Banaras – City of life, death and desire

I was not familiar with the term ‘slow journalism’ which, per a search, has multiple definitions (my favorite is “unbreaking news”). Words that fit Radhika Iyengar’s Fire on the Ganges include “storytelling” and “taking time” – to listen, to observe, to try and understand.

From 2015 to 2023, Iyengar, a journalist, interviewed members of the Dom community in Chand Ghat, a basti, a neighborhood, in Banaras, also known as Varanasi, Kashi and the ‘city of death.’ Some Hindus believe to die in Banaras means a nonstop ticket to ‘moksha’ – freedom from rebirth.

The Doms, a Dalit sub-caste, inhabit the inner arteries of the city, hidden from the main alleyways of Banaras. Chand Ghat…is home to a small community of corpse burners. Their profession involves cremating the dead and they are considered ‘untouchable’ by a majority of dominant-caste Hindus. The Dom locality, therefore, is isolated and unseen—unless you go looking for it.

Iyengar tells stories of the Doms she met in person or via phone and video calls. Over 35 “characters” are listed at the end of the book. At times it was like watching a movie. I was immersed in this community, its narrow lanes, the crowded homes. the ghats – the steps leading to the river, and, to a point, the tasks and roles cremation entails. Such a clinical term – cremation. It cleans up the burnt flesh and its stench, the injuries and drug abuse, the bones and ashes through which boys and men dig, looking for a shroud or any kind of metal to sell.

A three-hour toil in rain or a five-hour slog under a harsh sky, sifting ash can be as valuable as it can be meaningless. A man can make Rs 10 or Rs 1,000…More often than not, however, a labourer earns Rs 20-30, just enough to buy a fried snack and a cup of sweet tea.

Many stories are about the wives, who stay home waiting for their husbands and sons to return from the ghat, and the younger Doms trying to break free from the death surrounding them and the “enduring sense of inferiority” which “the elders have suffered in silence for many years.”

It is the generation after…that is more outspoken and willing to make its voice heard. It is in their eyes that you can see the city’s caste monolith slowly crumbling. They have ambition that steer them off the path that has been set for them. They are driven, eager to somehow become more than what society dictates.

The book starts with mysterious death of Dolly’s husband who fell off a bridge. The motorcycle accident, or murder, changed Dolly. With five children to feed Dolly starts selling snacks on her doorstep – the first shop owned by a Dom woman. Iyengar then focuses on Dolly’s neighbors and family members.

Aakash, Dolly’s neighbor, is matter-of-fact. He has experienced much ugliness growing up at the ghats. He was scared as a kid but, “Dead bodies meant money. If I was scared, I couldn’t earn.”

Bhola is determined to leave Chand Ghat, to get an education and shed his Dom identity, no matter how many lies it takes. He is the only one from Chand Ghat to attend a private university, away from Banaras.

Speaking English is important to him. People naturally assume that one belongs to a ‘higher caste’ if they are fluent in the language….I don’t let anyone know what or who I am. I don’t let them know that I am a Dom, that my worth is nothing.

Lakshya, Dolly’s brother and Aakash’s friend, has attitude. He won’t spend his life burning bodies. A guide, he takes tourists to temples and on boat tours of the ghats. It’s good money – he’s saving up to do the unthinkable, to open a sari shop and marry Komal, a Brahmin girl.

Komal endures much from her family and community when they learn about Lakshya. Her only fault, she says, was to fall in love with someone who treats her with respect, who doesn’t hit her. Her family is clear, if she marries a Dom, she will no longer be “a Brahmin’s daughter.”

Caste purity is inextricably linked to a woman’s virtue, and thus, any hint of ‘waywardness’ on her part is cause for alarm. The moment a girl is born, she unwittingly inherits the invisible ‘duty’ of protecting the ‘honour’ of her family and, by extension, her community.

Interspersed among the love stories and tragedies is background. The chapter “Hunger” has examples from Dalit literature and research showing how those ‘above,’ of a higher caste, historically impacted what Dalits ate. The reader then is brought back to Chand Ghat, to how little food families have to eat now. “The Great Makeover” describes Prime Minister Modi’s beautification of Banaras, the Kashi Vishwanath Corridor. Those being displaced had mixed reactions – to some Modi was a god himself, cleaning up the filth left by pilgrims, tourists and cows; others lamented the loss Kashi’s character.

