Playing tourist guide to Sir Vidia | The Indian Express

Playing tourist guide to Sir Vidia | The Indian Express

Playing tourist guide to Sir Vidia

When Nobel laureate, VS Naipaul was in Odisha to research for his book, he was fascinated with its temples and annoyed with its rules

New Delhi | Updated: August 19, 2018 4:14:47 pm

I was tipped off by my former editor, who wanted me to do an interview with Sir Vidia the for their newspaper. (Source: AP)

Written by Purabi Das

If someone had told me that on a winter afternoon in ’97, I would be taking one of the world’s greatest living writers on a tour of a lost monument near Bhubaneswar, I would have pinched myself awake. But this surreal experience happened. I got the opportunity to escort V S Naipaul and his wife Nadira Naipaul to the Chausathi Jogini Temple (temple of 64 yoginis) in Hirapur, on the outskirts of the capital city, when the writer was in the city for research on his book Beyond Belief: Islamic Excursions among the Converted Peoples.

As a freelance journalist, I was always on the lookout for offbeat and interesting stories. And I had a humdinger; a low-key visit by one of the world’s greatest living writers to Bhubaneswar. I was tipped off by my former editor, who wanted me to do an interview with Sir Vidia the for their newspaper.
So there I was, knocking on his door at the Trident Hotel where he was staying with his wife Nadira, determined yet nervous. I had somehow managed to talk my way in, for the notoriously publicity shy writer had requested for privacy. But I had done my homework and had a hook. I knew he was in Odisha to study temple architecture and was sure that the local travel agents would not have told him about the unique but rather neglected Chausathi Jogini Temple.

Lady Nadira opened the door and let me in after I had babbled my pitch. But the great man dismissed me in a couple of minutes. “You are too young to have understood my books,” he commented. As I was about to leave, his wife took me aside and asked for my contact number. She said they would come for the trip but warned me not to mention that I was a journalist nor to speak of his books. She guarded him fiercely like a mother hen!

The next morning, we piled into my old Maruti can, Sir Vidia, the Nobel laureate to be, Lady Nadira , my former boss, who was introduced as a guide, and me. Sir Vidia came dressed in tweeds, a soft hat and perfectly polished shoes. He was a tad overdressed for a visit to a lost temple in a warm winter morning though he did ask whether he would have to take his shoes off. His wife told me in an aside that he was very annoyed after his encounter with the priests at the Jagannath Temple, Puri. I told him that the Chausathi Jogini Temple was not a living temple and he could keep his shoes on, a remark I would regret later.

On the way, we had a taste of the incisive and brilliant mind. He showered us with questions, history, geography, politics, demographics, temple architecture. When we passed the Kalinga stadium, which was then under construction, he wondered why a state where people were so poor would need a stadium, the kind of remark that had earned him his reputation for insensitivity. My colleague parried, don’t the poor too deserve entertainment? I was glad to have someone else with us to field the barrage of questions. For I must confess, while I was in awe of the writer, he intimidated me!

Naipaul was very critical about the backwardness of the capital city and even more unimpressed by the poverty of the village through which we approached the Chausathi Jogini Temple. But once there, he was fascinated. The writer was absorbed with the beauty and obscure origin of the monument. While we were leaving the site he remarked, “These are not the people who built that monument”. Later in his book, he wrote of how Islamic invasions wiped out the great temples and civilizations of Odisha and South India.

He had one complaint though; he was made to take his shoes off by an over eager priest who had noticed the dignitaries and decided to earn his dakshina. “But Purabi told me I wouldn’t have to take my shoes off”, he kept repeating in obvious irritation till Nadira stepped in. “Stop badgering the poor girl, Makhnu”, she scolded him. It was a treat to observe their interaction. Despite his views on Islam and his pride in being a Bramhin, he was managed so well by the Punjabi Moslem expatriate from Pakistan who was his last love.

I never got to discuss A House for Mr Biswas with him, which remains one of my favorite novels till today or An Area of Darkness which disturbed me greatly, or any of his other books that I had read despite his assumption of my immaturity. But when we bid farewell to the writer and his wife at the airport the next day and gifted him with noted poet Jayant Mohapatra’s book on Odisha, he graciously offered to autograph my copies of his books. And I had carried none. I was privileged to see a very human side to this great yet controversial writer.

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