Sunn Kabira

Respected Kabir Ji,

I hope you are doing well in Heaven. Where else can you find such godly men like you who, over the centuries, have inspired people to follow the noble path. Sir, I am not one of those enamored by your gospels of truth called Dohe for they have wrought more misery in my life than joy. So this is my letter of complaint to you and, if possible, you need to use the delete button in your super computer to erase the dohe and ensure future generations are not misled by your thoughts.

Childhood  Days

Every time the report card would be given out in class to be signed by the parents, I would always get a pinch of guilt. This guilt was not for my father who, out of his paltry salary, went out of the way to give me education in a fine Catholic school, but it was more of self-realization…..had I studied a little more and played a little less, had I listened more to my father and teachers who went hoarse trying to put the subjects into my thick cranium…..and less about the friends who were found more outside on the playing fields than at home. Maybe, I would have done better…at least slightly better… and the Red Sea on the face of the report card would have been a bit narrower. Father was always prompt to quote you:

रात गंवाई सोय के, दिवस गंवाया खाय ।
हीरा जन्म अमोल सा, कोड़ी बदले जाय ॥

It meant that I had wasted the night sleeping and the day eating away. The life, which was meant to be like a precious diamond, is now wasted and is no more valuable than a cowrie…simply nothing.  I tried explaining to my father in your words that studying books in life was not real education and he should himself learn the language of love especially when dealing with his misery stricken son:

पोथी पढ़ि पढ़ि जग मुआ, पंडित भया न कोय,
ढाई आखर प्रेम का, पढ़े सो पंडित होय।

I would, with bowed head and tears in my eyes, go to my father for his signature promising him better times ahead. No prizes for guessing what he retorted with… what is the use of repenting now when you wasted your days in unnecessary activities:

आछे / पाछे दिन पाछे गए हरी से किया न हेत ।
अब पछताए होत क्या, चिडिया चुग गई खेत ।।

Times of Youth

As I grew older, I tried using your wonderful lines on damsels at Durga Puja pandals. Sorry Boss for twisting the essence of your godly love to love of mine by saying “if you were to enter through my eyes, I would quickly shut them and then neither will I see anyone else nor will let anyone see you.” How romantic it ought to have sounded to the pretty faces.

नैना अंतर आव तू, ज्यूं हौं नैन झंपेउ।
ना हौं देखूं और को न तुझ देखन देऊँ॥

I tried convincing her by saying that he, who has not tasted love in life, is no better than a guest who enters a house which is lifeless and empty and gets nothing.

कबीर प्रेम न चक्खिया,चक्खि न लिया साव।
सूने घर का पाहुना, ज्यूं आया त्यूं जाव॥

Sadly, the pretty faces were not at all impressed by my knowledge of your gospels. Possibly, they were seeking someone who could recite Shakespeare and Wordsworth…the Desi Gully Boy had no place in their eyes nor hearts. So you couldn’t help me in my youth as well.

Corporate World

Then as time passed, I went up the corporate ladder with a number of people reporting. While the Human Resource Department would inhumanly impose the Ghanta (Bell Curve) Policy during appraisals, I just could not give the subordinates anything below 3 rating for which I was often pulled up for being too soft and unprofessional. Here too you were the cause of my misery I always got reminded of one of your dohas while doing the appraisals:

बुरा जो देखन मैं चला, बुरा न मिलिया कोय,
जो दिल खोजा आपना, मुझसे बुरा न कोय।

As I went out seeking weakness and failings in others, I first judged myself and found that no one was as bad as me. So if I expected to be rated good , how could I rate others badly. And so my climb up the ladder got halted as I saw more able and professional men and women walking and scrambling past me.

As if all the failings were not enough, now in my fifties, you have once again caused me great loss of face. As I go out looking for an able groom for my darling doctor daughter, the people on the other side ask me in hushed tones…”Does she drink? Does she take drugs? Is she aggressive? Beats up people?” All this image bashing because someone made a film where the protagonist is a doctor with your name…Kabir Singh.

In short, Kabir Das Ji aap ne meri zindagi ki waat laga di!

While my love-hate relationship with you was a lifelong story, one of your verses touched me positively.

