Bhoomi Puja

Commenting on the news item that a chief minister performed the Bhoomi Puja at a proposed international airport site, a friend remarked that it was an anachronistic act. Commencing a project for which cutting edge technology was central with an ancient religious tradition, he argued, was highly inappropriate.

From a purely material and 8220;rational8221; viewpoint perhaps, his observation is not refutable. However, if one were to take a more holistic view, there is much to be said in favour of the ancient practice. Bhoomi Puja essentially is worship of the Bhoomi or the Earth on which work is to commence. All ancient spiritual traditions have considered man as an integral part of nature. Living in the virgin lands and forever having to face the challenges of nature, primitive man had no doubts that his destiny was firmly linked to the elements around him. Our own ancient religious beliefs go a step further in declaring that the all-encompassing Divine is manifest in all and every aspect of the Earth and that humans, though at the top of the evolutionary pyramid, are part of Earth8217;s many forms. The five components of Nature namely, Earth, Sky, Air, Water and Fire are manifest in all forms of life, flora and fauna. All are bound to each other, within the rhythm of Nature. Significantly, modern environmental gurus echo an identical sentiment!

The worship of the Earth and the various unseen forces present in the space enveloping the construction site is but an extension of this underlying principle. If a 8220;May I?8221; reflects 8220;good breeding8221;, the Bhoomi Puja, where you respectfully seek Mother Earth8217;s permission to work on her, certainly ranks as 8220;good culture8221;! Not just that, it also offers an apology to the various insects and other creatures that live on the land. So the prayer is also to these apparently insignificant and powerless creatures that are humbly requested to bear with the inconvenience of migrating!

In the Vaastu Puja that8217;s often included in the Bhoomi Puja, one acknowledges the powers in the various directions that are not perceived by our senses. Irrespective of whether or not one believes in the existence of such powers, it is a moment of humility that admits the truth that man is open to myriads of influences that he has no control over. On the face of it, all of the above actions may seem nothing more than a ritual charade. Yet they carry a profound wisdom that man, precisely because he is at the top of the pyramid, is vulnerable to any instability that may happen at the base and the base on which the evolutionary pyramid stands.