Mana Mandira - Katyar Kaaljat Ghusli

Note - My latest recording of this song, 6 years after this post. Do listen, like and subscribe:)

KaTyaar KaLjaat Ghusali is a landmark movie in the history of modern Marathi Cinema. Based on a Sangeet Natak by the same name, it is an attempt at portraying the story in a cinematic format, with aesthetics which cannot be possible done in a live musical play. 

It has most of the original songs composed by Pt. Jitendra Abhisheki, one among the very few who helped preserve and popularise Naatya Sangeeta in modern times. The soundtrack contains some new tracks too. It is a beautiful work of art by the composers Shankar-Ehsan-Loy and the singers Shankar Mahadevan, Rahul Deshpande and Mahesh Kale.

Shankar Mahadevan as Panditji

One of the new songs from the sound track is Mana Mandira, beautifully sung by Shankar Mahadevan. There is also a version by his younger son Shivam which is wonderfully done, considering his young age. Shankar ji's improvisations towards the end of the song are very impressive.

In the movie, the picturisation of this song is a highlight. Panditji (Shankar Mahadevan) is leading his young disciple Sadashiva to the forest, with a promise of manifesting fireflies with the help of music. To do that, he sings this divine song and in the process, not only teaches music to his protege but also imparts knowledge about the values of a good Saadhaka. 

The Divine vibrations and ideas expressed in the song inspired me to attempt a translation of its straightforward but philosophically rich lyrics, written by Mandar Cholkar.

मन मंदिरा… 

Based on Raaga Des

Lyrics - Mandar Cholkar

Music - Shankar-Ehsan-Loy

Sung by - Shankar Mahadevan
Translation by - Shrinath Shenoy

मन मंदिरा… तेजाने उजळून घेई साधका

संवेदना… संवादे सहवेदना… जपताना

With Divine Radiance,

A  Saadhaka illuminates the Shrine of his Mind

Cultivating a sensitive and an empathetic demeanour.

तळहाताच्या रेषांनी सहज सुखा का भोगी कुणी

Does one enjoy a life dictated by Destiny alone?

स्वयंप्रकाशी तू तारा...

चैतन्याचा गाभारा

भर पंखातून स्वप्न उद्याचे

झेप घे रे पाखरा

A self-luminous star,

You are the sanctuary of Divine Consciousness.

Full with the dreams of tomorrow,

Take a leap and fly to great heights.

Some thoughts on the term Saadhaka

When i started translating from Marathi to English, i realised that our Indian words capture a lot of information and meaning compared to their so called English counterparts. There cannot be a perfect translation for words like Aatmaa, Dharma and hence, the translations of many ancient Indian scriptures fail to capture the intent and essence of the sacred texts.

At most, i could have used the term Seeker in place of Saadhaka. Now, the imagery created by Seeker is of a person trying to find something. Saadhaka illustrates a person carrying out Saadhanaa - continuous, dedicated practice in order to attain his objective. The term Saadhaka intrigues me, as it brings out the essence of Panditji's character, who, like the singer saints of ancient India, practiced Sangeet Saadhanaa in the pursuit of the Divine. The path to God followed by every artiste in ancient India was about achieving transformation. The song thus speaks about the path of a Saadhaka, which requires cultivating sensitivity, empathy as well as courage, an action-oriented attitude and hope.

The lines that got edited

I had attended Mahesh Kale's concert - 'Sur Niragas Ho', held in Shanmukhananda Saraswati Auditorium in Mumbai, on 15th May 2016. Before performing this song, he sang a few lines which according to his commentary, were written by Subodh Bhave and were originally part of the song, but later got edited out.

Presenting the clip for anyone interested.

My performance of the song

I had performed this song on 18th December 2016 at Nagayakshe Dharmartha Sabhabhavan, Bhatkal, on the occasion of my engagement ceremony. One of the few performances which gladdened my heart like no other. Totally impromptu, no rehearsal, hence kindly pardon my mistakes.

Would not have been possible without support of my co-musicians - Sanjith (Harmonium), Sanketh(Manjira) and Sudarshan on tabla.

Update - 11th November 2018

This post is the most accessed one in my blog. One of my readers, Shri. Sajith Pallippuram, had appreciated this post as it helped him gain and understanding of the meaning of the song, as he was preparing to perform it in an event. He has also been kind to share a video of his performance of this song. I happily share it for all of you to check out.

Shri Pallippuram is a Malayalee. I am a GSB Konkani. And look at the power of this composition, it makes everyone attempt it because it truly is a beautiful one. Music truly transcends barriers of all kinds...:)

This rendition is very unique and I recommend it highly.

Notes - 

a. Marathi lyrics taken from http://cinelookout.com/2015/11/katyar-kaljat-ghusali-man-mandira-tejaane-lyrics.html

b. Updated the translation of "तळहाताच्या रेषांनी सहज सुखा का भोगी कुणी" based on the correction suggested by Shri. Sumeet Malshe.

c. Made additional changes in the first stanza, based on translation insights gained from watching the movie for a second time.

The Ghost in the Keyboard.

The problems started when one day my laptop met with a serious accident. The power LED was the lone casualty; at least it looked that way. Not a case to cry upon; accidents are a part of life.

Then while typing a note, I observed that all of a sudden a '/' came out of nowhere in the text. I dismissed it as a case of slip of my fingers when all of a sudden there was a train of '///'s. Now how could one explain this?

Probably some grit under the chicklet key of '/' must be doing that, hence I removed the key, brushed under and put it back. Problem solved for the moment, just to be back in the next 5 minutes. But it was a small problem which I was managing in a number of ways and so a few weeks passed by in which I had learned how to live with it.

I had tried Googling (Caps for my respect for Google) up to find possible causes, but to no avail. When it comes to Googling, I have had the most weird queries, and each time I do such a search I realise I am not alone - there are others who share my weirdness. But in this case, this was a problem only I had faced in all these years of human history. So now, as Googling was not an option anymore, I started using my imagination and the most obvious speculation was that of a Ghost in the Keyboard.

We know about Ghost in the Shell, but Ghost in the Keyboard? There are trojan horse viruses which get installed in our machines maliciously and try to record keystrokes but in this case, this thing was hell bent on typing this single uninteresting character of '/'. What was the reason this ghost had chosen this key? In the times of new age theories and aliens trying to contact us from within a Black Hole (inspired from Interstellar), I found this theory both interesting and hard to shake off.

So what to do about the ghost? Maybe try a few mantras. I used to hit the key hard and mentally chant some mantras I know, and it seemed to work for a while till a day, the ghost went crazy and would not allow me to type anything meaningful. This meant that when I tried to force a restart to solve this problem (yes we Indians think a restart can solve all our problems), I was no longer able to type in my password. Holy Fish! A serious problem indeed!

Having had disassembled my laptop some months ago I thought of giving it a try to see if this could solve my problem. A huge task in itself, but was a quick thing to do this time. But once assembled, the problem came back.

Now all of a sudden, I realised what I had not realised in all these days of using my efforts and my imagination - there was another key with '/' on my keyboard!! I realised the issue, removed the key, cleaned underneath it and voila! all is well.

This experience made me realise that there are 2 basic principles in trying to solve any problem

1. Raising ones awareness to find all the possible causes of the problem.

2. Using minimum imagination as possible.

But yeah, imagination does help people like me put up blog posts like these to illustrate simple principles...;)