Have We Lost Those "Saperas" of Blissful "Saawan"?

The seasonal changes in India are so distinct and well-marked that we develop our special likings for special seasons. Every season has it charm and beauty. When after the scorching summer of May and June we get to see dark clouds piling up at the horizon, the heart at once yearns for the rainy season to come in pouring over fields and plains and drench us all over.

Like many, I too, love Saawan, the rainy season. The earth takes on a new look and the beauty is such that poets create their best poems in this season. Yes indeed, it is beautiful, but I am no poet and nor do I get poetic in the season. My impression of this season is very different and I can say I look at this beautiful dark clouded season with a bit of aversion and fear.

I have grown up in the outskirts of the city, were grass plains adorned our sprawling bungalow. Lush green lawns made it a pleasing sight to see all year. With the rainy season it would become a tough task keeping this well pruned lawn under check and often the lawns and garden were over grown with tall grass covering everything and this for me became a source of constant terror , for often we would shriek at the sight of a glistening slithering reptile slipping away---a snake !!!

Snakes and rainy season go together for me. The jhoolas of saawan never made me happy....as for me, all that was fully shrouded by fear of snakes and snakes.In our times rainy season and snake charmers went, almost, hand in hand.

Snake charmers were seen almost everywhere, that was their money minting season.
Every region of India has its typical name for this man, donning a colourful heavy turban and flowing kurtas, cane baskets tightly closed hanging on either sides of a wooden fat stick which in turn would be balanced on his shoulders, roaming the streets playing their flute...the 'been'. Some called him Kalibelias, some Joginaths, some Irulus and common to all, was the name saperas and some places called them ojhaas. It was an interesting cluster of elders and youngers, when the sapera would be called in, and after a bit of higgling and haggling on the the payment, he would sit down to open his baskets one by one, letting out his valuable collection of cobras, pythons,scorpions and the like, while his "been" would be playing that popular note of the film then most popular, "Nagin". It would be thirty minute show, we would sit hypnotised watching it all---the sapera would take his earnings and move off to other streets..his sweet melody from the "been" slowly fading with the distance.This was a full time profession then, their livelihood and families thrived on his earnings from these petty displays of these reptiles.Apart from this, they were often called in emergency when anyone would be stung by a snake...by the sincerity of their clan they would almost immediately reach the spot and amid amazed crowds of people, he would recite mantras and blow his "been", the snake would come in slithering to the victim lying almost dead, and suck out the poison from the spots where it had stung and poured in his venom. These were stories we had heard in our growing years, but with the passage of time these interesting anecdotes got lost, lost too were the sight of saperas in the streets in the rainy seasons.Their thriving business dwindled down to almost complete eradication. Major reasons for this extinction was the coming in of the TV,nature documentaries which extinguished the fear and mystery of the wild and extensive deforestation all over has made the existence and spotting of snakes very rare. Today's children will hardly get to know the mystified magic the snake charmers created in the dark clouded rainy season, our saawan. But I feel myself fortunate to have lived in those times when snake charmers were given so much importance and were so much needed at many critical moments.

I remember one incident, which in today's life can be labeled as unbelievable or impossible, but I have seen it, hence it stands as a true incident for me , which till date sends a chill down my spine. It was Panna, a small city then, in Madhya pradesh...not well developed....mostly forests full of wild animals and reptiles. One evening, while it was raining, we children sat on a mat in our courtyard---"aangan" playing a hilarious game of Ludo. Suddenly, my cousin screamed out looking at a long crack along the side of the floor and before the scene changed we saw a black slippery shiny tail vanish into the crack. We all saw it, so there was no scope of blaming my cousin that she had imagined, At once, we as if got charged up, sprang to our feet with shrieks and screams that brought out all elders to see the cause of the uproar . It became a terror for all, the snake was inside the crack and the crack was all along the side of the courtyard---where had it disappeared was the cause of all the screams and questions. Each one had to say his version, all stood wide-eyed gaping at the crack not knowing how to get the snake out. In the confusion someone was sent to call the ojha.. the sapera.Each one there seemed to know every detail of the crack....where it led to, where did it open out. At last came our 'know-it-all' Kallu, the Man Friday for all of us.With a hurried serious expression he dispersed our panic stricken little crowd, and then what he did was a lesson I learnt for life. He took a thin stick and a small rag which he tightly cupped around one end of the stick, soaked it in kerosene oil and set it on fire and then waited for the fire to extinguish. We too waited, hardly daring to breathe, hearts almost not beating , waiting to see what would Kallu do next. As soon as the fire died out and black thick smoke rose from the burnt rag, Kallu thrust that whole end into the crack. He thrust it so well that we could see nothing of the smoke anymore. Thin streaks of black fumes started coming out from various curves of the crack and with each streak we felt
that it was the snake. After a few minutes kallu pulled out the stick and moved away; asking all of us to move away too. We could not follow what was to happen, and then suddenly, as if by magic,from the crack that was oozing out smoke, shot out a black shiny cobra straight out of the crack at a height and then fell with a whipping slash on the cemented floor and slithered like lightening on the ground. Our screams and shrieks knew no bounds at the sight before us. It was helter skelter with all of us as Kallu tried to push the reptile out of the courtyard.
At this juncture came in the expert ojha. His appearance, itself, deepened the fear and mystery of this reptile still slithering on the floor. The ojha with a voice of authority asked all of us to move away, we should not be in the vision of the cobra he said. We, like meek obedient pupils, at once went off to take a safe place inside, behind doors and windows, kept a bit ajar to let us see the show that was to build up in the aangan. The sapera , then, with tremendous speed opened his bag of dirty linen, took out his "been" and an earthern round pot that was tightly covered with a piece of cloth. The snake was still there, trying to find a place to disappear.

Then started the sapera's mantras, chanting loudly, in a varied series of shrill volumes..... sometimes low and sometimes almost near to a shriek, holding the pot in which he had now made a small opening at one end.
It was as if some magic flew out from his loud mantras, we could not believe what was happening before our eyes. Slowly the electrifying slithering of the snake slowed down. It swayed slowly as if charmed by some potion and in its slow meandering movement it began to move towards the pot. The mantras became louder and louder as the reptile kept nearing the pot---and as it reached the pot, the sapera tilted the opening towards the snake. Gone was the swift lightening like slithers of the reptile, it moved slowy as if drugged heavily and unbelievably, before our eyes, it just slowly slipped into the earthern pot. As soon as the tail vanished inside, the ojha swiftly took up the pot and immediately secured the opening tightly around the neck of the container. His mantras stopped at once . We, too, as if broke out of our trance of fear and awe, stepped out of our rooms and looked with chilling fear at the tightly secured pot.

My grandmother went ahead to pay the sapera, but he refused to take anything, as by their profession they should not take any cash in return for such acts. Grandmother gave him some rice and flour to last for a few days. She asked him what would he do with the pot ---he touched the container to his forehead to show his reverence for the reptile and said he would throw the pot in the jungle--" we cannot kill him, he is our source of livelihood".saying this he collected his belongings and the pot and moved out, while, we still in fear, saw him mingle into the forest.

Where have such saperas gone? Will our children ever get to see such shows of live magic--nothing hidden or tricked , just in front of our eyes. We have lost all this in our march to prosperity in modern life. The forests,the greenery, the unknown thrill of the wild , the mysterious charm shrouding the saperas have all been lost forever. Saawans no longer can hear those lilting eerie music of the "beens" of saperas in the streets in the rainy seasons...good or bad is for you to decide---but my childhood cherishes the memories of those days of saawan.