The Malayalam poem which inspired this post |
A poem that I read in a Malayalam journal yesterday
continues to haunt me up to this moment. A very short poem, just 16 short
lines, it is titled Rahim and Ram. Unable to catch sleep, Ram is wriggling
convulsively in his new temple. From beneath the temple’s sanctum sanctorum
rises the adhan in the fractured voice of a mosque’s debris. Rahim apologises
to Ram and says, ‘This is the Kali Yug. Its humans don’t know that we are merely
characters created by poets.’
This afternoon a young friend sent me
a query on WhatsApp. “Is objective truth the same as objective reality?” My
response: The Ram Temple in Ayodhya is objective reality. But is it
objective truth?
The first prime minister of India asserted
vehemently that India did not need more gods and temples. He said dams were
modern India’s temples and went on to construct the Nagarjuna Sagar, the Hirakud,
the Damodar Valley dams, etc. When some malicious person infiltrated the Babri
Masjid soon after Independence and placed an idol of Ram Lalla inside to stake
a claim to the mosque, Nehru asked the police to throw the idol into the Sarayu
and be done with it.
Three quarters of a century later, Nehru’s
successor, who had installed himself as the Maharaja of Bharat by ceremoniously
carrying a sceptre to the new palatial parliament building, spent a royal sum
of Rs1800 crore on a temple for Lord Ram who had abandoned his own palace to
live in exile in wildernesses for the sake of keeping his stepmother happy. This
Maharaja-PM defied the rubrics of the consecration ceremony for various reasons
all of which ultimately boil down to his megalomania and self-aggrandizement.
Is Lord Ram wriggling in this palatial
temple consecrated by a royal thespian? Is he there inside that temple at all?
I am reminded of a parable.
A man known for his many
transgressions was excommunicated from the church. He took his woes to God. “They
won’t let me in, Lord, because I am a sinner,” he said to his God. “What are
you complaining about?” God asked. “They won’t let me in either.”
“Open your eyes and see your God is
not before you!” Rabindranath
Tagore tells the worshipper in the temple. All your chanting and singing
and telling the beads are useless. Your God is not sitting in this lonely dark
corner of your temple. God is out there where the tiller is tilling the hard
ground, where the path-maker is breaking stones…
How far back have we been taken from
Tagore and Nehru by the Maharaja-PM. Tagore and Nehru were visionaries, Nehru’s
current successor is a reactionary who changes costumes too often.
Hard hitting!
ReplyDeleteA lot of people are concerned about tha temple politics. See this, for instance: https://m.thewire.in/article/rights/ex-civil-servants-express-deep-disquiet-over-states-involvement-in-ram-temple-consecration/amp
DeleteHari OM
ReplyDeleteEloquent hiss and spit! Again I fold my hands and sing pranaams for your insight. YAM xx
Thank you, Yamini.
DeleteWhat is truth? What is reality? I don't think I can get my head around this on a Friday. It's too much for me.
ReplyDeleteWe are in post-truth world.
DeleteI love your parable.
ReplyDeleteGlad you do.
DeleteWill change the constitution too not only costumes!
ReplyDeleteYes, and there will be a lot more...
Delete