is complete from your side. Your karma is fulfilled in this.”

He speaks very kindly.

I take leave with parting words about his chela being very smart.

“Please don't trust him blindly,” I say.

But he just smiles.

Trust.

Trust and faith are all he has, this old Baba.

It proves to be a very long day of walking.

I walk through the evening, my stick handle loose and rolling. It rolls after me, making a constant dragging sound.

That also is its support.

I reach Rishikesh when the night has fallen.

The pilgrims are savouring spicy food in the narrow, shop-stuffed bazaar after the evening Ganga arati—worship of Food Devata after melodious prayers to Mother Ganga.