A Miracle on the Ganges

 

Fed by the heavy spates of rains in the Himalayas, the holy river Ganga flew with full life and vigour. Its waters fervently rushed past, creating torrents of devotional fervour.

The evening Ganga arti at Parmarth Ghat, Rishikesh, is an important milestone on a typical day at the pilgrimage town.

Everything is routinely settled for the evening prayers on the holy river’s bank. The yellow robed young monks are ready to chant delicious mantras to enthral the congregation held on the marble steps overlooking the majestic river. The tourists and pilgrims are set for a delicious dose of religious musicality.

At half past five in the evening, the hills to the north get clouded by dark gray clouds. The air mass moves down the valley. A strong wind blows. The arti has just started. The rain lets loose a pining, pleasant outpour. It’s a torrential rain buffeting the earth with new life. It pours down with open heart. The opposite bank becomes almost invisible. Meanwhile, the arti continues under the waterfront pavilion as the people rush to take shelter under any portion of roof available. The people stand, sit and recline and clap to the rhythmical chime of the mantras. Brass prayer lamps with hooded snakes projecting over the fire bowl burn with unaffected charm and imposing vigour. It warms the cold air gushing into the valley. The hymns are captivating. The Ganges becomes one with the falling dark grey torrents of water. It seems a conduit to the awesome super entity above. Everything is thoroughly washed. 

The people, a teasing mix of natives and foreigners, gather and dive into the devotional enthusiasm with equal measure. Incense smell wafts across, pleasantly plummeted around by the wind blowing down the valley. The spears of rain pierce the heaven-bound fragrance to keep it lingering on earth for a little bit of more time. The simple rhythm of mantras and devotional songs vibrates the chords of faith in many hearts. It’s beyond language, religion, caste and culture. The people are sitting on the bathing steps, lost in devotion, staring at the fervently rushing waters of the holy river. All are part of the devotionally surcharged air.

Even though you try your level best to surrender, your uncontrolled mind is encouraging you to have more expectations through the righteous set of rituals, entitling you to more blessings by the higher entities.

There she is: An innocent, pure, unadulterated being, beyond the maladies of unchecked ambitions and the bug of fight for some more space in the world. An accident at the time when she was conceived puts her on the sidelines. She isn’t a participant in the buzzing game of life; she is a mere presence.

She is a girl around 14 years in age; her ‘being’ defined by the clinical symptom named autism or may be cerebral palsy, I’m not sure. Whatever it’s, it makes her a special child and sidelines her, puts her beyond rampant desire, the devil bug that infects the modern mankind and despite best of our efforts stays side by side with our imposed goodness.

The swift currents of prayers have captured the mundane souls around. But all this, more or less, is meaningless to her. Or does she have her own share of meaning that we can’t understand and perceive?

She is a beautiful special child. Her identity would have been still more significant in the mundane, worldly sense of the term, had she been in a position to gather the traces of her individuality with the cord of self-interest.

The doctors may call it some debilitating clinical symptom, she but is just the way she is. Unconcerned about the fight for larger stakes through the crutches of faith, she looks the other way. She stares into the tiny side-lane where she has been pushed into by the birth-time biological accident. She has virtually no claim over the life’s bounties that we so brazenly fight for. This look of detachment appears a punishment to the normal world burdened with its mountainous pettiness. Holding her head at an awkward angle she looks away. She has no reason to be too serious about the clouds of surcharged prayers.

The girl has beautiful eyes, a perfect nose and an attractive face-cut. Overwritten is the imprint of her special ability that we take as disability. Her lower lip hangs loose. It’s an opening into her disarrayed persona. It’s a clue to her not being in control of her identity. A bit of saliva drips down. With an effort she moves her hand to wipe it with the back of her hand and muster up some control. She then fiddles with the towel hanky given by her mother sitting next to her.

Her limbs and head move with mechanical pauses, not with that fluidity which pushes us into the stream of commonness. Looking at her helplessness, everyone around appears to own a sea, and she merely a drop. How will you accept such injustice on the part of nature?

Her family appears to have enough sensibility to take care of her needs, but that is no justification. She doesn’t even realize what she has lost right from the beginning of her innings in this life.

Lost in the oblivion of her own special world, she comes gasping on the surface, awkwardly tugs to draw her mother’s attention, who has learnt to ignore such disturbances on her girl’s part.

