The Himàlaya -A Cultural Pilgrimage 9788126042623

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Himalaya A Cultural Pilgrimage Dattatreya Balkrishna Kalelkar Translated by Ashok Witste] areval

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The Himalaya A Cultural Pilgrimage

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The sculpture reproduced on the endpaper depicts a scene where three soothsayers are interpreting to King Suddhodhana the dream of Queen Maya, mother of Lord Buddha. Below them is seated a scribe recording

the interpretation. This is perhaps the earliest available pictorial record of the art of writing in India. From : Nagarjunakonda, 2™ century A.D. Courtesy : National Museum, New Delhi

THE HIMALAYA A Cultural Pilgrimage

Original Gujarati by

Dattatreya Balkrishna Kalelkar

English Translation

Ashok Meghani

Sahitya Akademi

The Himalaya: A Cultural Pilgrimage: English translation by Ashok Meghani of Himdlayano Prawas, travelogue in Gujarati by Kakasaheb Kalelkar. Sahitya Akademi, New Delhi (2014).

Sahitya Akademi Rabindra Bhavan, 35 Ferozeshah Road, New Delhi 110 001

Sales Section : ‘Swati? Mandir Marg, New Delhi 110 001 Regional Offices

172 Mumbai Marathi Grantha Sangrahaiaya Marg, Dadar, Mumbai 400014 4 D.L. Khan Road, Kolkata 700053 Central College Parisar, Dr B.R. Ambedkar Veethi, Bangalore 560001

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© English Translation, Sahitya Akademi Cover : Biplab Kundu

First published 2014

ISBN 978-8 1-260-4262-3

Rs. 200

Typeset and printed at Vikas Computer & Printers, Delhi

To the angelic memories of my beloved friend Anantbuwa Mardhekar

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History This series of articles was originally written for a handwritten monthly publication at the Sabarmati Ashram, mainly to satisfy the wishes of my Ashram coworkers and students. There were three of us that went on the trip chronicled here: Swami Anand, our dear

friend Anantbuwa Mardhekar and I. It will be impossible for me to properly convey the joy and experience the three of us derived from this Himalayan trek. * * OX

The oppression that followed the Delhi Darbar — the extravagant celebration of the 191i India visit by King George V immediately after his coronation — made it impossible for me to continue any further with my beloved Nationalist Education work. And that made me think of going on this pilgrimage. I left my Vadodara home in early 1912, if I am not mistaken, on the auspicious day of Akhatrij, and set out for Prayag (Allahabad). The pilgrimage that covers the three holy places of Prayag, Kashi and Gaya is known as Tristhali Yatra. I wanted to complete it and be freed from my obligation to my late father’s soul. Following that, I had planned to fulfil my longtime wish to visit Swami Vivekananda’s Belur Math and to pay my respects to Shri Mahendranath Gupta, the author of Sri Ramakrishna Kathamrita. We were very fortunate in reaching there on the day of Vaisakhi Purnima — the full moon day in the lunar vil

History

calendar month of Vaisakha — and were able to join the residents of the Math in the religious celebration of Buddha’s birth anniversary. That same day we went to the town of Khardah to listen to Chaitanya Sankirtana — a chanting and singing of hymns. Sister Nivedita has written about the significance of this place. My friend Anantbuwa, being a hereditary member of the Ramdasi Sect, had a great desire to visit Ayodhya. We did that and then proceeded to Almora to réndezvous with Swami Anand. We spent the remainder of the month of Vaisakha there. From there, accompanied by Swami Anand, we formally started our pilgrimage on foot from Haridwar, on the holy day of Gangaji’s Dashahara. The farther we went, the more ambitious we grew. Finally, we covered Jamanotri, Gangotri, Kedarnath and Badrinath — four of the holiest

[Hindu] shrines in all of North India — and returned to Almora. That is the journey that this travelogue is all about. Most people believe that travelling on foot is a very hard task. For me it is not the travel itself, but finding the time to write about it, that is the difficult task. The entire Himalaya trip described here

took forty days to complete. I started writing about the trip in 1919, a whole seven years later. That is a long time for all of the memories to remain equally fresh in one’s mind. And how interesting can it be to recount experiences that you don’t clearly remember! Due to a variety of circumstances, this series of articles took fifteen years to complete. Is. it any wonder then if the writing lacks consistency? A careful reading would reveal big shifts in my attitude on life. The hastily written last few chapters are short on descriptions. In addition to my recollections virtually being erased by the elapsed time, the latter part of the travel itself had been completed in a somewhat fatigued state. That fatigue substantially affected the description of that part of the travel. Readers had justifiable expectations from me, expectations that I had the responsibility to meet. If I have failed them in that regard, I hope they will find it in their hearts to forgive me. vill

