The Forsaken Wilderness, page 13
He was said to be a man of some eminence, Swaami Atal-Anivaarya, a doctor of note even—and the seclusion of his weekend dwelling was only legitimized by the secrecy of its activities. It was known in most circles to be an ordinary Resort whose visitors mainly sought its facilities for the purposes of surveying or photographing rare specimens of wildlife that were less likely to frequent the civilian zone. It ran alongside a kilometre-long strip of river making its way down towards the adjoining Dam. There were parts of the property that were said to peep into the innermost recesses of the core area of Rajaji. One could obtain permission to enter the core area of the National Park only through a painstaking process of application, first to the state authorities, then to the forest office, and only by way of a letter of recommendation from any government servant ranging from a member of the armed forces to the I.A.S.
The core area had once been a biodiversity hotspot teeming with fauna of infinite variety. Although technically located within the confines of the Rajaji National Park, Swaami Atal-Anivaarya’s Forest Guest House was a private enterprise, and hence not regulated by the government. Apparently, a branch of his family had owned the plot of land since the early 1900s, before the expansive jungle became a protected forest. It lay along the eastern section of the tiger reserve overlooking the precipitous ravines and escarpments blending into the hovering foothills just beyond.
As I drove past the gate, which to my surprise was open, I crossed a small nightwatchman’s cabin attached to the right-hand side of the entrance. It was empty, the small wooden door lay open, creakily swinging back and forth at a leisurely pace as if in acknowledgement of an approaching wind. My white Gypsy, its gear adjusted in four-wheel drive, crunched over the gravelled driveway that wound on into three indistinct sectors, bouncing up and down the wobbly road. I glanced all about me at the surrounding property, rocking back and forth in my seat, yet maintaining enough stability to admire the dense vegetation that flanked the onward path. At a junction less than a hundred metres ahead, I could notice a pole standing erect in duty with three obligatory signposts attached to its neck, pointing in three altogether distinct directions. I paid no attention to what the signs specified, gazing instead on across the dense overhanging foliage towards a large colonial bungalow—red-bricked and three-storeyed, that lay rapturously ahead at the conclusion of the gravelled driveway. On approaching closer, I could faintly perceive a large wooden board hung over the front entrance to the bungalow which proclaimed ‘SWAAMI: SHREE SHREE—Gurudev Atal-Anivaarya Nateeja WELCOMES YOU TO HIS FOREST GUEST HOUSE’, beneath which was etched in clay, ‘You are cordially invited!’
The attic above the third floor of the bungalow branched off into a rectangular tower protruding from atop the structure like an observation post. The opaque window obscuring its interior was higher above even the mosaic-tiled terrace that lay beside it. The architecture of the bungalow was irregular in its proportions, with more weight on its gabled roof than its foundation could provide for. The verandahs too spilled out indefinitely from the corners of the bungalow into sub-structures and cottages of their own. One of them housed what I later came to know as the dining area which lay half in the open-air and half enclosed beside the main foyer.
Attached to a wooden pole standing at the tail end of the driveway was a sign board pointing towards the ‘Aviary’, beneath which was another sign pointed slightly askew which said—‘Pooja Point’. Outside the front porch of the bungalow beyond which presumably lay the reception, stood a signboard next to a small kennel pointing towards the ‘Infirmary’, and another below it which said—‘Rooms 1A to 32B’.
I dismounted my Gypsy and parked it right astern the main house next to the other vehicles clasped on to the gravel path that broke up into four disparate directions to four altogether separate quarters of the property. It was about eight acres in all, bound by a barb wire fence that ran clear along the perimeter of the entire property, replaced in sections by a brick wall with bits of broken glass stuck on top to keep off miscreants. I entered the bungalow after much thought and deliberation, gazing cautiously at the many artefacts and articles of intrinsic collector’s value, especially to one in a field similar to my own.