It’s a particular challenge to raise a special child. You need unending patience and the tank of maternity should never be empty, otherwise the special child has no choice other than suffering.

There are girls of her age, fleeting around, full of life, sweet-sour experiences of life waiting with excitement at the threshold of adolescence. The people are floating leaf bowls containing flowers, incense and a tiny lamp. One tear in her unseeing eyes is more substantial than the Ganges itself.

The sea of her loss drowns me in its endless waters. My own tears add to that sea.  My own bickering and bitterness feel such a meaningless thing. There is everything around, but she cannot so much as take a confident, solid step to claim her share, while everyone in the devotional crowd is busy in a stampede to collect huge piles.

The evening Ganga prayer is over. The rain has stopped. Her family gets up. She also gets up with an effort, her movement standing somewhere between a human and a mechanized robot. It’s not a confident, fluid run. Every moment has a full stop, a kind of an end of the journey. Walking absorbs her in its own world. There she goes with unsteady steps, her hand on her mother’s shoulder to get that support which she will need forever.

She can survive only as long as there is love and care in a fellow human’s heart. It’s more vital than the oxygen, water and the food she eats.

What is the meaning and purpose of her survival? Perhaps, it’s to keep the banner of love and care flying in this worsening world.

The night is falling. Her language includes just a few efforted sounds. She can merely respond to the language of love and more still to hate and anger.

I’m lost in the sad sea of her loss. I try to swim to find some justification and meaning to all this. I find none. It’s blank, pointless. Tears are streaming down my face. Her image haunts me. I sit to meditate by the Ganges. The sea of sadness surges in. A daughterly affection for her engulfs me. My hands convulse to bless her with all the happiness possible in the world. My lips move to kiss her forehead and sip down all her agonies with my fatherly prayers.

This seems to be the meaning of her life. Melting hearts, creating selfless torrents in the hearts caught in the selfish quagmire and make people feel grateful for whatever they have got in life.

As I close my eyes, more tears stream down, washing my soul of much of the bitterness I hold on account of my own losses.

I feel like a helpless father who cannot give a portion of the world to his daughter that she surely deserves. I implore mother Ganges to pour all blessings on this little angel; to fulfil the endless abyss of her helplessness with all the happiness and joy possible for a girl. I pray for the long life of her parents, for only the parents are best suitable to feed the vulnerable lamp with the oil of love, affection and care. I pray for her family’s economic well being and the overall luck and fortune so that satisfied with life, and hence less bitter, they turn more loving and sweet and she gets her share of love and life from that happy pool. I pray for her younger brother to grow up to be a sensitive human being who will take the baton of love from their parents. I pray for him to have an understanding and loving wife who will help in keeping the flame of love going on to enable the flower survive happily.

At the top of all this, I put my faith in Ma Ganga:

‘Ma you have a soul. You are so full of life and carry miraculous powers in your holy waters. Your force can cut mountains, so it can definitely help this little flower take control of its destiny in her small hands. Do a miracle Ma! Let her be cured gradually so that she takes her portion of happiness on her little palm. Do it slowly to make it appear like a digestible fact, a kind of little surprise medically, if you don’t want to make it appear too miraculous!’

The blissful torrents of Ma Ganga ripple past. With the tears streaming down, I pray for that little angel of love and affection. My tears have absolved me much of my bitterness. I open my eyes and look helplessly into the darkness. In the dark, Ma Ganga feels capable of performing miracles. I want her to be miraculous.

Next evening, I visit the arti ghat again to see the angel more than anything else. There she is! I look at the angel with a peculiar mix of sadness and happiness: A strange equanimity, equidistant from pain and happiness. I may have forced myself to believe in a miracle. I am happy with it. I can sense a small instalment of Ma Ganga’s blessing going to her share.

Today she isn’t looking with sad indifference into the side-lanes of her unparticipating existence. She looks closer to the world around. She is looking into the praying mass. She appears a bit closer to have her own share of happiness, all by herself. She laughs, shakes her head, hardly making any noise. She tries to clap, rapidly bringing her clenched hands together without actually hitting them. She pulls at her mother’s sleeve with more authority. She looks belonging to this world and ready to see and understand it at her own pace and conditions.

