the rickshaw puller with his customers |
When it comes to religious fervour, one can
vouchsafe with all integrity that the Assamese would score
much much higher on their RQ than their counterparts in most other parts of
India. Every place of worship has people flocking by the dozens and chartered
trips (often called line trips) are a craze here, when it comes to having
darshans of their favourite deities. Sunday evenings were marked by bhajans and
other related rituals which testify to their zeal and religious intensity.
Takes me back to the age-old views about India
being seen as a ‘land
of religion’ through Western eyes, as a land that promised ‘spiritual
release’ from the fret and fear of mundane worldly life, which gives us the
pride of place as having the richest and most exciting cultural traditions in
the world. This was evidenced in the numerous places of worship that adorned
the townscape of Dibrugarh. Especially in the Joysagar Shiva temple, (photos of
our travel can be found in our fb page), which was constructed by a woman –
Queen Madambika, wife of King Siva Singha. This temple is believed to be the
tallest Shiva temple in India. Underneath its kingly age-old trees, one could
find sages (sadhus) reclining regally with their typically long beards, doting
the magnificent temple at all places, and giving their blessings to young and old
alike for a modest sum. Girls (who expected a wedding on the cards) believed it
very auspicious to get blessed by these old sadhus, who were peace-personified,
having renounced the desires of the carnal world and its pleasures. Fifty
meters away from this temple was the beautiful tank which had a lot of lotus
leaves, blooming sprightly lotus flowers. Now, my mind could not but equate
these great sadhus with the lotus leaves having a water droplets on its
surface, having renounced actions, and untouched by the sins and bondage
whatsoever. The freedom that they enjoyed was envious. The sadhus were found
sitting alone, with no one for company. Yet, they enjoyed their solitude as if
it were bliss! At times, solitude in itself is bliss!
No wonder,
India is known as the land of spirituality and philosophy, a myriad land famous
as much for its piety as it is for its patriotism.
Reminds
me yet again of McCoy’s Parable of the
Sadhu! (do read it for yourself)
The only sympathetic sight was the presence of
beggars in and around the temple waiting
for alms all around the precincts of the temple. The women who lined up shops
around the temple premises, were seen singing songs in Hindi (not Assamese!).
When our friend Ramji who was quietly recording their singing (should I say a
Professor Higgins in Pygmalion) quizzed
them on their penchant for Hindi film songs instead of Assamese film songs, she
had a lament in store (story) for us. She lamented the fact that there were no
cinema halls in most of the towns and villages in Assam. They were either close
down or faced a threat of closure in most places, and so, the already ailing
film industry was, in her humble opinion, on the brinks of disaster. One heart-warming
episode is that, very recently, the Assam government stepped in to plug the
breach, by resolving to open 100 cinema halls which have closed down in the
past few years. The question is, will state-run cinema halls prove disastrous
in the long run, with political bias determining the screening of films? Much
remains to be seen! A case of Big fish gobbling up shoals of little fish!!
Goat rice or feed rice is another peculiarity
in this part of Assam. Most shop keepers, even
while opening up their shops in the mornings, make it their duty to feed the
goats that have queued up over the hours in front of their business
establishments. One could also see doves cooing around these shops for their
share of the pie! Since this was a peculiar feature in many villages of Assam,
we wanted to enquire about this curiosity, but couldn’t get any convincing
explanations behind this ritual.
Rickshaw-wallahs were a common sight in almost all interior regions of Dibrugarh. My colleague Ramji (he’s from
the Mahatma’s land – Gujarat) took time to remind me of the Mahatma’s disgust
for rickshaws as he said that, "it was thoroughly disgusting for him to sit in a vehicle pulled by human beings".
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