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Content Tip |
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Children's
Story Writing is a good creative outlet and can be used to
inspire others. |
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Cobra Village
Original
name of the village was Sunder Gaon or the beautiful village on
account of its situation where it was set in a countryside surrounded by a
pretty panorama of land and hills. Its population consists of about six
thousands souls and their mainstay is farming and when the monsoon season
arrives, the wetness takes over every nook and corner of the landscape. It
is a time for planting rice, which is the staple food of the inhabitants.
The greenery then takes over with miles and miles of paddy fields covering
the long stretches of countryside with men and women in muddy fields
planting the stalks of the crop. Some transplant the seedlings with a
definite plan when the insert is pushed up to three centimeters into the
soil and the rows at definite distance. The others do the transplants at
random distances. Most plant it during rainy season as it increases the
surrounding vegetation for mutual shading of the growing plants.
While wading through the deep mud, some people come across other small
creatures, usually the crawling ones like worms or other creatures like
snakes that are usually trying to find a higher ground for dry spots of
uplands of the village from the flooded lowlands. The planters are bound
to step on these creatures unknowingly and during the years there has been
fatalities from snakebites but not many as majority of theses creatures
are of non-poisonous type but when bitten a person is jolted into a shock
and panic whatever type the snake may be. There is a hospital few miles
away which keep the antidote serum and one is lucky to reach it, when the
fatality can be cured.
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Some years back the crops
began to fail either due to lack of seasonal rains or decrease of yield
from the paddy fields and most people could not account for that sudden
change. There has been droughts before but were offset with adequate
monsoon the following years but it was difficult to pinpoint the reduction
in yields from the harvests so regularly. The priest performed some
rituals for enhanced yields but without much success. They consulted other
specialist in the farming industry but no one could explain the reason for
it. Villagers put extra labours and hard work into their fields and then
left the whole thing in the wills of gods as they have done whatever they
could do.
Then the rains came with a vengeance and it rained perpetually for four
days without any stop. All the land around the village was flooded and so
were the low-lying surroundings villages. It did not do much damage to
Sunder Gaon due to its elevated position in the district.
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The villagers observed
that besides people coming from the adjacent districts to take shelter
on the higher grounds of their village, there were other creatures
too, doing the same thing. There were snakes too seeking shelter in
the village by swimming through the floodwaters.
On the first day of
such happenings, people sighted about half a dozen of these creatures
but soon their numbers began to increase to the dread of the villagers
who tried to lock themselves behind their doors and watched the
panorama through the windows or through chinks of their wooden doors.
The strange thing that they noticed was that the army of snakes kept
themselves to a piece of a plot outside the village and did not move
into the vicinity of village where most people were inhabiting. In
order to discuss any further action they decided to have a meeting in
the village temple. They discussed all the options opened to them.
Firstly to leave the snakes alone but there were many flaws with this
proposition. Suppose their numbers even increased to some enormous
proportion? They would take over the village and then the villagers
had to leave their land and this was impossible to envisage. They
could not leave the village as they depended on their lands and farms
to make a living and they could not simply be driven out by those
lowly creatures. They had to take a firmer action and a united stand,
they had to either kill them or drive them back to the territories
where they had come from.
Before mapping out their strategy they observed the creatures from a
safe distance. There were creatures of all sizes and colours. The
majority were the king cobras but others were there including rat
snakes who lived mostly on catching the rats of which there were
plenty in the village and the fields. They would be useful in
protecting their crops from the vermin. There were so many other
varieties and they called a snake expert to identify those.
The expert identified numerious varieties both poisnous and non-
poisnous. He explained that most of these were king cobras. Most of
these are near sighted creatures and are all colour blind and do not
have eye lids to cover their eyes. They can smell pretty well by their
sensitive tongues but not much by their nostrils. The tongue normally
picks up the odour molecules. There were few pythons and pit vipers
too and these have sensing pits, which can help them to detect and
catch t warm-blooded animals like rodents and birds even in complete
darkness
Dog-faced water snakes could catch and swallow fish and other marine
creatures. When they come on the land, their movements were rapid and
so sometime are called 'side winders.' People were anxious to know how
the venomous snake kill their victims and the expert explained that
their venom is not composed of a single substance but was toxic saliva
made up of a mixture of chemical enzymes. Their victims attacked in
two ways
Through blood toxin, which attacks the blood circulatory system
damaging muscle tissues and causing excessive scarring and gangrene,
which may result in amputation of a limb. |
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The poison attacked the
central nervous system too resulting in heart failure, breathing
difficulties and eventually to respiratory paralysis. The death then
occurred due to collapse of the whole bodily system. At this time, the
chief priest intervened and put forward reasons for not killing the
creatures. He directed the audience to ancient mythological scriptures
where the serpent has been a symbol of the flow of energy in human body as
in kundilini yoga where the serpent power lies coiled at the lowest charka
or energy center of the body and when it is awakened and made to travel
upwards through earth, water, heat, air and space charka and when comes to
eye center where yogi can control its flow to master the lower charka and
becomes controller of all the material reality and further when this
female force Paravati meets its consort Shiva residing in brain charka, a
yogi can tastes enlightenment.
