Well here I am still locked up in the hostel. Feeling like a ghost, the entire corridor is empty only two or three guys are still here in the entire hostel. Though I like the solitude, at times it creeps me out, having no one to talk to and no one to share anything with. I spend most of my days and nights in the lab, it’s the same scenario there as well. I really feel like a lab rat, that has reached the end of its wits, don’t know how long I can last, just hope I can bear with this for 6 more days and then things will definitely be looking up during the Science Conclave.

Last Night I had made up my mind that I will be leaving today on the first bus which leaves from Civil Lines at 8.15 AM. Accordingly I had planned my schedule. I had three places on my radar Assi Ghat, BHU and Sarnath. I returned from the lab around 3.30 AM, took a bath at around 4 in the morning ( I know it’s crazy, but I am a bit unhinged these days ).

Went to sleep around 5.30 and I told myself that I must wake up by 7 in order to catch the bus. I was sure my biological clock will come to my aid, but wallah things don’t work when you need them the most. Woke up to the sound of my cell phone ringing, it was mom waking me up and pleading with me to have breakfast I hung up the call and glanced at my wrist watch and I was like Mother of God, its a quarter past 10. I messed up, missed out on the only chance that I had. Grumpily woke up and checked my mails and all, when I received a call from one of my pesky juniors, “Sir if you are free, may I come please” and I was like since I have nothing better to do now, let me waste my time on you.

Talked with him for about half hour till 11 A.M. when he left I thought to myself, well I can spend the rest of my life regretting, that I missed out on this one chance that I had or I might still take a shot at it, all is not lost yet. With this thought I embarked on a journey which would be one of the most exhilarating and satiating experiences I have ever been through. I put on a shirt and a jeans and walked my way towards Jhalwa, stopped at the ATM on the way, replenished my depleted coffers and waited for an auto to the station.

But as fate would have it, there was a scheduled exam of the railway recruitment board, it was so crowded, there were hardly any autos. Luckily found one, but he agrees at twice the normal fare, I said yes as if I had any other choice. It took quite a long time to reach the station the streets were more crowded than they usually are (for the same reason as stated above). As a side note, the railway exam paper was damn easy, I borrowed it from a guy in the auto and had a look at it. Completely based on Civics, History, GK and Current affairs. I could answer almost 80% of the questions on the fly, though I haven’t been in touch with Civics and History since my ICSE. And I am grossly out of sync with the current state of affairs in the world. The guy thought that I must have also been an examinee like him and enquires “Bhaiyya aapko bhi aisa hi paper mila hoga, Kaisa hua….?”. I told him “Ha aisa hi mila tha, sahi hua paper”, didn’t want to disillusion him so easily.

Anyway back to the story, reached the railway station at 12.15, took a rickshaw to the Civil Lines bus station. On reaching there, the first bus that I lay my eyes on has Allahabad to Varanasi labelled on it, went up to the driver asked him when would the bus be leaving he said that it will be leaving in just about 10 minutes or so. I didn’t have anything since the morning, went to a nearby shop and bought a packet of chips consumed it within 5 minutes straight. Got up on the bus to find that only a single seat was still unoccupied, it was a window seat (God was with me all along the way, this was just the beginning). The bus trudged its weary way along the fields and meadows. I have to say that these outskirts of Allahabad like Jhausi and Handi and Saudabad are far better developed in comparison to Jhalwa. The bus had a scheduled stop at Gopiganj, where the driver has his meal. I too was feeling hungry by this time, didn’t have anything since morning except that packet of chips. It was around 3:00 by this time. I had “chhole samosa” as that was the usual fare for everyone else.