A dining table lay ahead of the foyer in the canteen, covered with a striped linen tablecloth. Delicate cutlery of all sorts from chinaware to ceramic saucers and silver spoons and forks lay stacked next to the placemats. In immediate view of the entrance stood a wooden counter upon which was painted in white calligraphic lettering—‘RECEPTION’. In between a disconnected telephone and a rack of magazines and manuals lay the calling bell where I at once placed my hand. A wooden board hung from the back wall behind the reception with all the room numbers. Some room numbers had been crossed, some had been ticked, and those that did not have any signage on them were presumably vacant. An unrolled calendar and map hung from the top of the board and an old grandfather clock ticked away discreetly in the vicinity of the reception, blurting out the seconds and minutes while I searched timidly about for any other living being. The only occupants seemed to be in a suspended state of animation.
The head of a Chital hung above the centre of the back wall. Stuffed birds of all sorts adorned the room. Little animal figurines were to be found all over the foyer which also doubled up as the recreation room with a billiards table and a Carom chest. A leopard carcass was pinned diagonally across the back wall. A seating area had been set up in a far corner of the room away from the dining table where an opulent Kashmiri carpet was surrounded by two sturdy arm chairs overlooking a makeshift bonfire next to which a small side table had an oil fire lamp upon it.
The opulence of the entire arrangement startled me, especially considering the absence of anyone to employ its amenities. It seemed styled to accommodate a royal family, yet wore the manner of some derelict hotel in an abandoned Ghost town. Towards the centre of the room, stood a rock hewn effigy of Lord Ganesha looking ominously into the rectangular distance of the living room. A single beam from an overhead lantern shone upon him, accentuating his deadly features, and filling his contours with shadows that hinted at a latent terror. The basuri he held too appeared as if he were wielding some deadly weapon with which he intended to inflict the severest of blows upon humanity.
I left the foyer at once, retreating to the reception area to commence the formalities that would necessitate my stay. Wearing a cap and shorts with a pouch wrapped around my waist, I looked around—suitcase in hand—at all the furnishings and ornaments out of awe and perplexity. I searched in vain for some occupants, even half-considered calling out but soon abandoned the idea, plonking my suitcase down on the floor instead. I walked up to the reception and rung the call bell two or three times. There was no response.
I looked around bewildered, tried studying the wooden board with the room numbers, glanced through the register even. This time I was rattled by the rumble of some presence behind the counter. A loud knocking was heard. I recoiled from the counter, puzzled—contemplating silently where it could possibly be emerging from. My first impulse was to look towards the front door, but there was no one in sight. The knocking continued, growing more urgent and somewhat impatient. I looked beneath and around the counter as if someone were stuck inside it. I knocked on it a couple of times. The knocking which burst out in response startled me immensely. It was a disembodied call, appearing out of nowhere. But more bothersome was the fact that this was the first contact I had made with any living being on my entire sojourn up till this house.
chapter three
Much to my relief, I did finally manage to identify the origin of the knocking. Behind the counter, invisible to the other end, lay a trap door which had evidently been bolted shut. I went behind the counter and unlocked it. The wooden door rumbled open as a small figure emerged from it. He was a short squat man, barely five feet in height and with a posture bent-doubled to an alarming degree. As he straightened up most laboriously, I noticed a faint moustache sprouting from the semi-circle of his mouth, a balding patch of hair encircling the scalp, and a demeanour given to long spells at the desk. He was barefooted and had a starched off-white dhothi wrapped around his waist. A yellow triangular tikka swam up the folds of his forehead to his widow’s peak, and broadened with the slightest hint of expression.
‘Namashkaar!’ he pronounced, with hands ominously joined.
‘Swaami Ji?’ I inquired.
‘That would be me,’ he nodded, wrapping a yellow dupatta across his naked upper torso, and leaning lazily on the counter.
‘Are you alone here?’ I asked.
He closed his eyes a moment and thought—‘How may I be of assistance to you?’
I thought about it a while. He yawningly reached for a beaded necklace of rudrakshes to string up to his neck as if that would restore my memory.
