Far from the maddening Imedaka
The clang of cymbals that set the peacocks dancing sparked the December festival of Margazhi at the Oregalym area, centered on the large temple tank. Temple gates were adorned with green banana stems and colorful electric lights hanging on slim wires. In the Mada Veethis between houses with tiled roofs and modern apartments sharing walls, between make-shift, trinket-selling stores and well-built, brightly-lit shops, past supermarkets and buildings, Bhajana groups moved. Some carried a Tambura; and some, a manual srutibox. But, everybody wore silk: bald, old men with naked chests wearing gold-bordered white veshtis, workmen carrying petromax lamps, women rustling up in silk sarees, and little girls wearing anklets that rang in sync with the song rhythms as they walked. In smaller streets, the clanging was faster, a striking of gongs and small, resonant drums, and the people walked faster and with springs in their steps; and some groups broke into dances. Little boys and girls looking cute in traditional attire shrieked in sheer joy darting in and out with happy yells that rose like the swell of peacock’s feathers. All the groups came together towards the north side of Rasmad at the city’s most prestigious concert hall—the Rasmad Cisum Imedaka—where the group leaders stood with reverence holding bronze plates full of jasmine flowers to a picture frame of the music saints at a corner of the Imedaka stage and worshipped the music goddess idol. The cows were brought to Imedaka were arranged to stand on its verandah. Their horns were capped in golden trinkets and a bell hung tight to their necks. They shook their heads setting off the bells; the crowd excited them, the cows being the only animal considered holy and a messenger of prosperity to communities. Far to her east, the Bay of Bengal lashed half encircling Imedaka and a series of fine dining restaurants; and to her south, the most posh road in all of South India made its private sway over her. The cool morning air was so misty that the flyover crowning the building vanished from view and in its place gathered a snowy-white film of mist across the miles of haze, under the still-dawning sky. Winds had taken leave in that season. In the clamor of the continued Bhajan singing, the sparse traffic could hear the Doppler effect of the music, which under a mild but active and cheerful mist alternated between peaking resounding din and blissful meditative and sonorous clanging.
Blissful! How can one be blissful? Are the musicians of Imedaka full of cheer and bliss?
They were a happy lot but that didn’t mean they were simple. It wasn’t about simplicity and contentment that led them to that state. Their happiness was wholesome; and during chants, blissful. If not contentment and simplicity, what does one look for? Were their talents being nurtured? Sure, the musicians had no qualms there. All of them traveled to every place on the globe and sang soulful concerts. That cheered them. Prosperity engulfed them. It cheered them. Their faces glowed and eyes shined. Their smile had cheer. But complete happiness is more than cheer. Did they expect to be in power? Did they need to lobby or value for their say in the society? They did not need a representative. They were not ambitious. They did not vie for a seat in the elections. The musical society must have had few rules, I suspect. As they did without ambition, so also they did away with greed—went on with concerts without sponsorships, promotions, gossip and backbiting. Yet they were not simple musicians—not blind believers, irrational or overly sentimental people. They were as logical and balanced as normal people. Happiness is never understood by intellects and scholars. They dismiss it as stupid. Only problems are interesting; only troubles are challenging. Pain and suffering have more depth, they say. Artists resort to melancholy to feel depth. They remain aloof; and in the snobbishness of solitude, they derive their seen-it-all attitude. By appreciating despair, the self-proclaimed superior beings deride happiness; by holding pain, they lose everything. Under the grip of problems, pain and suffering, how can the intelligent mind even comprehend happiness? How can I describe these musicians of Imedaka? They were not innocent or ignorant. Their happiness was not borne out of any of the two. They were a bunch of smart, broad-minded and intense people who never felt miserable about anything. How I wish I knew better ways of describing them! How shall I convince you? In short, if you can imagine a utopian music world, it would be Imedaka. It would be best that way; and best to leave you to that imagination as I cannot answer all the questions. If someone were to ask, what about their levels of technological sophistication? Using devices will sure lead to conflicts. So, were they not using them at all—like the Amish people? Didn’t they have needs? Did necessity—the mother of troubles—scare them? Did it not even exist there? What about convenience—less intense than necessity? Didn’t they live in comfort? Did they have any luxury at all?—they could probably have had all kinds of devices suiting their needs: dish washers, cars, ipads, luxury phones; but they never flaunted them. The sort-of garish extravaganza prevalent in other parts of the country didn’t even attempt setting foot here. These people had conservative habits and tastes that forbid them to indulge with pomposity. It doesn’t really matter as well.
