The Nagas, though, are ever ready to spend time with the lay pilgrim. Born story-tellers, they will talk with equal felicity about their life in the foothills of the Himalayas, or of the myths and legends surrounding the religion. As it chances, the Kalpavasi group had at the time of his arrival been discussing the Ganga and her sacredness. The Naga listens for a couple of minutes, occupying himself with a chillum which he fills, from a pouch tied to his waist. And then he takes over....

This is not the real Ganga -- the real Ganga is there, see?

A broad sweep of the hands takes in the heavens -- dark and deep and impenetrable, punctured here and there by stars. The Naga indicates the sweeping array of stars in an expressive gesture, and almost as a continuation of that same sweep of the hands, offers the chillum around. The Kalpavasis refuse -- some quickly, some with accompanying nervous giggles. The chillum comes around to me.

Marijuana, when I last encountered it during my college days, had proved the first step of a ladder that led upwards, into the realm of harder and ever harder drugs. The smoke-wreathed chillum thrust in my direction evokes memories I would have preferred to have left buried. Yet, almost unconsciously, I reach out, take the warm stone implement in my hands cupped in the accepted fashion, and drag deep. The baba, meanwhile, is in full flow...

Before, way back in the mists of time, there was only the Akash Ganga. This one flowing here did not exist. See, how the waters here twinkle, reflecting your fires? The stars are like that -- reflections of celestial fires on the waters of Akash Ganga.

Meanwhile on earth, King Sagara ruled. And had 60,0001 sons. These sons performed the Ashwamedh, and Vishnu, disguised as Sage Kapila, captured the horse and when the sons of Sagara arrived at his ashram, pretended to be angry and burnt 60,000 of them up.

There was no Ganga then, to immerse their ashes in, and to give them salvation. Three generations passed, until Bhagirath embarked on ghor tapasya for many many years to propitiate the gods. The gods finally gave Ganga permission to come to earth -- but how was Bhoomi Devi to withstand the force of her descent?

And so Bhagirath did tapasya again, this time to propitiate Shiva. Until finally, he appeared, and agreed to receive the Ganga on his head, while he sat in yoga on the Himalayas, at Kailas.

Ganga...

The way the Naga, having refreshed himself from his chillum, refers to the Ganga is the way you and I would refer to the girl next door. The tone is laced with a certain fondness, as though the river were some pesky neighbourhood girl whose antics bring in equal parts irritation and amusement...

...Ganga was a young girl, a proud, arrogant young girl. You see, she had the run of the heavens, the gods bathed in her, frolicked in her, and she bore them without feeling their weight, she was, or she thought she was, greater than the gods.

So when the gods pointed down, to a small man sitting motionless on the Himalayas, and told her that she should flow down onto his head since the earth was not capable of taking her weight and the force of her fall, she thought to herself, who is this man who can take my weight? I will smash him into pieces, I will sweep him away with my waters...

And so she gathered herself -- and came crashing down... and Siva, who knew her thoughts, smiled to himself and sat there, waiting...

I wonder if it is the atmosphere of that mist-shrouded spot on the banks of the Ganga... or the Naga's skill in story-telling... or the chillum, that ever so often reverts back to me... but in some mysterious fashion, a tale I have heard several times before assumes a new-ness, a fascination... I find myself engrossed, in a way the latest Sidney Sheldon potboiler, which I had finished en route to Allahabad, could not grip me... and then again, perhaps it is just that we all love a good story, well told...

...She flew through the air, and crashed down on that puny head... and found herself stuck. Siva's tresses (The baba shakes out his own healthy mass of dreadlocked hair presumably by way of illustration) caught her, and held her fast.

The more Ganga struggled, the tighter she was held. She did her best to flow, but the broad sweep of her stream lost itself in the impenetrable forest of Siva's hair, breaking up into little streams, going round and round that forest, in endless circles...

Ganga was humiliated. She, who could with ease bear the combined weight of the Devas and the Nagas and the Gandharvas and other celestial beings, she was helpless in the grip of Siva. She struggled and she wept, but she could not move, she could not escape that grip.

And finally, she learnt that she had been tamed, mastered.

I need to go easy on the chillum -- I could have sworn that I heard Ganga, flowing peacefully past us, let out a rueful chuckle... or again, it could just be the swirls and eddies of the waters, making its own unique music...

Women are like that -- when they are young and pretty, they love to play, to tease. And they think that they can control any man. And then they find someone, a real man, who knows their tricks and who can tame them with ease. And they struggle for a bit, and finally, they realise that they have been mastered -- and then they change.

Ganga changed. She stopped fretting about her captivity, and began enjoying the endless meandering through Siva's hair. Her waters, at first angry, gradually mellowed, her streams flowed gently, softly, over Siva's head, occasionally drifting onto his forehead, lightly stroking, caressing...

The way the Naga baba tells the tale, the way he uses his voice and his hands and his fingers, he has, somehow, managed to imbue the tale with an overt eroticism...

...Siva felt the change in her... and his smile broadened... and he let her play...

And as her play got more passionate, a few drops of water escaped... and sprinkled on the ground... and they formed a lake, Bindusaras, the lake of drops... and from there, from those drops, the Ganga flowed on, down the Himalayas and into our midst...

There is a purpose to all things, a meaning behind all the many tales that make up our religion, the Naga baba tells us...

From then to now, nothing has changed. Siva sits there, in Kailas. And Akash Ganga flows, constantly, onto his head. And swirls around his hair, gently flowing down his body and into the lake... the waters you bathe in here are the waters that bathed Siva in Kailas... haven't you seen, in Siva temples, there is always a jar hanging over the Lingam, dripping a steady stream of water onto Siva's head?

Siva is hot-tempered, fiery. Even though he spends all his time in yogic meditation, it takes very little to ignite his temper. And that is why the cosmic order is so arranged -- Ganga, flowing onto him for all eternity, keeps him cool, dampens the awful heat of his anger...

One day, when it is decreed that it will happen, Ganga will stop flowing down from the heavens, keeping Siva cool. And then, there will be chaos. Tandav hoga. Mahapralay hoga! Sarvanash hoga!!

The Kalpavasis look at each other, and they sigh at the sheer inevitability of it all...

One day... the Naga, as he picks up the tale, chuckles, rather in the manner of a talk-show host who is aware that he is leading up to his best bon mot of the day... many millions of years later, Siva married Parvati. And on Kailas, they frolicked and played and were happy...

And then, one day, Siva and Parvati were together, as a man and woman will be together, and Parvati noticed that Siva's body was wet... and she looked up... and saw Ganga peeping from between his tresses... and she was angry that even when he was with her, Siva was also playing with Ganga... and so in her anger, Parvati cursed Ganga and she said, 'May you forever be impure.'

And from that day on, the curse has worked... we all come here and we bathe in her waters and when we do that, we shed our own impurities and our sins, which she carries with her, and the more we cleanse ourselves, the more impure she herself gets, with the collective weight of our sins...

The Naga gets up and dusts off the grains of sand sticking to his legs and walks away. For what seems a long time thereafter, none of us move... huddled around the faint embers of what had once been a warming fire, we sit... listening to the echoes of the Naga's voice... and, as though it were some background score for a tale of passion and anger and redemption, the Ganga flows beside us, making her music...

Illustration, page design: Uttam Ghosh

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