Today the young person has got a lot of freedom to explore. With the internet, the mobile phone and the television the youth is being exposed to the best and the worst at a very early age. In previous generations, social and familial structures had created some norms based on the experience which had to be adhered to. But with globalization, all rules have broken down and the inexperienced teenager (or even sometimes the small child) is left to find her own way. There are many pitfalls to this availability of information and many unfortunate experiences which can be avoided if we have a wise guide who has traversed almost the same path as we are currently on. We call such a person a 'Guru'. Changing priorities in society have made true Gurus a rare commodity. Faith and patience have also taken a beating in the current atmosphere of instant gratification resulting in people not being able to recognize a great master even if they come across one. Consequently, the youth will have to also have to develop her inner strength to equip herself with the means to go through life relatively unscathed. Our heritage can construct this support system beautifully. It builds an anchor that pulls us back to shore when we are going through turbulent times. Previous generations had a relatively safe passage through life, but now the youth are being thrown into the deep blue sea which they have to learn to navigate largely by themselves. The key lies in them learning to connect with themselves. This is the art of ‘Yog’ which has been discovered in this great nation by our ancestors. If the youth all over the world could learn some form of 'Yog' their lives would become fuller and more meaningful. Let me explain with the help of an example—the man-woman relationship. This can bring the highest degree of selfishness. We are aware of the unhappiness that romantic relationships largely generate in the modern context. Knowing this we still run towards the flame like a moth, to experience fleeting moments of extreme pleasure at the cost sometimes even of death. The mind takes hold of us and leads us into the abyss. If we could somehow control this mind we could avoid such a situation. It is not that relationships are intrinsically bad. It is in the manner in which the mind makes us approach a relationship that makes it good or evil. If we could somehow direct the mind we could make relationships beautiful. 'Yog' helps us to do exactly that. By practicing any of its forms, the mind becomes 'Ekagra' (focused) and tends to obey the commands of its master more frequently. But this is not sufficient. So the practice does two more things. It cleanses the mind and also makes it subtle. With this, the subtle mind, being able to recognize the pitfalls in the abstract domain is able to guide the human being, taking her to unprecedented heights.

'Naad Yog' is one such technique developed using sound which manifests itself in our classical music. 'Hatha Yog' uses the physical body to help us achieve the same end. 'Bhakti Yog', 'GyanYog', ‘Raja Yog’ and many other paths experimented with extensively in this country can help us find our way. There is a very thin line of demarcation between what is right and what is wrong. The same situation can turn from right to wrong or vice versa in a split second. A controlled, pure and subtle mind can help us discriminate and can take us in the direction which will facilitate our inner growth. With so much disharmony in today’s society (which is a reflection of the disharmony within each individual), it is the need of the hour to develop ourselves internally.

One often wonders why our ancestors called the world an illusion when in fact it seems so real! Watching a close relative with her newly acquired daughter suddenly provided me with an answer. The mind keeps on flitting when actually we want it to be fixed as expressed in a Beatles song “To keep my mind from wandering”… This is an extremely difficult task and even after many years of medita¬tion, great people have failed in this endeavor.

Hence nature has worked out many little illusions that we can easily focus upon and thereby temporarily be in a state of bliss. When people get married, their immediate focus is on physical pleasures; when the newness of that dies down, nature brings in a child who takes up the attention of the parents.

As it grows up and requires less looking after, another one arrives and the process starts all over again. When we cannot get our minds hooked onto the real, nature makes sure that we latch on to one thing after another, which is unreal in the sense that it cannot give us sustained happiness. As a Buddhist text says, “The only meaningful life is a life which strives for individual realization absolute and unconditional of its own particular law to the extent that a man is untrue to the law of his being”. A true state of bliss is only possible when the mind has been stilled through deep meditation. In such a state one can realize why our great saints called the world ‘maya’.