The behemoth project would sweep across areas neighboring the temple, razing homes, labryrinthe lanes, old libraries and shops—anything that came in God’s way—to the ground in order to clear a 400-metre-long passage that would allow devotees to walk hassle-free from the temple gates to the banks of the holy Ganges and take a ritualistic dip in the river. Supporters claimed that this way Lord Shiva could directly see the flowing Ganges.

One would think the omnipotent god could see the river by just soaring into the sky above.

The chapters covering the pandemic were difficult, bringing back images of non-stop funeral pyres and shallow ‘graveyards’ along the banks of the Ganges.

In March 2021, the second wave of COVID-19 rushed in, setting the ghats in Banaras ablaze. Endless rows of pyres glowed with topaz fervour long into the night. A thick layer of smoke, like a sprawling grey shroud, blanketed the cremation ground. The dead waited in queues and crowded the ghats. The once towering columns of pyre wood were reduced to meagre piles, Dom labourers numbly hauled the bodies and built tombs of straw and timber around them.

Unfortunately, much of the book has a soap-opera feel. After the grim descriptions of the pandemic, Iyengar veers off into personal drama. Desperation and demand meant any amount could be charged for cremations, lifting some Doms up, causing resentment among neighbors because now some could afford refrigerators, a status symbol. Chapter titles like “Mohan’s New Bride,” “Komal’s Mehndi” and “The Most Beautiful Girl” seem more apt for an Indian TV serial. Lakshya and Komal’s inter-caste affair does illustrate what happens when lines are crossed, but I’m not sure details of their romance – even the music played during wedding rituals were necessary. There are many stories about the jealousies between women in joint families – which ones sit and do nothing, whose husbands are at their beck and call. It’s all real, but perhaps less would have been more.

That said, when Iyengar writes how little has changed for these women, generation after generation, it resonates.

Uttar Pradesh, specifically, along the Ganga river, is the India I’ve known since childhood. One deep root of my family tree originates in a village near Banaras. My memories of Banaras, the city, are mostly negative – wading through the ankle-deep muck of ‘Vishwanathji ki gully’ (today’s Kashi Corridor) and the ‘pandas’ – paunchy priests with less than stellar reputations.

When the women of Chand Ghat tell Iyengar the rules women must live by, I was reading words – verbatim – I’d heard for years.

“You can’t go to the chhat, the terrace, men on the street will see you.”
“Why are you sitting with the boys – so what if they’re your cousins?”
“Wear a dupatta, cover up, yes, even inside.”
“No, the bride can’t come outside until the wedding, she’ll get dark from the sun.”
“How come your wrist and neck are khaali, bare? – girls your age wear bangles and a necklace.”

That last one more than rankled. What I thought was a strange obsession of female relatives was apparently normal. I have worn something on my wrist and a chain around my neck since my teen years – my neck hasn’t been ‘bare’ for more than an hour since. Not because I like jewelry – because of the ‘taanas,’ the sarcastic jibes, taunts and scoldings that (apparently) have conditioned me. 10 years ago I removed my gold bangle to more comfortably use a laptop. I lasted two days before replacing it with a delicate bracelet, which I wore until a couple of months ago. This time I lasted a whole week before replacing it with a thread. This conditioning, the restrictions placed on women (girls) in Chand Ghat and this region – Iyengar’s explanation is The Patriarchy. I feel that’s too easy – these rules were/are imposed by women who could have broken the cycle long ago. They suffered and now, they say, their daughters and daughter-in-laws must too. I’ve seen small changes in recent years in [my] India; for [some] Indians abroad [from certain regions of India], it may take another generation.

After a string of disappointing South Asian fiction I was ready for non-fiction. For the most part, Fire on the Ganges delivers. The prose is engaging, the 20+ pages of notes show the contents is well-researched. Iyengar’s writing is detailed and descriptive but not dramatic; succinct and factual, but not distant. Just my luck that a book about cremation and the burning ghats took me where I didn’t want to go.