In this episode, we’re doing a story about a Goddess called Bonbibi. This goddess is rather unique considering that she is worshipped by both Hindu and Muslim people. We’ll learn how centuries ago, people cared about protecting the environment, maybe to a greater extent than they do today. One of you listeners specifically requested this story. So here we are.
Our story begins in the Sundarbans. If you haven’t heard of the Sundarbans before, I will give you a quick introduction. These are dense mangrove forests in the delta of the Padma and Brahmaputra Rivers before they empty into the bay of bengal. They are spread across both India and Bangladesh, but around the time that this story is set in a few centuries ago, there was no international border there.
The Sundarbans are an inhospitable place for most people unfamiliar with the area. They were certainly even more so a few centuries ago when humans had less sophisticated tools and weapons of destruction to deal with all the dangers there. Those dangers Royal Bengal Tigers, and Venomous King Cobras. And if you thought being in the water was better, don’t forget that there were crocodiles and sharks in the water.
In short, life was difficult for the residents of the Sundarbans.
One day, the new set of immigrants moved to this jolly old place. There was Abraham, and his two wives, Flower and Red. Hey this was centuries ago, so there was no law that prescribed monogamy.
This family of foreigners arriving on these shores truly saw the Sundarbans as the land of the free and the home of the brave. The Sundarbans citizens were free of any luxuries in their hard lives, and they had to be brave to survive these harsh conditions. And yet, as they were landing on these shores, there was definitely some tension in the air.
The reason for that was entirely to do with a little bit of history in the trio. This was before Abraham and Flower were a happily married couple. Well, actually. The happiness was one-sided. Because Abraham longed to have children, but the couple didn’t have any. They worked out a rather questionable deal. Abraham would remarry. And in exchange for Flower’s blessing of this marriage, he would promise to do anything she asked for. At an indefinite point in the future.
An important lesson to learn from these episodes is that if anyone asks you to make unconditional promises you should really question their motives. It’s like giving them a blank signed check, but a lot worse. Dasharath did that to his wife Kaikeyi and look how it turned out in the Ramayana. See the episodes linked in the show notes for more details on that.
But Abraham made the promise, because he was desperate for a child. And now here he was with Flower and with Red, his new wife who was now pregnant. Flower still had the unconditional promise from her husband that she could cash in any time she wanted. And it seemed to Flower that today was the day to do it.
The boat docked and the family set foot on this dangerous, yet beautiful land. Flower was observing Abraham assisting his new wife Red, and she couldn’t help turn a little green. I’m sure you may have seen some green flowers, but I meant that figuratively. She couldn’t help feeling that her position in the family had fallen to the bottom.
And it was a pretty safe bet that Red’s baby was unlikely to knock her off of her spot at the bottom. Before the fire of hatred could go out within her, Flower decided she had to take some action.
Abraham and Red were walking ahead of her, talking as if she didn’t exist.
Red seemed to be describing a dream she had last night about how she dreamt that God had sent them here so that their children could solve some pretty major ecological and political problems in these Sundarbans.
There she goes again, Flower thought to herself. Always thinking herself the center of the Universe. Time to step in.
“Abraham, wait” she called out to her husband.
“Weight?! I told you before dear, we don’t have to worry about the weight of our luggage when we are getting off the boat. We only have to worry about it when getting on the boat”
“It’s alright Flower” Red spoke up condescendingly. “Some of these things are confusing. But don’t you worry your pretty little head about it. Abraham’s got it all covered. Don’t you Abraham?”. She flashed a smile at her husband.
That was the breaking point for Flower, seeing her smile with those perfect little teeth. “I’m going to cash in on my promise right now” she said, addressing Abraham while completely ignoring Red.
“Can it wait till after we have cleared customs?” asked Abraham
But Flower could not wait. And that was exactly her point. “I want you to abandon Red in the middle of the forest”
Abraham replied “but there are snakes and spiders in the jungle. I can’t go in there”.
“And Red can’t either” he quickly added when Red jabbed him with her elbow.
“But my children, can’t I have them and then abandon Red?” he pleaded once again with Flower.
But Flower was having none of it. “No. You have to cut the cord now”
Abraham was confused “You’re asking me to cut the cord now, but you don’t want Red to give birth first. How is that possible?”
