Requiem in Raga Janki

by Neelum Saran Gaur

  ‘Did this come by the dak, sir?’ she asked.

  ‘His Highness disdains the common postal service. He has his own couriers. This was delivered to me this morning. What say you, bibi?’

  Janki had no words.

  ‘I’ve never sung before royalty, sir.’

  ‘Not so. You have sung before the maharani of Benaras.’

  ‘That was as an untrained child, sir. Not as . . . as a . . .’

  ‘A finished performer? You proved yourself then.’

  ‘No one judges a child severely, sir. But a . . . a songstress, a tawaif . . . I don’t know what exactly I am,’ she faltered, vexed.

  ‘You are a musician, no more and no less,’ said Hassu. ‘And a very good one. And if Hassu Khan recommends your name you had better justify the ganda I tied round your wrist. You had better be not just any good musician but a surpassingly great one!’

  There was such a ring in Hassu’s voice that it brought a little shiver into Janki’s throat as she bowed her head in deferential submission.

  ‘And should you pass this test, daughter, then Hassu Khan can consider himself amply rewarded and can betake himself back to Lucknow or Gwalior, content in the knowledge that the ripe fruit no longer needs the bough.’

  She looked up, stricken, as his meaning got across to her.

  ‘I shall do my best, sir, to be a credit to your name,’ she said quietly.

  The first big question now was—how was Janki to be got up for the great event? There wasn’t enough money to buy a suitable costume befitting an appearance before royalty. The girls offered their best outfits but Manki politely declined, finding them all a trifle tacky and over-garish and all too revealing of their low profession. Naseeban offered to alter one of her good ensembles but she was broad of girth and hip and shoulder, and taking in the entire flank of the dress wouldn’t work.

  An answer to the problem suggested itself as an inspiration in one of the girls’ inventive minds. Why not go to a costume-lending store, the kind that theatre companies and vaudeville shows rented costumes from for the Ram Dal procession and pageant and other performances? This seemed a viable possibility and Manki and Janki returned from a costume store with a Begum Hazrat Mahal costume, suitably hemmed and tucked to Janki’s measurements. A popular play had been doing the rounds in the United Provinces towns, When Begum Hazrat Mahal Met Mallika Victoria. A highly political play, written to coincide with the Indian National Congress’s fourth session at Allahabad which the district administration had done everything to scuttle. There had been raids on the ‘black town’ side of the railway line and the play had been reinvented as a comedy When Noor Jahan Met Mallika Victoria. It did not matter that the two eponymous queens had lived three centuries apart, for neither actors nor audience were overly inconvenienced by history. The old Hazrat Mahal version was still performed in private gatherings. But its wardrobe came in hugely handy in Janki’s case. At Rs 12 a day the outfits, four of them, would see Janki through several public appearances at the Rewa durbar. And if Janki was privately mortified by this circumstance, she more than made up for it in later life by indulging in the most expensive clothes that money could buy in the city of Allahabad.

  The next big question was who should accompany her. It was decided that Hassu would not go. Neither would the ailing Makhdoom Baksh, who was her usual sarangi accompanist, nor Rahim-ud-din Mian who played the tabla best with Makhdoom. This time Ram Lal Bhatt and Ghaseete would be her accompanists on the tabla and the sarangi. The two cooks Bhaggu Mian and Baddu Mian were also included although it was altogether likely that the hospitality of the royal court at Rewa would dispense of their services. For good measure Jallu Mian, the accountant, went along, as a sort of events and legal manager. This was to be her standard troupe for years to come.

  The twenty-ninth scion of the Solanki–Chalukya clan of the Baghel Rajputs, Maharajadhiraja Bandhresh Shri Maharaja Sir Venkat Raman Ramanuj Prasad Singh Ju Deo Bahadur ruled over the princely state of Rewa. Tiny as it was, Rewa was the largest independent state in the province of Baghelkhand with a British Resident stationed at Satna. The Bombay–Nagpur Railway touched its southern reaches but Janki went by buggy, making a stopover at Manikpur and at a dharmashala at Maihar where she prayed, like that other great maestro, Alauddin Khan, to the goddess at the Maihar Temple. The pale ochre dust of the Gangetic plain changed to rocky, scrub-coloured wasteland and then the road to Jabalpur cut through undulating stretches of red earth and softly humped hillocks growing steadily greener and more densely wooded until at the end of a day and a half it was carving its way through thick forestland.

