Faith and fear

A trip to Jammu is considered incomplete without a visit to the Raghunath temple that is said to have statues of all the 33 crore Hindu gods and goddesses, writes A.J. Philip

After a terrorist attack in 2002, security at the temple has been beefed up

ONE, often, learns by mistakes. My mistake was to book a train ticket to Jammu. I gave a carte blanche to the office person to book a berth in any train. I should have known that all trains leave Ambala after midnight and my sleep would be disturbed.

Another mistake I made was to rely on the Railways’ website. Only when I reached Ambala did I know that the train that was to leave at 1.35 a.m. would arrive only at 3.25 a.m. The pleasure of sitting on a cold bench all alone, while waiting passengers were fast asleep on the floor, was entirely mine.

Again, the thrill of discovering that the coach I was to travel in was missing was very much mine. A friendly ticket examiner — an oxymoron — came to my rescue, "I can accommodate you in a lower class coach". Gandhi made a career when he was forced to spend a cold night at Pietermaritzburg railway station in South Africa but I had no such career to make. So I jumped at the offer and got into the train.

The TTE was not overtly pleased when I asked for a refund of the price difference between the class I was booked for and the class in which I was travelling. "I will give you a certificate and you will have to collect the money from the Jammu station on arrival".

The people of Jammu are proud of General Zorawar Singh, who also finds a mention at the Raghunath temple

I did not want Railway Minister Lalu Prasad Yadav to increase his revenue with The Tribune money. It is a different matter that a colleague from the Valley who helped me get the refund had to spend three hours at the station. "We Kashmiris are not well-versed in the ways of the Railways," he said, handing me a crisp Rs 500 note. After all, the Railways have begun service in the Valley only a few weeks ago.

But, unlike him, I knew that once a train was late, it would continue running late. By the time it steamed into Jammu, my plan to attend a meeting at 11.30 a.m. had gone bust like the plans of the Planning Commission.

"Till you visit Raghunath temple in Jammu, you have not visited Jammu," said a colleague from Chandigarh, whose ‘in-laws’ belong to the city, when I told him about my first visit. That had strengthened my resolve to visit the temple this time.

Having visited some of the grand temples in the South and the grander ones in the North, it was a little disappointing when I reached the temple gate in a crowded locality. "The gate is narrow but the temple complex is large," said Perneet Singh, who accompanied me. Whether Gulab Singh, founder of the kingdom of Jammu and Kashmir, who began the construction of the temple in 1835, was guided by the Semitic aphorism about the eye of the needle is not known.

Bahu Fort, said to be 3,000 years old, was fortified by the Dogras

Clearly, the securitymen had made the entry more difficult. "No phones, no pens, no camera," said a stern-looking, gun-toting jawan. That ended my dream of taking photographs of the temple. The security in charge made me realise that journalists did not enjoy any rights other than those enjoyed by the poor citizens.

After a thorough frisking, we entered the sprawling temple complex only to find an idol of Valmiki holding a quill pen and furiously writing the Ramayana. Beside him was Tulsidas, who made devotion the heart of the Ramayana. How did the security personnel allow the Maharshi to bring inside his pen, I wondered.

Things were not this bad till the terrorists struck at the temple in 2002 killing 11 persons. The ban on the pen is to prevent sketching by terrorists, potential or actual. Why should anybody waste time on sketching when he can get a clearer idea of the temple’s topography from Google Earth? But the ban prevented me from taking notes.

The main temple is dedicated to Lord Rama. Though Rama is worshipped more than any other god, there are only a few temples in his name. Even Hanuman has many more temples dedicated to him.

The main temple’s inner walls are covered with gold sheets on the three sides. A bespectacled, middle-aged IPS officer, accompanied by two young women IPS officers — all in uniform — and a battery of constables, was so engrossed in darshan that he did not let others like yours truly to get even a simple dekko, forget darshan. Even the priest seemed to be attending only to him.

For anyone who has read the Ramayana, this is the place to visit as almost all characters in the epic are depicted in one form or the other. "It has statues of all the 33 crore Hindu gods and goddesses," I was told. How can there be so many statues? The mystery was over when I saw galleries of saligrams (tiny cement projections). I had no way to count them. There were, may be lakhs, but not crores.

We meandered like the Tawi and reached a Shiva shrine.

"The Shivalingam was made in Germany. Look at it. It is transparent. It has magical powers. This is a 100-rupee note. I will hold it behind the lingam. And see what happens," the priest was at his garrulous best.

I could see a magnified Rs 100 through the lingam. "Money offered here would be magnified up there," he pointed skywards. Milk was sprayed on the lingam when he squeezed a plastic pouch. Then, he poured a mug of water on it. Special prayers for me and my wife were over and it was time for prasad — a small flower dipped in saffron water. One good thing I noticed, the pandas and priests did not pester visitors.

With little else to do, we went from there to Bahu Fort, up on a hill. Said to be 3,000 years old, it was fortified further by the Dogras. The security guards won’t allow you inside unless you leave the mobile phone and camera for safekeeping. For the devout, there is a Kali temple inside the Fort and little else to see.

Instead, we went to a modern fish-shaped aquarium, a veritable treat for lovers of nature, in the vicinity. It has galleries from where visitors get an excellent view of the city and the Tawi that ‘flows quiet’. A Mughal-era sloped garden and a lake with boating facilities lend further charm to the place where picnickers throng on Sundays and other holidays.

On the way back, I asked the driver to stop so as to let me take a picture of the statue of Gen Zorawar Singh, the Napolean of India, whose fort in Leh I visited recently. It was a swordless Zorawar that I had just clicked. "I will stop the car on the other side and you can take the full picture," said the driver. He had better photographic sense than me as this time the sword was very much in the frame.

The people of Jammu are indeed proud of Zorawar who finds a mention at the Raghunath temple, too. "Since you are interested in the General, I will take you to the Zorawar Singh auditorium in Jammu University," said Perneet. The university has a beautiful, green campus and the auditorium is an impressive brick and glass structure.

Then, the phone rang. It was a friend, C.K. Sardana, a veteran PR professional, on the line. He wondered why I, too, began dropping names. "What names?" I asked. "You mentioned the Defence Minister’s name in your article on Leh," he said in righteous indignation. "I mentioned the Air Force driver’s and pilots’ names also," I answered. Suddenly, he became apologetic.

It was time to catch the return train. Thanks to a little racket by the Jammu Police, passengers have to leave the car at a distance and climb up the stairs. Exceptions are made for VIPs, not VOPs (very ordinary people). Worse, every piece of luggage had to be X-rayed. Such was the rush I wondered whether I would ever be able to retrieve the luggage. How could a lone policeman detect a bomb in hundreds of bags that passed through the machine in a few minutes?

I had never seen a platform so crowded. Most of the passengers were Vaishno Devi pilgrims. As usual, the train was late. But when it finally arrived, my coach was there. It was sheer luxury to have a four-seat air-conditioned coupe, all to myself. A few stations later, the tinkling of glass bangles of a newly married girl broke the silence. Besotted, she was busy taking pictures of her handsome husband.

"Papa, we have boarded the train. We are alone in the coupe, except for an old man who is sleeping," she said on her mobile as I squirmed in my bed. And when she pulled him down from the upper berth to share her lower berth, I really wished I were asleep.