How to be spiritual in Haridwar

I don’t like going to Haridwar. I don’t like it because it’s a holy place, and like all holy places in India it’s always crowded—only God knows why—and full of people who want my money. I personally find it very difficult to concentrate my mind on spiritual thoughts, like world peace, universal love, and Vijay Mallya, when people are constantly asking me to take out my wallet.

add_main_imageBut I keep going to Haridwar because every time mother visits me in Delhi, she has to go to Haridwar. And she won’t go with just about anyone—I have to take her. But this year, she was not content with my taking her to Haridwar and back. She decided, unilaterally, that my head must be dunked in the Ganges so that my atheist soul, upon its departure from my sin-cleansed body will attain instantaneous moksha. This washing of my sins in Hinduism’s sacred river, she gave me to understand, will free me from the endless cycle of rebirths and I can then pour my cup of Atman into the drum of Brahman and have a fun time in Nirvana land.

I explained to her that nirvana was not worth the 200 km plus 200 km equals 400 km of driving through hellish traffic full of asura-like trucks coming at you from all sides. Plus, I explained to her that I was uncomfortable sharing the bath water already used by all those people who were washing off their sins upstream from me: what if their sins came floating downriver and get stuck to my body? And what of the ashes of the dead that were being released into the Ganges all over the ghats? How can I bathe in a river rich in dead men’s remains?NextMAds

But mother, like all women in my life do, had her way eventually, and we set out for the holy city one Sunday morning—me, Mother and her two sisters, Aunt A and Aunt B. We reached Haridwar around two in the afternoon, and proceeded straight to the Har Ki Pauri ghats, where we were welcomed by gangs of photographers, uniformed extortionists, and assorted seekers whose seeking was directed more toward the contents of my wallet than the secrets of spiritual salvation.

As we made our way to a bathing spot acceptable to all the three sisters, I tried explaining to mother that, as someone who has lived a spotlessly virtuous life all his life, taking a dip in the Ganges would be a superfluous exercise for me. Since I have not committed a single sin, what is there to wash off in the Ganges? I was destined for moksha, with or without physical contact with Ganga Maiya.

But mother would have none of it. Left with no alternative, I began to undress, in full public glare. I wrapped a towel around my waist and wriggled out of my jeans. My immediate objective was to get out of my underwear and into my swimming trunk as quickly and unobtrusively as I could.

Just as I was getting out of my underwear, I was accosted by a middle-aged Panda-type man in a blue uniform. He brandished a bill book at me and demanded to know how much I would like to contribute toward his association that was doing charity work in the area. Before I could answer him, a photographer thrust his album at me and wanted to take my photo, just thirty bucks a print. Before I could process the photographer, a beggar with dreadlocks tugged at my arm, mutely seeking some monetary offering.

By now I was hopping from one foot to the other, trying to dislodge my underwear from where it had got stuck—somewhere between my left knee and right shin. My towel, which was barely long enough to wrap around my waist and not broad enough to reach my knees, was threatening to slip off and walk away from it all.

In a moment of light-headed madness, I considered swatting the photographer, the extortionist, and the beggar with my towel in one fluid movement, preferably in slow motion, and taking a running jump into the river. But something stopped me. It was the sight of Ganga Maiya herself emerging from the waters to save me from the mercenaries of the material world—but no, it was Aunt B come to stand guard over our belongings.sixthMAds

Leaving my aunt to deal with the three interlopers, I rapidly changed into my swimming trunk and made my way to the water.

The current was faster than I’d expected, and I lost my footing every time I bent down to take a dip. Mother wanted me to chant some lines from the Gita holding some Ganga jal in my hands, but what came out of my mouth as I slipped and landed on my bottom were excerpts from the pleasantries exchanged by Virat Kohli and Gautam Gambhir in a recent IPL match.

“Okay,” I said to Mother, “I’m done.” But she wanted me to take a full and proper dip, wherein my whole face and head would go under water. Why, I wondered. Do your sins automatically climb to the top of your head so they can save themselves from being washed away, like survivors scampering to higher altitudes in a flood-hit landscape? I didn’t ask Mother this, but eventually managed to take a vertical dip that satisfied her. But as I was lifting my face from beneath the water, a slipper floated by and bumped against the back of my head. Mother wanted to scream some unholy and none too spiritual words at the family which had seen it fit to dispose of a dead relative’s footwear in this bathing area. But she checked herself, and the slipper was swiftly borne away by Ganga Maiya -- as were, I presume, the sins and dirt of all those bathing upstream from me.

Then the photographer made me pose with mother and took some pictures, which came out rather well, I thought, if you were prepared to overlook the unexplained pinkness that loomed in the background. As we walked up the steps of the ghats in our Gangetic wetness, cleansed of all our sins, we allowed ourselves to be convinced by the purohit-type and the dreadlocked beggar to shed some of our material burdens, most of which, coincidentally, happened to be in our pockets and purses. After the three holy men—the donation-seeker, the photographer, and beggar—had been suitably appeased, they left us alone. And we finally found peace in our hearts and a certain liquidity in our souls.

On our way back to Delhi, as our material selves remained locked in a four-hour traffic jam near Meerut, I said to Mother, “You were right. We should go to Hardwar at least once every year.”

She looked at me doubtfully, not sure if I was being serious. But I now understood why Haridwar was always crowded.

“Visiting Haridwar,” I told her, “is like an insurance policy for the soul—a smart investment that will yield moksha on maturity.”