  It was an exhausting ride, the horses thirsty and slow, despite their frequent restings. There could be no travelling by night. The thugs of this region had long been eliminated but the extensive forest was the haunt of tigers, the famous tigers of Bandhavgarh. Janki was glad that the durbar performances were still a good two days away.

  She was to spend a day resting in the palace and witnessing the Dashera festivities. The royal Gaddi Pujan, the annual throne- worship ceremony, was the high point of the celebrations. All valiant Kshatriyas cleaned, polished and worshipped their swords and shields and lances and guns on Dashera morning, the day of Goddess Durga’s victory over the demon Mahishasura. What more suitable day for a king to worship the prime symbol of his pledge and power than his gaddi, the throne? In the evening there would be illuminations, fireworks, a royal procession, a banquet, followed by the nightlong music soirée ending at dawn.

  The Baghela rajas belonged to the Agnivanshi line—the fire-lineage clan—and were Gurjars in stock, descended from the original founder of the Anhilwara dynasty of Gujarat who, in one of those great cycles of migration, had travelled eastwards and settled down in the wooded Baghelkhand region some time in the early sixteenth century. Tigers were their royal insignia, their first king having adopted the title of Vyaghradev, Lord of the Tiger.

  As Janki’s troupe went up the rocky road, the medieval fortress swam into view, a grainy, earth-brown sandstone edifice surmounting a hill, the citadel of the princely state of Rewa left incomplete by Salim Shah, son of Sher Shah Suri, and occupied by the Baghelas in the sixteenth century. It took them a good hour and a half up a steep incline to draw up before the thick, massively carved pillars of the main gateway overlaid with its heavy carved lintel which had, emblazoned centrally on its crest, the royal coat of arms, two tigers, their tails curling up in stylized flourish, holding between their paws the forked flag of Rewa. Beneath a cusp of carved scroll the words which Janki, craning out of the buggy window, identified as ‘Mrigendra Pratiwandtam Mapayut’, which later inquiry informed her, translated as ‘Beware the Tiger’. From the tallest flagpole fluttered the swallow-tailed red-and-green-banded flag of Rewa.

  They alighted in the first forecourt where liveried retainers awaited them, and were conducted to their quarters, Janki’s in a separate wing in the palace’s premium guest chambers and the accompanists housed in a different section of the palace.

  It was a large octagonal chamber, a corner suite. It was done up in the best of High Victorian decor. Vast mahogany bedstead with brocade canopy and velvet drapes and a lofty carved headboard with the tiger crest in low relief. Massive mahogany chest-of-drawers with heavy branched candle stands on either side. A tall, lace-draped mirror.

  Floors carpeted in the green and red colours of Rewa. There was a life-sized marble Cupid drawing his bow on a wrought-iron pedestal and across the room a vast painting depicting a lavish Mughal hunt. A large mock fireplace, tiled in onyx and, on the mantelpiece, a row of porcelain dogs, shepherdesses, milkmaids and tiny bonneted and crinolined, knickerbockered, doublet-and-hose clad English figurines. The windows had a triple row of velvet, brocade and lace curtains. There was a bathing chamber attached with a deep, sunken marble bath. But for her convenience a copper bucket and pot had been thoughtfully arranged on a marble shelf. In a closet adjoining were large wardrobes of Burma teak with full- length panels
of Belgian glass. All the chambers had something Janki had not seen before—tulip-shaped crystal lampshades hung from the ceilings with real electric bulbs that cast a mellow, buttery light at the flick of a black-and-white switch on the panelled wall behind the polished folding doors.

  A soft, deferential voice spoke up.

  ‘My name is Rukhsana, Baiji, and I have been entrusted with your comfort.’

  Janki turned and saw a pretty, mild-faced woman, pleasingly dressed in pearly silk, a silver-spangled odhni draped over her head and shoulders.

  ‘Thank you,’ murmured Janki.

  ‘Should you require anything, I am here to answer your every command. To help you dress and bejewel yourself. To oil and arrange your hair and henna your feet and hands. I am trained in all the ministrations that noble ladies require. And my companion Rabia here shall carry your instructions to the royal kitchens and provide you with whatever you may wish to enjoy.’

  ‘You are most kind,’ said Janki. ‘I only ask that my accompanists and attendants are looked after.’