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Furthermore ancient Indian
sculpture depicted union of Naga and Nagini as a significant metaphysical
force of universe as in the creative union of male and female forces.
Further example of such visual arts being Lord Vishnu riding in a snake
vehicle and seven hooded cobra protecting Jina in his meditation. During
the festival of Nag Panchmi the snakes are revered -cobras are trapped,
worshipped, fed with rats and then set free. Due to its intrinsic power
the snake is both revered and reviled. Krishna has to battle with a king
snake to subdue its power and sometime is depicted in a blue coloured body
as a result of snake poison.
The people heeded the
pleas of the priest and asked him how they could win the co-operation of
the snakes for their benefits as otherwise they have to get rid of all
those creeping creatures. The priest thought about it but stated he could
not give an answer straight away and the matter needs to be thought over
and he would have a plan ready in two days time. The people agreed as most
of them were inclined, to abhorrence of killing any living creatures
however revile they might have looked in appearance.
They gathered in village hall again to listen to the priest again. He
needed to perform a ritualistic ceremony to charm the snakes, as not to
bite people or use their venom against any of the village inhabitant.
Recitation of simple mantras would not do, he had to organize some
dramatic and theatrical performance. In the meantime people saw that the
snakes were getting lethargic and there was a lack of movements among them
and people
concluded that the creatures were getting weaker on account of lack of
food and the women of the village took jugs of milk and earthen pots near
that place in order to save them. They poured milk into those pots and
waited further whether anything happened. To the amazement of people the
snakes began to move towards it attracted by the prospects of food and
sensing the milk due through their acute sense of smell and people were
happy that they done a good deed by dint of saving a few snake which
otherwise might have died due to hunger. Children were especially
entertained by that strange spectacle and imitated their crawling
movements in the village streets to the amusements of the adults.
The priest recruited some dancing girls and separas or the snake charmers
for the performance and scheduled it for certain day. The villagers began
to tempt the snakes by placing the food in and around the temple and they
succeeded so and when any snake strayed into the people's home, they
chased it to the temple by show of raised sticks and other threatening
gestures. In that way the snakes began to be trained by spoken words and
gestures just like a dog gets trained by its owner.
The performance took place one afternoon in the temple. The dancing girls
were dressed like snakes in their stripped costumes, as snake goddesses,
with hoods on their heads and when people thronged to the hall and sat
there the snakes were invited too by putting saucers of milk around the
stage. Few guards stood with their sticks ready in case of any mishap and
then the show began. The separas came with their beens or musical pipes
made of dried bottle gourd plant and started an orchestra of their
especially composed tunes. They were dressed in saffron robes and made an
impressive scene. The dancing girls began to dance first in slow movements
putting a spell on the snakes and with the snake charmers movements and
music; the creatures were impressed and came under a sort of spell. The
cobras stood with their hoods erect and danced to the music too, swaying
with the movements. The people in the hall were spell bound too, with the
misty evening sunrays filtering through the windows. That impressive show
lasted for sometime.
*
Things changed for the better in the village and that year there was an
abundant yield from the v crops and since than every year in and out, it
has not diminished and people are becoming prosperious and most of them
attribute it to the presence of snakes amidst them. More snakes have come
to stay and now there are nearly three thousand of them or one snake for
two of the inhabitants. The creatures have learnt to keep away at arms
length from people. In the morning they go to houses for their daily
breakfast and are fed by the woman folk. Most people have become used to
their sight and are not alarmed accept the strangers or the travelers to
the village.
Recently the village was accorded with a certificate for preserving the
wild life of the district and also got mentioned in all the
prestigious publications.
Durlabh Singh© 2008.
Contributing
Story Teller
Durlab Singh
durlabhsingh@hotmail.com
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