Ustad Bismillah Khan was one of the finest human beings I have ever met. He was a great musician – we all know that. But he used music to transcend it. “Yeh to ek ibadat hai (This is just a prayer)”, he would say. He was on a different level, and it showed on his face – almost childlike and smiling. At namaaz time, he would request all guests to leave. He was one of the most beautiful examples of our composite heritage. Sitting with him in his small barsati room in Varanasi, he once told me that he was playing the shehnai on the banks of the Ganges one day when the Goddess Ganga rose out of the waters and blessed him for the lovely note that he had played. He narrated this with such conviction and glow in his eyes that I was moved to tears. Almost every time that I have sat at his feet and interacted with him, he has shaken me to the core. His complete faith in the spiritual domain irrespective of the religious order has always inspired me. Some of his quotable quotes are: “Hame paisa chahiye, par sirf paisa Nahin (I want money, but not just money)”; “Insaan ki pehchan hai uski jaban (A person’s character is determined by how she keeps her word)”. And he was one who lived by what he said. At the SPIC MACAY annual convention at Dehradun in the early nineties, Ustad Bismillah Khan was scheduled to give the concluding recital of classical music overnight. The whole group had been booked by a train reaching Dehradun, one day earlier. The tickets were waitlisted, but we had contacted the Railway Board to get them confirmed. This did not happen and the group could not board the train at Mughalsarai. We were very taken aback. Many people coming solely to listen to Khan sahib would go back disappointed. In those days, there was only one flight from Varanasi to Delhi (there were no flights to Dehradun), and there were no SUVs. The only way that we could have the whole group reach on time was to fly them down to Delhi and have a matador take them from the airport on a whole night journey to Dehradun. Very hesitatingly, I suggested this to Khan sahib on the phone. His reply was: “Jab hamne vayda kiya hai, hum use nibhayenge (When I have given a word, I will honor it).” He reached Dehradun in the early hours of the morning just in time for his concert. I suggested that we postpone his program to the afternoon so that he could rest a little. He asked me if people were there in the hall. When I replied in the affirmative, he decided to go straight onto the stage. He gave a memorable concert. That was Ustad Bismillah Khan. 

I first met Khan Sahib in 1978 in Crown Hotel, Fatehpuri in Chandni Chowk. I had expected him to be staying at a five-star hotel, but when I went there, I found this unshaven man wearing a lungi and a baniyan, sitting on the floor. I had gone to request him to perform for the students. He heard me out, at the end of which he asked, “Par paisa kitna doge? (But how much money will you give?)” When I told him that we had only a small dakshina to offer, he immediately refused. I tried hard to argue with him, but he would not oblige. He said that he had a large family of his own and of his musicians to look after and that he would not perform unless he was paid properly. I had given up and was preparing to leave when he asked me to sit down. He talked to me some more, and realizing the genuinity of the effort, he finally gave his consent. This gave SPIC MACAY a boost. After that, he performed all over India for this movement. In fact, probably his last public appearance was at the SPIC MACAY convention in Jaipur on June 19th, 2006.

Like all human beings, he had his failings. His temper scared many people including his family and accompanists. However, he would become normal very soon and would never harbor any ill feelings towards anyone. The Padmashri, Padmabhushan, Padmavibhushan, Bharat Ratna and yet the ‘no airs attached’ Ustad Bismillah Khan will be remembered by us for a long long time.

As a child, my parents took me to many ashrams. I have fond memories of watching The Mother playing tennis at Sri Aurobindo Ashram in Pondicherry, of the smell of freshly baked brown bread and of witnessing the table football game there. I remember the serenity of the Shahenshahi Ashram in Rajpur, the beautiful bhajans of the Swamiji and the gushing waterfall not very far away. The Shivananda Ashram in Rishikesh was very special. Swami Chidananda had an all-pervading glow in his eyes. He would attract people without speaking a word.

