The Lord and the Tattoo Maker of Panchavati

Hanuman was omnipresent every which way I turned my face in Panchavati on an overcast Dussehra day last year.

Statues large and small, in varying poses, left little doubt of the imprint Ram’s presence had left behind on Panchavati in the years he lived here during his exile from Ayodhya. It was here his resolve was to be tested on Ravana’s abducting Sita. It was here the die was cast, eventually shaping the consciousness of a people and the values of a civilization.

Dedications to Hanuman, sometimes simply carved on stone blocks left standing in the open by temples dedicated to Lord Ram, or along stairways leading to the river Godavari channeled along stone masonry on either bank, and other times located at corners of passageways bridging the river, were easily identifiable from the bright orange Sinduri applied to the deity.



Among the largest statues of Hanuman in Panchavati, the 15 feet high representation standing to attention, his mace facing down, was getting a fresh coat of Sinduri by a devotee using a ladder for the purpose as we walked along the eastern bank of the Godavari towards the vegetable market adjoining the Dhobi Ghat downstream of the Ram Kund.



On the opposite face, at the same height, the mace rested on his shoulder while a demon cowered under his foot.



Even in the bright colours of tomatoes heaped in cane baskets in the vegetable market located among the many temples dotting Panchavati, Hanuman’s steadfast pose was easily discernable.

While Hanuman famously ripped his heart open to show the deities Ram and Sita residing within, children from rural areas were busy debating which of Hanuman’s best known poses to tattoo on their forearms from the options available with an elderly villager’s tattoo shop spread out in the open area fronting the famous Naroshankar temple.



The temple is adjacent to the Ram Setu spanning the river and is considered unique for its 18th century architecture constructed in what is known as the Maya style. Intricate lattice work in stone graces its outer walls.

A large bronze bell hangs in a bell tower above the entrance in the eleven feet high stone fortification enclosing the temple on all sides.


Arched entrances in the fortification on the outside apparently opening into a passageway along the front of the temple have been boarded up with cheap tin and evidently function as commercial outlets, disfiguring the stone façade of the historic temple built by Naroshankar Raje Bahadur, a Jahgirdar in the reign of the Peshwas.

A board above one such enterprise identified it to be a Brass Band.

After Chimaji Appa, the younger sibling of Bajirao Peshwa, won the fort of Vasai from Portuguese invaders with considerable assistance from Naroshankar Raje Bahadur, the bronze bell was removed from the Portuguese church in Vasai and marched on an elephant to Nashik as a token of victory over the Portuguese before presenting it to Naroshankar Raje Bahadur for his bravery in the campaign.

I walk along the periphery on the inside looking for a tap to wash my hands and wet my neck. On the steps leading up to the platform where Nandi, Shiva’s bull, kneels in attention, facing the deity, a man in white Kurta and Pyjamas, a shiny brass plate pinned to his chest and identifying him to be a tourist guide, awaits pilgrims stepping into the temple.



“Do you need a tourist guide to take you around?” he asks me. His white kurta-pyjama are crisp, and pressed well. They do not show the wear of a guide called upon to show pilgrims around, at least not the day I met him. Inevitability of a circumstance makes a virtue of patience, eventually!

I decline, and before long I step out and go down the stairs to where the tattoo maker has set up shop in the open space in front of the temple.

The elderly tattoo maker in Gandhi topi and dhoti had spread the implements of his trade before him. Designs sketched on paper and protected by plastic cover were held down with stone paperweights. The battery powering the tattoo machine sat alongside.


He sat in the way the elderly in the hinterland of Karnataka and Maharashtra sit – knees lifted and held together by hands locked at the palms in front of the knees, legs usually crossed at the shins, the back curving in the relaxed pose. A quick glance at his face and I walked over to him. He sat still, unmoving as I bent down to see the designs he offered.

He does not look at me, nor does he proffer to show me the designs as I leaf through them. He knows I won’t be getting a tattoo from him. There’s very little that faces do not reveal in India.

Fate had etched his face with deep lines. In the furrows stretched weakly across his cheek, stories hiding from the glare of the Sun over the years refused to surface even as clouds overhead blanked the Sun out, filtering the light to the soothing grey of a monsoon month threatening rain on an ancient corner of what must have been a paradise once.



Each page held sketches of deities in neat rows, depicting Hanuman in several forms. Ram and Vishnu were equally represented. And so were Lord Krishna and Ganapati. A young boy stopped by the tattoo maker and quickly selected Hanuman in a standing pose from the options available before extending his arm to the tattoo maker.

The sketch of Hanuman the boy chose to have tattooed was similar to the statue we had passed along the way to the tattoo maker.


A quick rub of the arm and the tattoo maker got down to work, the young boy watching as the needle began to trace the contours of what must surely be India’s most favoured deity among the young, favoured as much for his strength, as for his daring exploits deriving from his loyalty to Lord Ram.



The boy grimaced as the needle punched his skin, welts rising along the outline. A dash of haldi (turmeric powder) over the tattoo and the old man was done.



About then a large group of children visiting Panchavati had stepped out of the Naroshankar temple and made for the tattoo maker out of curiosity, and just in time to see the kid getting his tattoo of the deity, Hanuman.



He got to his feet, dusted his behind, and paid the tattoo maker ten rupees before stretching his hand out to show his tattoo to his friend who had tagged along with him, watching patiently as he got his tattoo done. The friend did not get a tattoo. I’m not sure if it was because he did not want it or because he could not afford the fee.

The crowd surged forward to examine the tattoo. The kid held out his fresh tattoo while several children from the group took turns to examine it, exclaiming their approval of the Lord.

Lord Hanuman has many admirers, and possibly none more so then those who’re prepared to have him grace them every living moment of their lives.

It is not just the belief that drives them so. And nor just the faith. It is the legacy of the culture bequeathed them that they carry forward, even if they’re too young to know it themselves or understand its import.

If you do not question it for yourself, you’ll not question it for others. And it is in this convergence of faith and belief that India continues to survive its contradictions.

And sometimes it takes a tattoo to realise it.