  ‘They are provided with every comfort, Baiji, and lodged in the east wing of the palace.’

  ‘How may I communicate with them? I’d like to practise for a few hours tomorrow morning.’

  ‘A chamber for riyaz has been made ready in advance, Baiji. Your attendant, Banwari Singh, shall be posted outside your suite at all hours to carry messages and to conduct you to the practice chamber, should you wish to be led there. And now, Baiji, we leave you to rest.’

  It seemed to Janki, as the door closed after them, that a sort of whispering flutter overtook her temporary retainers, a stir that impalpably communicated itself to her on the other side of the heavy shisham doors.

  She laid her headcloth on the dresser, took a turn round the room, paused at a window to look on the pavilion and steps leading to a rock-hewn lake outside, then had barely taken in the view when there sounded a polite knock on the door again. She opened it to find a tall, suave princely form, in achkan and churidar pajamas, turban and tinsel-edged cummerbund.

  He uttered a gentle cough.

  ‘Maharaj Kunwar Sri Kundan Singh Baghel at your service, Baiji. As master of the estate and kinsman to His Highness Sir Venkat Raman Ramanuj Prasad Singh Ju Deo Bahadur, I bring you greetings and come to ensure that every comfort attends your gracious visit.’

  She could not divest herself of a misgiving. There was in his eyes a look of such disconcerted probing, an expression of such peculiar unease, completely at odds with his smooth words, that she took a long moment to reply.

  ‘I am grateful to His Highness for extending this welcome to me and I assure you that I find myself in comfort far exceeding my humble needs.’

  He bowed his head in a slight, deferential gesture and said, ‘It is our pleasure, Baiji.’

  She saw him turn and stride away down the carpeted corridor and there seemed to be a certain haste in his movements that mystified her.

  The mystery was soon cleared when, half an hour afterwards, there sounded yet another knock on her door, a knock more urgent and restless than the last. When, sighing, she opened the door, she saw an elderly man dressed in a cream silk dhoti and ornate, brocade tunic, who appeared to be in a state of severe agitation.

  He uttered no formal speech of welcome but stood in front of her with hands clasped in a pleading namaskar.

  ‘Baiji,’ he said, ‘I come to beg your forgiveness. A great mistake has been committed, for which I am engulfed in more shame and misery than I can utter.’

  She could make nothing of this and stood silent in surprise.

  ‘I am His Highness’s chief steward, Munshi Manohar Prasad. I was given the assignment of arranging a durbar soirée on the occasion of our Dashera Gaddi Pujan, and to this end I approached Ustad Hassu Khan of Lucknow and he suggested your name. But a most terrible error has occurred, Baiji, and I shrink from uttering it. So base is it and so unworthy, but I have no choice . . .’

  ‘Please don’t hesitate,’ she said. ‘Speak your mind.’

  ‘It is like this, Baiji. His Highness is fastidious and disposed to quick displeasure. He has a fine ear for music and also . . . also a . . . finer eye for a woman’s appearance.’

  ‘Oh, I see,’ said Janki, instantly grasping.

  ‘Whispers reached me, Baiji, that . . . that you . . .’

  ‘That I am unpleasing of face?’ completed Janki calmly.

  She understood that stir among the retainers, that visit of the princeling and his strange, disturbed air. She understood that this moment had been waiting for her all her life.

  ‘You shame me indeed, Baiji,’ he whispered in misery. ‘But such it is, and I tremble to imagine His Highness’s reaction.’

  ‘Now that I am here,’ said Janki drily, ‘I put myself at your disposal. Tell me how I should help you out of this troublesome situation, short of changing my appearance by mantras or magic.’

  ‘Is it possible . . . is it asking too much, Baiji, that another songstress be arranged, someone more . . . more personable?’

  He was in a cold sweat, ready to sink through the floor.

  ‘I wish that were possible, Munshiji, and I’d do anything to be of assistance, but I regret that I am the only singer in my group.’

  ‘It’s much too late to engage another,’ he fretted, distraught. ‘The journey alone . . . Ah, you cannot imagine His Highness in a right royal rage. Ah, the ignominy of it! And the sorrow and mortification I feel before you . . .’