‘What were you doing down there?’ I inquired with a slight air of impertinence.
A muffled chattering of birds sounded from beneath the trapdoor he stood upon.
‘Working,’ he replied.
‘And who had locked you?’
‘Well…’ he thought about it a moment before answering. ‘I had locked myself. Often, when the work gets too demanding, I have to practice complete and total isolation! Only this time I had asked the door to be locked from the outside, as I had not anticipated to come out before dinnertime.’
‘What have you got down there?’ I asked, leaning over the counter to inspect the bolted trapdoor.
‘Would you like to find out?’ He stepped aside from it, a violent flapping of bird sounds thumped at the firm wooden floorboards.
‘No thanks…’ I demurred.
He made a peculiar squeak of a sound out in reply to the cry of the creatures confined down below. That silenced them, at least momentarily. When they resumed their chirping, it was softer and somewhat subdued. After kicking at the trapdoor one could detect their presences positively vanish.
‘My name is Barkat Singh Randhawa.’ I introduced myself hesitantly once he stepped back onto the trapdoor.
‘Ahh…Barkat…’ he smiled, gathering his hands into mine. ‘It was long expected that someday prosperity would pay me a visit,’ he jested, or perhaps meant it. ‘You come from Ranibaug?’ he inquired.
‘Indeed.’
‘Then perhaps you and I have a little business to attend to?’
I looked around and then whispered—‘Indeed.’
chapter four
‘Incredible!’ he surmised, after a long stroll in the various verandahs and balconies that branched out from all corners of the bungalow in innumerable directions. ‘Most incredible. You said the State Energy Board paid you a visit with regard to this? Smt Damini Jain. I happen to know her. Used to advise her brothers.’
‘Are you in contact with the Professor?’ I baffled myself with the words I uttered, but as there was not a living being in sight apart from him, they were accommodated into reason.
‘Not exactly, you see…’ he shook his head and frowned. ‘It doesn’t work like that. It’s not so simple. Professor Chaturvedi has arrived at his desired destination, and is out of reach,’ he soon admitted after a long pause. ‘No mobile phone network will be able track him, let alone some mystical embalming fluid that contains a holy vessel. Aural Morse code!’ he scoffed. ‘Heh! Nonsense! He’s gone!’ he rolled his lower lip over his chin. ‘Forget about him.’ Flicking a hand into the air, he waved it towards the steps that descended into the lawns.
‘How can you say that?’ I followed him down.
‘Because he is happy, and at peace. I know it. I can feel it. I could even bet on it. He’s where he always wanted to be. In the very bosom of the mountains. They’ve taken him. The Himalayas have claimed him.’
‘Come on Swaami Ji…’ I laughed. ‘You don’t actually believe that, do you?’
‘The history of belief in all its forms has been for me something of a specialty of late. I know what belief can bring, what it can hide, what it can reveal and what it can stall!’
‘The Electric Division tells me that I am of unsound mind,’ I said. The chirp of some passing sparrow settled mildly into the grassy scenery.
‘The Electric Division!’ he spat, derisively. ‘Hah! Tell them to restore my electricity first. Then they can go off on their errands of mercy! And cordon off that entire mountain if they have to. Seal it up under lock and key!’
‘They tell me what I saw up there was wholly of a psychiatric nature…’ I continued. ‘A manifestation of the psychic state. After all, Ranibaug is said to have a strange effect on the mind of the individual who nears it.’
‘What do you think?’ he asked me, halting astride the brick margin of the garden.
‘I think what I saw up there was as real as anything I’ve seen before,’ I said. ‘I know I was malnourished and not in the best shape, but I still retained the capacity to distinguish sight from thought. What do you think?’
‘I know what you saw up there was true, beta!’ he shut his eyes. ‘For I have seen it myself, in my prayers. A land of primeval rock, where insects reign supreme and the snow shuttles past not daring to touch it. I had endeavoured in my entirety to reach it!’ he blinked, and then tapped at the thigh of his right leg. ‘If Professor Charan Prakash has found it, I say all the better for him! He’s managed to do what I couldn’t with all my strength accomplish.’
