Tales from a recce – Narlai village
About 80 kilometres from Jodhpur is a small village called Narlai. Small hutments line either sides of the road that leads to the place. People sitting around totally oblivious to a couple of guys who have descended down armed with a camera. While the elderly men-folk were busy in their discussions and buried into them newspapers another man was being given a haircut and we were seeking a story. It is only the kids that seem enticed by the camera. They were all keen to get photographed and competed with each other to snuggle into my viewfinder.
Old men huddle around a Tea-shop or a Banyan tree that seems to be part of every single village we went to. One elderly gentleman willingly took off his ‘Pagdi’ (read turban) to show us how the thing is tied around his head. A few photographs and a black tea before we head back to base driving through the same village. En-route we bump into a goat-herd and a girl who would be his assistant. Each one of their faces tells a story. So much character, so many stories hidden behind those lines. We also talk to a few women working in a field nearby. Another thing we gathered from our Rajasthan trip was that the colour of the turban is caste-specific. So much so people can identify an individual’s caste from the colour of the turban they are wearing. Wonder who invented these distinctions. (One old Malayalam song comes to mind. A bad translation of it for your benefit : Man made religion, religion made god. Man, religion and the gods together divided land, divided minds. Sigh!) It was some relief to hear one villager mention that the distinction no longer exists and all colours are now used inter-changeably. Some consolation that I must say.
And interestingly we did see quite a few peacocks and an odd deer on either sides of the road we traveled on. It is mostly thanks to the Bishnoi* community that nature has been conserved here. Quite ironically education and development seems to ruin in us the conservatory nature. It is a pleasure driving through this village with intermittent stops to meet with some of the people here. The place and the people have a texture that is entirely different. You won’t find this place on too many travel maps but let me recommend it to anyone who is fascinated by people and faces, and villages that are real.
* In the year 1730, Amruta Devi Beniwal was tending to her work in Khejroli village (Khejri from the spiky trees), near Jodhpur. Maharaja Abhaya Singh’s men landed up to cut the Khejri trees for fuel. Amruta Devi, a Bishnoi, Bish (twenty) nau (nine) referred to the 29 principles advocated by Guru Jambeshwar, an early naturalist born in 1451. He laid down one very fundamental rule : don’t kill animals or trees. Amruta Devi refused to let the Maharaja’s men fell the trees with the words “Sar santey rukh rahe to bhi sasto jaan” which roughly translates to “Even if one has to sacrifice one’s head to save a tree, it’s worth it.” The Maharaja’s men cut off her head when she hugged a tree to protect it. Her three daughters and then over the next few hours 363 Bishnois sacrificed their lives to protect the Khejri tree. Two centuries later the Chipko movement was inspired by this one incident. Most people who read India’s leading newspaper frontpage headlines will relate to the grief Salman Khan is going through for taking on wildlife here. I love these guys. I hope to get them to Namma Bengalooru and Aamchi Mumbai so they can drive some sense into indiscriminate urbanization.
About 80 kilometres from Jodhpur is a small village called Narlai. Small hutments line either sides of the road that leads to the place. People sitting around totally oblivious to a couple of guys who have descended down armed with a camera. While the elderly men-folk were busy in their discussions and buried into them newspapers another man was being given a haircut and we were seeking a story. It is only the kids that seem enticed by the camera. They were all keen to get photographed and competed with each other to snuggle into my viewfinder.
Old men huddle around a Tea-shop or a Banyan tree that seems to be part of every single village we went to. One elderly gentleman willingly took off his ‘Pagdi’ (read turban) to show us how the thing is tied around his head. A few photographs and a black tea before we head back to base driving through the same village. En-route we bump into a goat-herd and a girl who would be his assistant. Each one of their faces tells a story. So much character, so many stories hidden behind those lines. We also talk to a few women working in a field nearby. Another thing we gathered from our Rajasthan trip was that the colour of the turban is caste-specific. So much so people can identify an individual’s caste from the colour of the turban they are wearing. Wonder who invented these distinctions. (One old Malayalam song comes to mind. A bad translation of it for your benefit : Man made religion, religion made god. Man, religion and the gods together divided land, divided minds. Sigh!) It was some relief to hear one villager mention that the distinction no longer exists and all colours are now used inter-changeably. Some consolation that I must say.
And interestingly we did see quite a few peacocks and an odd deer on either sides of the road we traveled on. It is mostly thanks to the Bishnoi* community that nature has been conserved here. Quite ironically education and development seems to ruin in us the conservatory nature. It is a pleasure driving through this village with intermittent stops to meet with some of the people here. The place and the people have a texture that is entirely different. You won’t find this place on too many travel maps but let me recommend it to anyone who is fascinated by people and faces, and villages that are real.
* In the year 1730, Amruta Devi Beniwal was tending to her work in Khejroli village (Khejri from the spiky trees), near Jodhpur. Maharaja Abhaya Singh’s men landed up to cut the Khejri trees for fuel. Amruta Devi, a Bishnoi, Bish (twenty) nau (nine) referred to the 29 principles advocated by Guru Jambeshwar, an early naturalist born in 1451. He laid down one very fundamental rule : don’t kill animals or trees. Amruta Devi refused to let the Maharaja’s men fell the trees with the words “Sar santey rukh rahe to bhi sasto jaan” which roughly translates to “Even if one has to sacrifice one’s head to save a tree, it’s worth it.” The Maharaja’s men cut off her head when she hugged a tree to protect it. Her three daughters and then over the next few hours 363 Bishnois sacrificed their lives to protect the Khejri tree. Two centuries later the Chipko movement was inspired by this one incident. Most people who read India’s leading newspaper frontpage headlines will relate to the grief Salman Khan is going through for taking on wildlife here. I love these guys. I hope to get them to Namma Bengalooru and Aamchi Mumbai so they can drive some sense into indiscriminate urbanization.
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