People from all parts of India—Bangalore, Visakhapatnam, Kochi, Trivandrum, Hyderabad, Mysore, Mumbai—all towns west, south and north have been routinely coming for the Margazhi festival to Rasmad and particularly Imedaka by trains, buses and own cars. The latest attraction has been the comings and goings of culturally-oversensitive Indians from US, UK, and South East Asia, flooding the Rasmad airport, which is getting redesigned into an ultra-modern one and where you see building materials lying scattered all over the place and laying of extra polished floors that slip during the December season rains. So, you thought the musicians of Imedaka were a happy lot in a spiritual way? You thought they were modern, prosperous and pure? Actually, it is that they are happy in a wholesome way—to put it crudely, and in a materialistic way. Purity, as one would see it, in the mind didn’t exist in them. They were disciplined, followed routines, practiced well and kept to rituals. A big Yes to religion, routines, and rituals. And, another big yes to bodily cravings: culinary and copulating arts. With refined taste buds, the musicians and their fans could never have enough of exquisite and classic dishes. A simple vathakuzhambu or tamarind based sauce would be equally or more enjoyed as a complicated or rare akkaravadisal. Caterers would vie with each other to cook for the hundreds of concert halls that come alive during the season. Newspapers will be full of reviews of catering more than concerts—some of them publishing menu of the day at popular joints beforehand. Caterers would also join the Bhajana groups. Let the cymbals clang above culinary desires and the glory of the gong be heard above bodily passions. Whether these musicians had fear or anxiety, which they had, they had no guilt. Secretive passion flowed not only in the music they made but also in the love they made. Women students may offer themselves to the hungry needs of the male gurus; musicians’ musician-wives may change their minds and leave one for the other; male musicians may change wives for girlfriends; and musicians may adhere to sexual discipline at home but wander freely for the rapture of the flesh abroad. Nobody tried to notice or ask questions. Passion was a secret only to be enjoyed and not talked about. Wives, girlfriends, husbands, and boyfriends join the Bhajana groups. A magnanimous victory, a limitless, transcending, and gracious feeling of contentment not targeted towards some common enemy but generally flowing in the community with the classiest and chivalrous spirit of the musicians of the world and the misty, cool season: that is what made the musicians (male) bare their chest (even in the chilly weather); and they celebrated the triumph of music in their lives. The meditative trances were not because of drugs or booze. These people had no such habits and did not move in such circles to inculcate them. Music was their drug. Music was their booze.
More Bhajana groups started pouring into the Imedaka by now. A wonderful smell of hot venpongal attacked the misty air through the backside of the large hall where the caterers had put up their multi-colored tents. Everybody’s heads turned that side with expectation as the saying went: Margazhi thingal Madi neraya Pongal (month of Margazhi; lap full of pongal---a popular breakfast dish). Women and children dipped the little plastic spoons into the ghee-dripping pongal served in leafy cups attempting to simply eat and not hog (though they would have had a go at it if men weren’t around); men simply did away with the cups putting the hot Pongal on their hands and gulped it all in one go, bits of rice sticking on the edge of their lips. A few traditionally attired women brought a bronze plate fill of vermillion water and began doing aarthi for the lined-up cows; a few cows trying to put out their tongues to lick the aarthi water—pongal smell having tickled off their taste buds. A little girl standing amidst the thin crowd at the edge breaks out into an aarthi song; her eyes closed and rapt in the music. People fall silent and listen to her sweet voice and enjoy the bliss. When she completes and opens her eyes, the Tavil player begins his rhythmic drumming and everyone suddenly become attentive. Nadaswara players begin their music with its trumpeting and piercing but pleasing sound after blowing it once or twice to tune into the right pitch. The cows wag their tails to ward off flies; some of them lift it to relieve themselves. The crowd begins to walk slowly towards the entrance of the concert hall; leading it is the Nadaswara group announcing the beginning of the festival. Yes, the festival of music, the December Margazhi season of music has started at Imedaka.
You’d be wondering if such a festival exists. Yes, it does; I can say for sure. Then, you’d wonder if such a happy festival is celebrated by ever-happy musicians. Is it possible for these musicians to be so happy and all the time? You’d ask. Going further, you’d wonder if a community can be so happy or even just one person happy and happy all the time. Sounds impossible, doesn’t it. Do you accept the ever-joyous music festival? Not possible, you’d say. In which case, let me unravel something: a secret, a dark secret.