Flower had to clarify that cutting the cord was an expression. True it had originated from the act of cutting the umbilical cord right after childbirth, but that’s not how she meant it here. And could he get on with it now? We were deep into the episode and nothing much had happened yet. The listeners might be yawning at this point.
Abraham had a choice to make. He could either stand by his new wife whom he had promised to stand by in good times and bad, and who was very close to bringing into this world the children that he had long longed for. Or he could obey his first wife’s obviously evil command just to keep his word.
He chose the latter.
Red had a rather difficult time. The trauma from being left alone in the middle of the dense forest was rough enough, but the occasional growling noises put her further on edge. So much so, that it induced labor. I’ll spare you the details. But the outcome was that she gave birth. To twins. A boy and a girl.
Even as she cared for her newborn babies, Red knew she had a hard decision to make. The tiger growls were getting closer and closer. There was no doubt that a Tiger had smelled food and was now coming here. There was no way she would defend herself from a beast that size, and no chance of being able to outrun it. The only way out for her was to create a diversion.
Unfortunately the only thing she decided she could distract the tiger with was one of her babies. She would make off with the boy, whom she had named Shah Jangali, while the girl Bonbibi would have to stay back. But all would be well, she hoped. She had read in a pamphlet on the boat that the tigers were “man-eating”. That must mean women and children were exempt right? Maybe. She wasn’t sure how Tigers could selectively tell the genders of human victims before slaying them. That’s why it was safer for her to run away from here with Shah Jangali while Bonbibi stayed.
It’s not advisable for women who have just given birth to make a speedy dash through a dangerous forest with an infant in their arms. But Red managed it. She was gone like the wind. She would not return.
The baby Bonbibi might not have survived if it hadn’t been for a passing family of deer. The deer were on the move. And it was only when they reached their home that the Deer parents did a headcount and noticed that their family had grown. This had never happened before. The reverse had happened several times, where a family member would be caught and eaten by a Tiger. That’s why today was such a surprise.
Daddy deer looked at his daughter and said, “Now, now, what have we said about bringing home guests?”
“But daddy, this is a human baby. Look. She’s so cute! Can I please keep her? I promise to take care of her everyday”
Reluctantly, her parents gave in. What none of them realized was that this was going to be a longer commitment than they had anticipated. You see the average lifespan of deer in the wild is about 5 years. That meant it was not just this deer family, but their great-grandchildren who were also taking care of Bonbibi until she grew up.
When Mowgli grew up amongst the wolves, he considered himself a wolf. But not so with Bonbibi. She grew up amongst the deer, but there was no deer in the headlights sort of situation with her. She never ran away from danger. Quite the contrary, she confronted it, and won out easily enough.
One such challenge came soon enough from none other than Dakkhin Rai, who ruled everything in the Sunderbans. Oh, and did I mention that he was a tiger? Anyway, he was. And considering that his tail alone was 6 meters in length, he must have been a pretty huge tiger indeed. Probably the size of a bus. He sat there in the middle of the forest, in conference with his supernatural and yet human looking mother, Narayani, and his adviser, a minor tiger of sorts.
“Tell me again,” Dakkhin Rai said to the adviser. “Who is this upstart who is disrupting my kingdom?”
“Her name is Bonbibi,” said the adviser. “Her mother came into the forest about 20 years ago, gave birth to her and promptly abandoned her. Funnily enough the child was born in around the same area where we were testing those motion-triggered growling machines”
“I remember the machines” Dakkhin Rai said “They seemed like a great idea, but what a waste they turned out to be. All the animals were always worried and they lost a lot of weight before we even got to hunt them. Instead the new sound machine we got is so much better. They play subliminal messages on how it is an honor to be eaten by a tiger. I even had a rabbit come up to me directly and insist that he eat me. He was so enthusiastic that even I was worried for a bit.”
The messenger rolled his eyes at this pointless anachronistic diversion from the main story and then continued “We don’t know how she survived all these years, somebody probably helped her, but no one is admitting it. Anyway, she is disrupting everything. She stopped a King Cobra from biting some deer recently. She didn’t hurt the Cobra, she merely nodded her head at it, and the Cobra slithered away. She even keeps a pet crocodile!”
