Photos courtesy : Rohit Markande
Text : Aakanksha Gaur
Vrindavan, is not just a town in the Mathura district of Uttar Pradesh. It is a throbbing and bustling giant of ancient history and beliefs. The place where Lord Krishna spent his childhood, stealing curd and "makhan", climbing on trees near the mighty Yamuna, slaying dragons that came his way, helping friends and cows alike, giving the universe potent messages in every act of generosity and universal harmony.
Vrindavan takes a daily bath in the nectar of faith by thousands of devotees, pilgrims and foreigners, all of whom flock to the place like starved and thirsty sparrows, to dip in the overflowing Yamuna of supreme peace and salvation from the worldly troubles. On a usual day, you can find everyone with the trademark symbol of sandalwood on their foreheads. The symbol is made at the junction of two eyebrows, marking the spiritual third eye.
There are a million gods and goddesses in India, but only after paying a visit to Vrindavan, can you truly submerge yourself in the innocent and indelible love that Krishna's childhood antics marked, also in the selfless love for Radha and other gopis who were attracted to him. His teachings of pure love transcend religions, borders and languages, and that is why, the entire humanity is eligible and invited to take a ride to ultimate salvation with him. But may be Krishna forgot to mention the protocol of human tolerance with innocent wives after they lose their husbands, or maybe, the society conveniently forgot to extrapolate his teachings to these hapless widows. Because, only these reasons can provide a justification to what goes on in the dirty bylanes of Vrindavan.
The huge gate marking the entrance of Vrindavan marks the start of a spiritual journey and promises to cleanse your soul of all the dirt which has accumulated during your worldly journey. The road ahead is paved with huge billboards of real estate developers promising unworldly pleasures, and the lure of sharing physical space with the thousands of temples of Krishna, and hence, being closer to Krishna himself.
You move a little further and sights of majestic temples almost tempt you to step into them and attain instant moksha. But you don't have to stop there, keep moving further, further where the wide clean roads pave way to little by lanes, with margins of litter and filth. My destination was Bhagwan Bhajan Ashram where close to two thousand widows assemble daily, in the morning and evening for their prayers. It was close to 1 pm, and I was told that I won't be able to meet them, as they are available from 3 to 7.
With no other option, I trudged along. Moved further, missed a turn here and there, and decided to ask a frail Bengali lady about the whereabouts of the ashram. She made sure she was dressed in all the ornamental proof of a married Bengali woman, and was walking towards the ashram. I asked her for directions, but she wasn't able to fathom either my Hindi or English. Anyways, she led me to the road to the ashram. It was a full 2-3 kms from where she had started and I was wondering how long it would have taken her, had she continued walking.
It was getting hot and I decided to walk towards the ashram in the meek hope of finding the elusive white widows of Vrindavan. Its a very ordinary and similar marketplace, when you walk towards Bhagwan Bhajan Ashram. There are eateries, where you can get a stomach full of morsel for quite cheap, then, there are the usual shops selling Krishna merchandise, bright yellow dupattas, rosary beads, incense sticks and sweetmeats.
I continued walking, in this street, where I noticed an old building, with a huge wooden door and stone slabs leading upwards, to almost nowhere. I halted for a while, and pondered on its photographic utility, and then, for reasons unknown, I stepped in, out of curiosity.
Steep stone stabs functioning as stairs led me to an open courtyard, where I found what I was looking for.
There were six or seven of them, the courtyard had a huge banyan tree in the middle and the ubiquitous raised platform for the Tulsi plant. The building was in shambles, decrepit and scary, the brick walls seemed to hold onto nothing in particular, and could have its last breath any time soon. But this was nothing in comparison to the state of being of its residents.
Draped in a tattered old white saree without a blouse, it was a scene straight out of a Satyajit ray movie or Mira Nair's water. The only difference was the difference in the time. The movie was pre-independence, this was 2011. Zilch improvement.
I started talking to one of them, who was talking to me in Bengali and broken Hindi. I could make out that she has seen more than a decade go by, in these by lanes. With a sad smile and teary eyes, she told me in a couple of sentences that there was nothing to go back to. Her children (read sons) won't keep her, the poverty is not encouraging either, and there is no life after her husband. What held me captivated to her was the fact that no gesture of her indicated that she was begging me for pity. She had just stated the harshest facts of her life in a monotonous monologue, while I was looking at her eyes, swelling up slowly. She was comparatively young and must have been in her late thirties or early forties. As I started taking her pictures, another old woman sat besides her to take a quick bath. She must have made a cunning mother-in law, the one you would be afraid of. She was quick to retort that I must pay them some money, for the pictures that I am taking. The kind woman protested in my favor, said something like "Look at her, she isn't even married, has come all the way from Delhi, wouldn't even have a job, how will she pay you?" Perhaps, this act of kindness was not something I was expecting. It instantly made an unsaid bond between us. I wanted to come to her, after talking to a few more.
Its then when I noticed, Lolita, perhaps, the oldest of them all. She must have been a tall, slender and dusky Bengali lass, who was now wrinkled beyond repair. Short cropped hair and missing teeth, cataract infested eyes and her reluctance to smile, spoke a lot more than she did. She did not remember her age which was guessed to be around 70 by her companions. Standing stiff and stoic, may be she was just too confused to fathom all the activity around her. She came here around 8 years ago, from Kolkata, to wait for her death in the close proximity of Krishna. But looking at her, and her fellow companions, it can be easily deduced that they have died a lot more deaths than they were looking for. We started taking her photos, and instantaneously, everyone got involved, smiling toothless grins, and jumping to take a look at their photos, it seemed a little fun too, but looking at her, you experience a multitude of emotions, which starts from rage, to pity to helplessness. She was standing there, with some empty water bottles collected from the streets to sell and make some money.
I could imagine, how she would have bent down, with her aching back to pick the bottle and must have kept it like a treasure in her torn saree, all for 2 rupees.
I prodded a little more about the finances of these widows and found out that 3 or 4 of them share a single room, whose monthly rent is 400 rupees. And how on earth do they arrange for a princely sum of 100 rupees, well, there are good people who give them a rupee or two on the streets. This was a humble way of telling me that they beg for it. After this talk, the nice woman, went to cook her meal, for she was getting late for the prayers at the ashram. There she told me, that the ashram gives around 100 grams of uncooked, raw rice everyday on attending the prayers. That explains the 2000 odd numbers of widows who flock to the ashram every morning and evening.
I came out of their home, towards the ashram, where I found a lot more such widows. The same cataract laden eyes, the fixated stare at the road, the same bent back and the same hunger. On every face. With no means to approach medical help, no one to call their own, they were sitting at every pavement, hands begging to survive another day.
Special thanks to Rohit Markande, for permission to use his images.
For rights to the images : Contact : rohit.markande@gmail.com
For using text, and additional details : Contact : aakanksha.gaur@gmail.com
References : http://widowsofvrindavan.blogspot.com/
http://www.whiterainbowproject.org/
http://articles.cnn.com/2007-07-05/world/damon.india.widows_1_widows-vrindava...:WORLD
