The Goddess

It began just like any other day. The sun rose in the east illuminating the small corner of his room where the bed stood, providing comfort to his otherwise dimly lit room. The chirruping of the birds came floating to his ears, diluting his sleep. He loved this early morning noise, because there were many things he loathed that came from his small one-framed window. The constant noise of heavy traffic which reminded him of his existence was his constant companion as the day started to grow old.

The poverty-stricken sense of the room was enough for anyone to dampen their spirit but not with Asim, he had grown himself resistant to this environment. A medium sized man he was, with appearance which showed him to be in mid-twenties, with a rare hint of his daily struggle and turmoil that appeared in his face. He was an apprentice at the office of local publication still struggling to find a proper job, like many other millions who had left their home and gone to the capital in search for their future.

He laid in his bad with sunlight directly hitting him in his face, his brain regaining its senses, though he kept his eyes shut. Today he was feeling unwell. Asim didn’t feel like going to work. There was nothing it could offer him, he always felt. When you are out in the streets to fight for your survival, for your daily bread then everything else becomes secondary and Asim had long known this after coming to this dream city where his dreams were shattered and broken. Yet he had always fought back, and valiantly.

There were times when his body refused to carry on but his brain was always strong, always urging him to move on. And so Asim knew the basic rules of survival, kill others to live. This very idea repulsed him but there was so little he could do. The vast river through which he swam left its marking on him, Asim was vastly matured as compared to his age. He was capable of thinking beyond the wall, or to simply put it, he was a survivor, a philosopher who knows of wrongs and rights of the society and interprets it in the term of the common people.

He knew where he needed to go. Ever since he came to Kathmandu, Maitidevi Mandir had been his favourite spot. He visited it often, when he was worn out and when he was a winner. He did not go there to worship, no, but to find shelter in peace. It shared both types of his feeling. The sculpture always attracted him in a strange way. It was the place where he spent hours watching and thinking about people, religion and civilization. It was the place that soothed his heart when it was bruised, that made him thinker. He had watched countless times when the people throw their coins to the still statue and turned a blind eye to a starving homeless starving child nearby. Numerous times he have witnessed when people bargain for a rupee to a poor vegetable seller and gave extravagantly to a lifeless stone which they believed to be god. They insulted creation of god in the name of god! Such pathetic were the people who searched god in temples when god lay dying in every street.

Asim reached the temple and it was quiet except for the noise coming from the nearby road. Few children were playing nearby in the dust with their parents busy in attending customers in their small open street shops. They were not shops really, just a small display of goods for their livelihood. He found a quiet place under the peepal tree and his eyes grazed in his surroundings. It was same like he had seen before, same walls, same lions, and same cravings in the wall….but wait…something caught his eyes. He saw a craving of a woman with its head missing.

Yes, it was a woman with its distinct torso and the breast. He had never noticed that before, though it was so distinct. The sculpture lied next to the lions that guard the gate of the temple. Its hand was spread in either direction like an eagle that is ready to fly or rather more like a lion ready to leap. Yet somehow they seemed like they want to grasp something, as if in pain. And then he saw more. There were many other cravings and statue like this all over the temple, some craved in the walls and some in the pillars that hold the temple.

“Strange!” he thought. “How come I’ve never noticed that before?” Asim went near to one such craving in the wall and touched it. Below he noticed some faded inscriptions but could not understand what it meant.

“Wondering what they are, are you?”

He turned upon hearing the voice. A young girl stood next to him and was looking at him searchingly. The girl must have been fifteen or sixteen. Her skin was very fair and she had a smile that could kill any hostility. Asim just stared the girl finding nothing in response.

“It is the statue of a princess.” She said. “Craved in her memory for the service she has offered to goddess maitidevi.”

“Who are you?” Asim asked, but realized his question was too direct and quickly added, “Hi, I’m Asim.”

“I’m Singhini.” She answered. “I saw u looking at those cravings and thought you might want to know about it.”

“Yes. They seem strange! A beheaded statue of a princess in a temple! And how did you know about it?”

“A princess born in the royal family of Malla dynasty about 600 years ago is thought to be the protector of this temple. Only few people know about this. She is also considered to be a goddess. People worship her but hardly anyone now knows who she is and why they are worshipping her.” She paused to look at Asim, “It’s a story, about the princess, and I think you will like it.”

Asim looked to his strange companion who was offering to tell him a story, a little girl whom he had met for the first time. There was no reason why the girl should tell him a story and yet she was offering it, and there was no reason why he should listen to the girl. His first impulse had been to walk out of there because he thought the girl to be insane but there was something about her that kept him rooted to the place where he was.

“I’ll like to hear it from you”, he told the girl automatically without meaning to.

