{"id":904,"date":"2016-03-31T11:09:50","date_gmt":"2016-03-31T11:09:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/13.201.39.237\/?p=904"},"modified":"2016-03-31T11:09:50","modified_gmt":"2016-03-31T11:09:50","slug":"varanasi-india-mukti-bhawan-death-mumukshu-bhawan-kashi","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/13.207.105.184\/?p=904","title":{"rendered":"The Wait for Death at Varanasi\u2019s Mukti Bhavan"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><span class=\"dropcap\">I<\/span>n a narrow lane in the oldest city on the planet, the Kashi Labh Mukti Bhavan and Kashi Mumukshu Bhavan stand next to each other. Barring their huge gates, there is nothing remarkable about the yellow structures located at a walking distance from Assi Ghat and Ramu\u2019s famous tea stall \u2013 except, this is where people come to die.\n\nLast year, the movie <\/p><em>Mukti Bhawan<\/em>, by debutant director Shubhashish Bhutiani opened to widespread <a href=\"https:\/\/www.arre.co.in\/pop-culture\/mukti-bhawan-india-ganga-varanasi-adil-hussain-shubhashish-bhutiani-national-awards\/\">acclaim<\/a>. The film\u00a0follows Daya, the patriarch of a middle-class Kanpur family, who decides to breathe his last at Varanasi\u2019s famed death hostel. Because Mukti Bhawan isn\u2019t merely a place to die: It is a sure-shot path to attaining salvation.\n\nThis hope of achieving nirvana keeps alive people who have been staring death in the face. People like Gulab Bai, who has spent 33 years \u2013 the most anyone ever has \u2013 at the facility. In the game of \u201cwho will blink first\u201d between her and Yamraj, the latter seems to be losing. The 83-year-old, with a mala round her neck, is the last word on the ashram to nosy reporters. She walks around Mukti Bhawan with a streak of chandan paste smeared on her forehead, wearing gold kadas around her wrists, and a tattoo of her and her husband&#8217;s name on her right arm.\n\nGulab Bai was 59 and her husband 62 when they first arrived here from Itarsi in Madhya Pradesh, at his insistence. Shivnath Ram Jaiswal, a clerk in Northern Railways was very keen on Kashivaas and attained \u201cmoksh\u201d within 13 months. \u201cAnd I have not been able to do so for over 30 years,\u201d she laughs. \u201cMaybe my husband\u2019s soul wants me to spend more time here.\u201d\n\nIn the initial days, Gulab Bai was not particularly inclined toward living in an ashram, but she has changed her opinion dramatically over the last three decades. Life goes on, full of colour, as she waits for death to come to her.\n<blockquote class=\"quote--center\">Gulab Bai\u2019s family has also accepted this as her home. Her three children call on her during their holidays, and want her to return with them.<\/blockquote>\nThe \u201cRainbow Woman of Kashi\u201d is a keen follower of routine. She wears a green sari to mark Wednesdays; on Saturdays, it\u2019s black, while Sundays are for white. A strict regimen at the ashram governs her existence in the sparse but airy room painted a dull yellow. She wakes up at 4 am to the sound of temple bells and cleans her room before heading to the ashram temple to pray. By 8 am, she returns to her room for a tea and paratha breakfast; the rest of her day passes in prayer, chanting, and in trying to catch a glimpse of Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Doordarshan News.\n\nThis routine remains unbroken except when Gulab Bai steps out to eat tamatar chaat to curb her boredom. \u201cI know each and every lane of this city and the aarti timings for every God in the different temples,\u201d she says. \u201cThis is my city and I love it the way it has accepted me. I never feel like I am away from home.\u201d\n\nGulab Bai\u2019s family has also accepted this as her home. Her three children call on her during their holidays, and want her to return with them. But she no longer wishes to live with her family, engaged as she is, in the single-minded pursuit of death and salvation. \u201cKashi meh to suar bhi moksh prapt karta hai, aur ham toh insaan hai.\u201d (In Kashi, even a pig can attain moksh; I am still human.)\n\nIn this city that celebrates death as release from the cycle of life and suffering, Gulab Bai\u2019s desire to cease to exist, is neither morbid, nor an anomaly. Funeral processions in Varanasi could be mistaken for wedding celebrations, as people sing and dance for the departed. Thousands flock to <a href=\"http:\/\/kavitakosh.org\/kk\/%E0%A4%95%E0%A4%BE%E0%A4%B6%E0%A5%80_%E0%A4%AE%E0%A5%87%E0%A4%82_%E0%A4%B6%E0%A4%B5_\/_%E0%A4%B6%E0%A5%8D%E0%A4%B0%E0%A5%80%E0%A4%95%E0%A4%BE%E0%A4%82%E0%A4%A4_%E0%A4%B5%E0%A4%B0%E0%A5%8D%E0%A4%AE%E0%A4%BE\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Kashi<\/a>\u2019s ashrams like Mumukshu Bhawan to spend their last days here \u2013 choosing autonomy in life as well as death \u2013 whenever the event might occur.\n\nGulab Bai has witnessed 13 deaths as the oldest living resident of Mumukshu. According to her, the people living in the ashram have accepted that they may die any day \u2013 so there is no crying, no grieving, no mourning. \u201cNo one knows when Yamraj will come with the invitation,\u201d she tells me, \u201cbut everyone is prepared for the final journey.\u201d\n\nShe recalls an elderly man known only as \u201cBabuji\u201d, who would sit in the lawn and tell everyone the exact time of his death. For Babuji, death came at the appointed hour. It is difficult to determine whether he chose death or whether death chose him. In Kashi, the land of people awaiting their end, the lines can often be blurred.\n<em>\nEdited by Karanjeet Kaur<\/em>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In Varanasi\u2019s death hostels, the hope of achieving nirvana keeps alive people like Gulab Bai, who have been staring death in the face for decades.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":100,"featured_media":905,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[25],"tags":[76,1632,19,1633,1634,1635,1607,1636,729,1610],"class_list":["post-904","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-people","tag-death","tag-doordarshan","tag-india","tag-itarsi","tag-kashi","tag-madhya-pradesh","tag-mukti-bhawan","tag-mumukshu-bhawan","tag-narendra-modi","tag-varanasi"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v28.0 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ 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