IDLE WORSHIP!

Rituals without Education:

When I was a young boy growing up in Pune in the 70’s, things were naturally different. Model Colony, which today is the heart of the city, was then classified as being in the ‘outskirts’ of the city. My mom had to walk across to the bus stop near the area post office to accompany my sister back home after attending lectures at Fergusson College. The roads were dark and hoodlums snatched chains riding fast on bi-cycles. I was studying at Loyola, Pashan then and we rode our cycles, our prized possession, four abreast, right under a canopy of banyan trees. Visiting Sindh Society where we had some friends was a chilling adventure on few evenings of the week.

The local Ganpati mandal came a bit later but when it did, it never intruded on our sanity. The melodious arati’s sung by Lata Mangeshkar were a delight to hear every morning as we too did pooja at home and devoured all the goodies mom actually made! Infact, almost everybody made them at home then. Like every other growing children, my two siblings and i were excited to have the Lord of Wisdom home for the five days that he was our guest and all else revolved around him. Even doing homework. And when he was gone, our moods lifted after temporary sulking, as there were neighbourhood Ganesha’s to visit and the mandals were yet inviting.

Years rolled on and marriage happened. We moved out and the tradition of Ganpati continued at folks’ place. Mom began ageing and the goodies became lesser but not one bit less tasty, mind you. Some stuff was outsourced. Core competency of making modaks she retained. And yet does. And then one day she established our worthiness and insisted that we, my wife and i, take over the responsibility of playing the Lords host in our own home. Sure, we agreed. The kids were over the moon!

By this time, the mandals began mushrooming all over the city. The fragmentation became conclusive. As a boy i had read that BG Tilak had some other agenda on his mind. This we, as middle-class parents, conveyed in all sincerity to our kids too. But the outside was turning out to be something else. Weird smelling and burly men came to our doorstep ‘requesting’ vargani. They never seemed happy all the years we home-heartedly parted with whatever we could from dad's honest income, despite his government job. I took my kids to show them around the mandals and turned their attention away when i saw the men gamble and booze binge under the Lord’s glutes. “Good Lord!”, i exclaimed mutedly. The music was no longer melodious. Raunchy and sleaze laced songs with suggestive meanings blared from early mornings late into the nights. Then the Supreme Court stepped in. Youth loitered around the by now massive pandals keeping girls and ladies from many sections of society away from offering their obeisance without keeping half an eye open, just incase the adventure of 'making friendship' got the better off these boys! From simple backdrops, the decorations became electronic, mechanized, digitized, robotized and even disguised. The grandeur of the Lord himself was relegated to second place now loosing out to mankind’s superior decorative abilities.
This got us young adults re-look at the concepts of co-operative living, social celebrations, collective worship, dedicated service and other such. My sense is that the Lord re-visited these concepts too.

Things have only ‘advanced’ in these aspects. In the form of multi-ring security cordon, now man provides protection to the Lord. A few years back when i went visiting mandals, i sensed some vacancy in the spirit from when i was a young boy. And now, my kids don’t seem as excited as they were a few years earlier. They continue to be in playful devotion to the home Lord though. Maybe the crowds keep them away. Maybe the show of strength rather than the purpose of devotion has had a role to play in their transformation. Or maybe their child sense is numbed by the absence of right motivation and the true nature of the celebrations which perhaps have lost their way over time. Or has my perception changed, i wonder? Looking around, i see the same glint of excitement in the eyes of kids who came from far and near as i once had decades earlier as a kid myself and my kids had till only recently, only to diminish instead of getting stronger in these difficult times. Will the same happen to these thousands of kids too, i shuddered to think. Adults with the same faith, as earlier, come to visit my city in hordes during these 10-days. But then i also read with amusement that the sale of condoms sees a spurt during this period! On one hand, i have come to realize that the very purpose of devotion and prayer is to keep the cravings of the mind under vigil, yet this news was contrary to the teachings of the Lord himself. Maybe my simple mind cannot put this jig-saw together, I conclude.

“Never mind, let the music play”, says the Lord, “there is hope to learn and mend ways, isn’t there?”

Ganpati Bappa Morya! Pudhchya Varshi Buddhi Dya!
(Hail the Lord! Bestow wisdom upon us in time to come!)