Page 50 - Seniorstoday January 2022 Issue

Saraswati river. Lord Ganesh laid down a
Scenic valley on way to Govind Dham
to a very seldom referred Prayag – Keshav
Prayag where the Alaknanda meets the
mythical Saraswati. The massive mountains
Nar Parvat, Narayan Parvat and of course the
conical Neelkanth peak take centre stage.
Legend has it that after the battle of
Mahabharat, the Pandavs were so morose
and saddened by the large scale loss of lives
and destruction that they decided to repent
and leave the worldly life. In order to atone
for their sins they came to the Himalayas in
search of Satopanth – the place where the
holy trinity sit to meditate. To reach the lake
and the Swargrohini, Bhim had to make a
makeshift bridge over the river at the prayag
which is known as “Bhim pul”. It is here that
the Saraswati river just goes underground
and does not emerge again. An interesting
story goes that Lord Brahma asked Ved Vyas
to narrate the Mahabharata for posterity
and asked Lord Ganesh to write it which he
narrated the entire epic. The place chosen
was a cave on the banks of the fast flowing
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condition that once the sage Ved Vyas starts to
narrate, it should be without any breaks. Ved
Vyas too decided to lay down a condition for
Lord Ganesh – which was that each and every
word / shlok he recited would have to be first
understood and the only written. Ved Vyas
started narrating very difficult sholks (he is
said to have narrated 60000 such shlokas)
which Lord Ganesh was understanding
with some difficulty. Due to the noise of the
fast flowing river and the difficult non-stop
recitation, Lord Ganesh found it difficult to
hear it and time and again ask the river to
quieten down. As the river did not accede to
his request, he decided to curse the river that it
would just vanish right there. That is why the
river just disappears without a trace!
Early next morning while driving past the
Badrinath temple, we saw a sight which will
remain etched in my mind forever – in a small
opening in the clouds covering the Neelkant
peak, the very peak just emerged and looked
so ethereal and beautiful that the entire trip
became worth it.
The return was through Srinagar and Pauri.
The early morning breakfast stop at Pauri
for chai and bun-omelette seemed like a
gourmet meal. Landsdown was unusually
quiet for this time of the year and by the time
we arrived back in the plains it was very hot
and one wanted to just head back into the cool
mountains again.
Short of Joshimath