Salutations, O Lord of the mountains!
Salutations, O Crescent-crested Lord!
Salutations, O Ash-smeared Divine!
Salutations, O Rider on the eternal bull!
Salutations, O Lord of Lords!
“After Lord Shiva had forgiven him, Shankacharya asked a question in turn: ‘Tell me, O Lord, why did you take this strange form to present yourself to me, your most devoted devotee?’ To this Lord Shiva answered: ‘Truly, you are a wise man and well on the path to salvation! But you will never get there unless you understand that all men are deserving of respect and compassion. It was to teach you this that I took this form, for I realised that only then would you understand. You have to fight against prejudice and ignorance, and use your great knowledge to help people of every caste, not just your Brahmins. Only then will you attain true Enlightenment.’
“Shankacharya bowed his head and replied: ‘Thank you, my Lord. Now I understand. But in order to make the generations to come also understand, I am going to initiate a theyyam which will celebrate you in your current form. Before I do that, however, I will consecrate some temples where I will install your idol in this form of the Pottan Devam so that we humans may worship you.’ So Shankacharya made the shrine, and it is this form of Shiva as a Pullaya that is today one of the chief deities of this part of Malabar, and this theyyam which is now among the most popular of all theyyams. It is also one of the longest,” added Hari Das. “I have seen Pottan Theyyam rituals which have gone on for twenty-four hours.
“This happened thousands of years ago,” added Hari Das. “It was a form of true Enlightenment. The great modern reformers such as Karl Marx or [the Dalit political leader] Ambedkar are really only reinforcing the lessons taught to us by the great god Shiva.”
A couple of hours later, after he had washed and changed, Hari Das came to the house I was staying in outside Kannur, on a bluff above the sea. We sat drinking chai on the veranda as the sun set, and he began to tell his story.
“I grew up in extreme poverty,” said Hari Das. “Like me, my father was a day labourer, who also did theyyam during the season. Today theyyam can bring in much more than labouring—in a good season, after expenses, maybe Rs 10,000 a month—but in those days earnings were very meagre; maybe only Rs 10 and bag of rice for a single night.
“I lost my mother when I was three years old. She had some small injury—a piece of metal pierced her foot—but it went septic, and because she couldn’t afford a real doctor she saw a man in the village instead. He must have made it worse. Certainly he failed to cure her. She died quite unnecessarily; at least that is what I feel.
“To be honest, I can hardly remember her. All I remember is her kindness, and her kissing me and encouraging me to be good. But I am no longer sure whether the face I see when I try to think of her is actually her. There is no photograph. In those days no one in our community had access to cameras, or anything like that.
“Within a year, when I was four, my father married again. I never lived with my stepmother. I am not quite sure what happened—presumably my father thought he could not cope—but I was given to my peri-amma, my mother’s elder sister, to look after. She lived in a different village, six miles away. The house had two rooms. It was unplastered, but it had a pukka tile roof. As my father had no money to give, my peri-amma had to pay for everything. I was lucky: although she was also very poor, she loved me, and was very good to me. So were my three stepsisters and my stepbrother. They were all ten years older than me, and they showered me with love.
“My father would visit every so often, and I was fond of him, though in those days fathers were fathers and sons were sons. We would never play together—he was very formal with me, more like my guru—and sometimes when he came to visit I would run away rather than face the very strict interrogation he would give me about school. He had never been himself, and was completely illiterate, so he regarded education as very serious, almost a religious affair. My real affection was soon for my peri-amma, who was always there for me. I’m not sure about my stepmother. She’s all right, I suppose.
“Maybe theyyam is in my blood, because although I never lived with my father, I always wanted to be a theyyam artist like him. Even as a child I would play at theyyam, beating a piece of tin to make a noise like the theyyam drums. As I grew older, I became very proud of him, and the sight of him being worshipped by so many people made me swell with happiness—who would not be proud to see their father being worshipped by the whole village? I went regularly to watch him performing the theyyam from the age of five, and by the age of nine I was certain that this was what I too wanted to do.