Jyotish: Rock stars of Hinduism

[Guest guest]

The headline is from the internet newspaper Rediff on the net. It makes an

interesting reading. It is about Naga sadhus in the Kumbhamela.

 

 

 

Rediff

January 25, 2001

ROCK STARS OF HINDUISM

The main entrance to the Juna Akhara is barricaded, to cope with the huge

rush of gawkers. Two Naga sadhus — not naked ones — carrying swords stand at

the entrance, chasing away the faithful.

When the crowd gets too close to the barricades, one of the Nagas swishes

his sword at the crowd. There are a few squeals, and some nervous laughter —

but no one is really alarmed.

If religion is the music of the soul, then the Nagas are the rock stars of

Hinduism.

Wilful, capricious, prone to sudden bouts of friendliness and equally

inexplicable fits of rage, the Naga encampment at the Juna Akhara has been

attracting hordes of pilgrims and gawkers alike — and not the least because

a large majority of them walk around stark naked, and will — if they are in

the mood — willingly strike poses, perform acrobatics and talk to you.

On learning that I was a newspaper reporter, one of them startled me by

winking, and pitching his voice low, said, “Beta, you walk around the camp,

taking the road to your left, then turn left again, then left again and you

will come to the backside of the camp. There is no barricade there, you can

go in.” And then he chortled in glee — presumably the thought that he had

put one over on himself and his fellow guard tickled him no end.

The camp, which I enter through the back, is made up of long double-rows of

tents, facing each other, with a walkway in between. Each tent is occupied

by a Naga sadhu, doing nothing much in particular that you can see. They

take their ease on their sleeping mats, a burning diya, a bowl containing

vermillion and another open bowl for alms keeping them company. As you look

inside the tents, some raise their hands in benediction, some glare at you,

some ignore you.

Shiv Chandra Bharti’s tent is crowded in comparison to those of his

neighbours — within it are a couple of foreign girls and a white man with

hair so long and so heavily matted as to be the envy of the sadhus

themselves.

In response to my salutation, Bharti beckons me closer, applies a vermillion

tilak to my forehead, sprinkles on my head a few grains of rice coloured

saffron and invites me to sit.

He is one of the garrulous ones and needs little prompting to talk of

himself.

He is, he says, 63. And adds, in matter of fact fashion, that he has another

57 years to live before he voluntarily abdicates life. “And then they will

bury me, and my disciples will offer regular pujas at the site.”

How does he know how long he has left to live? “I know — Baba se kya aisa

savaal poochte ho? (How can you ask me such questions?)”

The language is colloquial, the mood mercurial, as he tells you how he ran

away from home at the age of five because his father was a drunk and his

mother had died. The runaway took up with a wandering Naga sadhu and made

himself useful, doing little odd jobs for him in return for food.

“When the Baba thought the time was right, he made me undergo the diksha,

the penance. I did penance for 12 years, eating very little, doing all that

the Baba asked me to do, learning what he taught me. And finally, I was

initiated.”

Among other things, he had at that point to formally forsake all worldly

things — clothes, possessions, women, whatever.

>From the age of 20, which is when he was initiated, to now, he has made the

Badrinath Hills his base camp, where he lives along with several other

Nagas. Most of his time is spent in the hills, from where he occasionally

descends to take part in some religious mela or the other.

And what does he live on? “Our disciples give us alms; when we come to melas

like this pilgrims give us alms, and that is enough for us,” he says,

talking of how the young disciples of the Nagas occasionally go to the

nearest village to buy basic provisions. Food is a once a day affair,

fruits, roots and herbs easily available in the forest are the staple diet.

And, of course, there is the ubiquitous chillum, as much a Naga stamp as

their naked, ash-clad bodies.

Where do you get the marijuana from? “We grow it ourselves,” he grins. And

why do you need it? “It helps to subjugate the senses,” he says. But hasn’t

he achieved that already, thanks to his yogic studies? Why does he need

drugs to achieve that state?

The question is greeted with a glare that signals I am transgressing. Yet, a

moment later, he relaxes, then goes into a discourse about how the human

mind is a hyperactive animal. You may think, he says, that you have tamed

it. And if you focus on that one task, of taming the mind, you can do it.

But when your attention is distracted by other things, then your control

slips, and that is when the mind plays its tricks on you.

“See,” he grins, pointing at the two young girls sitting in the tent,

following the proceedings with evident mystification, “aren’t they pretty?

Now when they are here and talking to me, it is easy to get distracted. But

the chillum helps to make sure I never am.”

The girls, by their body language, appear to have realised they are the

subject of the conversation. And simper. And look clueless. Which hugely

delights the Naga sadhu — somehow, as you spend time with them, you realise

they love surprising you with their words and their antics, making you

uncomfortable.

So when, I ask him, did the Nagas originate? “I don’t know for sure,” he

says. “Our Mahants tell us the Juna Akhara is 300 years old.”

He does not know, either, just how many Nagas owe allegiance to the Juna

Akhara. “Thousands,” he says simply. “Not all of them have come here.”

The sadhus, he points out, have as rigid a social structure as the rest of

us, for all their seeming freedom. At the apex there is the

Mahamandaleshwar(s), with the Mahants below them. And each Mahant is

spiritually responsible for the sadhus who owe him allegiance.

A young lad, clad in mud-stained saffron, interrupts, talks to Shiv Chandra

Bharti in a language I don’t know. “We have been called to prayers and

lunch,” he informs me. “You can go now.”

Imperiously, he gestures for me to bow before him, then lays a hand on my

head. “You are a good boy,” he says. “You will have a happy life.”

A further sprinkling of rice, a gesture that any alms I am desirous of

giving may be deposited in the open bowl in front of his seat, and off he

goes — incongruously, stopping for a second to pat one of the girls on her

head and to ruffle the hair of the other.

Both laugh — a sound half-nervous, half-excited. And we all watch him go.

Lisa and Kate are from Brisbane, they tell me over cups of tea in a stall

just outside the Naga encampment. Both are young, in their twenties, and

besides the usual paraphernalia of the tourist, they are clutching a

rudraksha necklace apiece, while Lisa is additionally burdened with one of

those ubiquitous white plastic cans they sell all over the mela site.

“Gangajaal, she tells me. “Oh, is it jal? Sorry.”

And why would you be carrying Gangajal around? “They told us it is good to

sip a little bit each day, and it didn’t cost us anything, so...” A shrug.

What were they doing in Shiv Chandra Bharti’s tent anyways? Did they

understand what he was saying, do they know the language? “No, we were

walking around, and looked in, and he gestured to us to come in. We thought

it wouldn’t be polite to refuse.”

So did you bathe in the Sangam, I ask.

“Oh yes,” says Lisa. “It was very cold, we went early in the morning, hired

a boat...”

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