As they get up after the arti, and as she follows her mother with efforted steps, she pulls at her shoulder and points to her waist. Her mother turns and adjusts her pyjama. There they go at their own pace.

It’s better to believe in miracles because sometimes that is the only option left.

For the remaining part of my stay, I fervently pray for her to the limits of my soul. On the day of my departure, at five in the morning, I walk down the steps to reach Ganga Ma, wash my face and pray again for the angel. The holy river looks very calm in the pre-dawn darkness. It looks as if she is able to hear my prayers in the absence of all the din and noise. 

Even while moving on the road along the opposite bank, I keep lighting the lamp of my prayers.

She is in her own world surrounded by love and care which I believe will only grow with the passage of time, making her happier. More importantly, the miracle of Ganga Ma will work. It may happen slowly but it is inevitable. With the passage of time, she will become capable of having her share of life and living at her own terms to give back the love that has kept her alive.

Any memory of her doesn’t go without praying for her. I feel enriched and evolved by her sight. My bitterness has poured out and it has made me more loving, full of gratitude and more open to the belief in miracles. For, ultimately only miracles count. It may not appear like this, though.

GOD BLESS HER!

MA GANGA PLEASE CURE HER!

LET HER BE THE PART OF THE COMMON STREET!

LET HER COME OUT OF THE TINY SIDE ALLEY!

Miracles are happening all the time. What is quite miraculous is that most of them pass off as ordinary occurrences. Perhaps, that’s how it has been planned.

Never felt so fatherly before. I can feel the likeable pain of being a parent. Blessed is the parental pain!      

 

A Note of Thanks for my Dear Readers

 

Dear readers, your love and affection is the basic driver of my urge to keep posting on my blog. A few people tell me that my writings have brought a positive change in their life. That’s enough reason to keep writing. As I write this, we are facing lots of challenges due to the pandemic. These last two years have been very tough for most of us.

Things are rough indeed. But isn’t life only about successfully crossing a series of hurdles? And then reach home, finish that last line, with a smile.

What if the room full of miseries appears immovable at the moment? Accepted that the room with its thick walls is beyond your capacity to shift its location or change its shape. You cannot push its walls to change its shape and change the interiors. You might even be incapable of removing the darkness inside, having lost the light of enthusiasm, the sunrays of your will power, and the brightness of your passion.

It is not necessary to be a revolutionary fighter all the time. You can very well sit in a still darker corner of the room full of your own miseries, most of them invisible to the uncaring world outside. But then sitting in a dead dark corner is being dead and we have no business to be dead before we actually die. Temporary shelter in the lap of a musty, stale corner might be of some utility, but it’s not more than allowing the tears and anguish of self-pity and helplessness to flow out through the feeling of being a victim.

Once this little puss is out of your wounded system, it serves no purpose at all. A little bit of crying after being overpowered by the feeling of victimization at the hands of forces beyond one’s control helps. Crying helps in letting out the salt from your injuries. It also clears the eyes. After the watery outpour, you are supposed to see better and clearer.

You have been on the hospital bed, taking a bit of rest for the diseased, afflicted self. Now you are supposed to step down, wear your slippers and walk away to claim what you lost while you were forced to take a rest.

Looking beyond your dark corner in the murky room with immoveable walls, you can at least open the windows that either you or the situational winds have banged shut. Do not move the walls, do not even try to bang against the locked door, just open the openable window to allow a bit of light, to expose yourself to the fine traces of light that will surely burn the fire in you again, that will definitely ignite your passion, enthusiasm and the willpower lying dormant.

If you cannot lift your roomful of miseries on your head and throw it miles away, you can surely lift little-little signs of your worth and capabilities lying around your feet in the dark and look at these against the light from the just-opened little window. These are the imperishable seeds; these cannot die, and will surely grow into a luxuriant harvest, provided you give them even the moisture of your feeble self during the re-germination phase.

You might not be able to laugh to the full contentment of the self, but you can smile at the little world outside your tiny peeping window. Even the slightest semblance of smile will do. These are the tiny buds that will surely blossom into full laughing flowers.

Your hands might not be still ready to go agog and start breaking the mightiest boulders around. But you can raise your hands and wave gently at the world outside, it will wave back with grace and acknowledgement, giving back its share with kindest interest.

