The Chanter

If you enter Lalbagh from the West gate – the gate that opens out onto National College and the Basavangadi area – and walk straight, past the roundabout and the fossil thats on display, you get to the clump of bamboos, which once housed a troop of monkeys. To the right is the steep flight of worn stone steps  that leads up to the lake, and to the left is the road that goes on to the rose-garden. Keep walking straight-not turning to the left nor climbing up the steps to the lake, and you will hit a steep incline which leads up to the children’s’ maze.

Sankara Sastry was a regular visitor to Lalbagh in the morning and this was his preferred route. He walked all the way from the Sankara Mutt area where he lived, so this was quite a long walk. After completing the walk up the incline, it was his habit to turn right and walk along the embankment to the lake till he found an empty bench where he would sit for some time in silence gazing over the water and catch his breath.

Nothing odd about this, you would say, except that Sankara Sastry really, really needed to catch his breath, for he had been loudly chanting from the moment that he had left home.He did not chant a repetitive mantra under his breath like many others in the park did, but his chant was from the Vedas, and anyone who has listened to Vedic chants knows that this can be a difficult task even when sitting cross-legged. 

But why did Sankara Sastry do this? That was the question that people sometimes wondered about. Perhaps it was to keep out the racket coming from the cell-phones that everyone sported these days or perhaps the bird-song irritated him, or perhaps it was just that he liked the sound of his voice.

Sankara Sastry was a tall, imposing, middle-aged man with a tonsured head, and, of course, he wore only a dhoti and an angavastram, no pants and shirts for him. Vibhuti was liberally used on his forehead and forearms, although by now, when he was half-way through his walk, the sweat on his brow had damaged the horizontal marks. He had a stern face and he seemed to totally ignore all the other people who were walking in the park.

But Sankara Sastry had not always been like this – there was a time when there had been a little romance in his life. Lalita, the daughter of a distant relative of his mother, had come to stay with them in Chamrajpet. She had got admission in the Mahila Seva Samaj and had nowhere to stay in Bangalore, and Sankara’s mother had readily agreed to put her up. It would be some company for her, she thought. Lalita was a very pretty girl, and all of Sankara’s friends were envious of him. They thought that he was a really lucky fellow, able to talk to her whenever he wanted, and eat the food that she made, for Sankara’s mother taught her to cook.  Sankara too delighted in the thought – sometimes – that perhaps she was the one meant for him. But he was a desperately shy chap and he had no siblings, and rarely got up the courage to talk to her.  Once in a way, she brushed past him as she went about her work in the small house that they lived in then, or her fingers felt his when she served him food, and then Sankara felt happy. And occasionally, he complimented her on the upma that she had made, and then her smile was something to wait for! 

But nothing happened – Lalita finished her studies and went back to her ooru, and one day they received an invitation card for her wedding. Sankara was disappointed for a day or two, and then forgot all about her. And as is the way of the world, in time,  his parents passed away, and he was left alone in that little house. No one wanted to marry a pujari and  a vaidika – a teacher of the Veda – for that was what he had become, and there was no one to look out for him, either, except perhaps his Guru, to whom he had really owed everything, and to whom he was devoted beyond measure. 

His Guru was not just a guru – someone who had taught him something – but also an Acharya, one who lived his teaching. For him, his Guru’s words were paramount, and he always referred to him – in his occasional English conversations with people who had hired him as a pujari  – as an Amazing Acharya.  

Of course, his Guru was proficient in Sanskrit, and enlivened his listeners with a profound knowledge of  Panini’s Grammar, and his enjoyment in Kalidasa’s works was evident. His Acharya was well-versed in the Veda, and could quote large swathes from it at will, and his knowledge extended to the many commentaries  of Adi Sankara on the Sruti. Sankara Sastry had learnt something new from every conversation with him. 

Sankara Sastry was in some demand as a pujari, but he was exacting in his demands for the materials to be used for the rituals and scrupulous in preparing for every event, and this did not always please his clients, who usually wanted something done quickly, and didn’t care for ritual niceties. These clients were also usually tight-fisted, and didn’t want to pay anything much for what they thought was a simple puja. Occasionally, there were requests from some wealthy people who wanted to be taught Vedanta. He would sometimes, of necessity, accept such requests, because the payment would be good, although the student would usually fall asleep by the time his talk on the subject was done. But he didn’t mind. What kept him going was his strong belief in the truth of what he had learnt from his Guru.

Slowly, as the sun went up in its silent way, Sankara Sastry’s eyes closed. He remembered what his Acharya had told him about the three states of being – jagrat, swapna, sushupti, and how one’s real nature belonged to none of these, but above and beyond, in the turiya avastha.

As he thought about this, his chanting continued, internally. 

In the waking state, his Acharya had said, everything that we dreamt about had vanished. No longer was one an  emperor accustomed to  riches beyond measure, nor was one the beggar who had prayed for some kindness – all that had gone, and there was nothing real about what had been, for some hours or minutes, very true to the dreaming self. Similarly, he had said, when we go to sleep, and begin to dream – with the cognitive senses shut down – the external world, jagrat,  had ceased to exist. And then, later when even the mind had shut down, and one was aware of neither dream nor sleep, there was the bliss of quiet sleep, sushupti.  And through all these states, there was the undying sense of selfhood – the one experiencer of all these states. To recognise that one actually lives always in that substratum always is to live life completely, in all its glory, his Acharya had said.

Sandra Sastry had caught his breath, unknowingly, and now even the chanting inside was slowing down. Now, every single element of the mantra seemed to take an eternity. Suddenly, the mantra ceased, and Sankara Sastry was confronted with an immense silence. No Om,  no Hrim, nothing at all…

Passers-by thought he was asleep. But he was waiting, waiting for something to happen within, as the Guru had foretold.

He seemed to realize within, that he was still waiting for something to happen, although the chanting had ceased.And then, in a moment of surprising decisiveness, the waiting, too, ended. Not expecting anything to happen, Sankara Sastry’s silent mind sank to oblivion, and in its place was the presence of  an overwhelming sweetness.

There was no place within that he could pinpoint as the spot from where this sense of bliss had opened up, no chakra that he could identify. And Lalbagh had vanished, just as his mind had. He could not open his eyes, or perhaps he did not want to, realizing that any movement might stop the spring of bliss flowing within.

And so he sat there, totally oblivious to everything around him. The harsh afternoon sun

gave way to the mellow warmth of the evening before something stirred within and he

opened his eyes, once again to the quiet waters of the Lalbagh lake.

He would go home now, he thought, and he slowly stood up.