Almost every evening, a cripple would be sent to fetch a little girl of twelve or thirteen who lives in a guarded two-room dirty house in a narrow by-lane near the Imedaka. Wooden bars cross-fixed on the windows of the house make it impossible to open. The old, dilapidated, tiled house is dark except for the gaudy make-up on an old-looking face and flashy saree of a malnourished girl. The house is all of ten by ten, divided into two rooms. When the cripple opens the lock, the grey light blinds the girl’s eyes. She doesn’t rub her eyes for fear of smudging kohl her eyes are lined with. The cripple hands her a packet of biriyani; and she snatches it, squats in the doorway, grabs a handful and shoves it into her mouth unmindful now of the bright red lipstick. This happens every day---except that the girl cannot make out night from day---everybody’s night is her day; and their days, her nights. Her only idea of day light is the streak of dusk light that enters when the door is opened; the first morsel of food going in only in the evening. When she is ready, the cripple locks her in a van and takes her to a bedroom in a mansion where she meets an old man. The men change every day; but they are always old. She is returned to the house in the morning and locked up. Sometimes the girl would scratch herself to sleep in the day; sometimes the scratching would keep her awake.
The musicians know about this. They had seen her. Some had just heard about it; some have inside information; some understand why and some are clueless as to the real reason. But they all know one thing: their prosperity and happiness, their vast musical opportunities, their widely-acknowledged talent, their continuous popularity and lucky growth amidst continuous ridicule from other communities, the broadmindedness of their community, the good health, the maturity of their minds, the healthy and tasty food and good rains—all depend completely on this little girl’s wretched ruin.
All musicians who gain their first entry to performing at Imedaka are taken to see the girl. They are given the explanation. Whether they understand or not, they see her; and most of them who see her are youngsters. After the explanation is given, they invariably feel shocked. Some feel pity, some disgust, and some anger. They are seized with the idea of helping her out. But when it is said that the moment the girl is provided a comfortable life, the moment she sees daylight, the moment she gets to spend her nights sleeping, that moment, all the happiness, wealth, and health of the Imedaka musicians would be destroyed. That is the mandate. Any small change in the girl’s life would be at the cost of the happiness of the millions in the community: that would open up the Pandora’s Box of guilt.
Don’t change the girl’s life. Period. The mandate is final. Period. A secret and powerful clique at the Imedaka, much like the influence wielded by the Stonecutter’s club over the Queen of England—decided on that fateful day when a much-touted ‘spiritual’ guru laid the mandate on his death bed. Was it due to the crow sitting on the palm tree that led to fall of the ripe palm fruit or was it a premeditated move—nobody knew; and none were willing to risk the contrary. But when the devadasi’s daughter was locked up and used to pleasure the men of the clique, or visiting dignitaries, or sometimes, power heads; the glory of the music community began spreading. The daughter was followed by her daughter and so on.
Often the young musicians who witness such misery feel depressed for a while, weeks or months. But then, with the passage of time, they reason out that the girl would best be that way. She was born and had grown into it. A normal life may be abnormal to her now. She may become more miserable if something were changed in her routine. Firstly, how can one make her sleep nights and study or play during the day? It would take months or even years to change the fundamental routine. Whether she liked it or not, she had seen things early in life and moved and talked like a grown woman—a mature face on a child body that was starting to curve on the hips. She may not like to change. She may not enjoy going to school. She may not have the aptitude to study. It would prove very difficult now. They also reason out that they too, like her, are not free. Her state brings out noble feelings in them, spews out feelings of depth in their music, makes their music unparalleled in the whole world. If she were not there, the girl singing aarthi song could not sing joyfully, and the music festival would not start on the first cool day of the misty Margazhi.
Do you accept that? If so, there is something nobler; much more incredible.
A few youngsters, who had seen her, turn and go away—not necessarily to their homes. Some shock themselves into an angry silence after going home but leave in a day or two. They go out into the road alone. They continue walking, walking down the Mada Veethis, straight to the Imedaka and exit through its large, well-adorned gates. They walk across the busy roads near Imedaka. Each carries their instrument and goes alone; man or woman. They get into their cars. It gets dark. They leave, going through the wide highways between modern glass buildings looking like huge glass bulbs and classy shopping malls into the dark marsh lands. They go south, west, or north but go alone. They go on and on. They leave Imedaka. For music’s sake. They go into the night. Whatever they do, wherever they go, one thing is sure: they do not come back. Where they sing or play music may not be as happy as Imedaka, where they settle may not be as prosperous as Imedaka, for all you know, they may just get into the habit of wandering too. But they know that they were going to make music faraway. Far, far, away, and away from Imedaka, they would make music and still worship music and not Imedaka. They knew it.
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