Benaras Standard Time: The film

The lines in his diary were crisp. He would never have imagined he would experience the worst 10 days of his life. 1st February to 11th February. He would never imagine he would see his brother disappear into the wildernests of a God-foresaken dream. A cosmic interruption. B came to Benaras for the first time on a wintery February. An emergency phonecall brought him to the oldest living city in the world where his brother, P, had apparently "gone mad". N, B's cousins friend, called him and told him something had gone "wrong". Initially, the plan was to visit Benaras end February but this phonecall changed that. He took the first flight out and booked a room in the Taj.

Prior to this, P spoke of his supernatural experiences in Benaras, of his marriage to Ganga, of a Valentines day super-wedding on a boat drifing along the Ganges, of bringing Thermal and a Quarter to Benaras to perform at a derelict mosque, of the strange connections to nature's ways, of birds and animals now coming together to form a spiraling circle into his own mind, of movement within Shiva's third eye, of brushing off negative vibrations...of, of, of. P experienced a shift in his consciousness on Republic day, 26th of January 2011. That day "Sheila Ki Jawani" was blasting everywhere through broken speakers, everyone was rejoicing, there were fireworks in the sky. That was the evening Dara Okat was born. P introduced himself as Dara Okat to everyone and welcomed his friends to Hinterland. Among his friends at Shiv-Ganga lodge, there was Cusack, an Irish guitarist, Jona, a young spanish Kurt Cobain wannabe, a yoga expert (also a tabla player), and a french Dhrupad singer and watercolour painter. Cusack came out of his room with a broom feeling the vibrations of an evening where something was happening. That night P cried. All night. His pillow was full of tears. Brownie, his pet Nepali dog, lay next to him but P had a feeling that everything would turn around like Brownie turning ferocious, pretty women morphing into ugly men, etc etc. He even tried his hand at the Sarod but it sounded off-key. The Dhrupad singer coughed all night. There was a bunch of pundits singing "Mahadeva" in a nearby temple. They welcomed the entry of Shiva into Benaras. P was Shiva. But he had to make it through this horrible night. Somehow he made it alive through the night. The next four days were the beginning of something new. Everything seemed fresh. Reverse-perception. There was light everywhere. P could almost float. He lived on the sun's energy, squinting his eyes into the harsh 11 am morning light. Eating only hummus and pita bread, he made it through the days with fake Ray Ban aviators and flip flops. He walked everywhere, took cycle rickshaws and spread the word of Shiva. He introduced himself to a select few as Master Mahadev. Sometimes he was P.

N arrived on the 29th of January. By this time, P had transformed totally into an urban Radiohead-listening Shiva. He walked constantly. He slept only four hours a day. His brain was lit up like a thousand Diwali lights on the Ganga. His mind flowered into a liquid state. He wished everyone Happy New Second as he felt that every second there was something new happening. It had to be grasped. It had to be related to. When he returned to his room that evening, he didn't even notice the presence of N through his sunglasses. She felt a strangeness in his aura. She called B the very next day and asked him to book the next flight to Benaras.

When B arrived, P didn't even visit him or pick him up from the airport. He made B take the trip right up to Shiv-Ganga lodge in Shivala Ghat. The first glimpse was terrifying. P was shabbily dressed, he wasn't wearing slippers and there were cows and goats around him as he held Brownie in his arms. He wore his classic Ray-Bans and gave B a hug. B didn't know how to react. This was the beginning of an unforgettable journey into the mind.

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B first looked for N. She was out with Jona. When they arrived back at Shiv-Ganga, they all went and sat on the terrace as P lay on the swing staring at the sun. Everyone was concerned. B didn't know what to do. Uncertainty and impermanence loomed. P spoke in circles, he wanted to change the world. He felt he had the power in his 100hands to hold onto the sun. He told B there is a lot of restoration and architecture work in Benaras. He told B that the old forts, the derelict mosques needed to be occupied with P's friends and family. B told him everyone was concerned to which P replied saying it was him that was concerned...he asked B to look carefully at everything that was happening. There were signs and signals everywhere. Change was inevitable. There was disturbance in the air. B was confused. How was he to come to some sort of resolution in this situation.

P walked everywhere in his flip flops. Sometimes he was barefoot. His right foot had a powerful hit to the ground. He felt he was Hanuman sometimes with so much power in his hands and legs. He drank Banana Lassi and ate only Hummus (an Israeli dish made of chickpeas). He wore different shades of sunglasses, sometimes red, sometimes blue. Few days later, G, a friend of P's landed in Benaras. B needed the help of close friends to bring this dilemma to some sort of standstill. G was also going to be part of a mad rollercoaster ride in Shiva-city. The three of them woke up everyday at 5 to welcome the sun. P had the local pundit at the ghat smear turmeric on his forehead every morning. With his aviators and red lungi, P looked like he had landed from Tarapith - he was slowly transforming into a modern-day Aghori. For the outsiders and the locals, it looked very scary. Many people thought he was mad. P related everything to himself. He felt that everyone was waiting for a sign from him to be exalted into paradise.

The people at Shiv-Ganga also told B to take him back to Bangalore and get him treated. But P had no intention of leaving Benaras. He wanted to die there. He lived every moment in the power of the city. Wherever he walked temple bells would go off and he would relate that back to his presence. Wherever he walked there were cows waiting to greet him. He would feed them vegetables and advice vegetable-sellers to give freely. He distributed 500 rupee notes to the needy. He bought expensive incense sticks and kept them in his pocket to give to Saddhu's. He felt he had evolved into the next stage of man. It was his ascent to a higher form. He wanted to dissolve the physical human form and become water...a pure consciousness with no form. B noted everything in his diary. These were going to be unforgettable days.

But how was he going to get P to return to Bangalore?