You might not be still ready for the marathon, but you can shuffle your feet and count your steps and listen to your slow pace between the walls. It will prepare you for the longest journey that you might take. It will be a prelude to your first step on the winnable journey that you will definitely take.

Close your eyes and with an open heart accept your share in making things dark in the room. Nobody is perfect and we just have the bigger or smaller share in our miseries. We cannot change the universe, but we can definitely bring about a little reformation in the self. You might not be able to overhaul your personal self, but you can definitely change tiny bits of life in general. It will blow up the wrong shades, leaving you a totally different person.

Close your eyes again and think of your positives, your advantages, your good qualities. There will be many I’m sure. Look around with a gentle look, these must be somewhere around. You will surely spot them. Smile at the little basketful of your qualities. These are your weapons to help you win through the battles and wars. A mere acknowledgement of their existence will do at this stage. Just caress your qualities and look at these with a proud smile.

These and many little things will help you. Forget about bigger things. These little seeds will grow into a bigger harvest. Just gather these seeds, hold them, they will take you back to the bigger world of shiny roles, responsibilities, praise and achievements.

These little anecdotes and my frank opinions posted on this blog are in celebration of life and living. I sincerely hope the time  invested by a dear reader in reading this blog brings about a positive change. Journey well and never forget your smile as you walk on the beautiful path that life is!

 

Musings on a Hazy Early-winter Day

 

If you can’t respect others’ thoughts, not a big problem with that. Just slog it out—even egoistically—to prove your point. But never do the same in case of feelings. Respect others’ feelings. There is a big difference between thoughts and feelings. You can trample your fellow human beings’ thoughts but please spare their feelings. Feelings are sanctimonious. Leave them unstigmatized and pure on the altar of heart.

***

In the book "Animal Farm" the pigs led a coup against humans, driving them away. Nothing to do with humans and anything related to them, they declared. The commandment included not to stay in the farmhouse once used by the human owner. Later when the group of pigs, the leaders, shifted to the rooms, their propaganda master said it was more suitable to the dignity of a leader to stay in the comfort of a house. Well, it reminds me of Kejriwal and his big official bungalow after becoming the Chief Minister of Delhi.

***

World is just set for fundamental changes. Even birds are taking short-cuts on natural instincts. A dove simply picked few sinews to tag them in the flimsy protection of the money plant clinging to our neem tree, just 2 ft above the ground, visible to wild cats and humans. Laying two eggs it just flew away not to be seen. I found one egg missing and the other somehow fruitlessly stuck up. We have done irreversible damage to nature and its constituents!

***

Among monkeys we grew out of our skin to rule the planet. Among us, now the politicians are evolving faster as a totally different super-species. Time is not far when they will stand out as winners at all levels. So fellows join politics. It’s merely a matter of making good choice in the scheme of evolution.

  

***

"When they measured my stature, they failed to measure my heart," NFL veteran Vernon Turner on the sports officials' doubts about his suitability for the game given his less than adequate physical attributes. He proved them wrong by not being a product of his DNA. He became a product of his actions. Go within and dab into the innermost reservoirs of your will power. It undoes any evident limitation imposed on the outer surface of our existence. Be tethered to your axis. That is what supports your spin. Forget about the periphery. Those are merely some revolving offshoots of temporary winds let loose by your axial forces.

***

I may not have the genes to be a world champion, but I have the option to act and be a smart, successful, happy, competent, confident and caring human being. And once I do that no reward stays unachievable.

***

Kafka’s unfinished novels are the fullest stories I have ever read.

***

The rich and powerful countries, not willing to engage each other directly in warfare, hit each other through helpless third world countries. They use them like hunters to strike each other. Problem here is that the back is of stone and hardly gets a bruise. The hunter but gets broken. See through the tragic plays unfolding among poor and developing countries. Funny and tragic. That's what modern warfare is all about.

***

Majority of our repentances are born of the failure to act in the past, rather than the actions that failed. So think, rethink, discuss with the best person you have around, and then just nail it man, simply act. The burden of regrets becomes lighter in future.

***

The mighty lord whispers in the softest voice,

My son grow thou stronger and sire chances for those without any choice! 

***

Though your enemy, I am sweet!

My neck thus deserves a softer treat!

***

You know why people kick a football? Simple, because it reacts and invites more kicky acts! And why don’t they kick a stone? Because it doesn’t react, only your toes get an ache! So fella become stones, controversies will find you untouchable then!

