The eternal tales of Prayag...

by - June 01, 2017

We looked around for that familiar face to greet us, always smiling through his plenteous wrinkles, but not seeing him today, we asked “Munna kahan hai?” (where is Munna?)… His son stepped forward, with his head lowered, to inform us about Munna’s demise and that he has taken over his father’s work… leaving us behind, in what felt like an abandon, he hurried down to the river bank and started unfastening his boat… 

I don’t recollect Munna’s face exactly, but I do remember the stories that he continuously streamed as he rowed upstream and downstream the Yamuna… stories of the Mughal fort built by Emperor Akbar that defines the river bank, of the Haathi Dwar and Jodha Dwar that descend into the river and how river was used as an advanced mode of transport then, story of the big, old banyan tree - Akshayavat - that has mentions in Ramayana, was destroyed to ashes by British and how it resurrected itself to be worshipped widely today, stories of the Kumbhs and Maha-Kumbhs, of the mythological Saraswati River, of the changing depth, velocity, and winds, stories of the depleting water levels and increasing contamination, of the migratory birds of Siberia that visit in January every year, of the pyres that lit on the banks across, stories of the soil, sand and ashes that defined his life and probably now his death too… 

We were on our annual visit to Allahabad, also known as the holy city of Prayag, home-town for me for last 14 years now, and each visit is marked with a customary homage to Triveni Sangam, the confluence of three rivers – Ganga, Yamuna and the mythical Saraswati… we glided down the slopes of Saraswati Ghat, to reach our boat.. Munna’s son and his accomplice were to be our navigators today… an hour long boat ride in the mighty, deep and calm Yamuna river, wades east-wards to reach a point where it merges with the shallow, bouncy waters of Ganga… the sea-green water of Yamuna and the mud-grey water of Ganga can be distinctly seen coming together at the Sangam… thereon, it flows eastward as Ganga, the grand powerful Ganga, towards the next holy abode of Sitamarhi and then to Varanasi… 

I have visited this place at different times of the year, at almost all times of the day, to always find it thronged with visitors and believers taking a dip in the holy waters of the Sangam, which apparently is believed to wash away their sins… this dip in water somehow I have never managed to gather courage for, and so I remain completely baffled seeing them immerse in the murky waters to ‘purify’ themselves… I dutifully pull up some water in my palms and sprinkle on my head, an acceptable sign of ‘purification’… While the primary purpose, if I may call it so, is to conquer this zenith called 'Sangam', this imaginary pinnacle of divinity… the real high comes from this boat ride upto the Sangam and back… on one side, the Mughal fort stands tall against the vagaries of the time and the tides, and on the other side the fertile yet desolate banks mold themselves with the shifting tides and the changing times… on one side the old Naini bridge and the new Yamuna bridge suspend over the river, connecting the lives across the two banks… and on the other side, the river flows far ahead, into a forlorn silence, into oblivion… in between lies this land of Prayag, and the eternal tales of its three rivers, their soil, sand and ashes…

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