Jawhar Sircar,
6th Aug 2017
Ananda Bajar
Patrika
Millions all over India brave the
lashing rains of the month of Sravan to reach the holy Ganga or the nearest
river they can find. They fill up two pitchers with water and then carry them
over long distances, just to pour it all on Siva’s head at selected places,
like Tarakeshwar in Bengal. Rituals like these, that are unfortunately being
misused by rowdies, may rather appear strange but it is through them that
Hinduism ensures that its flock renews its physical and emotional links with
the mighty Ganga. It is not just a river but is a metaphor for
an all-embracing religion. Incidentally, all the three major pilgrimages in
West Bengal, namely, Sagar, Kalighat and Tarakeshwar are linked to this Ganga.
Of them, the temple of Taraknath is fairly recent and through its story, we can
get to know a lot about the religious history of the Bengalis.
In the 1950s, Benoy Ghose mentioned
repeatedly that Tarakeshwar’s Siva-Puja was distinctly north-Indian and in, in
fact, the Kolkata High Court had also said the same in 1934. It declared that “the
Dashnami maths in Bengal were founded by Brahmans who came from the
north-west provinces and not by local Bengali Brahmans”. To understand why was
this cult was imported, we need to recall a bit about the Mangal Kavyas
of the 16th and 17th centuries. These balladic poems had managed to bring the autochthonous people and their worship into Hinduism.
Though the upper echelons of Shastric Brahmanism would have nothing to do with
the masses, the vast majority of which had swung decisively towards Sufi Islam,
the poor rural Purohits had to devise a response. After all, their very
livelihoods were threatened and it is this class of Brahmans who produced the
the Mangal Kavyas to valorise the deities of the folk. In the process,
they ensured that the subaltern gods and goddesses invariably defeated the
mighty Puranic devatas. Thus, the
hideous one eyed snake goddess of the indigenous people, Manasa, proved to be
more powerful than the Siva that Chand Saudagar worshiped and Dharmaraj of the
western tract was so strong that his devotee Lausen could defeat Icchai Ghosh,
even when Durga took his side.
In the 16th century, Chaitanya had also campaigned vigorously to open up Hinduism to
all social strata and his alter ego, Nityananda, carried this forward after his death. But
this Bengal Vaishnavism was devoted to one Puranic god, Krishna, so what about
Siva and Durga, the pan-India deities of the Puranas which had succeeded the
out-of-style Vedic ones like Brahma, Indra and Varun ? To understand how they
were re-established in Bengal, we have to move two centuries forward, to the
18th, when momentous political and economic events overtook Bengal. Aurangzeb
has died in the seventh year of the century after which chaos followed, in
which Murshid Quli Khan set up his Nawabi, and exactly seven years before the
century ended, Cornwallis introduced a new class of Bengali zamindars
through his Permanent Settlement. Murshid Quli and the Bengal Nawabs favoured
educated Hindus, and so many a landlord like the zamindars of Natore
thrived. This is when many North Indian business families migrated
to Bengal such as the Jains of Azimgang-Jiaganj and the Jagatseths-Ominchands of Murshidabad. North
Indian soldiers of fortune like Vishnudas and his brother, Bharamalla of
Ayodhya and the Punjabi Khatris like the Barddhaman rajas could also settle in
rather well during this period. The two brothers from Ayodhya brought the
martial north Indian Dashnsmi sadhus to set up Taraknath’s temple in 1729. And
some years later, the Barddhaman rajas installed 108 Siva-lingas in their
famous temples at Nabab-hat. There are more such examples. As for the Devi, her
worship was introduced with great fervour by the local Bengali zamindars,
like Kansa Narayan of Taherpur during Shah Jahan’s time, but it picked up
momentum only after the Battle of Plassey favoured Hindu interlocutors like Nabakrishna Deb and Raja Krishna Chandra
of Krishnanagar.