जाति न पूछो साधु की, पूछ लीजिये ज्ञान,
मोल करो तरवार का, पड़ा रहन दो म्यान।

Which meant, never ask the religion or caste of a good man. And a good man I found recently called Salabeg. Not many would have heard of him and I too came to know of him when one of my friends’ daughter had her formal initiation into on-stage dancing of what is called Arangetram.  Here the beautiful young girl danced on lines composed by Salabeg which was surprising. How on earth could a TamBram take to serious dance on lines written by a man whose name definitely sounded less Brahmanical and more Persian? On asking my friend I came to know about the man a little more.

Salabeg was the son of a Mughal Subedar called Lalbeg who, during one of the military campaigns, married an adivasi widow. As soon as Salabeg was old enough, he took up fighting and joined his father in the military campaigns. Folklore says that once, when he was badly injured, his mother asked him to chant the name of Lord Krishna which he did and miraculously he got cured. Feeling indebted to Lord Krishna, he came to know more about him from his mother who explained that Lord Jagannath is the incarnation of Krishna. Salabeg went to Puri but was refused entry into the Jagannath Temple as he was a Muslim. Disappointed, but not completely put off, Salabeg went to Vrindavan where he started living an ascetic’s life along with other sadhus and began reciting bhajans in praise of Krishna. After a year, he decided to go back to Puri to see the Ratha Yatra festival but suddenly fell ill before reaching the town. He feared he would not reach in time to see the festival so he offered prayers to Lord Jagannath asking him to wait till he arrived. It is said that on the return leg of the journey, Lord Jagannath’s cart did not move until Salabeg arrived and got a darshan of the Lord.

Salabeg composed many hymns in praise of Lord Jagannath. He was cremated at the same place where the Lord’s cart stood still for him. Even to this day, every year Lord Jagannath’s cart stays for a while near the Samadhi of this great poet devotee. Salabeg did not write in chaste Oriya and, possibly, that is why his popularity among the local people is even more. He was instrumental in the local language entering the sanctum sanctorum which till then was an exclusive domain of Sanskrit language. Here’s an excerpt from his poem on Ratha Yatra:

Brother Balabhadra leads the way,

In the middle comes,

The sister with a pretty moon-face,

Mingling with the noisy crowd

The Dark One follows behind,

Says Salabega

This was in early seventeenth century and here we are, after three hundred years, fighting over temples, cows and chants of one Lord as opposed to the Lord of another religion.

हिन्दू कहें मोहि राम पियारा, तुर्क कहें रहमाना,
आपस में दोउ लड़ी-लड़ी  मुए, मरम न कोउ जाना।

Dear Kabirji, it is not me alone who gives a miss to your message of love, brotherhood and compassion in today’s world but also a vast majority of people of my beloved nation. No wonder you vanished when the different sects of people were fighting over your corpse to lay claim.  They seem to be still fighting against each other since then not just in your name but more.

In this turmoil, blessed is the child who, so pure and untouched by such worldly schisms, dances to the music and composition that makes her reach a blissful trance.

SS

eArrival

Circa 1968, Delhi

Today we will be getting our fridge, said the mother.

What is a fridge? How does it look? What does it do? Why are we at all getting it? Questions poured forth from the little boy of the house, a shade less than five years old.

Will you please keep quiet? We have to now go to bring the fridge and you can see it for yourself.

I want to go with you to get this thing home.

No..Yes..No..Yes…Finally the boy’s perseverance paid off and he was included in the fridge party.

Two gentlemen came in scooters, one was a Lambretta and the other was a Vespa. The father, who was mortally afraid of two wheelers, hesitantly sat on one with both his legs on one side, the way you would find ladies of old. The mother sat quite comfortably and confidently on the other. Our young boy tried sitting between the mother and the driver but the mother’s size was slightly big so he quickly found a place of pride standing between the handle and the driver’s seat enjoying Delhi’s hot summer winds blowing on his face.

They went to a house where a handsome man, whom all referred as Colonel Saab, greeted them. He took the family inside and showed a huge thing which looked like a steel almirah- it was much taller than him and had a word written in cursive on the door starting with G. The boy was amazed when he saw what the mother called a fridge.  The off-white almirah looking object of wonder on opening had a few aluminium shelves  and a separate counter on top with two trays.

This huge and heavy almirah was loaded on a tempo waiting outside the house and then the journey back home started.  When the tempo reached their small one bed room government house in Moti Bagh, an expecting crowd had gathered. As the almirah was unloaded, people started clapping and asked the mother, Bhabhiji mithai khilayiye. As this huge, monstrous piece was placed in the small living room, the father pulled the wire at the back and put the plug in the socket before pulling the lever down. A loud sound emanated from this monster as the light inside it lit up and the clapping went into a crescendo.