The bus was about 30 kms away from the destination and boom we come across an accident scene. An auto and a matador had a head on collision, the scene was just too gory to describe, scattered around the scene were shards of glass mingled with blood. The auto driver was still in his seat, I can say this without an iota of doubt, that he didn’t have a sign of life left in him, he bled profusely and a pool of blood had gathered around him. The passerby’s were just standing there and staring, the bus didn’t stop there for long, but just enough to give us a feel of the things. You have no idea how I felt, it was the first time I had witnessed something so gory, but that will not be the last corpse that I am going to see today.
The rest of the journey was quite uneventful (like we needed anything else). I reached the bus stop in Varanasi at 4.15 P.M. Its near the railway station, which by the way looks awesome the best that I have ever seen, its architectural brilliance and beauty dwarfs, even the mighty Howrah station. The first thing which I did after landing was to ask the people around when does the last bus for Allahabad leave. It was around 10 P.M. So I had limited time on my hands, I had to be there before 9, because I was in no mood to stay the night at a hotel. About 4 hours to explore the city. As per my previous schedule, Assi Ghat and BHU would be the only places which I had a chance of visiting, Sarnath was out of question now.
Took an auto to Assi Ghat about 10 km away from the bus stop. I was actually enjoying the new place, way better and eons ahead of Allahabad in terms of development. Then began the trek, literally one through the ghats. Assi Ghat, has all these 5 star restaurants thriving on the foreign exchange brought in by the multitude of foreign nationals frequenting the holy banks. It was heartening and amazing to see that most of the temples and hotels were atop a fort, as if they had been placed on a mountain and the banks were far below seeming insignificant in the shadow if these mighty structures. Not to mention that the Ganges was extremely placid as if it had been chided by the forces of time and fate to be on its best behavior. The seasons had chaperoned the holy river to act in tandem to the needs of the millions of people depending upon her for a livelihood and/or bestowing their faith in her, as is most often the case. I had made up my mind that I won’t be taking the usual boat-ride or light the diya, leave alone taking a dip to cleanse me of all my sins. I said to myself, I have already accumulated enough sins for a lifetime in order to guarantee a direct ticket to hell, permanent reservation no extra costs, lifetime membership or rather death time membership . Either way I was not going to put the onus of cleansing my sins on the holy river, it’s bad enough she has to support the faith of a billion hearts.

I moved from one ghat to next, encountering new places and people all along the way, looking out at the horizon to the vast expanse of opportunity that lay ahead. There was a water treatment plant, Jain ghat and temple, Hanuman Mandir, the ghats even had a tinge of parochialism attached to them like there was a Ghat for the Karnatic State and one reserved exclusively for the Bengalis (it seemed so, I will get back to this later). You remember that I had mentioned that it was not going to be the last corpse that I will be seeing today. The Shivala Ghat had an array of deceased men lined up to be cremated in full public view, and that too in the traditional way using logs of wood and oil. The bodies were lying on bare ground, some half-dipped in water some being readied for the last rites. It was the first time I had seen a body being cremated and usually there were two or three piers burning at the same time. It’s as if one moment there is this person in flesh and blood and the next moment he is up in smoke, gone forever never to be seen again. A thousand thoughts raced through my mind at that moment, just watching a lifetime dissolving in the minuscules of dust and smoke, being wafted by the evening breeze and relentlessly consumed by the greedy fire. The fire grew as if, it had a singular objective in life, that is to completely decimate the physical footprints of a soul from the face of the earth. “Dust thou art, To dust thou shall return”, these cliched words never had so much pertinence as they did in that moment. Although in this case, they were ending up in smoke and not dust.
The poignancy, brevity of life and the connotations of the ultimate destination, the absolute truth still weighed heavy on me. With, these thoughts clouding my mind I moved on. If there is anything good that has come out of this, it is this – it has reinforced my long standing decision to donate my body after my death. Its like I have polluted the environment enough during my entire lifetime and hence, let me at least make an attempt to reduce the carbon footprints in my final hours. Also I should try to do something nice at least when I am dead, I might just end up helping someone.

Just two or three ghats away the sombre pall tarnished away in the face of the effulgence of the spotlight. The fort wall and the steps leading to the ghat were brightly lit up, the stage was being set for a movie shoot. I still don’t know who the actors/director were, or even what the movie was all about.But anyways it was also a first for me, though I had seen ads being shot in Mumbai, but never a movie of this scale. I can only juxtapose and reflect upon the wide spectrum of fleeting emotions passing through my mind and seizing my heart one after the other, perhaps making a seasoned and concerted effort to make an indelible impact on my mind’s eye. I brisked from one ghat to the next, they had names ranging from Kedar Ghat to Vijay Nagar Ghat and finally reached Dashwamedh ghat, the preparations were in full swing for the evening aarti, which, I have heard is a splendid sight. But I had no time, had to get out of Assi by 6 and make my way towards BHU. With such heavy time constraints, I decided to turn back. And as I had mentioned before, I will get to the notion of the ghats being alloted specifically to the Bengalis, it was the dashwamedha ghat. Announcements were being made in bengali, the entire space was full of chattering Bengalis. Ahh its was as if I had suddenly arrived in a crowded north Calcutta street and the cacophony was getting on my nerves. I am not claustrophobic by any means, to say the least but this is a small world and you never know when you get to meet an acquaintance. Hence decided to let go of all the “sholo ana bengali” nostalgia once and for all, I mean that’s one of the prime reasons why I am over here, I don’t gel well with everything that traditional bengalis do.