“That there is real power, son,” Narayani said.
“I don’t care what she has. She is disrupting the delicate ecological balance we so carefully set up. What will the Sundarbans be if the Cobras and Crocodiles won’t even kill other creatures? Who will keep the mice and fish population in check?”
He had a point of course. But his solution was a bit extreme, so Narayani said. “You can’t go confront her yourself. A King should delegate these kinds of problems. Besides, if you go and you lose, your reputation goes down the drain. There will be anarchy in the kingdom. Let me go instead. I can take the Ghost and Goblin army.”
So it was settled. Narayani’s Ghost and Goblin army had scouts that soon located Bonbibi and suddenly they all appeared and surrounded her.
“Well don’t just surround her, arrest her. Take her prisoner” Narayani ordered her army.
But for the first time in her memory they did not follow her orders. They couldn’t, even though they tried. “I’m sorry, your highness,” a General said. “We can’t seem to move. It’s as if we’re all frozen in place. It’s as if she has a force field around her that repels us ghosts and goblins.”
Bonbibi who was casually sitting in the center of the circle smiled at Narayani. Which only infuriated Narayani further.
Narayani guessed she had to do it herself. She stepped into the circle. She was able to.
She said slowly. “In the name of the King, Dakkhin Rai, I arrest you”
Bonbibi slowly rose up. “You can try,” she said.
In one swift motion, Narayani jumped at her and grabbed her with her left hand and out of nowhere appeared a sword in her right hand.
Bonbibi had appeared unarmed, but she quickly pulled out a little sword from inside her cloak, and blocked the move in the nick of time. Narayani stabbed again, and Bonbibi blocked her again. And again and again. Narayani was aggressively stabbing at Bonbibi, but Bonbibi kept parrying every blow. Bonbibi was able to defend herself perfectly, but at the same time she couldn’t launch a counter-attack herself. Narayani’s blows came relentlessly.
“Mom, what is happening here?” said a new voice. It was Dakkhin Rai who had come to investigate why Narayani hadn’t already returned with Bonbibi in chains.
That bit of distraction is exactly what Bonbibi had been waiting for. She took advantage of Narayani’s very brief loss of focus. Swiftly she knocked the sword out of Narayani’s hands and held her own sword to her neck.
“Wait!” said Dakkhin Rai quickly. “I’m sure we can do something here. Some kind of compromise. You can have my Kingdom, just let my mother go”
Bonbibi let Narayani go. In a gesture of good faith she only kept a part of the Kingdom for herself – only the parts inhabited by humans. And what’s more Bonbibi and Narayani became pretty good friends.
That is how a new balance of power was set up in the Sundarbans. And the locals believe it persists to this day. Bonbibi rules over all of the inhabited parts of the forest, and Dakkhin Rai rules all of the dense forest. The locals have also worked out pretty detailed schedules and rules and procedures for people entering the forest. Now you might ask why did people want to venture into the forest at all? With all its inhospitable dangers?
Well, the answer was that they needed to survive. Their lives depended on the fishermen and fisherwomen collecting fish even while dodging crocodiles and sharks. The honey collectors had to avoid the tigers as well.
The locals living in the Sundarbans developed a system – they would pray to Bonbibi or to Dakkhin Rai before heading to their terrifying workplace with all its death traps.
In one such case there was a honey collector called Dhona. Dhanai was off to take a boat, go deep into the forest and collect a lot of honey. In fact he decided to collect so much honey that he needed an extra pair of hands. He found Dukhe, a shepherd who was fine going along as long as Dhona’s people kept paying Dukhe’s mother who was not in very good health.
As Dukhe said goodbye to his ailing mother, she reminded him that if he were ever in serious trouble he must pray to Bonbibi.
Now, if Dhona had similarly prayed to Bonbibi or Dakkhin Rai before starting his expedition, all would have turned out okay. But he didn’t. And so, 3 days into the expedition he had nothing to show for it. No honey, and Dukhe and himself were starving. Dhona decided that he would wait one final night and then return the next evening if they still didn’t find anything more.
That night, Dakkhin Rai appeared in his dream.
