Faith plays an integral role in making teams work. Faith is an important part of leadership lessons. These lessons include some brilliant nuggets on faith in oneself, in each other, and in the team, but the scientifically inclined management fraternity shies away from accepting that faith in the one who controls the universe is also an important part of leadership success. Probably because our belief systems link faith with religion, and religion is something to be practised privately. But the recent case of the 41 miners trapped in a tunnel in Uttarakhand should encourage conversations around the need for faith in God.
In the fear of being called unscientific, while covering the Silkyara rescue operations of the 41 miners trapped in the tunnel, a lot of news agencies mentioned the prayers offered to local deity Baba Bokh Naag only when the pictures of Arnold Dix, a global tunnelling specialist, praying to him, took social media by storm. Here, we had a white man from a technical and skill-based industry share his views about the failing operations and their subsequent success with such beauty as to suggest his belief in the power of the universe and the forces beyond our understanding.
But this deep-rooted faith is something that is genetic to those from the hills of Uttarakhand. And probably the reason that even with the hills facing adversities and some of the biggest natural (and man-made) calamities, its people live by their conviction and faith to see through them. It is this faith that allows them to strive and survive through the toughest of terrains and situations, sometimes threatening their very existence.
Many people take a sceptical view of the faith local people in the hills show in their devi, devatas, who they believe are jagrit (living) and own a place, but it is so ingrained that when the government removed this ancient temple of historic significance of Baba Bokh Naag to construct the tunnel, the villagers, with their local priest, advised them to commit to making a temple for him at the same place next to the tunnel, to ensure its safety and successful completion. They believed that without Baba’s permission, who is considered to be the lord of the hills, no such drilling or cutting of a tunnel into the hills would be possible.
Coincidentally, as we may like to put it, it’s only after offering prayers and committing to constructing the Baba Bokh Naag temple that the operations for 17 days were successfully concluded, bringing the miners out. Of course, there was a huge team of government officials, Army and Air Force personnel, mining experts, and especially skilled rat miners who eventually saw this through, but not without the blessings of Baba Bokh Naag.
Baba Bokh Naag, as the legend goes, is believed to be the lord of the hills and an incarnation of Lord Shiva. He is said to have appeared as Basagi Naag in Silkyara. Silkyara is a place in Kafnaul, Uttarkashi, in the hills of the Garhwal side of Uttarakhand, and the Bokh Naag temple is situated right in the middle of the rivers — Ganga and Yamuna.
It is believed that this is the place where Shri Krishna stopped over for peace and tranquillity before heading to Sem Mukhem temple in Tehri after the war of the Mahabharata concluded. It is through playing his flute that he invoked the Naag devta, and therefore the name Basuriya Naag, Basagi Naag, or Bokh Naag. Every alternate year since time immemorial, there have been fairs held at this place to celebrate Shri Krishna’s stay here.
Every village in Uttarakhand may have its own local deities, which are the incarnations of Shiva, Bhagwati, and Vishnu as the protectors of the community, the ‘kul’ or the village, every village also has a Nagaraja temple as the protector of the hills that surround it. Each of these devi, devatas have human interaction during the village festivals, and it is this belief and faith that gives the villagers the strength to survive and strive in the extreme weather and terrain with minimal facilities.
The rescue operation in Silkyara is a display of strong human conviction, great teamwork, and compassion, as well as a display of tremendous faith in the power above, and thus should be duly credited.
As the popular Sanskrit verse sums it up-
yatkṛitaṁ yatkariṣhyāmi tatsarvaṁ na mayā kṛitam
tvayā kṛitaṁ tu phalabhuk tvameva madhusūdana [v41]
“Whatever I have achieved and whatever I wish to achieve, I am not the doer of these. O Madhusudan, you are the real doer, and you alone are the enjoyer of their results.”
In this world of cutthroat competition, where everyone is out to prove his or her strength and influence through the number of followers on social media, it is these episodes in remote parts of the much-inaccessible hills, where the universe and the creator of that universe shake us out of the delusion that it is us who have the power to move mountains.
Lipika Bhushan is the founder of MarketMyBook, a leading publicity and digital marketing agency. She is also the founder of The Indic Pen, a premium speaking platform on Indic ideas and has her roots in Uniyal Gaon, Uttarakhand. She tweets @LipikaB. Views expressed in the above piece are personal and solely that of the author. They do not necessarily reflect News18’s views.
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