Cosmic Bluff

An obscure corridor on the first floor of Delhi’s Select Citywalk,usually the most neglected area in India’s most buzzing mall,was bustling with activity this past weekend. The mall was holding its first Astrology Fair with very interesting sounding stalls: palmistry,numerology,kundli-making,tarot reading,reiki,meditation and vaastu vigyan. Pundits in traditional attire stood behind the stalls,while a crystal healer,covered in gem stones,urged passers-by to stop for consultation. One of the stalls was selling a variety of salts for bone aches and good luck. There was another that claimed to cure depression and anxiety. Needless to say,many shoppers were transfixed,moving around in a trance-like state,at the happy sight of an endless supply of soothsayers and fortune-tellers. A manager from Select Citywalk tells me that they’ve been holding a flea market in the same corridor every Wednesday for the last three years,and the most successful stall in the flea was the tarot card reader who would easily hold around 30-50 consultations in a five-hour span.

“We thought why not get a variety of faith healers together for our shoppers?” says Harpreet Suri,the PRO of the mall. Why not indeed? A study in the UK some years ago suggested that 50-60 per cent of newspaper readers religiously read horoscopes. I read my own in three different papers every single day. No matter how far we progress in science and technology,ideas that positions of constellations and the date of birth can play a significant role in determining our future is the kind of stuff that people continue to believe in. Reading horoscopes is still harmless timepass that doesn’t cost anything. But I’m constantly amazed at how some of the smartest people I know attach so much importance to some pundit’s half-baked prediction that will only become relevant two decades later.

According to astrology,even the most random and insignificant event happens for a reason. We humans are not separate but part of a chain,in rhythmic harmony with the universe. How this explanation translates in to someone which can predict your future,I’m not quite sure. But anyone who’s been to an astrologer knows they have perfected the art of talking in circles and telling you non-specific,irrelevant things about yourself. They give you a vague but convincing opinion after consulting some undecipherable diagrams,appear to speak knowledgeably about quadrants,ascension charts and mumbo jumbo that the rest of us know nothing about,so are more likely to believe. No astrologer has been known to commit to statements such as “you will get married on so and so day,in so and so year”. Yet,a magnetic force draws some of us to them,more so when the future is looking bleak. Think about an encounter with an astrologer: he holds your hand,looks you in the eye,and tells you flattering things about yourself,or at the very least,that everything’s going to be just fine. Even if the mysterious forces in the universe are not conspiring to sort out your life,his reassuring words do.

Astrology is bigger than ever. There are horoscope and tarot shows on channels. Spiritual channels air shows that predict your future. Even Simi Garewal’s India’s Most Desirable has a tarot card reader. Astrology fairs also,it turns out,are not all that uncommon. The annual trade fair at Delhi’s Pragati Maidan last year had a special pavilion,Mystic World,devoted to spirituality and other alternative therapies that raked in profits. Everyone needs help in figuring out life’s up and downs and it can be an amusing crutch,provided one doesn’t take it too seriously.

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