“Dhona, you do realize why you aren’t getting any honey, don’t you? You don’t pray to me at all like all the other villagers do, and you expect to show up at my doorstep and magically get seven boatloads of honey?”
Dhona was sheepish. He didn’t know how to rectify things.
So Dakkhin Rai told him. “Give me the boy, give me Dukhe, and I’ll give you seven boatloads of honey. You won’t even have to collect it. I’ll have my people load it in your boats for you.”
Dhona was pleased with that. Hey it meant it would be harder for him to navigate all seven boats by himself, but that was a small price to pay, he thought. Besides that would get him out of having to pay Dukhe his wages. In fact, he almost asked Dakkhin Rai what the catch was.
So the next morning, when Dukhe woke up he was surprised to see Dhona was already sailing away with all seven boats loaded full of honey.
“Hey, what about me?” he shouted. But Dhona didn’t even hear him. But you know who did? Dakkhin Rai.
The tiger appeared on the scene crashing through the trees.
This was not a moment for Dukhe to panic. This was the time to pray to Bonbibi. He began furiously chanting a prayer.
Dakkhin Rai didn’t care. He launched himself towards Dukhe, claws out and would have bitten his head off, but something stopped him. It was Bonbibi. She had arrived on the scene and had grabbed the tiger by the tail. She pulled on it, only enraging Dakkhin Rai further. The two fought a fierce battle. If you thought that Dakkhin Rai was a formidable opponent you were right. But Bonbibi matched him blow for blow. This fight went on for a while to the point that Dukhe himself yawned a little and considered asking if they wanted to put the proceedings on hold and continue tomorrow.
It’s a good thing that Dakkhin Rai’s adviser appeared on the scene just then. “Your majesty, you’re needed everywhere! You were supposed to be gone for five minutes to eat Dukhe, and you’ve been gone for a few hours! You’ve missed out so many of your appointments, your subjects are worried”
Bonbibi and Dakkhin Rai realized that they couldn’t continue this fight, and both secretly believed that if it continued Dakkhin Rai would probably have lost. So they decided to call a truce. And as a gesture of good faith, Dakkhin Rai gave Dukhe a cartload of precious gems. “So long Kid. Make better friends in the future”
Bonbibi adopted Dukhe for a bit. She treated him fairly and he helped her out in managing her part of the forest. But beyond a point, he longed to see his real mother, and so Bonbibi had her pet crocodile escort the lad back to his village.
There was a fair bit of confusion in the village on seeing Dukhe re-appear. Dhona had sworn to Dukhe’s mother that he had seen the lad being eaten by a Tiger. And now, Dukhe’s reappearance scared the living daylights out of Dhona. What if Dukhe spilled the beans?
Well, long story short, he didn’t. In exchange for becoming the head of the village, and getting to marry Dhona’s daughter. Dhona was happy to have bought Dukhe’s silence. After all, Dukhe was probably the most powerful person in their village, given that Bonbibi had this maternal caring for Dukhe.
That’s all for now
Some notes on the show
The names of the characters are translations of their actual names in the legend. Abraham is synonymous with Berahim. The names of Berahim’s wives were Golal and Phul, which can be translated into Red and Flower respectively.
The people who live in the Sunderbans have a long tradition of praying to Bonbibi and to Dakkhin Rai before venturing in. Here are some links to pictures of Bonbibi temples
Bonbibi temple
Bonbibi at Dayapur Temple
Bonbibi reenactment
There are studies about how the people in the Sunderbans use their resources in a sustainable way. Something they have been doing for centuries, and not just in response to threats from rising seas and the changing climate. This includes harvesting a small amount of honey at a time, and not the seven boatloads as Dhona intended to do before Dakhin Rai dipped into his reserves of sustainably harvested honey instead.
That’s it for this week.
Next Time
In the next episode, we’ll do something very different. For the first time in over a hundred seventy episodes of this podcast, we’ll actually go into the future, instead of the past. We’ll see Kalki, Vishnu’s upcoming avatar.
The events in the next episode are yet to happen for you listeners. But because I have the powers to travel anywhere in space and time, kind of like Doctor Who, I can tell this story. I actually went into the future to check the details before preparing the next episode. But don’t worry I’ll be careful not to reveal anything that may crash the stock market.