The Loss of our Gods

One of the biggest assets of Hinduism I have always felt is its decentralization of religious practices. And therefore I have always believed more than a religion, it is a way of life. We have more Gods than we can count and remember and while many believe that Hinduism is essentially a throbbing, living example of polytheism, I always believe it also has the traits of Monotheism and Pantheism. Which is why when someone from Europe wonders how I plan to celebrate Diwali, I itch to answer, “Just like the French wine connoisseurs celebrate Oktoberfest.”

Our different Gods help us to reach the One as we deem fit. And then we find our own unique ways to reach The One. But as I travel around the country, I see a strange phenomenon. Slowly the complex fabric of our culture is giving way to the worship of what I call the Mega Gods – The avatars of Shiva and Vishnu. Even the Incarnations of the Mother Goddess are losing out to the male deities of Monotheist nature. The local gods are slowly being forgotten. In Luka and the Fire of Life, Rushdie speaks of the Forgotten Gods from ancient religions who no one remembers anymore. Slowly the Gods in our ancient forests and lakes and mountains are facing the same fate. Time it seems is able to consume even divinity. Whether it is good or bad only time can tell. I just wish there was someone working on the forgotten Gods of India.

While the Gods leave, one by one, like the vanishing languages of the world, the ‘Godmen’ fill up their places. Feeding on our insecurities, they now control a vast swathe of our country and slowly blind faith and rituals replace the logical mind that once told us that paths to The One can be many and yet they reach the same destination.

Sometimes you need the light of Knowledge to show you the way. For darkness is powerful and all encompassing but always loses in the end.

The Tough Task

SNDU (if you have forgotten by now, it’s the company I work for – Sabun, Nakhun and Datun Unlimited) sometime back started asking me to go and recruit from campuses. Amongst all the tasks that increase my heart’s palpitation, this probably is the toughest. It’s even more stressful than the times when you have to disagree with your boss on the costumes of your model in the ads that you make or when data fails to answer a question and you have to swallow hard and take a stance. Now close to 8 years later you have enough confidence to take that stance, but nothing prepares you to face a Placement Committee Member (Placeu as we called them) and tell her how many candidates have you decided to make an offer to.

Now these Placeus come in all shapes and sizes. Some of them make puppy faces, some of them play the martyr, some are plain obnoxious (to both the candidate and the company) but generally they have a tough job trying to place a batch that believes that getting a job offer at the highest pay scale is their birthright.

Anyway, the placeus are always handled well by the world famous (really, true story!) HR team of SNDU. So that takes care of the first problem. But then begins the most important task of selecting a candidate.

Multiple rounds continue, the day changes to night and we meet some of the brightest youngsters in India. Sometimes, they freeze up, sometimes they try to put on a show, sometimes they realize as soon as they walk in and this probably is not what they have wanted to do in their lives but for the most of them, it’s an opportunity they have been waiting for.

I was talking to my grandma the other day about how this stresses me out. Not because I cannot do it, but mainly because every time I say “No” my heart feels a pang of sorrow. And there is no way I can select someone who I do not think is right for the organization I love so much. She reminded me of a Tagore line, “When the judge feels the pain of the convicted, that’s the greatest justice that can be done.” The important feeling to have is empathy that ensures when someone walks out after meeting you, they feel nice about the process irrespective of its outcome.

But still, every time I walk into that room I am scared as if I am the one going in for mine.

The Loss of Reason

“Shantih! Shantih! Shantih!” the chants of the Brahmins on the banks of the Ganges reverberated around the woods. The sacred fire burnt in front of them, purifying their souls and their offerings to the Gods above.

Slowly they picked up their humble belongings and started walking back to their huts. The fire had shown them visions, ones they were too scared to even talk. In the raging fires, they were shown the world of Kali when the world would slowly move towards a realignment of time, the ultimate Yuganta.

The world they knew, where knowledge and light ruled, would lose its way. The pursuit of fame and glory would leave behind a thousand battered souls and slowly the world would become a darker place. People would forget why it’s important to be honest to oneself. Lies, deceit, half truths would masquerade as the truth and we would lose track of what to believe and what to reject.

In every step, humankind would slowly move towards their final test where the world would be cleansed and repopulated. That would once again turn the Wheel of Time. But what they had seen was a possibility that the seeds of destruction of the world would be sown without a hope for a rebirth. Unreasonable, argumentative, desperate for a lifestyle they cannot sustain, mankind was racing towards a point of no return.

For years they prayed, hoping to find a path for redemption for humanity. And yet answers failed them till one day the answer came, “The Loss of Reason will spell the end of all things we hold dear.”