The Dashnami sect that came in was
entrusted not only Tarakeshwar, but a full network of other Siva temples in the
region. This explains why Tarakeshwar’s Bhole Baba “paar
karega” is in Hindi. Incidentally, the
Dashnamis played a rather controversial role in Bengal in the later
decades of the 18th century and led the dreaded Fakir-Sannyasi raids that
caused quite an uproar, just when the British were legitimising their control
over the province. These Sadhus were Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyay’s inspiration
for his ‘Anandamath’works, where armed Hindu monks sang their Vande Mataram
song: “glory to the Mother”. But it is not only the imported Dashnamis who
rejuvenated Saivism in Bengal, which was, incidentally, much later than other
parts of India. The Naths inspired by Gorokshanath, whose temple chief has now
become Uttar Pradesh’s chief minister, also campaigned for Saivism here. This
is evident from the folk songs of eastern Bengal, like Gopichrander gaan, that
narrates the trials and tribulations of Matsyendra-nath, the true propagator of
the mighty pan-Indian Siva. But, ironically, once Siva settled here his body
and soul became totally Bengali as he is not revered as the mighty king of
Kailash, but a fun-loving poor Bengali peasant. He wears a tattered loin cloth
and makes merry with his ganas until an exasperated Parvati comes and
chases him all over, to send him back to the fields.
This peasant Siva is evident not only in
the Sivayan poems, but is found in Dharma Thakur’s liturgical text, the Sunya
Puran in the Atho Chaash section. That reminds us: this Puranic
deity had to indigenise a lot in Bengal by absorbing much of the worship of
local gods like Dharma-Thakur. I agree with several scholars like Ralph
Nicholas that Dharma-raj’s wondrous charak-gajan, the hook swinging
ritual, and the stark rites of
self-flaggelation were subsumed by Siva. Rituals that are a must during Siva’s
festival in Baisakh, such as lwalking over blazing coals, inserting large hooks
and needles into the body, rolling over clothed in dry thorny creepers and
jumping from high on to big open swords are still practiced more severely by
the die-hard worshippers of Dharmaraj, who have not yet moved over to Siva.
This point is that even the imported Siva of Tarakeshwar is now totally Bengali
and this is clear from the fact that the biggest gajan, the very
indigenous summer festival of the local Siva, takes place at this site. Ashok
Mitra’s comprehensive volumes on Bengal’s festivals mention that the Sravan
trek to Tarakeshwar was originally a test of stamina and that even in the late
1950s, most of those who went to Taraknath were Marwaris. The hit film of 1977,
Jai Baba Taraknath must have played a big role in popularising the
Sravan pilgrimage to this temple among the locals. But, as in the rest of
India, a new restless class has appeared, that gets into this water ritual
purely for the fun and for the temporary sense of power it confers.
Tarakeshwar was in the news recently
when Mamata Banerjee appointed a Muslim minister to oversee the infrastructure
for pilgrims, but then, it has gone through these over-publicity phases in the
past as well. During the 1870s, for instance, all of Bengal was in excitement
over a criminal case involving an outraged husband, Nobin Chandra who had
murdered his young wife, Elokeshi for having a torrid affair with the Mahanta
of Tarakeshwar. It was so overwhelming that huge crowds starting thronging the
court room calling for special protection and all newspapers carried the story
in lurid colours, over weeks and months.
In fact, the popular art of Kalighat pats received an unexpected
boost during this period and the painters produced numerous visuals of each
scene in this murky affair. Nobin was
released soon due to the public outcry but the wicked Mahanta was sent to jail.
So popular was this Elokeshi affair, that pilgrims
visiting Tarakeshwar could even buy souvenirs with her name on them for the
next several decades.
This was not all. In 1924, another
Mahanta also became so infamous because of his voluptuousness and his open
extortions that the people of Tarakeshwar and pilgrims rose in revolt. Two Akali leaders
from Punjab, Swami Vishwanda and Swami Satchitananda started a long protest at
the temple and the Bengal Pradesh Congress Committee had to intervene. It sent
its President and Secretary, CR Das and Subhas Chandra Bose, to Tarakeshwar on
the 8th of April to enquire and assuage local feelings. But CR Das’s compromise formula came in for criticism, si had
to visit Tarakeshwar once again in May and declare that the Congress formally
supported the satyagraha. Hell broke out soon when Gurkha guards
employed by the Mahanta suddenly attacked many satyagrahis and slashed
them with their khukris. The matter became quite serious and even
Mahatma Gandhi expressed his concern. But peace was not in sight, even though
the colonial administration became quite tough and started arresting the
protestors. Finally on 22 August, the situation deteriorated so much that
police had to open fire, injuring several satyagrahis. The movement finally
ended when the Mahanta, Satish Chandra Giri, was removed and a Receiver stepped
in. But the Brahman Sabha went on attacking poor CR Das.
Thus, we see that in less than 300
years, Baba Taraknath has gone through a roller coaster of events and has seen
a lot of excitement. He has, however, remained quite cool and unflapped. One
reason could be because of the rivers of water that have been poured over his
head.
