Namaskaram Yogi Adityanath garu,
I am writing to you as a fellow citizen, deeply pained by the loss of lives at the ongoing Mahakumbh. Since you have chosen to appoint a commission to inquire into the reasons for the incident, I will not refer to the same in my email below. The issue I am raising, even though arising from the incident, is not connected to what happened but rather to what should happen in the future.
Need for Memorial Spaces
As you may be aware, India lacks a culture of collective remembrance. We built a war memorial only very recently. Apart from this, there are hardly any spaces for us to mourn those we have lost in riots, terrorist attacks, natural calamities, or man-made disasters.
This is in contrast to other places in the world, where memorials are built for families and ordinary citizens to visit and pray for their loved ones lost in unfortunate circumstances.
We have Individual Rituals
On the other hand, at an individual level, we have rituals like Panchamahayajna, Taddinam, and Tarpanam. Through Panchamahayajna we express gratitude to our gods, rishis, ancestors, fellow humans, and all living beings as a daily duty. Through the annual Taddinam ritual, we pray for the immediate three generations of ancestors and through Tarpanam, performed at various times during the year, we pray for all our ancestors, both known and unknown.
Stampedes at all the Kumbhs since 1947
After the recent unfortunate incident, I researched all the calamities that have occurred at the Kumbhs in the four sacred locations since we gained independence. We lost 800 lives at Prayagraj Kumbh in 1954, 50 in 1986 at Haridwar, 39 in 2003 at Nashik, 7 in 2010 at Haridwar and 36 in 2013 at Prayagraj.
New Memorial with a Ritual
We do not have memorials for these victims, and these deaths have largely been forgotten. I believe the time has come to change this.
I propose that we build a memorial in Prayagraj on the banks of the river, designed as a special ghat. The names of all the pilgrims who have lost their lives since 1954 can be etched in stone in an aesthetic manner. This will enable surviving family members to search for and feel the names of their loved ones while they are offering Tarpanam.
I would also like you to come once every year and perform Tarpanam for all the victims. This would not just be a memorial but a memorial with a ritual, performed both by the survivors and by yourself as the Chief Minister of the state.
I believe a ritual of mourning led by the State but rooted in our traditions, can heal not just the families but society itself.
Hari’s Curries A buffet of reflections