Made my way back to the Assi Ghat, hopping from one ghat to the next and racing against time to make it to the Assi Chauraha before 6 in order to reach BHU. Reached Assi at 6.05 sharp and then trudged along to the Chauraha to get a rickshaw. The streets leading to BHU were really very wide and well maintained, it is located in a bustling market the place is aptly dubbed Lanka and I said to myself , “Ravan ki Lanka mein aa hi gaya hu aag laga ne ke liye ” . The rickshaw puller asked me where do you want to go..?? I really had no idea of the names of the buildings, or any departments, I only had a faint idea of the Computer Centre over there. So I said Computer Center le chalo. Obviously he didn’t know where it was, instead he took me to a place called Birla. It turned out to be a boys hostel the largest on campus, loitered in and around the hostel for a while, I was feeling hungry by this time. Asked a guy where is the canteen, he pointed to a place inside one of the hostels and said, you can get food over there. I was like, I am at a strange place, I have to enter a new hostel and eat in their canteen like an outsider, cool, challenge accepted. Went straight through the main gate and as I entered the porch I could gauge the magnificence of the architecture, I swear to god they carry every bit of resemblance to the old zamindar houses of the regent period. The canteen was spick and span and the food was cheap as well, it was more like a community kitchen rather than a canteen, ordered an omlette for myself and filled up my now empty water bottle. It was around 6.30 by now and dark outside I had only an hour left to explore the place and get back to the bus stop. By the way I don’t know whether this is a coincidence or not, but the hostel in which I had my meal, was named Raja Ram Mohan Roy Hostel, as I found out later, and the funny part is he shares his birthday with me or vice-versa either way, I was amused when I found out about this. I spent the next hour walking around the place anywhere my eyes and legs would take me, caught a glimpse of the institute of medical sciences, Pandit Madan Mohan Malviya Bhavan, Sir Sunderlal hospital, BHU Women’s University (sans the women), Chanakya Hostel, Chemical Engg department, Instrumentation department, Biomed Department but couldn’t find the CS department, should have asked someone the way to the building , but that wasn’t my priority, the journey and not the destination was a boon in itself . I met a guard in one of the dark deserted alleys, and he asks me “Bhaiyya aap library ja rahe ho…?? “, he made that assumption probably seeing me with my backpack. I said yes, though I had no idea where it was, still don’t, then he replies back saying “Mujhe pata hai raat ko jo bhi jhola lekar nikalta hai woh library hi jata hai”, I smiled at him in approval and walked away.

It was then that I realized why the institute had become so famous, with 124 departments and over 24,000 students on campus, it boasts of being the largest residential campus in Asia. It was not only the vision of one man, it was the sacrifice of the men who followed him, those who rose above petty ambitions and narrow calculations to imagine a institute spread across the banks of this Holy river and all the nameless, faceless men and women, who toiled in solitude to get the job done, without the least expectation of recognition of their hard labor or a pat on their backs. Rejuvenated, I made my way back to the bus stop the ride was smooth I stopped once on the road to have a sip of the famous Varanasi lassi, refreshing was what I would call the drink
Got on the bus at 8.30, reached Civil Lines at 11.30, then took a rickshaw to the railway station and from there a auto back to the hostel. It was midnight by the time I entered my room, and then ruminated on the long and eventful day I had spent. The journey of a lifetime had been compressed in a few hours let’s see what I have been through, dead people, holy waters, intellectual enlightenment, that pretty much sums it all up. Of course the day didn’t begin the way I thought it would, but ended in a way I had always envisaged, its not how you start things, it’s how you end them, that’s what matters the most. We always have a choice and I had made up my mind that come whatever may, I am ready to face it. Yes things won’t work out the way you planned, things will be difficult and sometimes I will even falter and fail. But its all a part of growing up, its how we deal with them. A man is defined not by the magnitude or scale of troubles which encompass him, but how he faces them and ultimately “what matters most is how you pass through the fire” , And if you don’t pass through quickly enough you end up in smoke like those dead people .

I can almost feel the winds of change whipping through me, the bag of beliefs that I have and especially those that have endured the test of time, have made me worldly wise. Yesterday I was clever so I wanted to change the world, but today I am wiser and I am busy changing myself
Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness, that most frightens us. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won’t feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine as children do. It’s not just in some of us; it is in everyone. And as we let our own lights shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.

Rupak
B.Tech(IT), IIIT Allahabad