The lady of the house filled the trays on top with water and also filled some old XXX Hercules Rum bottles with water and kept them inside the almirah. The neighbours were examining the coming of the first fridge in the locality with great inquisitiveness and amazement. Every five minutes they would ask the lady to open the fridge and check the bottles which she would do. After about thirty minutes she smiled and pulled the bottles out and poured the water into a dozen steel glasses. The people almost fought with each other to get hold of the glasses. The mother, however, had kept one small steel glass separately and gave it to the bedazzled boy.

Ma this is thanda….and then he gulped the cold water in one go. The mystery of the almirah was now solved and he realized that this was a magical thing which could turn hot water to cold. In some time the neighbours came with small utensils  and the mother, in all generosity brought out the trays from the upper section and placed it for a while in the normal tap water. Soon the ice in the trays rolled into the waiting utensils. A cube of ice was handed to the boy and now the mystery was completely unraveled.

The matka or the earthen pot was soon moved out of the house and a smaller surahi was bought each time a railway journey to Calcutta was to be undertaken. All neighbours became extra friendly but would often curse the family when the cold water or ice was denied. The boy would fill his water bottle everyday with cold water and drink it well before reaching school lest it turned warm.

When the boy and his family shifted to Mumbai in 2001, this piece of wonder, which was very much working and had seen the history of the family over thirty -two years, was given to an old family friend in the vicinity. During their intermittent visits to Delhi  they found this wonderful gadget functioning well for the next ten years…never stopped working…the paint work had come off at places  but no more. Wonder why they only talk of grandfather’s clock going non-stop tick tock tick tock.

Circa 1974, Delhi

The boy had now moved from one BHK to a two BHK government quarter at Rama Krishna Puram.  Television had just been introduced to the Indian public but it was still out of reach for most people. With some good bonus money that the father had got, the television came into the boy’s house in the winter of ’74. The brand was JK with a hammer as a logo. The jewel was placed on a small round table with the finest table cloth available in the house. The television worked for a couple of hours only in the beginning starting with the unforgettable signature tune of Doordarshan which was always followed by Krishi Darshan. And then were the few English shows and the hourly news. Star attraction, however, was the Wednesday 8pm Chitrahaar when we enjoyed the Hindi film songs. That half an hour seemed so wonderful and they all waited for it every week.

Come Republic Day when the crowds thronged on both sides of Rajpath as the military might of the nation was on display along with the cultural tableaux. If managing these crowds at Rajpath was a problem, managing crowds at home on such days was an even bigger problem. The TV walas had to finish their morning chores well in advance. Then out came the old blankets and durries which would have to be laid out on the floor for the multitude of public who could not get the passes for the grand parade. Chairs and big metal trunks were put in the back row for the senior citizens who had to be shown great respect. With every marching contingent on the screen, the cheering in the house sounded as if the country had just won a war against their arch rivals. While there were these fixed people who would come often and were welcome, many had to be turned away for want of sitting space. Then there these ‘other boys’ of the colony, with whom the boy did not get along, who were never permitted inside- TV kharaab hai was the normal excuse given.

In the biting  January cold of Delhi, the mother  would have to go and make some hot tea and serve it with the Marie biscuits. In the past the family would never miss the opportunity of going and witnessing the spectacle live and also enjoy a picnic sitting in the lawns afterwards with packed parantha, pickle and hot tea in Eagle Thermos flask. But now with the onset of television, the picnic had moved home with a lot more people enjoying the hospitality. Not a moment was missed right from Bismillah Khan’s shehnai vaadan to the fly past where often the aircrafts flew past in great speed that viewers at home could not see it properly on the screen. The crowd, determined not miss a minute of this grand spectacle, would quickly scamper from the TV room to the terrace and see those fighter planes return to Palam Air Force base which was not far from the boy’s home. Heartbreaks were common whenever signal  was not clear despite five people trying to move the antenna on the terrace and another twenty shouting from inside the room…thoda right…thoda left…abhi bhi nahin aaya!

The home became more of a community centre but surprisingly in the small space available there was life…today when we look back we find a television in every room for the wife wants to watch her movie and the man wants to see English Premier League and the kid opens up the laptop or the iPad to watch the latest episode of GOT…all sitting in different rooms…alone…aloof…lifeless.

