Fluid beliefs

 Millions of lights twinkled in her fluid lap. Not one overturned or upheaval. Flames flickered but the wicks were steady, for they knew the waters were their buddies. The wind blew northwards, delicately nudging each diya to sail ahead. From the steps to the waters, she made their descent smooth. "This is what she must be doing to the departed souls?" wondered Chandru Babu. 

The scene of last night's Ganga aarti was fresh in his mind as today morning he clambered down the ash-laden stairs of Manikarnika Ghat. The incense scent of jasmine and mogra was replaced by odours of half-burnt flesh. The light of diya was now ruled by the fires lit at the wooden pyres. Maybe yesterday who prayed for moksha was today a part of it. Ganga Maiya, as they called her was working towards the souls' nirvana. 

The chants of 'Har Har Gange', were now substituted by the Maha Mrutunjay mantra. Chandru Babu looked away from the gaping emptiness with which the rituals were performed. The relatives of the dead ingratiated the river by offering prasad, flowers, perfumes and diyas. Some of them were well versed in this ritual while for some their beloved was whisked away in a jiffy. 

"What kernel of truth lay in these disdainful practises? " he contemplated. 

"Luckily, I do not have to perform these pitiful practices for any of my kin." Chandru Babu smiled through his overgrown wilds of beard and moustache. Having left his hometown in West Bengal, Chandru Babu was an educated wanderer. Having graduated from the prestigious Calcutta  University, he was a staunch follower of Rabindranath Tagore. It was early 1900, and Bengal was rife with the sacrilege of communal and religious riots. Lord Curzon, the then governor of Bengal, made churlish attempts to divide West Bengal and East Bengal. West Bengal, was a believer in Gita while the East placed its strong belief in the Quran. College students, shouting slogans in Bangla, boycotting British goods and bowing to swadeshi, tried to turn Curzon's efforts into a fiasco. 

Chandru Sengupta, was one enraged man, with youthful hubris, fighting for the freedom of his state. Chandru's father was a dog trainer with the British Army. The family of eight, lived in a hovel near the British cantonment, on the banks of river Hooghly. Chandru's father, Sudhanshu was never involved in the freedom struggle. For him the British were God and their rule was heaven. Gambling, and womanising on the titbits thrown by the officers, Sudhanshu relished his life. Chandru was a sharp contrast to this. He turned British luxuries to ashes and made his Ma cook rotis in the fire. Ma was Baba's eloped bride. Shabana, now Sangamitra was a dancer in the courts of Nawab of Mansur Ali Khan, and Nawabs of Murshidabad. Love had made her world a vortex of faiths. Swirling to the tunes of Sudhanshu, Shabana had happily converted herself to Sangamitra. Chandru was her firstborn and he was fed the cream of her milk. Having been exploited by the Nawabs and British alike, Ma had instilled patriotism in him through the umbilical cord. She sang 'Amar Sonar Bangla' to him from his cradle days. 

She was one robust reason, Chandru fought for the Independence of Bengal. Ma was dragged into the dancers' court and was made a concubine at a tender age. Every day with a new rise, she prayed for her estranged family in Dhaka. Someday she wished she would see them, touch them though now their faiths won't match. 

"Hud, hud, you little swine... Run away from here!" The pandit's disgruntled voice shook Chandru Babu from his maternal reverie. Two small children were caught red-handed while picking up a laddu from the offerings made to the dead. He saw how tactical, the duo was in running away with the laddu from the clutches of crows that hovered over the shradh food. It was only the second time, they were caught when the boy tried to make another loot as his sister craved more. 

"Good for nothing, demons! They must have angered my liberated souls, beyond measure!" The pandit fumed incessantly over the theft. 

"Angered liberated souls!" this time Chandru Babu laughed out loud. Ma had taught him how karma works its cycle and how we all are dust making more dust. 

"From the mud to mud, we will be back however high we soar." He remembered Ma teaching him the Gita. He was soon to liberate her, from the oscillations of her beliefs and turmoil to have not belonged to one. Born a Muslim, lived a Hindu, how was she to die? 

"Dada, I am still hungry." Chandru Babu heard the little thief's growling stomach. The duo sat on the steps of Manikarnika Ghat waiting for a shradh to happen. The sun scorned them with its razor-sharp rays. The Ganges shimmered in guilt as a mother who cried in helplessness seeing her offspring long for a morsel. 

Something moved Chandru Babu. Placing the urn in his hands on the steps, he rushed to the market. Back with two hands full of laddus wrapped in green leaves, he approached the little thieves, "Take this."

The boy and girl couldn't believe their eyes. All their life they hadn't seen full, round laddus. The bright yellow mother teased the blinding sun rays. The firmness of the laddu shattered all baseless faith. And the sweetness definitely spread a wide toothless grin on the girl's face and the boy at the feet of Babu. Babu was overwhelmed, he had left Bengal when he was tired of grief protruding from his existence. He had severed all familial ties, taken an oath of celibacy and now wandered in search of nirvana. But that copper urn was still with him. He would detach it only when he thought he was ready to live without it. When he would find liberation in the true sense, the urn too would find moksha. 

Today's benevolent act showed him the first step towards moksha. 

"In humanity, lies Godliness. Ganga is holy only because she drinks evils and begets blessings every time an urn empties itself. " Ma spoke to him from his memories which were now replenished with mildew. 

With the urn, in both his hands, Chandru Babu descended the steps of Manikarnika. He emptied the urn and its ashes into the holy river. 

"Ma, rest in peace," was the only he could muster up. In his deeper realms, the Ganga would carry the distraught lady to Dhaka. With her land, she would be one. Life would come full circle.

Born a Muslim, and living as a Hindu, Ma died the death she believed in. A cloud shadowed the sun, while the siblings on the Ghat licked a few remains of motichoor.