  ‘I think I have a solution,’ she said coolly. ‘You’ll have to do with my poor self, sir, whether you like it or not. But you can tell His Highness that this songstress lives in strict purdah and never goes unveiled. Tell His Highness she begs to be allowed to perform from behind the privacy of a curtain. Beseech him, as a gracious accession to a lowly artist’s prayer. Can you carry my appeal to him and bring me his answer?’

  He looked at her, uncertain. ‘Go,’ she prompted. ‘There is no other way.’

  In an hour he was back, relief writ large on his harried face. ‘His Highness grants the lady’s prayer and says he shall gladly oblige the vagaries of an artist if her art warrants it. Oh, Baiji, how can I thank you enough!’

  ‘It is no matter. Go, arrange for thick curtains, Munshiji.’

  The accidental grace of invisibility and the mock solitude of the curtained dais afforded such soaring spaciousness of play to her voice that Janki felt her body fall away as she became her song. She travelled through nebulous realms of mind lit with the light of the subtle worlds. After dusk when the sun has sunk there rises an indeterminate unease of the soul, caught between movement and fixity. To render it she sang Raga Shree. Then, in the second watch, between nine and midnight, with the progress of the evening, came the hour of longing consecration, and she slipped into Shuddha Kalyan, following it up with an expansive thumri in Jhinjhhoti. When the night had thickened, her voice rose in a Kaafi bandish. Navigated itself smoothly away towards a regal Darbari Kanada. And finally settled into an esoteric Malkauns trance. On her curtained platform she relaxed completely. With no eye contact and no witnesses, alone with her music, she sang to herself, appeasing every flourish, indulging every flight, expressing every whimsy, in deep converse with the ragas. And so through the remaining praharas of the night to the tremulous stirrings of a dawn raga, Lalit, before coming to rest in a resonant finale with a glowing Bhairavi.

  After the climactic tihaii, the three-spiralled coil of notes that ended her performance, she awoke from her spell when a rude disturbance broke in. The curtain was abruptly flung aside and a massive brocaded form stood before her. His Highness Samrajya Maharajadhiraja Bandhresh Shri Maharaja Sir Venkat Raman Ramanuj Prasad Singh Ju Deo Bahadur, maharaja of Rewa. If the maharaja’s seventeen-gun-salute princely state had the motto ‘Beware the Tiger’ it had to be said that his personal expression did much to enforce that warning. She felt the piercing ferocity of his riveting gaze bearing down on her from eyes that brooded over an aquil
ine nose and the dense upsweep of a bushy fan-beard. Whether this was a consciously cultivated expression of ancestral authority or a natural inheritance of feature, it was hard to tell. He stood there, poised to open fire, an elaborately robed and turbaned form, as she rose to her feet, bowed and namaskared him.

  ‘So this is the mystery unveiled,’ said the Presence. ‘The coy lady who might wilt under a king’s gaze, so she chooses a purdah to protect herself?’

  ‘Begging pardon for the presumption, Your Highness. But my purpose was entirely in His Highness’s interest.’

  ‘How so, lady?’

  ‘I feared lest the sight of so drab and disfigured a countenance might trouble Your Highness’s pleasure in the music.’

  It would be too much to say that Sir Venkat Raman Ramanuj Prasad Singh Ju Deo Bahadur flushed because he was incapable of flinching or flushing before a mere woman, but there came over him a moment’s pause, an instant of kingly deliberation between chivalric denial and gracious concession. Then his right royal pedigree prompted the proper courtly rejoinder: ‘What countenance, lady? I saw none while you sang and I see none now while you stand here before me. The faces I saw were the beauteous forms of Malkauns and Lalit and Bhairavi and Darbari, and they came to me gracefully unveiled as never before.’

  ‘Then what more can this lowly one ask, Your Highness?’

  ‘Baiji,’ he said, ‘how may I measure your worth?’

  ‘My lord,’ she replied, ‘an artist is measured by her seerat, not her soorat, by her art not her face. My soorat is worth nothing, my seerat I leave you to judge.’

  ‘Ah, do not make mock of me, Baiji . . .’ And this time Sir Venkat did indeed come close to flushing. ‘Just allow me to thank you with this small acknowledgement of your worth, which far exceeds anything that I can offer.’ He took off the rope of pearls he wore round his high-collared bull neck and put it in the large silver platter that his Munshi stepped up with. It held a velvet pouch and a jewellery box.

  Later in the day the Munshi brought a missive to her chamber. He appeared to be in a state of great excitement.