***

A well-timed realization:

Sometimes you have to nearly die to discover the meaning of life.

***

Expansion and contraction—

A raindrop in the ocean,

and a balloon in the air,

One mixing with the whole

to become complete and happily spread out,

The other capturing a part of the hole

to egotistically confine for a specific, limited self.

 

***

My religion is not so weak that in order to show love for it I have to take the support of hate for the religion of someone else.

***

Help your own self by adding little pieces to what you actually are instead of breaking mountains to be what you aren't.

***

The desert storm hunts around with painful fury. The burning beast! Ashes and ambers in its furnaced heart. Unquenchable thirst in its guts. Restless howls echoing in its sandy soul. Its existence defined by a futile belief in death and destruction—the absence and denial of supple, pliant, giving and forgiving waters. Its inflated vastness puffing out lifeless sandy blizzards. Poor thing doesn't know that a tiny oasis silently doing its lifeful duty is dearer to both humans and Gods!

***

In the calm core of my wind-lashed, stormed self,

some unmovable shadow defines the substance of my being.

I but have been running miles after miles,

chasing mirages to find my identity.

***

A dove couple is lost in the surrendering flutter of passionate love notes on a swaying neem branch decked with fresh, monsoon-fed leaves.

Dove in love.

Impatient he.

Teasing she.

Airy swirls.

Hugging frills.

Breeze free.

Passionate spree.

Almost a fight.

Soul's delight.

Love.

Dove.

Love.

 

Some Random Non-offensive Brain-farts

 

A sneeze shakes me and the mucus of opinionated truth dribbles out. Haa Haa…I run to wipe my nose and be presentable.

***

Ah peace, the redundant wish! Worldwide peace and harmony doesn't need authority, power centers and hegemony to sustain. But the latter—authority, power centers and hegemony—surely need strife, wars, violence and bloodbath to sustain them. Peace has never been the focal point of geo-strategists. If it was, most of the issues we are fighting about become redundant by default.

***

Don't write with hate in your heart, even against the most hateful. If good writers write with a bit more sense of equanimity, they do more justice to the art. Falling off the fine line of balance turns them cynical, and it affects their art. The only problem with "The Ministry of Utmost Happiness" is that it's written with too much "hate" for "religious hatred". It somehow taints the soul of the artist. Hate, even for a good cause, easily creeps up to turn to cynicism. The latter sours the spirit, which in turn smiles a degree lesser than in its unadulterated version. But it's human to have our prejudices, even if they come at the cost of losing our balance a bit. Otherwise the book is poignant and moving beyond words.

***

Learn to smile big from your small corner. It's the smallest plant in my garden but it beats most of others in bigness of flowers, in numbers and beauty also. It appears so happy to be just itself. No wonder, in a world obsessed with larger and bigger things, it attracts you from its little corner with big bouquet of beauty. It's so tiny and fragile but has a huge blooming spirit. No matter where you are, in whatever circumstances, at whatever ladder in the scheme of things, you can bloom at your own level to the fullest. And when you are true to your own being, your own self, you attract bigger eyes by default.

***

Shut your mind's eyes and hypothetical projections cease to be. Well, nothing exists as long as I choose to ignore it. And who are you? My colors are my own unlike yours. 

***

A moment drops from the endless sea of existence. Childish bud, youth in full bloom and dead decaying petals of an old flower. I see them on a jasmine leaf arranged as a big lesson. I decide to read. Nature accepts fluidity and transition. Spot impermanence and grab your moment now, this very moment. Mystical handover of the baton: little bud to full bloom to crumpled petals. Accept the change because that's what keeps nature alive.

***

A small leaf holds its drops of rain and proclaims, “My water! There may be seven seas around abounding with endless waters. But I reserve my right to hold the raindrops because those clouds rained for me only.”

Farts of a Village Frog

 

There is an independent will pervading the universe, expanding with the cosmic extension it elopes with the infinity. Its particles sneak into our subconscious mind, leading us in directions where we won't go consciously. No wonder our minds are such restless, unchecked horses. Thoughts just float around. It’s a chaos, disorderly mess. The mind is the sea in constant upheaval. There are storms of thoughts, ideas and emotions. The challenge lies in taming the self, in building strong ramparts against the meteoritic onslaught of the rampaging soldiers of the universal free-will. The citadel of the self has to be strong to withstand the barrage. Once the meteoritic showers stop their random crash-landings in our brain, it will turn a cool, tranquil, peaceful and calm pond where one can see the real self reflected in crystal clear waters.

