-Brian Mendonça
So
dar kayha, so ghar kayha
Jit
beh sarb samalay.
Vaje
nad anek, asankha ketem
Vavanahare
[Where is that gate, and where
is that door
Where you sit and take care of
all.
The naad is heard - of sounds, voice and vibrations
Countless musicians play their
instruments]
The
words above in Gurmukhi comprise the opening line of the 27th Pauri
of the Japji Sahib – the sacred teachings of Guru Nanak – of a total of 38
Pauris (set of verses).
The
27th Pauri has been sung by many kirtan
exponents. The foremost among these would be Padma Shri Bhai Nirmal Singh
Khalsa who we lost earlier this month. To listen to him sing the Pauri So Dar Kayha is to be in the presence of
the mystical.
Bhai
Nirmal Singh Khalsa was born in Ferozepur, Western Punjab to a poor farmer’s family
in 1952. During the Partition his parents were displaced and lost all they had when they moved to Mandala, Punjab. As a boy he loved to listen to the
songs of the Mirasi – nomadic tribes who used to sing in the evening where they
pitched their tents. Bhai Nirmal Singh used to steal away after his farming
chores were done and listen to them sing. ‘The melody really soothed me,’ he
says.
In
1977 he moved to Rishikesh to take a job as a music teacher. After this he
taught in Ganganagar, Rajasthan. In 1979 he took up the position of Hazoori
Ragi (Priest/Singer), of the Sach Khand Sri Harmandir Sahib, Amritsar where he
was till the last. Bhai Nirmal Singh Khalsa knew all the 31 ragas needed to sing the Gurbani i.e. the hymns in the Guru
Granth Sahib. He travelled to no less
than 51 countries to perform.
According to Siri Singh Sahib:
Naad
means 'the essence of all sounds.' All languages contain sounds, which relate
to one or more of the five elements of air, fire, water, earth, and
ether. Gurbani is a perfect
combination and permutation of sounds relating to all the five elements in
complete balance. When Guru Arjan Dev, the fifth
Guru Nanak, compiled Shri Guru Granth Sahib in 1604, he put in only those banis which
were in Naad. These compositions are called Gurbani.*
There
are several songs of Bhai Nirmal Singh Khalsa on YouTube. The songs evoke the
mood of Kabir and the oneness of humanity.
‘Koe boley Ram Ram /Koe boley
Khudaye’ [Some say Ram, some say Khuda] plead for the end to division. He
wishes all his choicest blessings in ‘Har
Koee Naam Sadaa Sukhdayee.’ [Let Every Name be Blessed] In tune with the
seasons he reminds the listener that Sawan
aaya Heh Sakhi. [The month of Sawan is here friend]
The
end came suddenly. When he passed on in Verka, Amritsar,
some locals objected to his body being cremated there, and locked the cremation
grounds. The recipient of India’s fourth highest civilian honour - the Padma Shri - was disowned by his own village. His last rites were performed at Shukarchuk outside the city under the mantle of darkness, near a friendly tree, in the beam of a car's headlights. Like Toba Tek Singh, he lay neither in Pakistan nor in 'India' but in the narrow strip of land between both.
On the occasion of Baisakhi today - the formation of the first five Khalsa Sikhs by Guru Gobind Singh in 1699 -- one remembers, gurbani lives in the realm of the divine, beyond space and time.
------------------------------------
Published in Gomantak Times Weekender, Panjim, Goa on Sunday, 12th April 2020. Updated 13th April 2020. *sikhdharma.org. Pic courtesy: indiankart(dot)com
Comments