Jamalpur

Jamalpur! Let me but hear the name – indeed, let me but think it – and my mind is awash with images. Baba is gone from Jamalpur, but the disciples of His days there will never forget. Jamalpur itself will never forget.

Jamalpur and my Baba stories of Jamalpur are now memories.

When people ask me about Jamalpur, before I can say anything, I am lost in the world of memory. All the events of that period flash on my mental plate like a series of pictures and I am at a loss where to begin.

I picture those narrow streets of the town through which Baba used to go to his office everyday; those evening walks in the vast green field surrounded by beautiful hills and His enjoyment of the pure, scented air there.

I picture Baba sitting on the tiger’s grave in the midst of the field and teaching His dear disciples there;

His walking the pathways lined with the waiting lines of devotees, sadhakas and spiritual adepts.

Baba calling some of them lovingly, throwing graceful looks at some and overwhelming others with his loving eyes and glances – these things are like a dream today, but then it was our everyday routine.

Everyday, but never taken for granted. Even then I glimpsed from time to time the desolation that would follow when that phase of our lives was no more. When things changed, as they would, as they must - when Baba moved on to the next phase of His mission, when the organization outgrew the intense, intimate structure it had in its beginnings – then some of us were left with a permanent insatiable hunger for those past days of Jamlapur.

Beyond the town, I see the vast green field spread out before me, bounded on two sides by beautiful hills. There in my imagination I find Baba on His evening walk accompanied by a small group of His disciples. Now I envision the tiger’s grave, a stone platform at one end of the field some distance from a trio of lofty palms.

There sits Baba, clothed in white, teaching the disciples who sit at His feet while the cool and fragrant breeze ministers to His presence.

This scene glows so vividly before my inner eye that for a moment it seems more real than the room where I sit writing, the table and the paper in front of me, and the events of the intervening years. At the mere thought of Jamalpur, many mysterious and enlightening events spring to mind.

Even as I write, tears of spiritual bliss overcome me. Those moments in Jamalpur have left deep and lasting impressions, a soothing touch and satisfaction that will remain with me for the rest of my life. If nothing can ever bring back those days, neither can anything ever take them away.

What is this place, this town and it’s surroundings,that are so central to the story of Ananda Marga’s inception? Most disciples will never visit Jamalpur, and many may see it only as a place of history. Yet to remember Jamalpur merely as a historical site feels so arid.

To me, to those who were with Baba in those early days, Jamalpur quivers with a living presence, and the heart swells with love and longing for the rapturous experiences of those times.

Jamalpur represents a phase in Baba’s play, before His leadership of a worldwide organization placed such rigorous demands on Him that it deprived His disciples of the close proximity of the Jamalpur era.Let me now, then, with some effort, disentangle myself from the clinging embrace of personal reminiscences and introduce Jamalpur as it was at that midpoint of the 20th century.

To begin with, Jamalpur was a relatively small, insignificant town located near the River Ganges in Bihar. Because of it’s geographical position, it gained importance with the increasing prominence of rail transport during the British era. Around the turn of the 20th century, Jamalpur became a major railway station, and some years later, one of the largest railway workshops in India was constructed there.

Besides housing the railway repairs workshop, it was also a factory for engine parts and constructing passenger bogies. Even today, Jamalpur’s internal economy and external significance depends on the railways.

The Jamalpur railway station stretches north-south. Immediately to the west of the station are the markets and the town-centre. Nearby is the Jubilee Well, and the rest of the town is to the west.

To the east of the station stand a few houses, offices, and a hospital, all belonging to the Eastern Railways. Farther to the south-east ranges the broad expanse of grassy land known as the Jamalpur field.

Two bridges, one wide and one narrow, span the rail lines, linking the town on the west with the field and its surrounding area on the east. Traffic across the wide bridge, most of it foot traffic, was light in those days, although today there are vehicles crossing.

Each evening it was Baba’s custom to walk from His home to the field, a distance of about 2.5 miles.

He took this at a leisurely pace and the distance was covered in approximately three-quarters of an hour. Baba occasionally crossed the tracks by way of the narrow bridge, but most often used the wide bridge when going to and from the field.

The Jamalpur field is one of nature’s jewels. The encroachments of civilization and commerce have not yet eradicated the features that give this spot its rare beauty.

Its gentle contours give the two square mile area a feeling of dynamic tranquillity.

Occasional banyans and mango trees grow among the palms that grace the landscape in groups large and small, interspersed with shrubbery and arranged in subtle patterns too pleasing to have been contrived by the clumsy hand of humans. Free-roaming cattle, sheep and goats bear witness to the liberty this environment affords to all life.

South-eastward, the field slopes into a long basin in which reposes a crystal lake reflecting in untarnished hues, the serene splendour of the place.

Dark forests that once covered this region now mark only the eastern perimeter of the lake and the field.

Beyond, to the east, hills rise up like a sigh from nature’s breast, then fall softly away in the distance. Shading to purple and blue as dusk approaches., they calm the spirit, leading the eye toward stillness as they lead the mind toward permanence.

For the past few decades, the government has been mining in these hills for the marketable coloured stones indiginous to the area.

Next to the lake and south of the field, is ‘Death Valley’, so called because it was once the refuge of brigands and cutthroats. As recently as a century ago, Death Valley, the lake-shore, part of the field and the hills beyond were all but a dense jungle.

Wild animals roamed freely, uninhabited by the proximity of civilzation. Even after the workshop was established, these jungles still abounded, and British officers used to go a hunting and riding in them.