myIndiamyGlory

There are many journeys in the life of a Hindu that begin with joy and then, there is that final journey that ends in silence. A silence so complete, so primal, that grief seems to echo within itself like the fading toll of a temple bell.

 

My mother’s final journey was one such. And I walked with her every inch of the way along with my brothers. As we navigated our way through the sacred choreography of rituals that our Rishis envisioned with profound psychological and spiritual wisdom, I realised that Hindu Antyeshti is not just about the mortal coil that a person leaves behind.

 

Our rituals are also about what we carry; the people left behind, the mixed feelings of love, duty, grief and the need to let go.

 

It is a fashion these days to dismiss rituals as meaningless. Hindu Dharma, in its timeless wisdom, doesn’t avoid grief or mask it. We ritualise grief. We exorcise it in a controlled way over a period of 13 days.

 

At the cremation ground, my brother carried a matka—a humble earthen pot filled with water—on his shoulder. It may look like a mere vessel, but it holds centuries of meaning. That water is not just water. It is symbolic of life, of Prana.

 

As he circled the funeral pyre that had my mother’s mortal body three times anti-clockwise wise, each time the priest knocked a hole into the pot with a hard stone.

 

Why?

 

Because just as water escapes the pot, at first slowly and then fast, it symbolises both the draining of the Prana as well as earthly attachment of the Atman to the mortal coils.

 

It is a visual, visceral metaphor for the slow release of the Atman from the ties of this world. The steadily increasing drip of the water is like the grieving heart—forced to let go, drop by drop.

 

And then comes the final act—the smashing of the pot. The Ghata Bhedana, the most intense, emotional moment for the mourners. In one swift, final, irreversible gesture, the mourner smashes the pot by throwing it behind him without looking at it.

 

Even as my brother was doing it, I was realising that it is not an act of mindless destruction, it is symbolic renunciation.

 

The pot stands for the physical body—beautiful, but temporary. The stone represents dispassion—Vairagya. When the mourner smashes the pot, it is the symbolic release of the Atman of the deceased person. With that one gesture we acknowledge impermanence. We let go. We release our loved one to go unfettered towards the light.

 

The stone used to break the pot is not ordinary. It is the smashana shila, the cremation stone. It bears witness to the final rites. It absorbs the residue of grief. It is preserved, till the entire uttar kriya is done. Because until the thirteenth day rituals are completed, the Atman is still transitioning. Still in need of clarity, not confusion.

 

Today, when we returned to the cremation ground to collect Aai’s Asthis, we didn’t just pick up fragments of bone. We gathered what remained of our sorrow, touched it, named it, and laid it reverently inside a copper Kalasha. I cradled the Kalasha in my lap on the car ride home just as my Aai would have cradled me in her lap many times.

 

We swept the area with a special grass broom. We didn’t do this for sanitation. We did it for sanctity. The pyre is the womb of transformation. It deserves gratitude and reverence. In that act, I felt something shift inside me. The tightness of grief loosened a bit.

 

And then, we released her ashes into the Sal river—the river that had fed the rice fields of Cuncolim since time immemorial. My mother’s body was returning to the elements. To Agni, To Bhoomi. To Aap. To Vayu, To Akasha.

 

It was strangely comforting to see her ashes float a while on the gentle lapping waves, before settling below the water’s surface, like she was returning to the sacred waters of the cosmic womb.

 

The structured rhythm of Hindu funerary rites is not superstition. It is spiritual psychology. It is our ancestral architecture for the resolution of grief. It prevents us from collapsing. It holds us when we are broken.

 

From the Mukhagni to the Pinda daana to the shraddha that nourishes the Pitrus, every ritual is carefully calibrated—emotionally, cosmologically, karmically not just to help the deceased get release from the bonds of this life, but also to help the family to exorcise the grief.

 

We did not watch my mother’s last rites from the sterilised environment of a funeral home. We stood beside her pyre—sons, daughter, daughter-in-law, grandchildren, relatives, neighbours, friends—an entire community. We heard the pyre crackling, Vedic chants rising, sandalwood smoke curling into the sky. We let the rituals become our medicine.

 

Modernity mocks ritual. ‘Why so many days of mourning?’ they ask. ‘What’s the point?’ The point is closure. The point is order in chaos. Hindu Dharma doesn’t demand that we deny our grief. It just teaches us to channelise it. Step by step. Day by day. Until the sharpness of the sorrow dulls and the soul of the departed is gently ushered into the Pitru Loka—without trauma, without restlessness.

 

Because grief, when left unexpressed, curdles into bitterness, but grief, when walked through ritually, becomes a sacred transformation. I have personally experienced over the last four days how rituals alchemise pain. Hindu funerary rites are not just about the deceased, they are also about the living.

The last rites give us one last chance to serve. To surrender. To let go with grace. To grieve, yes—but to grieve in a way that cleanses us.

 

When my time comes, I hope someone will carry a pot of water for me too.

Pierce a hole in it.

Walk in silence.

And then, with a single stone,

Let me go,

In peace, serenity and acceptance.