“It was the year of 1384 BS, when a great famine struck the kingdom. After 2 years without rainfall, and one day it rained. It rained so heavily that there was a great flood in the kingdom and many people died. The stored grains were lost in the flood, many people lost their homes and the plague hit the kingdom. Many people lost their lives and many were dying due to starvation and disease. And then king’s elder daughter was born, months after the flood, but the condition of the people was getting worst. It was then the royal astrologer proclaimed, on the 13th day after the birth of princess that the princess is the incarnation of goddess and all the misery will end soon.” Singhini paused again.

“So this temple was built to worship the princess?” Asim asked, gaining interest in the conversation.

“Ah Yes! It is. But this does not end here. Soon after the proclamation, a temple was built for the princess and you are looking at it right now. Gradually the famine was gone and people life became normal again. But whether it was really the power of the goddess or the healing of time I cannot tell you, it is for you to decide”, Singhini looked enquiringly at Asim, as if to know his opinion about the divine power.

She went on, “But the king was in great despair after the proclamation was made. He lost interest in the state affairs and used to lock himself up in his chamber and rarely saw anyone. No one was sure about the matter with the king. But he loved his daughter very much. Each evening he used to take her to the garden and they used to play near the big pond the king built for her precious daughter. His daughter was the only one that could revive life again in the king. Oh! You can imagine how they used to play!! Like a children who has just got a new toy and can’t get enough of it, like a flower that is feeling the first touch of a morning breeze, like the free birds in the sky. The king was a child with his daughter and his daughter soon became an obsession for him.”

“And slowly the princess grew to be a beautiful girl but the king was becoming ill day by day. And then one day on his death bed he called for the princess. He looked in the eyes of princess for a very long time and broke into painful sobs.

‘My dear daughter’, he said between his sobs, ‘there is something I need to tell you. Please forgive me for I have deceived you all these years my dear. I know you cannot forgive me for what I have done to you my child, but you have to understand, there was nothing I could do. The court was against me and I had to look after my people.’ He remained silent for a long time. ‘My daughter I must tell you this before I die. When you were born, the astrologers foretold that you were to become a goddess and you shall bring an end to all the misery of this land. My daughter, it was told that you are to be sacrificed in the holy ground of the temple so that you can leave this human form to enter the spiritual form.’”

Singhini shifted uncomfortably between her grounds as if troubled by the story herself. Asim could not believe what he was listening, “and you say that the king was obsessed with his daughter? Yet he never told her of the fate she was predestined to? What type of father could do that to his own daughter?”

He was practically horrified to hear the fate a small girl born of royal blood was to face, a fate much worse than the common starving subjects, who can at least fight for their survival. At least there was hope in them, but this little girl who had just started to appreciate her world, the most degraded cruelty was an inevitable guest to her life.

“Don’t judge the king too harshly, sir!” Singhini said, “For he was just one of the representatives of the society, just one of the many! You see, when we are born, we know nothing and we accept anything we see around us passively without any questions. And what we will become in the future is preinstalled in us even when we are unaware of the fact. The religion is a very powerful tool just for the purpose; it binds us to rules that we never dare to question. We simply accept it, out of fear, out of greed. Yes! King loved his daughter very much but he never dared to go against the priests and astrologers because he feared god too! He accepted everything for religion, for he was taught to fear god, accept every rules without questions.”

“And sire! You and I also bound by this treachery against god! Can’t you see the temples where animals and birds are sacrificed just to fulfil our wishes? The creation of the god is killed in the most holy grounds; the life given by god is destroyed. And who gave man that right? Who is man to take away a life when he cannot create one? Can’t you see the mutiny against your own brothers and sisters? We have transformed the most holy into the most sinful. A menstruating woman is untouchable; and what sin can be viler than this? The god’s most beautiful gift; the gift to bear a child is untouchable. If it is so then sire, we are all untouchables in the name of religion! The king is just one among many of us who are degraded by the things we accept silently.”

Asim was amazed and moved to hear this; many times these same thoughts haunted him. He sometimes wanted to yell at the mean creatures that came to the temple for worshipping. He thought that they simply didn’t know what religion means. We bind ourselves to many customs and rituals and simply close the door of our logic. We call ourselves civilized but the most uncivilized demon is among us. These thoughts stormed Asim’s mind.

“And what happened then?” Asim was curious.

“The king died shortly afterwards. Many times running away from the palace crossed princess’s mind but she always resisted those thoughts because she loved her father dearly. She knew she would be sacrificed when she became 15 years of age, and she used to weep alone when she thought no one was around. She became ill and very weak but she dragged on her life. Apart from her, only the priests knew about the sacrifice, and not even the queen.

After the king died, his younger brother became the king. And then one morning, the day of her sacrifice arrived. The new king was made aware of her fate by the priests and he too did not dare go against the prophecy. When the queen knew about it, she wept and cried in agony but there was nothing she could do, for the power had shifted from her hands.”

