I had been cooped up for a good two days, perhaps not quite 48 hours, but what felt to me like a near week, when the chance to make a great, yet, short escape, came my way! The significant-other, always one to have a fixation, or call it penchant, for Swamis, was telephonically informed by a friend of the same make, that a Swami had come to town and would only bathe blessings on those if their aura was aligned in a certain saintly symmetry, with the star constellation falling in tow, and so my house-mate got to his feet with an alacrity I hadn’t seen for a very long while, and more so, since he had been laid up with a backache brought on by a pinched nerve that decided not to budge an inch, announcing he was off to—fingers crossed—receive the “benedictions” of a Guruji. Of course, he added with an obligatory ring that I was free to accompany him, if I so wished. Me, not one, for Swamis, Gurus or Godmen, couldn’t resist the offer thinking that once the boon bestowing ceremony was over, we’d halt for a cappuccino and a toastie followed by a sticky toffee pudding! Good enough reason to go, right? Thought I’d wait in the car but then not one for having the air-conditioning running on a static vehicle, I was compelled to enter the Sanctum set up in a posh South Delhi mansion.
And there I found myself navigating the fragrant chaos of jasmine garlands, incense smoke and an elite crowd, so reverent that you’d imagine they’d have kissed the very marble the Swami’s slippered feet had trod. He was not any Swami, mind you, but the Swami had been imported directly from the Himalayas, if the brochures were to be believed. He sat on a sofa chair, that definitely looked like a throne, upholstered in psychedelic colours. His velvety, voluminous robes unbothered by the heat (super air-conditioning allows mortals to dress like Eskimos!). His biblical beard and his porky fingers one would imagine, groaning under the weight of nine oversized rings, each presumably instilled with celestial powers, and the sort of hair that can only be termed as, “strategically unwashed”! The room was packed to the rafters with the faithful…And not your ordinary folk—this Delhi’s silk-stocking society. Brigadiers with their polished to the buff boots, industrialists with P.A.s ever in the breakdown mode, doctors with their man-Fridays carrying their Hermès bags packed with stethoscopes and an emergency kit perhaps, journalists with the gravitas generally reserved for war-zones. I perched gingerly on a chair of questionable stability, quite disappointed with myself for having to be led to this spiritual masquerade, while calculating how long it would take to be free and locate a café bar. One by one, the faithful shuffled into the Swami’s chamber, returning with an incredulous sheen to their faces! How did Swamiji know that, “I wanted to expand on my business, build a resort of the Spa variety, where even cocktails stirred with a double-shot, were taken for muscle-relaxants?!”, “How in heavens did he know that I liked cats though my villa had only Alsatians and Rottweilers?!” Fine. If clairvoyance was a matter of guess work and good timing than the Swami was definitely the world’s most overdressed therapist! When it was my turn to enter the Sanctum, I definitely wanted to make an about turn but it was too late and so, made my way with the enthusiasm of a cat headed for a bath! He slowly looked up, then down, indicating that I had not followed the protocol laid down by the Gods—not having prostrated to touch his feet! Swiftly paid heed to his command, believing that in another 10 seconds or so, I could, with His Holiness’s sanction, make good my exit. This falling at the feet exercise over, he looked up bit by bit with scanning eyes, making my stomach lurch…The gaze of the Divine?! Rather the kind of once-over one receives from a man at a dodgy pub before closing time. And there I was wearing a baggy shirt and pyjama pants…Wonder what his staring (scaring) scrutiny would be for those women wearing well-structured clothes?! After the “blessing”— delivered with a flourish of marigolds and a rather animated stroking of my forearm—I made my way to the veranda where followers were queuing as if lining up for a Pop Concert. (Yes, I do wish I could have retorted back to his arched query of whether mine was a “Love marriage?” and “since so”, “Did the attraction lay in the husband’s voice or manners or position?” telling him to take a hike back to his supposed mountain abode!) And yes, should I not, while going blue in the face, have demanded to know if he had ever heard of boundaries, and that leering at guests, or whatever we were, was nauseatingly lewd, to put it most mildly! However, given this sage-scented scenario, the cat bites the tongue from the off-set…These Swamis, for the most, could be best described as marketing mavericks, part magicians, wafting around like messiahs sealing deals of salvation—or if you are lucky—a state-of-the-art, swanky four-bedroom apartment in Gurgaon! (High-End Flats where even the curtains open & close at the sluggish wave of the hand, automated fans, doors etc., yes!) And yes again, as mentioned earlier, the rooms were not filled with your garden-variety followers/fans. It was like a spectacle you come across with zealous buyers, wearing out the soles of their shoes while count-downing their turn at the Apple store on iPhone launch day!
The unspoken promise?? That with the wave of the “Godman’s” bejewelled pudgy hand, life’s trials of all varieties would vanish like Shimla’s morning mist…
Have we not seen this theatre before—in headlines, in Bollywood films, in Netflix series? The gurus exposed, the devotees deflated, the money trail laid bare…And yet, the show goes on…Fresh robe, fresh name, same game! A show-stopper question: Have we shape-shifted into a nation hardwired to gravitate at the sight of a mane of hair that’d put Rapunzel in the shade, and lusciously swishy robes making us beatifically believe that we’ve stepped into a sanctified catwalk, a divine runway?!
