The rising sun breaks through the hovering mist over the Ganga, the diffused light lending a delicate, gauzy feel to the morning scenes in Ramnagar. People gather in large groups under a sky bathed in pink and orange hues. There's a buzz in the air as people prepare to attend the day's episode of Ramlila.
Located about 23 km from Varanasi, Ramnagar is known for its unique Ramlila festival, which is more than 200 years old.
While Ramlila (literally 'Rama's play') is held in many places in India, the Ramnagar one is rather special. Tagged an intangible heritage of India by UNESCO in 2004, this month-long enactment resembles a veritable people's theatre. It combines elements of folk plays and rituals with the feel of a fair and a pilgrimage.
Patronized by Kashi Naresh (the king or maharaja of Kashi), the Ramlila begins on Ananta Chaturdashi evening (the last day of the 10-day-long Ganesh Utsav) and concludes on a full moon night a month later.
This 200-year-old Ramlila is unique because it is not enacted on one stage; the actors (known as swaroops) move from one location to another, with the spectators following in their wake. Much of the original feel remains intact even today; loudspeakers or electricity aren't used.
Different venues are chosen for each scene—Ayodhya, Lanka, the swayamvara, and battlegrounds. The settings representing important places in the Ramayana, such as Panchavati, Ayodhya, Chitrakoot, and Lanka, were mostly built in the mid-19th century.
The enactments start early in the morning and continue till 9 pm, with a break for sandhya (evening) puja. The Kashi Naresh declares the day's proceedings open. As he arrives, the crowds chant Har Har Mahadev. The swaroops, all male children between 10 to 14, look arresting with sandalwood markings on their bodies and costumes with sequins and sparkling stones. These children remain in character throughout the month and are not addressed by their real names during this time. But having a cast made up entirely of minors has its share of complications; in 2018, a day's performance had to be canceled as four swaroops came down with diarrhea.
"Today is a very special lila," said Kunvar Ishan of the Benares royal family. "It is the day of the Dhanush Yagya when the people of Benaras will wear special clothes. Some will carry staffs; others may sport headgear with embellishments, like a kalangi. Elaborate stages have been created for the scene where Ramji breaks the dhanush.
The audience members are called niyamis, who have to participate in a daily ritual where they take a dip in the Ganga, wear new clothes, and carry a staff with intricate adornments. The tale of Ram is narrated twice at Ramnagar. It is told through the recitation of Ramcharitmanas by the Ramayanis (narrators with a deep knowledge of the Ramayana) and the samvad (dialogues) spoken by performers. The samvad was written in the 19th century to deconstruct the complex language of the Ramcharitmanas into a more accessible, spoken language for the people. The Ramayanis chant the Ramcharitmanas before the actors narrate the samvad. The Ramayanis sit close to the Kashi Naresh, the principal audience for the Ramcharitmanas. Much like the settings of each scene, the costumes, props, and accessories change with the story's progress. It is common for people in the audience to wear specific clothes and accessories to signify the part of the Ramlila that would be enacted on a particular day.
"For instance, on the day of nakkatiya (when Lakshman cuts off Surpanakha's nose), some people from the royal family would wear a kalangi. The mount of the elephants would be silver," he said.
The Ramnagar Ramlila has been documented by several writers, academics, and documentary filmmakers. Among them is theatre pioneer Richard Schechner's book Performative Circumstances, from the Avant Garde to Ramlila.
Schechner first visited Ramnagar in 1976, and the first performance he attended was the episode where Vishwamitra took Ram away to the forest. He remembers being bowled over by the Ramlila's simplicity, beauty, and devotion. He later recounted in an interview that he had connected it to two other kinds of theatres—the medieval theatre of Europe (Passion Plays) and the experimental theatre being done in America. Schechner called the Ramnagar Ramlila an "extraordinary time-space-narrative."
He recounts the journeys made by people who came to watch the play every day from Varanasi, crossing the Ganga, "away from the westward declining sun and toward the brightly illuminated face of the Fort."
He remembers seeing 75 boats work the river on one journey he made after the day's play was over. "I realize that this accounts for only 2,250 persons, and sometimes the crowds were closer to 50,000... Clearly, many people walked home... Be that as it may, the crossing to and from Ramnagar constitutes a big part of the experience of the Lila itself. For the Ganga is no ordinary river. Crossing it puts one in touch with a great life-stream.
The relentless march of urbanization and modernization has inevitably impacted Ramnagar's Ramlila. "Earlier, you could walk with Ram, Sita, and Lakshman through a real forest with trees, the leaf-strewn path under your feet. It felt real, like you were in the van (forest) with them. Now there are these tall buildings around, and very few trees," rues Kunwar Ishan, as he explains the importance of this community festival and the connection between actor and audience. "This town has so much artificial lighting everywhere now. In my childhood, the play's scenes would be lit by petromax lanterns or flares. That had a magical vibe."
He talks about the incessant noise of traffic, which drowns out the samvad. "We do not use microphones and loudspeakers, and the honking of the cars makes it difficult to hear anything. The modern world is eroding the uniqueness of the Ramlila here."
Photography used to be strictly prohibited, but now the omnipresent camera phones have arrived on the scene. As the old Ramnagar, with its trees and green spaces as the backdrop for the play, slowly gets erased, and new buildings and cityscapes take over, one wonders, "Will this unique Ramlila also fade away?" For many, the Ramlila is not just an essential part of Ramnagar; it also embodies the spirit of Varanasi and Kashi. As Schechner says, "In seeing Ramlila, I not only experienced Varanasi, but I came to understand Kashi."