‘And what of Shera then?’ I asked.
‘Shera will find what he’s looking for…’ he yearned for some sunlight and walked onwards. I followed him.
‘They seem to have renounced all worldly considerations,’ I told him. ‘What would make a man want to do that?’
Swaami Atal-Anivaarya shrugged his shoulders in remorse.
‘He said he wants no part of the bright twinkling lights of the city that mock him from down below,’ I said.
‘Shera said that?’ he smirked.
‘Yes…’ I bowed.
‘He who could not spend an evening in Hrishikesh without degenerating into the talk of the town, the laughing stock of every wandering-eyed ascetic fool enough to befriend him.’
‘And what of the Professor then?’ I asked. ‘What of the HRA Institute?’
‘It lies in the able hands of Ms Pratyusha Negi,’ he said. ‘With a little monetary participation from my end, every once in a while.’
‘You mean to tell me he’s given up his name, all his life’s work, his reputation, his business and his responsibilities in order to go off and hunt for salvation in the eyes of the lord? Which lord is this who spares sinners their debts, that dodges workman’s wages and provides to those that fail to provide to others?’
‘His moral well-being is not my responsibility,’ he sighed. ‘I tried to do whatever was within the scope of my power to help him. He is quite beyond repair if you ask me. I should have never wasted my time on him in the first place. He is probably meeting his punishment as we speak.’
‘And his reward too?’
‘His reward shall not be met in this life…’ he mused.
‘When he is re-animated I suppose…’ I added with passing sarcasm.
‘From what you described of the processes of death,’ he began. ‘It wouldn’t be unlikely for him to have to endure multiple lives till his retribution is fully served. In the Buddhist context of things, freed only when the soul attains Nirvana. The karmic balance. True contentment.’
‘Why go through all that trouble for contentment? There’s far easier ways than climbing a godforsaken mountain.’
‘Contentment isn’t something that’s easy to come by, Barkat!’ he spoke at length. ‘Nor is happiness. One has to earn one’s happiness, and if one can’t earn it, then one has to find it! Dig it out of the ground, so to speak. In the spirit of the old prospectors and pioneers that built this nation. There’s multitudes of people out there who spend their entire lives chasing after happiness. They keep looking for it, in the simplest of things. Like in trees, in leaves, in the flowers and birds. In flies, butterflies, caterpillars, insects. There’s happiness in fruits too, in the grass, in the ground in God’s green earth. There’s happiness in everything, in all of God’s creatures.’
We strolled past a sprawl of lolling Monstera leaves to the mango orchard leaning and loping towards a river that curled away past the edge of the property. We trod along the marsh, going all the way along the river bank—across it a vast sweep of wires and electric towers hovering about the distance. The electricity had gone in the entire region that day. When I made known my prior vocation, I was obliged to provide an informed opinion.
Swaami Atal-Anivaarya had suspected that the malfunction was caused due to a broken down electric tower whose wires had not yet been disconnected from the main network of the Dam, thereby blowing the entire circuit. Possibly the work of some disgruntled elephant. All we would have to do was keep following the path of the wires until we found a section that had collapsed from its overhead trajectory.
‘Have you ever tried to trace the path of these cables and wires?’ Swaami Atal-Anivaarya asked, somewhat reclusively as if to himself. ‘It’s strange, isn’t it? That without these cables and wires any area is unfit to live in! It ceases to be a civilization! Life wouldn’t have been the same without these cables and wires!’
They must have been suffering. There had been no electricity for a couple of days in the entire Rajaji area, almost up to Hrishikesh. Since the electricity crisis, the water supply from the Dam had been dramatically altered due to the utilization of overflow for the generation of enough electricity required for the constructional appliances at adjacent excavation sites to go on running.
