GOD IS HELPLESS

Nowadays, grand immersion procession marks our festivals. While seeing one such procession, I felt how helpless our gods are! This was the preparation for the idol immersion in one of the backyard clubs. The God was mounted on a truck amidst floral and light decorations. There was a thick screen of cigarette smoke obscuring the deity’s face. The truck was so thickly crowded that the God shoved with men to stand erect. Sometimes somebody gave a nudge and sometimes someone bumped into him.

The pious custom to lead the God with dhunuchi, which evoked sacred ambience is passé. An indecent cacophonic desi number was screaming aloud. The club owners, heavily drunk, were trying to arrange everything on their wobbling feet. Apart from them, street children, vagabonds and onlookers made for a motley crowd. People from all age groups mostly dressed in tattered clothes made for a good sight. In this kind of street fest, street children put on the garb of self-appointed kings. Scurrying around, their talks acted as fillers in the weighty conversation of the elders. It was really amusing to see a man struggling hard to perform the drink-dance with the group. Old by his grey and white hair, but young by spirit. They were all immersed in a different kind of enjoyment; the excitement of being half conscious and spitting slang at each other.

One can notice that the sprouting of unidentifiable non-existing clubs is a common trend. The club maker’s main purpose is to celebrate each and every festival in the Indian calendar. The reason being very simple and straight - the collection of money. We Indians are rightfully very religious and we fear to deny when the question of God comes. Comments or scoffs are ready for those who don’t give in.

The priest offers his prayers as if hurling mantras at the idol. Except the club leader, who takes the pain of sitting in the puja, others continue their banter or card game. An altogether different fusion is created when the baritone of the priest and the cheap Bollywood song jostle to find space. The urchins, idle walkers and some over-enthusiastic group of women are the audience of this road-side mockery of worship. Some beggars also drop in to make that extra money other than their usual quota.


God remains in this make-shift heaven for a long time even after the worshiping. This is the post-puja gestation period for the God. This is a very viable plea for the club members to refrain from their usual job. During this time, he takes a stock of the surrounding. Most of the evenings the club members are so occupied with their boorish celebrations that the helpless God bears the imposed solitude.

Seeing all these I wonder, is the idol a mere symbol of wonderful craftsmanship? Or the God in the idol is smiling at the demonstration of culture deprivation? Is it that God, for whom homicide or sabotage is nothing, but a proof of being heartily religious? Many such questions storm the mind.

Nobody has seen God, but we hold it as the mightiest force above us. Idols are symbolic, in which we invoke Him in the festivals. And that is the main conviction behind religion. Religion is faith in that ultimate force. It is either hypocrisy or the death of humanity to use God for such indulgence. Gods have become alibi for barbarism. They are easy planks to meet seedy wants.