Ganga Ghat and Life

Look closely..You might just see a life of a man on those ghats in just a day.

This thought process was a culmination of a visit to Haridwar in the summers of 2009. It was the first time I had observed the sacred waters of Ganges so closely. Every night when the tired visitors, including my family, swarmed their rooms for rest, I sneaked out to the hotel balcony and calmly observed the Ganga and its Ghats. Strange as it might seem, with the cool breeze splashing across my face on those nights, I figured out some unmistakable parallels in the life of a human being and a day of Ganga Ghat.

At the dawn of a man’s life, or to be precise the beginning of man’s journey in this world, he finds himself surrounded by very few people. But in that ‘few’ are those for whom he is the apple of the eyes. For them, he’s their own. In this phase of life, the crass cacophony of crowds is absent, only the sweet silence of those who don’t intend to stir the ocean of calmness running inside him.

Similarly, when one notices the Ganga ghat at the break of day, very few footfalls are seen. But those seen are the ones who reach the ghat unfailingly everyday, braving the cold water sometimes, sometimes the freezing temperatures. They are the true devotees, for whom worshiping the holy river is as much a necessity as breathing. It is the pure and selfless devotion of their hearts that lend the ghats a serenity of some other world. Besides them are those for whom the ghat is life. Yes, those homeless men, whose days begin with Ganga and ends with it.

The morning on the ghats, with the orange ball in the sky now well up and awake, see a number of people flocking it. The Ghats are awake in the most literal sense now. Yet something is missing. Yes, its devotion. Many of the people now seen are those who neither could brave the morning blues, nor wish to face the stampeding crowds in the evening. They won’t mind a nice little stroll along the Ganga if they can’t manage a holy dip. Besides it is the time when vendors swarm in, selling everything they can in the name of sacred river. And quite contrastingly to the early dawn, when the devout had nothing to offer to their Ganga, the temptations seem to have started their games. Also as the day progresses, calm gives way to noise.

In the same way when adolescence arrives in a human’s life, the shell that had cocooned him for long bursts. More and new people flood his life. But not too many of these are to stay for long with him. It’s a temporary world that surrounds him now. Temporary smiles, temporary joys and temporary people. And this temporary world brings with it the baits of life. The zest and the zeal of this phase is unmatchable, yet somewhere the calmness of the soul is lost. Too many things give rise to too many choices and at the same time too much confusion. Things become chaotic.

As the afternoon descends on the Ganga ghats, the sun stands right above the head at its blazing hottest. Those who had walked the ghats now sleep in the cool comforts of their respective rooms. The ghats wear a deserted look and stillness sets in. The morning crowd has given way to very few people who seem very least interested about the Ganges. Along with them are those homeless residents of the ghats.

In man’s life, the hot scorching afternoon is the youth. Those who gave him his smiles and tears sometime before have now chosen their own paths to walk on. And he’s is left behind alone with decisions to make, rejections to face and heartbreaks to mend. Indeed, it’s a tough phase. His life has lost the earlier zeal and an intense battle within a daily routine. Only a handful of people who had always been there since the beginning, still hold his hand.

As the afternoon paves way for the evening with the temperatures fast dipping and gradually diminishing light, the ghats come alive with energy in the very literal sense. The glittering lights of the diyas and the devotee footfalls turn the ghats into an enchanting spectacle. Everything looks so beautiful for the time that seems to itself wish to last till eternity. But amidst this crowd, a huge chunk of people arrive only to witness the spectacle and enjoy the beauty of the moment. Devotion finds refuge in the heart of a few. Yet, in the overalls, everything seems so alright and perfect. Undoubtedly, the evening with all the lights, the smiles, the holy chants and the pious beauty of Ganga flowing in its entire splendor is beauty at its glorious best.

Amazingly enough, life does take a few positive turns after the confusing youth. It might lack the beauty and the glitz as the evening on the Ganga ghats, but one can’t ignore the fact that in man’s middle ages, things do wear a settled look. In this phase, man ultimately finds the way he wishes to walk on. And as if to round up the happiness of his success, love also strikes. Life, relations, money, future….everything begins to fall in place. Also, success attracts many new faces with smiles. But then it is one phase where people also cross his ways to take a pie of his success. Yet with things in their ideal places, a sense of vision for the future and people to share, life seems good in the overalls.

Back on the ghats of Ganga, scenes change rapidly as the evening leaves the ghats and day approaches its death. The feet that had crowded the ghats a while ago have either disappeared or have walked back to their respective rest places. The vendors fritter away too. The beauty of the ghats lie in tatters with everything undesirable strewn around. Things no more look beautiful and the energy is lost in the tired twilight. With emptiness setting in, its again those homeless mortals who are left behind, cleansing the ghats of all the dirt.

Just like the changing ghats, man’s life too enters a stage where the glitz begins to fade and all temptations begin to die. The twilight of life is just a stone’s throw away. As life slows down, loneliness begins to seep in as the crowd that once surrounded him begins to gradually diminish. The diminishing number does leave behind a few pains and deceits. But now, his heart is too jaded to recuperate and so he again falls back on the few trusted and loved ones to become his catharsis.

The curtain of night falls over all that could be called a spectacle till now, finally. The ganga ghats are deserted and a stillness of graveyard engulfs the atmosphere around. Yet, as the cacophony of crowds ebbs, a noise mounts every moment - the sound of the Ganga waters smashing the guard chains. Apart from the homeless residents of the Ganga ghats, the sight of men is a rarity at this depth of night. Only the deafening hypnotic noise and an equally hypnotic pitch darkness that disappears into light as much as one looks into it. The night soon ends and another day begins to finish with it.

In a very similar way, Man’s life too meets a gradual end, rather, a painful end. With the temporary layer out from life, he lives his last days in the company of those who have been the permanent part of his life. Things around him begin to fall silent for him. Yet in the inside there remains little peace. There is a deafening voice of the soul crying to leave its decaying clothes. And soon it does, thereby ending its journey to start another one.