JALANDHAR TODAY: THE GREAT BETRAYAL – Part 1-By Shyamala B.Cowsik

Shyamala Cowsik
1:40 am May 28, 3013

JALANDHAR TODAY: THE GREAT BETRAYAL – Part 1

Of course I knew what was going to happen today. So did you all. But still, watching it made my skin crawl. For the worst of betrayals is that of one who has loved and trusted and worshipped you all her life. And it makes no difference if it is committed by a God, with the excuse of poore sansar ka hith. It is still a black deed.

So the only reassurance of divine justice today came when Mahadev, having seen, through his divyadrishti, all that had been done to Vrinda by Narayan, makes the ominous pronouncement that this deed would have longlasting repercussions. Hearing him say that, I felt sure that facing the same circumstances, Mahadev would never have so stooped to conquer, never betrayed so deep a trust. It is not for nothing that he is the Devon ke Dev.

The fake Jalandhar is mute throughout his scene with Vrinda, perhaps because of some sense of shame, for surely, if Narayan could have copied Jalandhar’s physicality so exactly that even his devoted wife could not spot the difference till she touched him, he could have gone the whole way and copied his deep voice as well?

Whatever the reason for it, he does not speak at all. Instead, he follows Vrinda silently thru the vidhis of the final charan of the mahapuja, for which the smooth completion of which she has earlier sought her aaradhya’s presence and his blessings. The irony here could not have been sharper or more bitter.

He listens to her joyfully telling her supposed husband that in the puja, she will be affirming that he is most beloved of her, that he is her sarvasva, that she is devoted, body and soul, to him and to him alone, that he is her swami. I cannot believe that the deceit practiced on her would have transferred all these affirmations made by Vrinda, of abiding love, loyalty and devotion to Jalandhar, to the impostor who has taken his place. Surely it is the intent that should count, not the actual physical presence.

Watching his devotee of a lifetime make such fervent affirmations to an impostor must have made Narayan cringe, for he seems very awkward throughout. Vrinda of course would have attributed this to her husband’s acute dislike of such a puja.

Mohit Raina is remarkably convincing as Vishnu pretending to be Jalandhar. There is the ever present guilt at cheating such a great devotee and destroying her life; it colours the whole of his mind and is reflected as wary tenseness in his body language. He cannot look Vrinda in the eye, and his face seems frozen in an attempt to divorce himself, in some way, from what he is about to do. When he looks sideways at Vrinda, his eyes are blank. When she declares that he – Jalandhar – is now ajeya and amar, he seems to winced internally though his face is impassive. It must have been difficult, to play one character playing another, but Mohit gets under the skin of Narayan the deceiver, and makes it look both natural and effortless.

Vrinda feels a divine presence all around her. But the poor deluded creature, intoxicated with joy at what she takes to be her husband having honoured her dearest wish, misinterprets this. She speaks to the fake Jalandhar – half apologetically, as she assumes that he will not like it – about this effulgence that she senses, which she takes to be her aaradhya’s blessings for her endeavour. Again, the irony of the situation is acute.

Neha is superb in the whole of this beautifully scripted and written segment. She brings alive Vrinda’s childlike delight at what she assumes is her husband keeping his promise to her and returning for the puja. Even before she turns round, the sound of his footsteps make her smile with pleasure, and when she actually sees him, she glows as if a lamp had been lit inside her. Before the puja, she chatters lightheartedly about it, partly to bridge over any awkwardness that she thinks he might be feeling, and partly out of the happiness that visibly floods her whole being.

When the vidhi is over, she declares, her eyes brimming over with joy, that on the strength of her purity, she can now affirm that he is ajeya and amar, and that no one in the world can even touch him, not to speak of killing him. Narayan listens impassively. How guilty does he feel? One does not know as yet.

When she is asking him, with schoolgirlish eagerness, how he felt about the puja, one can see that she is lightheaded with relief at having safeguarded the life of the husband she loves above all else. It is then that she suddenly remembers that in the excitement, she has forgotten to apply the tilak on him . She approaches him and touches his forehead with her finger. In that instant, realization dawns on her, and her whole world comes crashing down.

Her sudden revulsion comes across so strongly, especially when Narayan assumes his real roop, that the viewer flinches with her. But Vrinda’s devotion to him is so strong and unassailable that she does not at first think it is Narayan at all. Instead, she demands that the impostor not pretend to be Narayan in an attempt to gain her forgiveness.

By the end today, one was left with a feeling of emptiness. The Narayan-Vrinda sequence had not only been interrupted, but also left incomplete, and it seemed that the other parts were being unduly stretched to make this possible. I felt anew what a piece of luck it had been that the superb Jalandhar-Shukracharya and Vrinda-Jalandhar sequences of the last 2 days, of as long as 12 minutes, were shown at a stretch, greatly enhancing their already great impact.

There was no indication today of where Jalandhar was while Parvati was calmly doing an abhishek of a shivalinga. And then how was a shivalinga there at all in Jalandhar’s mayalok? No answers to be had, of course.

Today, there was a betrayal, and the shock of this crippling disillusionment for the one betrayed. The real tragedy and the terrible, gut wrenching anguish are yet to come. First when Vrinda realises that it is her aaradhya who has betrayed her, and feels obliged to commit suicide, abandoning the husband who has been her whole existence and who now needs her more than ever before. And then when Jalandhar, through her death, confronts the unbearable loss of the one person who, after his mother, loved him for himself alone, and was also perhaps his last link to normalcy.

Today was bad enough . I shudder at the thought of what tomorrow holds for us, when Mohit opens himself up full throttle as Jalandhar mourning the death of his beloved wife.

Shyamala B.Cowsik