As I grew up, I visited ashrams in different parts of the world all by myself. I went to the retreat of Swami Muktananda in the Catskill mountains in New York, stayed at a monastery in France where the monks meditated with Gregorian chants, practiced dhrupad at the ashram of Ustad Nasir Aminuddin Dagar in Kolkata and Ustad Fariduddin Dagar at Panvel, visited the gurukuls of Guru Ammanur Madhava Chakyar in Irinjalakkuda and Pandit Kishan Maharaj in Varanasi, attended a two –week camp at the Bihar School of Yoga in Munger and visited many other ashrams. The atmosphere of total giving at the Shivananda Ashram, the humility of the Abbot at the monastery in France, the intensity in Ustad Aminuddin Dagar’s ashram and the rigorous riyaz at Ustad Fariduddin Dagar’s ashram have left indelible marks on my being.

These experiences helped me realize that our ashrams are scientific laboratories whose inmates experiment with their lives, following the results of research carried out by our ancestors and directed step by step by the gurus. All of us do not have to live in an ashram but as Swami Niranjanananda Saraswati of the Munger ashram says, we should visit a true ashram at least once a year.

What we call spirituality is at one level a scientific method of applying distilled wisdom and information on a large scale. Perceptive people at various places at different points of time have verified this truth. We know that Einstein was a great scientist and Otto Hahn a great technologist, who converted his theories into an actual fission reaction to the atomic bomb that later engineers replicated for more useful purposes, namely atomic energy. Similarly, Jesus Christ was the originator of a number of great concepts that his apostles propagated as methods of good living; the church copied this prototype and spread it in an organized manner.

We could be the engineers who could use the ideas developed in different ashrams to enhance our own lives. Different methods have been developed to connect with our inner selves and each human being would have a natural preference for one particular method. The more the number of routes, the greater the number of people likely to reach the goal. Each true ashram provides us with a route traversed initially by the original master. Taking ideas from the various ashrams, we can come up with a route that is most suited for each one of us.

Today, young people visit different cities in the world during their vacations, take up fancy jobs or simply spend their leisure time. Very few visit ashrams. The SPIC MACAY National School Intensives are attempting to bring the ashram to the student. As the saying goes, if the mountain does not come to Mohammed, Mohammed must go to the mountain. The School Intensives are designed to give the students an experience of staying in the proximity of great masters in various areas of human endeavor, learning from them and watching them perform. May this experience enrich the lives of many of my young friends.

A young person today is much more aware than someone a few decades ago. This could be due to Darwin’s Theory of Evolution and the technological revolution. However, time is required for information to become knowledge. A greater time lag is needed for it to transform into wisdom. Once a direction becomes clear through knowledge, a lot of hard work is required to acquire wisdom. The process also needs patience, a certain degree of faith and an open mind, all of which are at a premium today. Consequently, a bright and hard¬working young person is likely to fall into the trap of ‘I know it all’. This forecloses the possibility of progress.Ustad Nasir Aminuddin Dagar would say, “Hum bacche ko chaalis saal takstage par nahin aane dete the, ¬kahin wo bhul na jaye wo kis liye gaa rahahai” (“We did not allow the disciple to go onstage till he was 40 years old, lest he forgot why he was singing”). The way to progress is not by rediscovering the wheel, but by improving upon the best wheel available with your ingenuity. To get that, one must have humility, patience and a desire to learn. No one says that questions should not be raised, but it is important to know how, when and where to raise them. A teacher carries a treasure that cannot be parted with so easily. The only who has the qualities mentioned above can access it. Once the depth of what he possesses is fathomed, the teacher will tell a deserving pupil to move on and search for deeper truths but till that time one must try not to jump the gun.

An era has ended with the passing away of Ustad Rahim Fahimmuddin Dagar.  Artistes of his times like Pt. Malkarjun Mansur , Smt. Gangubai Hangal, Ustad Bismillah Khan, Pt. Ram Chatur Mallicik, Ustad Nasir Aminuddin Dagar, Ustad Asad Ali  Khan & other’s used music to transcend the form. They had reached a stage when they had very few desires left. I remember visiting Pt. Ram Chatur Mallk’s residence in Darbhanga, Ustad Bismillah Khan’s barsati room in Varanasi & Smt. Gangubai Hangal’s little house in Dharwad. The common factor was the simplicity and bare minimum of creature comforts with which they seemed perfectly satisfied. Despite having very little, one did not get the faintest impression that they had missed out on anything in life.