Circa 2000, Delhi

The action now shifted to an independent house in what is known as Bengali Colony at Delhi. The boy, all grown up and father of an eight year old kid, working with a public sector insurance company but with aspirations to join the private insurers who were yet to open shops in India. At office, the files were examined and handwritten notes were given to typists to type. Exposure to what we know as technology today was limited to issuing Overseas Mediclaim Polcies on the computer. A handful of fields had to be typed and then print command given for the dot matrix printer to come out with the policy. Insurance stamp was affixed and policy was hand delivered on receipt of premium in cash.

Someone gave the news of a gentleman at Friends Colony who was the liaison man for an international insurance company waiting to get the license to start business in India. With great difficulty a Curriculum Vitae was typed and printed as our man set off to meet the liaison man. He wore no suit but definitely bought a tie costing a mere twenty five rupees from the footpath next to the Regal Building and reached his destination. The man asked our hero to sit down and surprisingly said, “I do not wish to see the CV where you would have written only good things about yourself. What I want to know is how will you do business in the new world opening up? Come back in a week’s time with your detailed answer.”

Phew…with great difficulty, our man created a business plan of which he himself  was not very confident of. He reached out to Mr. Liaison who once again did not see the note  and ignored it the way  he had ignored the CV earlier  and instead asked, “Have you read the proposed Agency Regulations issued by IRDA?” “ No Sir”, said our man. “Then take this book with all the regulations and come back with a better answer”. Funny man- won’t see the CV, threw aside the work done and now wants me to study regulations! Anyhow, the work was done and finally submitted. Our man waited for some positive answer which never came for months. Then one evening whilst having dinner with his family the telephone rang. It was our liaison man who after a few pleasantries asked,  “Do you know how to work on Microsoft Excel”? “No Sir, but will learn quickly”.

A laptop was needed and a friend in the IT Department was helpful in allowing our man to take home an unused laptop for a few days. With great difficulty, slowly our man learnt how to use the computer and started taking first baby steps in using the Excel. By the time proficiency was achieved the position in the new company was lost to a more computer savvy candidate.

This was the beginning of computer in the boy’s house. From the borrowed laptop which had a letter key missing, he went on to buy a desktop computer with a printer. A nice computer table also entered the house and a plastic cover was procured to ensure no dust entered the instrument. The cover was fascinating…it had the globe printed on it. While the computer has been changed in our man’s house many times, a portion of the ‘globe’ cover remains intact till this date…tattered slightly but still gives great protection to the key board at home.

Another magical instrument had entered and life was changing but for good or worse only time would tell.

Circa 2002, Mumbai

The boy had moved to Mumbai and was working as a manager in an insurance company. The family had not yet shifted so he would work almost seven days a week. His immediate boss would often tell him, “Buy a mobile phone. It is very useful”. Our man would promptly reply, “Why do you want me to buy a mobile phone when I am in office 24X7? I will not buy any such instrument. If office feels I need one, it should pay for it”.

As luck would have it, the boss was to travel to the USA for a couple of weeks and he wanted our man to take all the official calls and so he requested once more. “You now get good salary, buy yourself a phone. Everyone has it”. “No, I won’t”, was the standard reply. In desperation the boss gave our man his own cell phone, as he had one spare, and asked our man to at least get a sim card. This request he did comply with and so our man was now in possession of a mobile phone even though a second hand one whose battery would not last  for more than a couple of hours. It, however, served Boss’ purpose and all his official calls began to be attended to by the donkey below.

Now the day had come when our man had to shift his family of wife, daughter and a sick mother who had just returned home from hospital after a bout of serious aliment. Since there were too many pieces of luggage to cart around and, in the confusion, our man left his leather satchel in the airport trolley at the gate while loading all the stuff into the cabs. The lost bag contained not only the valuable mobile phone but the house keys and some other important personal documents. No sooner had he and his family reached their residence than they realized that the bag was missing. Fortunately, he had made a duplicate key which his able wife had handy and all were able to enter the house. Our man rushed to the airport, filed a police complaint and then finally got the bag which had everything in it except the handed down Nokia handset. He returned home with a crestfallen face and next day went out to buy the simplest and cheapest of mobile phones available in the market.

The Boss was happy to know his lost phone had initiated someone into a life of 24X7X365 of solitude, drudgery and slavery.

Circa 2025 Mumbai

The boy, now an old man in his sixties, is awaiting delivery of Sita's tax saving eVaahan.

SS