One of the nicest things that has happened to Kolkata in recent times is the creation of two new parks around the eastern and southern periphery of Victoria Memorial. Earlier, for most of the year the place used to collect rubble, coming alive once a year for the book fair, only to relapse into being an eyesore.
Both have been finely done up, perhaps a little too ornately in parts, one by a private builder and another by a public sector concern and both are being maintained immaculately. The bigger one, along Cathedral Road, grows a profusion of flowers in winter, bringing to mind the large terrace garden that my father used to nurture at our ancestral home nearby.
The evenings usually draw large crowds that at weekends strain the walkways at the seams. For my part, I have got to know the parks in the early mornings, not much after daybreak, when it is comfortable to take a brisk walk irrespective of how hot it will get later in the day. And there, at that hour, congregates a fair bit of India in all its diversity.
They are mostly rich folks. The road to the rear entrance of the Victoria Memorial is jam packed with cars which have brought across the morning walkers. They variously speak Hindi, Marwari, Gujarati and even a bit of Punjabi. They are mostly in a happy mood, many know each other well and keep exchanging pleasantries as they pass each other.
Most are middle-aged or older. Some do a bit of yoga, others sit in groups, chatting amiably. One group sings a succession of bhajans. Two individuals clearly etch themselves in memory. A plump young woman couldn’t care less if she looks terribly funny as she jogs and perspires in a valiant attempt to get the weight down. The other is an eccentric old man with a cloth bag full of little eats slung across his shoulder, distributing them to friends as he passes them.
They must all be businessmen and there is a little bit of commerce in the early morning too. Two enterprising fruit-sellers park themselves at gates at two ends, with the choicest of the season’s fruits on offer, at a price. But the most distinctive is the rotund lady who looks every bit a businessman’s spouse, dispensing from under a wide umbrella, a range of herbal drinks and sprouts embodying God knows how many layers of traditional knowledge.
One day this early morning routine of sight and sound was suddenly interrupted when I was met with the strains of shenai from Rabindra Sadan opposite the larger park. It was Rabindra Jayanti, Tagore’s birthday, I realised and the shenai marked the beginning of the free public cultural event that inaugurated the week-long celebration of the poet’s legacy.
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On an impulse, I strolled in to find that even at that hour before six, a small band of enthusiasts had already sat themselves down on the driveway right before the dais to be able to secure a vantage view. Soon began the day’s proceedings with dance, poetry recital and song. Then the songs and the poetry went on and on as one hour rolled into another and the sun’s heat began to penetrate through the shamiana top.
It was like an assembly line. The dais was roughly divided into two parts. As one artiste performed, another took his or her place at the other side of the dais, ready to do the single number as soon as their turn came and then made way for another. The symbol of unbroken tradition that the renderings represented was a famous name of yester years. Her halting steps as she came in matched her silver hair but her voice with its vivre and strength would have done a far younger body proud.
As the day progressed it was full house on the driveway and commerce was only one step behind culture. Both sides of the driveway from the end of the shamiana to the gate were taken up by impromptu stalls spread out on the ground, hawking books, little magazines and trinkets. And there wending their way in between the audience seated on the ground, even as the proceedings went on, were the hawkers offering tea and potato chips. The annual event is an official do of the state government and officialdom was very much in evidence. The head of Rabindra Sadan gave away tokens of appreciation to the first few artists and the compere reverentially called out her name over and over again. There were many policemen and even a handful of police women, smart in white saris with blue borders. But the police were very unobtrusive, restricting themselves to keeping clear a pathway to the dais through the seated crowd.
There was a lot of jockeying in the large crowd for vantage positions offering a better view of the stage, without the benefits of seats and rows that lay down minimum lines of discipline in an auditorium. Yet there was hardly a quarrel. The middle-class crowd — some at the bottom of the ladder and precious few at the top of it — simply listened intently, almost as an act of faith.
The parks and the Rabindra Sadan grounds represent two cultures with a street in between. Two culturally distinctive groups of people live together separately in the city, for the most part in harmony. In its long decline, this live and let live spirit of the city remains one of its finest attributes.