***

One minute of hate and anger comes at the cost of one hour deducted from life. Hate is the choice of the worst; love is the smilingly picked up gift of the best. The journey from the worst to the best doesn’t cross seven seas. It’s just an arms-length endeavor. You just let go hate from one hand and hold love delicately in the other. It simply requires this much for the biggest transformation, from the worst to the best. Choose to be the best.

***

In the farthest fathoms of my being, a steady lamp is aglow with its soft mystical rays. I but kept on looking heavenwards for light and guidance, ignorant of the tiny torch carrying the cosmic flame within. Blinded by the worldly blaze outside, I fell headlong. Even the tiny lamp inside toppled and put heart on fire. Don’t worry guys, it gives just acidity. A bit of heartburn. Maya mili na ram—the end result!  

***

Two honeybees drowning in the water bucket. I take them out and they fly. Apart from saving two lives, I create the possibility of an extra honey drop for this bitter world. Goodness is complete in itself. It doesn't need the outcome to qualify it quantitatively. Do your good deed. It might be almost invisible, but it carries a positive outcome in some corner of the universe.  

***

Strong lies are better than weak truths. Sounds quizzical? Well, it’s no more than the support and confidence in your truth that draws the lot in its favor. Your truth is truth as long as it survives on the life-force of your trust in it. Strong lies are nothing but the tombstones and graves built on the dead truths buried safely for convenience.

***

After socialism you have to build capitalism. Ever saw anything more contradictory? Look at all the socialist societies. After the class wars and purging, and decades of torture and robbing people of their free-will and independent choices, they plant the seeds of capitalism again. Why? Because there is simply no other way. Efforts at socialism are all like burning down the previous harvest, weeding out endlessly, tilling, breaking clods, preparing the seed-bed, only to plant the previous seeds again. Damn funny and tragic. If all this ends at the same point then why all this blood-bathing?

***

At least be a living-room dissident. It saves the soul against the evil. This is a bit of practical advice to those struggling against undemocratic governments, for example, democracy supporters in Hong Kong. It keeps the flame alive for more appropriate times.

***

Imagine a philosophy student working in a boiler-plant, or a pianist working on radio circuits. Such wonders are possible only in a communist society. It’s only about killing the freedom of mind and choking the spirit to mass produce zombies who don’t understand much about what human life is all about. Left-leaning Indian intelligentsia ought to be put to some manual labor to get the rust off their ideology-clogged brains.

***

"A communist is someone who's read Marx, an anti-communist is someone who's understood him."
Svetlana Alexievich

***

When it rains in Haryana, the most chilled out people are the electricity board staff for they cool their heels and bless us with 24 hour power cuts, always everywhere in the villages at least. Possibly the belief is that once blessed with rains, the farmers don't need anything else in life. Anyway, it doesn't pinch too much because even on the finest day we have at least 14-16 hours of power cut. Our CMs have changed but they are all comfortable with the power cuts in the countryside at least. A very suitable agreement on certain policies, I see. It was the same under Chautala, Hooda and remains the same under Khattar. Possibly some things are better left unchanged.

***

Second-Hand Time by Svetlana Alexievich is elegantly fat, white, hardbound and seductive. Lose yourself to its charms. It will open up the communist-time horrors of stifled emotions, imprisonment of the individual soul and loss of the natural ability to even make sense of what freedom is. Hope the caricatured Indian version of communism does some soul-searching after such revelations.

***

 

That which is best, the universe conspires to preserve it. Same is the case with Taoism. Uprooted from China, it will survive in India. Buddhism was India's best export. Taoism can be our best import.

***

Watch your words, your sentences and speech. If you take a stock of the overall pitfalls of your life, your words, not the real bloody punches you gave out, might be the spoiler. It’s not usual to have a war. Real fights and bloody noses are exceptions. These come rarely. In between, most of the time, we are blabbering. So buddy it’s the words that carry the risk to land us in testing, awkward and painful situations. And of course words take us to the best moments of our lives also.