When God Descends

Somewhere towards the end of last month, India celebrated Maha Shivratri. Daddy to the most loved God of Hindu mythology, Ganesha, and no less loved himself, Shiva is said to be the coolest of the mighty Brahma-Vishnu-Mahesh trio. Easily invokable. Easily bribed. Fun loving and rather offbeat. And while he probably celebrated his birthday peacefully up there at his snowy Kailash Parbat residence, his  mortal devotees down here took it upon themselves to throw him (and themselves, while they were at it) a wild, wild birthday bash.
And so I was jolted out of my bed at 4 a.m., because apparently that's when the hosts decided to begin. Begin they did. And that's when I realised that it was much too loud. That they had erected loudspeakers across the colony on every second electric pole. That I was in for trouble. Happy Budday, Shivjee, I thought bleakly.


There was no point trying to sleep, and so I sat up and waited for it to end. I'm no music critic, really, but I can tell one sur from another.  There were none in the voice that blared from the loudspeaker that stood merely 10 metres away from my balcony.


I knotted my legs and arms and prayed and wished and prayed and prayed (to Shivjee, of course) and vehemently hoped that this was merely an early morning milk-abhishek ceremony or something, and that these people would kindly, quietly, go away in ten minutes, if not five.


They didn't leave. By afternoon, it was pandemonium. Both outside my house, and inside. For one, the noises intensified as more people stepped in to join in the revelry. The songs got worse and so did the singers. My study table began to lightly vibe from the impact of the unsteady beats. I sat crouched in the farthest corner of my room, doors tightly shut, ears stuffed with cotton, a fat physics book in my hand and tears threatening to overflow. I had my final board exams in five days.


Another two hours passed. I could now recite the songs word-by-word. Bhakton ki vinti tujhse, khushiyon se bharde jhole, Bhole Bhole Bhole, Bhole Bhole Bhole. And yet the 'devotees' down there seemed to take unwonted pleasure in my plight. We requested, pleaded with them to turn down the volume a little. They turned it up a notch. When my temper threatened to rise up to the Kailash Parvat, I called up the police and requested them to take care of it. They assured me they would.


Thirty minutes later, Delhi Police arrived. I could almost taste my victorious smirk as I heard sirens in the distance. 5 minutes later, the music cut off. The microphone crackled. 'Bhaiyon aur behnon...Bhole Shankar ke is darbaar mein...Dilli Police ki oar se...ek...chhoti si bhent. Dilli Police...sadaaiv peediton ki sahaayta ko tatpar...humaare Bhole Nath ki tarah! In veeron ko...humaara saadar naman.'
The microphone crackled. The music was back on.


!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Dilli Police! What backstabbers!!
For those two minutes, I was the angriest person on Earth as I went down to find out what exactly had led to this sudden dharmic outburst. 'Bhole Shankar ki baaraat hai madam,' they told me. 'Bas ghudchadhi ho jaaye, abhi nikal jaayenge!' I stormed back up in a rage, and stepped out into the balcony for the first time that day. And a scene unlike any other awaited me down below.


There was a fat man, painted a poisonous blue, with long tresses cascading down his flabby back, donning a deerskin skirt and a couple of assorted rudraksh neckpieces, holding a trident in one hand and a dumroo in the other, and looking slightly bored. Sakshaat Mahadev! And next to him, was a rotund black bull. Yes, a short, stout, Yamraaj-ish bull with a marigold garland around its stubby neck and a long, red, rice-y tilak on its forehead. Everybody around seemed 2 glasses of bhaang down. Everybody, including the bull I mean, who would keep walking off into random directions at random moments. The humans danced maniacally around Shivjee and his prestigious savaari. And then, they decided it was time for him to get married. Shivjee that is, not the bull. And so, Shivjee obediently turned around to face Mr. Bull.


Which was when it dawned upon me. There wasn't going to be a ghudchadhi. Arre, there wasn't a ghoda here anyway. It was going to be a Bull-chadhi. And then, the rituals began. Shivjee tried to heave himself up the bull's slippery, rotund belly. Once. Twice. Five times. Some times the bull would take a carefully careless bhaang-guided step to the side. Sometimes Shivjee would fail to aim right. Or his skirt would come in the way. Which was rather fun. It nearly made me forget my earlier plans of shouting at Shivjee from the balcony and asking him- 'Aap-kaise-bhagwaanji-ho-jo-bachon-ko-fail-karaate-ho-hain?!'


But just as I was beginning to slurp in the first dregs of sadistic pleasure, he managed to climb on, and the baaraat set off, drunk and shaky and content, gyrating to remixed bhajans (Leela! Bhole ki yeh leela! Apne bhakton ki yeh, door hain karte peeda!). I heaved a sigh of relief. They were going. The bull didn't like it. He stopped. The baaraat stalled. Shivjee looked exasperated. I clapped my hands to my mouth. Surely not again?! But the bull wouldn't have it anymore. Maybe the balance was too hard to maintain? Two balls, one black one blue, each with two pairs of limbs and a marigold garland apiece, precariously perched one on top of the other. Ab bechaara bull bhi koi Russian acrobat toh hai nahin?


One baaraati tentatively approached the holy savaari and stroked its neck. The bull shirked it away at once, in a very sulky teenager-ish Mujhe-aapse-baat nahin-karni-aap-jaao-yahan-se way. People moaned. And sighed. Some sat down on the footpath. Some returned to dancing. Others downed some more doses of bhaang out of anxiety. They needn't have worried though.


Within minutes of having stalled in the middle of the road, and jamming up the traffic and filling the place with sounds of honking cars, and making me lose all hope of passing my exams, a sickly smell wafted up my first floor balcony. Followed by a thumping, rejoicing noise. I'd never seen so many people being so happy on seeing bull poo. I never imagined I would ever experience such glee on seeing bull poo! Ohhhh! So it was just a potty break! And they were all gonna go away now! And I could study again!


I shut the balcony door behind me then, and happily skipped back to my room, humming under my breath. Bhole Nath Bhole Nath, Bhole Nath Bhole Nath, bhakton ki tu zindagi-eeh, ee! Bhole Nath Bhole Nath, Bhole Nath Bhole Nath, mita de kashtt sabhee!