What is defined as inconvenience or ‘causing mayhem’? What justifies it? Is religion a pardonable excuse? A chance conversation between a college-kid who practices stunt-biking by the night, and a kaanwar, takes an interesting turn and leaves many questions hanging in the air.
By day, Vishal was the archetypal Delhi University kid. Low slung jeans, T-shirts in blues and blacks, bag, sneakers and headphones plugged in; indiscernible in a crowd of 200 fucchas who had joined the University that year. His routine was pretty regular too; get up, get dressed, catch the bus that would take him to his college in South Campus, attend a few classes, bunk a few, hangout with friends and then back home by evening. By night, he was an anti-thesis of his good boy image. He was a stunt biker. Not the leather jacket, knuckle-cracking kinds, but one who did it just for the pure love of it, for the love of the high that the sport would give him, for he was a person who hoped that one day, India, like some other countries, would see stunt biking as another sport.
It was a Monday. Vishal was waiting at the bus stop for the bus back home when a man dressed in saffron and carrying what looked like two pails of water strung up on a bow, over his shoulders, came, hung the bow on two parallel bars and sat next to him.
Vishal got curious and decided to strike a conversation. Here is how it went:
Vishal: Hi! My name is Vishal.
The man in saffron: I am Pratap.
Vishal: What’s that you are carrying?
Pratap: It’s Gangajal, water from the Holy river Ganges. I am carrying it back to my village, a couple of kilometres from here. I’m a Kaanwar.
Vishal: Oh, right! I saw loads of Kaanwars today on my way to college. There were diversions all over the place to allow them to pass smoothly.
Pratap: Yeah. We walk for miles, from our hometowns, to the holy river Ganga. Then we carry water from the holy river to our hometowns, where we offer it at the local Shiva temples.
Vishal: Do you guys travel alone? It would get lonely, wouldn’t it?
Pratap: No, we generally travel in groups. Even if we do travel alone, once we are close to our village or town, all Kaanwars meet up. There is a warm welcome awaiting us; it’s a time for celebration in the village. That is the reason, traffic is restricted wherever we travel, because obviously, we cannot travel on roads full of vehicles.
Vishal: Yes, I heard. They closed portions of the NH-58 from Delhi to Haridwar, so that you could have a clear passage.
Pratap (pulling out a hockey stick from his bag with a smirk): Oh, we do not bother about clear passages. We clear our own passages. There is a reason we travel in groups, you know! Of course, the authorities are very co-operative.
Vishal: I see. No wonder the police tries its best to keep commuters away. So how come you are traveling alone?
Pratap: I’m not alone. I’m meeting up with about thirty other Kaanwars here. Our village is about 15 kms from here. We’ll all travel together to our village by a mini-truck.
(Pause) So what do you do?
Vishal: Oh, I’m a student. But I’m aspiring to become a stunt-biker.
Pratap: Stunt-biker – What is that?
Vishal: It is a form of sport where we perform stunts on our bikes. We use specially fitted bikes, using a different fuel for this sport.
Pratap: Isn’t stunt-biking a risky sport? And imagine the inconvenience you cause to commuters, practicing on the roads.
Vishal: It’s risky only for us. And we don’t mind it. Also, we don’t practice on the roads. We use deserted places like basketball courts, graveyards and empty stretches of roads where no one strays.
Pratap: But I heard the police were trying to round you up for breaking rules and causing trouble on the roads.
Vishal: Well, we break rules only because the rules never meant to accommodate us. We do not want to cause trouble on the roads. Stunt-biking is a recognized sport in many countries. Hopefully, someday, it will be treated the same way as any other sport in India as well.
Glossary:
Kaanwar: Short for Kaanwariya; Kaanwariyas are religious people in India. Every year on the festival of Mahashivratri, they travel on foot from different parts of the country (primarily from parts of North India) to the river Ganga or Ganges to worship it. Then they carry water from the holy river to their hometowns, where it is offered to the idol of Lord Shiva in the local temple. The vessel containing the holy water is not supposed to touch the ground till it reaches the temple.
Fucchas: A Delhi University slang for first-year students.
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