STEPPING STONE TO HEAVEN

When my father passed away, my younger brother and I travelled to Shanti Kunj near Haridwar to immerse his ashes in the Ganga. On my earlier visit to Haridwar, that holiest of holy places, I had been mesmerised by the evening Ganga aarti at the Har ki Pauri Ghat (literally meaning the Lord’s Steps). As twilight steals in, the river is set ablaze by a fleet of floating lamps and the air resounds to the chanting of hymns and clashing of cymbals. One can almost sense, at that enthralling moment, Lord Shiva dancing down the holy steps to partake of the puja in his honour. But this time my mood was solemn. I had mixed feelings, standing detached in the crystal clear water, as I released my father’s ashes from the urn in which they had come with us after his cremation. My brother and I watched his last remains floating down the river to their ultimate destination—the vast ocean. On the one hand, I was crestfallen by the realisation that this was my final adieu to my father. The world of the living would go on, but his company I could enjoy no more. On the other hand, I felt at peace with his memory in the tranquil and spiritual world of Haridwar—where there were no priests to harangue us, no touts to swindle us, no polluted water to affront us and no dogs to follow us around.

But it is typical of our society that we had to weather a storm from our relatives before we could start our journey for Haridwar. They were livid when they learnt about my father’s stipulation in his will on his funeral. “What, no rituals? How will our souls be ‘cleansed’ then?” they fumed. But our hands were tied. Father had specifically forbidden the observance of cumbersome rites and specified instead a brief funeral at Shanti Kunj, followed by immersion of his ashes in the Himalayan Ganga. He knew how painful these rites were, stretching over twelve days, and making the person conducting the rituals, viz. the eldest son, himself sick from overexposure and strain! Another condition laid down by him was not to have any ‘celebration’ with a grand feast. Only a prayer meeting was to be conducted, accompanied by refreshments. There was no merit in elaborate preparations, he had told us, just to bid a person a last farewell! Deluding oneself with rituals was no way to enrich society. This outlook pervaded his entire life. He was as simple in dress as he was forthright in his interaction with people, lending a rare impartiality to his words and deeds. Of course sometimes he could not ‘read’ the crookedness of others and had to pay a price for gullibility. Even then, he maintained that a simple approach in life was most ‘productive’, because any manipulation of a just and fair process gives rise to complications that ultimately come home to roost and destroy one’s peace of mind.

He was not a rebel as such, but a dissenter with a cause. He could never bring himself to conform to some of the traditional ideas that, to him, carried no ‘intrinsic value’ any more. But, even as he differed with his elders on how our principles should be interpreted for a better community life, he did so with utmost humility and respect. In fact, his candid approach was a potent weapon that upset his adversaries’ use of pretentious rhetoric in trying to justify the need to follow ‘hollow’ rituals. Is it any wonder then that, brought up in such an environment of reasoned enlightenment, his children imbibed his spirit in ample, if not full, measure? It is this spirit that helped us to stand steadfast so as not to deny our father his last wish in the name of ‘convention’. “A dead man’s wish is paramount,” we countered, overruling their insistence on a long-drawn ceremony with a multiple of rites. I am glad we did so. There was something of an abiding allurement at Haridwar, where the Ganga flows so chaste and transparent. The feeling that a peaceful surrender to the elements of Nature in those charming hills and deep abysses brings on is indescribable. No wonder he chose it as his last resting place. While I bid my father’s spirit good-bye forever, I resolved to follow in his ‘illuminated’ footsteps

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