Fahimsahib (as he was endearingly called) lived in a small flat in R.K. Puram. He seemed quite content living there with his Begum Sahiba. He was one of the last great musicians who understood Dhrupad intellectually & through it entered the spiritual domain. He would often say that the characteristics of a great musician was that he would have to process eight channels in parallel and then rise above them. He had to be Swaratmak, Ragatmak, Layaatmak, Taalatmak, Shabdatmak, Varnatmak, Bhavatmak and Rasatmak and also understand that finally Naad was Brahma. In fact he often ended a piece with the words ‘Naad Brahma’. His great father Ustad Rahimuddin Dagar often used to say “Jiska Iman Sacha Uska Swar Sachaa” (“One whose faith is true, his note will be true.”)

Entertainment has become a very big industry taking up a large portion of people’s lives. Even programs that have been developed with the inherent objective of elevating us are either mutating to become more acceptable or dying a slow death. Our classical music & Dhrupad, in particular, is one such casualty. Very few musicians have been able to retain that very special quality of deep introspection reflected through their music & Ustad Fahimuddin Dagar was one of them.

When Ustad Asad Ali Khan passed away a few years ago, it suddenly struck me that future generations would not possibly hear the Rudra Veena played in the majestic ‘Khandarvani’ style, that he had mastered. A legacy passed down through many generations has only one doubtful inheritor. When the tiger was getting extinct the dwindling numbers were carefully recorded & great efforts were & are being made to make sure that our children and their progeny do not miss out on this beautifully evolved animal. However, a treasure chest of our heritage has just disappeared and very little attention is being paid to this fact. It may be argued that Darwin’s theory of evolution would necessitate the birth of new forms emerging from the old. If anything can positively affect even a very small group of people intensely in the present, it has relevance and requires support. The Rudra Veena and many other instruments, and art forms in the country like Dhrupad, Surbahar, Gottuvadyam, Kudiyattam, Biraha, Pandavani and the Patua style ofpainting are fast disappearing, and very little is being done about this fact. Our ancestors, realizing that each human being is unique, designed many roads leading to the same goal. We learn about these great discoveries from our gurus and then choose one or more to find our own way to our goal. Each of our art forms represents a philosophy of life and when one is lost, we lose one road to the top of the inner mountain.

Smt. Kishori Amonkar, the great vocalist said a few years ago, that once a handful of musicians leave us, classical music would not remain the same. Changes come and they should, but once the ‘raison d’ être’ changes then there is a problem. In the past three years, Smt. Gangubai Hangal, Smt. D. K Pattamal, Ustad Ali Akbar Khan, Pt. Bhimsen Joshi, Guru Gangadhar Pradhan, Ustad Asad Ali Khan and many others have passed away with practically no one to replace them. India is definitely progressing. We may become the leading economic, technological, military power by the year 2020, but India may not remain India. Its biggest contribution to humankind is that it has developed different forms of ‘Yog’, different methods of connecting with the inner self. The knowledge & wisdom of these techniques is slowly getting lost. They are either mutating into something with a totally different world view to ensure their survival or are dying a slow death, like the Rudra Veena.

The West has given us so much in the outward tangible domain. Cell phones, internet, cars, planes, air-conditioners etc. due to which our day to day living has been made much easier in the physical domain. The intangible domain, which contributes to making our lives fuller & more meaningful, has been experimented with extensively in this country. However because its results take time to show, belief in the processes suffers in this day and age of instant gratification. The Rudra Veena which is one of the casualties, forms a beautiful part of our classical music which is nothing but ‘Naad Yog’ which is a wonderful method of connecting with the within, to reach a goal which is abstract, subtle, inspiring and mystical.

It is much easier to see the deforestation taking place all around us, but much more difficult to be able to realize the inner blindness which is taking over society at large.