Celebrity Column: The Ganges, writes Ayushmann Khurrana

“Karat karat abhyaas se khachchar baney na gaiyya, karat karat abhyaas se khachchar baney na gaiyya,
Haiyya Ganga maiyya. Haiyya Ganga maiyya.”

These are the words of Varun Grover, which were supposed to be used as part of the background score of Dum Lagaa Ke Haisha, but were unfortunately taken out from the film. In Rishikesh, I constantly think about my last week in the city. Watching the Ganga flow at Triveni Ghat gives you the certain yet ambiguous time flow. I had spent two long months here during the making of DLKH. Now that I’m back again for Shubh Mangal Saavdhan, the locals echo in unison, “Bhaiyya, aapko Ganga maiyya ne waapis bula liya.”

We had used a real cassette shop in my last film. It’s been shut for the past 15 years. The owner had committed suicide some years ago, when cassettes were going out of fashion. The shop right opposite is that of Pappu Lassiwala. He serves the best lassi in the world, especially in this horrid 42-degree heat. He claims that Ganga maiyya witnesses everything and that his lassi has the sweetness of gangajal. The nearby dharamshala owner gifted some gangajal to me in a gold-plated urn, which I’d sent across to Chandigarh to my ecstatic mom. Jai Ganga maiyya. Sigh!

Our nation is obsessed with this river. The Gangetic plains account for 40 per cent of our population. They’re home to over a hundred towns and thousand of villages. The Ganges is also one of the dirtiest rivers in the world. I bet religion has made it like that. I see the difference in the Ganga of Haridwar and the Ganga of Rishikesh. The former reeks of religion and the latter boasts of spirituality. The latter is clean, malleable and ductile. The former is diluted, adulterated and extreme. From the ashes of the dead immersed in the river to the self-inflicted lashes of a sadhu. The roving eyes of men around bathing religious women to the rituals of the yore. Ganga witnesses everything, says Pappu Lassiwala. The holy river has seen Mandakini (a bizarre coincidence is Mandakini is also one of the headstreams of Ganga) in Ram Teri Ganga Maili Ho Gayi and Zeenat Aman in Satyam Shivam Sundaram in their glorious real self. Ganga witnesses everything, says Pappu Lassiwala.

“No man ever steps in the same river twice, for it’s not the same river as he’s not the same man”
- Heraclitus

I’m a metamorphosed soul, this time around in Rishikesh. I’m more in control of myself, just like Ganga at this point of time, unlike some years ago. The river witnessed a catastrophic calamity in the recent past when there were landslides and floods in Uttarakhand resulting in loss of life and property in unimaginable proportions. Thousands of bodies were not even found.

My local friend says that the taste of tap water has become scarily different. But Ganga is still a life source. It flows like a pro. Patience, I say. Rivers know this. There’s no hurry. We shall get there some day. Rivers are an inspiration. They are same yet ever changing. They change their course over decades and centuries. They push their limits, sometimes conquering but mostly adjusting with land masses. They become deep like a poet.

I want to become a river. Rivers know the secret — pay no attention to boundaries. Rivers don’t judge you. They don’t care what you’ve done, where you’ve been. Ganga symbolically washes away your sins, whispering to your soul and your inner self, ‘It’s going to be all right’. The river just knows. Ganga witnesses everything, says Pappu Lassiwala.