It’s okay to party

Yet another batch of students has successfully crossed the great big barrier of Class XII. One major chapter in their lives is over, and the...

Yet another batch of students has successfully crossed the great big barrier of Class XII. One major chapter in their lives is over, and the next big one of college education is to begin. It is time to destress. And students, irrespective of their performance in the exams, know only too well how that’s done. Slouch in the couch till late into the night, stay in bed till lunchtime, curl up with the phone, look up friends. The only time stress shows on their foreheads is when an exasperated parent suggests a modification in the routine. Pat comes the impatient reply: “I have been through the grind for four years. Can’t I relax, even now?”

It is interesting to note the middle-class hang-up about fun. Grown-ups should be serious and responsible. The right to merriment belongs to the young. Who laid down this rule? I have no idea. But since all of society’s hang-ups can generally be traced to religion, I had assumed that “fun is sin” is also a judgement from our scriptures.

Till I came by evidence that it is not. An interesting incident is recounted in the Sundara Kandam of Valmiki’s Ramayana. A group of eminent monkeys, including Angada, the crown prince, Hanuman and Jambavan, has set off in the southern direction in search of Sita. They camp by the coast while Hanuman alone leaps across the ocean to search out Rama’s spouse. After days of anxious wait, Hanuman returns with news of Sita’s discovery. The jubilant monkeys leap from tree to tree, eager to get back and convey the good news to Sugreeva and Rama. En route they come by a beautiful forest garden, the Madhuvana, or the honey grove. The garden is a prized property of the monkey king. But Angada permits them to enter the garden and have their fill. The monkeys go wild at this concession and soon all of them, including Hanuman and the prince, are drunk silly on the sweet syrup. Unable to control the mob, the garden keeper reports the matter to the king, Sugreeva. But Sugreeva is pleased. He figures his responsible generals must have permitted the indulgence to celebrate the mission’s success.

This episode from the epic, where a riotous celebration is sanctioned or perhaps even considered a necessary de-stressing exercise, shows that our ancestors were not at all puritans who frowned upon all merriment.

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