The dancing monk of Majuli

I recall the serene face of the dancing monk of Majuli, and the life lesson that he taught me, says the author

In the inevitable annual reckoning as the year draws to a close, it seems as if we haven’t seen too many of those promised acche din in 2018. The economy is struggling. Political parties are forming and re-forming alliances with the single purpose of defeating the incumbent government in the 2019 elections. Civil society is perhaps at its lowest ebb right now and mob lynchings, murders of whistleblowers and intolerance seem to be definitely on the upswing. However, when I look back at 2018, strangely enough it is not these things that are topmost on my mind. Instead, I recall the serene face of the dancing monk of Majuli, and the life lesson that he taught me.

The first thing that struck me about 41-year-old Dr Bhabananda Barbayan’s demeanour was the aura of tranquility surrounding him, even thought we’d met in a chaotic green room of a Delhi auditorium just before he was due to perform. The foremost practitioner of Sattriya, the Assamese dance form which was recognised as a classical dance by Sangeet Natak Akademi in 2000, he is also a member of the monastic order of Uttar Kamalabari Sattra — the seventh generation in his family to become a monk. Today, with a PhD in music, he is studying the effects of dance on the nervous system even as he’s taught Sattriya to over 800 students across the world.

“I became a monk in Majuli, a remote island in Assam, at the age of three and a half,” he said. “So you can say I’ve been far removed from the life and stresses of regular folk.” However, even though he now lives in Delhi where he runs a Sattriya Academy, Barbayan’s serene face bears testimony to the fact that he’s far removed from the hurly burly of everyday existence. His mind is preoccupied with the eternal dance of devotion rather than by politics, the economy and indeed, all worldly things that give the rest of us so much stress and heartburn every day.

“I’m Krishna’s servant,” he told me when I commented on his detachment. “But he tells us that it’s also important to be concerned about the world around us.” How could one do that, I asked.

His answer moved me profoundly. “In my sect, we don’t believe there’s a heavenly other world waiting for us after death,” he says. “Our paradise, our bliss must be created right here, in this world…” Every man and woman, Barbayan said, could create their own paradise by the strength of their good actions. “My bliss lies in dancing for my Lord,” he said. “But everyone can create their own route to bliss...”

Later, I watched online videos of his performances across the world. With a drum around his neck and ecstasy on his face, he seemed to carry his own heaven within him wherever he went. 

So, dear reader, as the year ends and many of us wonder what 2019 has in store, I wish you and I are also able to discover, to some extent, paths to our own bliss just like the dancing monk of Majuli. Perhaps that’s what is needed for the advent of acche din in our lives — and not the outcome of the coming elections or the rise and fall of the stock exchange.