The Spiritualist
Unfailingly everyday he would be seated there beneath the huge banyan tree at the north end of the road which entered the market, in his typical composure of a spiritual achiever dressed in white long cloak , fastened at the waist with his self-improvised kind of belt, - a flat piece of cloth, the knots of which he would change from time to time depending on the condition of his belly and it's comfort.
He wore a rather long orange colour turban on his head leaving space just for his forehead and the smeared marks thereon:horizontal three short ash -lines and a large vertical bisecting thick line marked with calcified turmeric which gave out a kind of vermillion sanctity.
He also covered his shoulders and hands with a dark orange coloured cloth.
He wore conspicuously a garland of rudraksha seeds to add to the impact and would from time to time touch a few of the seeds in the garland for his intended effect.
His paraphernalia was strange enough which contained a small, carpenter -made cage for three parrots ,a bundle of palm leaves book, a pack of fortune card's,and some cowrie shells.
To preside over his gimmicks he had placed a small, framed picture of his favourite female deity. With a small cup full of calcified turmeric in it. There was also a couple of vibhuti cubes -the sacred ash .
He would always wait eagerly for a passer-by to approach him for his guidance or help.
Sometimes he would even cough, hem or exclaim a few strange words to attract the attention of on goers.
But the old woman ,whom people called , Honnamma seated a few feet away from him with her small mobile shop would have occasional buyers for her to attend. Her shop was a small box with glass sides displaying some fried groundnuts, gram -seeds and spiced, puffed rice, oranges, and other big fruits and cucumber to be offered in slices.
She was thin built but strong, calm and firmly, neat in what she did. She was herself dressed in a clean and neat saree and kept her surrounding place tidy and free from insects and other animal. From time to time she would sweep and thrown the garbage in the place ment for it at the end of the road.
The soothsayer was unconcerned about the surroundings, his eyes we're always fixed on the people moving to and fro waiting for an easy catch.
The world which is full of various kinds of suffering people who always seek relief for their problems outside and never within , want some magical power or an invisible agency to intervene and fight for them and drive away all their adversaries and calamities
Without themselves trying to get at the cause, effect and solutions.
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Every day, Honnamma managed to earn a few rupees which she put in side her self-stitched coarse cloth pouch and carried it back home.
She lived near- by in a small hut, her own, which her husband had left as the only property after his death.
Honnamma whom children addressed as Ajji, was soft and benevolent in her transactions with children. She cared for love and neatness, rather than money.
If her earnings for the day were copious she would pack up and go back home handing some eatable stuff to soothsayer, whom she called Anna,He would tell her to call him guru or swamiji in the presence of others .
The soothsayer was sometimes successful in attracting people. When they approached him with certain problems he would offer to solve them instantly. But kept them engaged in long conversations to extract information about them indirectly in their own words.He would then reveal them in his own words with a spiritual touch and convince them easily, besides extracting a few bucks from them.
For every question he charged two rupees and the questions were restricted to five in number.
After collecting the money he would mutter some words and spread the pack of cards on the little napkin in front of him .Then he would open one of the little shutters in the three-partitioned cage. A parrot would come out ,pick a card as it had been trained, and at his instance get back into the cage.
But the parrot which had performed it's work, never failed to claim it's reward- a well soaked peanut or gram seed.
None of the parrots could fly away because he had scissored; and plucked out the plumes making it impossible for them to fly away.
The soothsayer would then take the card so picked ,in his left hand, open it's fold and with a stylish wave of his hand after touching his rudraksha bead- garland , would read almost a paragraph pertaining to the life of his clients .It was stupid, nonsense and abstract. But his clients were under the psychic pressure to believe all the nonsense, to be applicable to them. Some of them even sought remedies from him for their calamities.
If they were prepared to pay an extra amount , he would sell them a talisman fastened to a piece of red coloured thread.
Honnamma neither believed in, nor looked at the cunning practice of the soothsayer. In fact she was made up of a different mettle altogether.