History

In those fifteen years, the youth of Gujarat have undertaken much travel. It is my sincere hope that those youngsters, Gujaratis and other Indians alike, gain greater understanding of the importance of travel, roam to every corner of this great country of ours and observe our countrymen... and then enrich our literature by writing many travelogues dripping with patriotism. To get up-close glimpses of our motherland and of her countless children, and then to verbalise those glimpses, is a form of worship. If this series of articles serves as one small offering of prayer, and lingers in the reader’s memory even for a few days, it will mean much to me. Dattatreya Balkrishna Kalelkar

ix

Translator’s Note

This work is an English translation of the original travelogue Himalayano Prawas by Kakasaheb Kalelkar, considered a classic of Gujarati literature. I had several reservations in undertaking this translation project. The principal cause of concern was a comment I had heard, “Kakasaheb’s ornamental prose is impossible to translate.” Although in similar awe of the author’s colossal stature, I took this as a challenge and decided not to back down from it. A careful reading of the original raised some other questions in my mind but they were not sufficient reason for me not to proceed. The original work consisted of about 195 printed pages. I figured I would need about six months to finish the project. It didn’t take me long to realise how badly I had underestimated the complexity of this job. The word-ornaments took their expected toll, of course;

but, what turned out to be really difficult came from the book’s hidden content. The work is replete with historical, scriptural and

literary references. Researching and understanding those references was crucial to preserving the author’s intent. Numerous Sanskrit and Marathi citations required help from others to understand and translate them. The travel information in the book being sketchy at best (for a travelogue), I spent quite some time in figuring out the trekking route and putting a map together to show it. All in all, it took me fourfold the time and effort compared to my initial estimate.

I must also mention

that information

available online,

specifically on the Wikipedia website, has been of immense value in all my research.

Translator’ Note

About this translation : ¢ I have used the singular ‘The Himalaya’ instead of ‘The Himalayas’ for a reason. The Himalaya stands as a father figure, a sentinel, a guardian in the Indian psyche. Geographically, it may be a range made up of thousands of mountains. Culturally, ‘The Himalaya’ is a single entity, and hence my use of the singular. ¢ In spelling of all except the most commonly used names, I have used an ‘a’ to indicate the ‘ah’ sound e.g. Himalaya,

Ganga, Vivekananda.

¢« As much as possible, I have tried to use the current and official spellings of place names e.g. Haridwar (not Hardwar), Belur Math (not Belud Math), Mumbai (not Bombay). ¢ I have incorporated some text from Swami Anand’s writings on the same journey, principally to supplement the author’s narrative with what had lapsed from his memory. ¢ Against the expressed wishes of the author, I have included some excerpts from his article “‘Yamunarani’ in the chapter ‘Jamanotri.’ ¢ I have added the text ‘[Hindu]’ in certain statements to clarify them as specific to Hindu thought and beliefs. * Inacouple of instances, my translations of quoted Sanskrit verses are not literal. This is deliberate because I have tried to interpret the author’s intent and put it in my words. Scholars would certainly scoff at my interpretation of Kalidasa’s famous déja vu verse in chapter 30. ¢ I had inserted many footnotes to explain textual references, mainly intended for readers not familiar with India, its history and its culture. Realising that most of the book’s readers would

be familiar with the information,

I later

decided to move most of them into a chapter-wise glossary at the end of the book.

Translator’s Note

Gujarati Literary Academy of North America initiated this translation of Himalayano Prawas under its program to make literary masterpieces from Gujarati available in English. I thank its officers and members for entrusting this extremely demanding job to me. I had to seek help in translating the Sanskrit and Marathi references in this book. I am thankful to Dr Vinod Joshi and Ashok Vidwans for their help. Early on in the project, I also sought advice from Dr Natwar Gandhi about my approach to this project. I thank him for taking time out of his extremely busy schedule and reviewing my work on the first few chapters of this translation. I am grateful to Rohit Kothari and his staff at Sharda Mudranalaya, Ahmedabad, for their help in preparing the two maps in this book, and to David Serota for adding directional information

to them. I have been blessed with the affection of two stalwarts of Gujarati literature - Dr Sitanshu Yasashchandra and Dr Bholabhai Patel. But for Dr Patel’s arm twisting, I would not have started on this project; and would still be floundering about halfway through if Dr Yasashchandra had not prodded me their deep interest in this translation, have much of it and provided extremely valuable and encouragement. I express my heartfelt

on. Both have shown minutely read through guidance, suggestions gratitude to them for

their kindness. I have also been blessed with a family that has supported me through two years of this work. My wife Asha has endured through my phases of intense work, as also tried to nudge me out of my days of lazy brooding. My children Bela and Sagar, two extremely good writers themselves, have read through the entire text and provided invaluable comments, corrections, and their generation’s perspective

to me. I owe my gratitude to all three of them. I must say I had some misgivings about the project after my initial reading of the original. Although the book is mostly about the author’s travels in the Himalaya, I thought it came up short in its details about places, and the travel itself, to be called a ‘travelogue’

Translator’s Note

in the geographical sense. I eventually realised that the book is about travel over a vast cultural landscape spanning time, space, and the Indian psyche. I stand humbled and corrected in this regard. It is necessary to add a word about this translation. Acutely aware of the enormous task I was entrusted with, I have tried to give my all to this project. If the result falls short, it will only be because my ‘all’ was not sufficient for a task of this complexity. I will be immensely grateful for any feedback from the readers. I would like to close with this. Not being very religious, going on a ‘Char Dham’ pilgrimage has not appealed to me. Kakasaheb and Swami Anand’s narratives have, however, created this intense

desire in me to experience the final walks to the Jamanotri and Gangotri shrines. Perhaps, with some cooperation from my aging knees, I may yet get my wish. This translation is affectionately dedicated to Shri Bholabhai Patel who made such an effort to make this project happen, and is now not around to see it come to fruition. I will sorely miss him. Ashok Meghani Baldwin, Maryland, USA

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Major Stops Made En Route to the Himalaya

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