“On that day, the princess was dressed in white robes and was led to the halo of the temple where the ritual was to take place. The priest tied her to the altar of the goddess and proclaimed that a goddess will be born from her body and the four limbs of her body will be the four lions that guard the temple. And a long dagger was brought, to pierce the heart of the princess. The royal priest carried out the killing and her body was buried in the house that was built near the temple. Her body still lies in the basement of that house and it is locked up.”

Asim was amazed to hear such minute details from the girl. Finding it hard to believe he asked the girl, “why do you think I will believe you and how did you knew such details?”

“I can show you her grave in my house.” Singhini replied.

“What?” Asim looked incredulously at Singhini.

“It is just there”, she pointed towards the old house that was about hundred yard away from the temple. “Come I’ll show you the way.”

Asim was speechless. He simply followed the girl on the way to the house. The entrance to the house was locked. Singhini knocked at the door and after couple of seconds later, the knock was answered by an old man. He was very old with bald head and greyed beard. He was bent and walked with the help of the walking stick.

“Come in please, come in”, he said in a trembled voice. And without another word, he picked up the torch and led him to the basement down the stairs where a great door stand, covered with dust and cobwebs, looked it as though it hasn’t been opened for quite a long time. The old man rummaged through his pocket and produced a key, a very strange looking key, and tried to open the door. It was hard to open for it was jammed at first but after few pushes it cracked open.

The old man slowly opened the door and lit the torch. The old man turned to face Asim and looked into his eyes. Then he turned back and motioned him to follow. Asim looked at Singhini, she had already sprinted into the room after the old man, and after some hesitation he decided to enter the room too. The room was full of cobwebs and a damp stinking smell filled the room. A thick layer of dust lay on the floor and the room had the sense of staleness. The old man locked the door from inside once they all had got in. At the middle of the room there was a raised structure that looked like the altar. And beneath it he saw, there laid a beheaded skeleton, laid there as if it had been asleep.

The very sight sent chills to his spine. Asim looked at the old man who was constantly moving his lips and muttering something inaudible. The old man seemed equally taken aback as Asim.

“This must be the princess.” The old man told Asim.

“The story Singhini told me, have you told her? Is she your child?” Asim asked the old man.

The old man slowly turned to Asim and eyed him suspiciously. He then said slowly, “The princess name was Singhini. It was said to be her grave and I had myself never opened it before! Well then it’s true! It sometimes thought it was just a myth.”

“Isn’t the girl who was with me your child?” Asim searched for Singhini in the room, but she was not there.

“Which girl are you talking about? You were alone when you knocked the door, and I didn’t see anyone else.”

Asim searched the room for Singhini in bewilderment, but she was nowhere to be found. Only the old man and Asim were the living souls present in the room.

Asim thought he was losing senses. He asked, “so you had never opened these gates before?”

“No I hadn’t”, the old man replied.

“Then why did you open it now? How did you know I wanted to see this room?” Asim was barely whispering now. His strength seemed to be draining off him.

The old man remained silent for some time, and then he spoke slowly, “This key was handed down through generations sire! This place used to be the home for the priest of the temple but since it was almost destroyed in the major earthquake of 1990, it is deserted. Many of them living here went away and my family was the last one to have stayed. You see sir! My family is all dead now and there is no one left except me and I’m sure there’s not much days left in me. We always knew that this was the grave of the princess but the stories encrypted about her were lost in the earthquake and there is no one left who knows about the story. No one knows why the princess was buried here, even I cannot tell you.”

“Sir! Believe me when I tell you that I’ve known you for quite a while though I’ve never met you before. I saw you in my dreams, regularly for some time now, and I knew you would come here someday. In my dreams I saw you standing in front of this door and suddenly the light peeps through the cracks of the door. You might think I am getting crazy because of my age but god alone knows that I am not lying. I knew you would come!”

And then Asim heard no more what the old man was saying. His world went spinning before him when he realized what has just happened. Even in his most bizarre dream, he never thought this would be possible. But there he was, a witness of the incident that happened six centuries ago, a witness to the history of the temple which carry the faith of the millions, a witness to its bloody history, and a witness to a crime that happened to a girl, the crime that has always happened and will happen in this so called civilized world, though the forms of the crime may change. Here at the altar of the religion, the decayed corpse laid on the verge of extinction of its memory from the world and still fighting to preserve its history! A corpse! A soul!

……….

That night, Asim laid in his bed, with the whirlwind of thoughts in his mind. He saw before him, the image of a laughing girl so free from this worldly affairs, and then the image of a girl who was playing with her father in her garden, and the image of the girl who was tied to the altar for the sacrifice, her face distorted in fear and agony. He saw before him the headless cravings, the pretty face of the girl who called him from behind. She had come to him when her story was lost from the world, when no living memory of her was left. She had told him her story, and why? He could not understand, or could he? He was not sure. But there was one thing he was sure of, that he will never forget the girl of royal blood.

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