She firmly believed that Time - past, present, or future in relation to man's Destiny brings forth what is due to him in accordance with his deeds and choice of life.
The soothsayer on the other hand was a vagabond ,who pretended to be an ascetic, a spiritualist and achiever. He misled people into believing that great feats could be performed with magical incantations, propitiation, oblation and sacrifice.
He always prescribed propitiating the wicked deities in chosen places. After a few months' trial in the present place the soothsayer disappeared.
One of the reasons was that the town had been submerged and devastated with the floods in the river. But Honnamma who changed her place went back to her hut and within a month found a change for the better. She gathered about a dozen young jobless women and decided to start something afresh and new.
She pooled all her saved money- and it was really a lot. She counted the same contentedly. On her own she gave away a portion of it as a little donation towards the Flood Relief.
She started making eatables, cookies, and various fried , home-made products with the help her chosen women. She improvised with pickles, condiments and other side -dish products also.
Within months she hit the market with each of her products labelled and promoted as ' best sellers '.
She became at least well -to -do, if not very rich. She had the rare satisfaction of taking other depressed people along with her and making them self-confident and self-dependent.
Presently the production of those women headed by her emerged as a remarkable business concern, drawing the attention nation wide.
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The soothsayer, who had now assumed the new name of ParamaGuruji, claimed himself to be a spiritualist . He collected scores of vagabonds and drop-outs like him and had formed his own clan.
They all were dressed alike and their gestures were nothing more than imitations of ParamaGuruji they tried to be always silent, composed;but there was something sly about them.
Rich, business people and men of power had given away part of there landed property and wealth to set right the calamities which had befallen them, their families, business or profession, now ParamaGuruji had grown hefty and slothful. But he used his weakness for encashment posing to be always meditating and anxiously thinking about the people and the world at large.
He said that he was always concerned with peace and prosperity of the world. He used a few sanskrit words or slogans to supplement his sayings.
His mansion in itself was a huge building situated in a big farm land. Entrance to the land was restricted. Only the rich and the powerful, with prior permission had access to it.
Every rich client of ParamaGuruji had learnt about the guru's fee -structure for every benefaction he intended to receive at the hands of the spiritualist.
It was well known that he charged a very heavy fee- amount, if he personally performed a ritual at the place and at the instance of entrepreneur or client, wishing to start some new enterprise or observe the occupancy of a new mansion.
ParamaGuruji would go there the previous evening and perform special rituals to drive away the evil spirits and negative forces hindering the proposed prosperity.
As was decided a helicopter was to come and pickup ParamaGuruji from his place to a rich ceremonial function , some two hundred miles away .
The spiritualist moved slowly towards the helicopter , waving his hand to everyone present and took his seat beside the pilot. The helicopter with the duo , took off rhythmically rotating it's propelling fans and within minutes disappeared in the blue sky.
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Every morning brought a vigorous newness to Honnamma. As usual she got ready within a few minutes for the day and prepared upama and tea for her co-workers. They were about to begin the day's work when Honnamma's eyes we're attracted to the pictures in the morning's edition of the newspaper .She took it in her hands and went through the headlines and details.
There was an air-crash on the previous evening resulting in the awful death of the pilot and the spiritualist on the flight. Their bodies were found torn to pieces and scattered around in a bushy trench , in a wild tract at the foot of a hill. There were the details of the accident.
After a few minutes' flight in the air , the helicopter met with a long stretched, large flight - a pandemonium ,of parrots which rushed into the course of the flight.
Honnamma either failed to recognise or could not remember having seen the spiritualist , though the inset coloured photographs in the newspaper displayed him clearly .
Honnamma was not the type of woman to make fuss over events and happenings. She, with her colleagues resumed the work.Her gestures and attitude seemed to form a kind of mutter:' Life is a bound , righteous journey to go on till one meets with the end : Death' .
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