Yellow’s the colour of amity at Nizamuddin dargah

NEW DELHI: It rained on Thursday morning. And the day turned out to be quite gloomy. Perhaps as gloomy as Hazrat Nizamuddin Auliya’s mood when his favourite nephew died.

The Sufi saint who lived between the 13th and 14th centuries helmed the Chishtiyya tariqa (order) after taking over from Fariduddin Ganj-i-Shakar. He never married, but was fond of his siblings’ children. One of his nephews was Taqiuddin Nuh, son of his sister Zainab. He was very attached to him and was crushed when he died young.

“Woh itne ghamzada thay ki woh bade sanjeeda rehne lage (He was so pained that he became a grim man),” said Altamash Nizami, a peerzada at the dargah, and a direct 21st generation descendant of Nizamuddin. The saint’s disciples were worried about him and looked for ways to cheer him up. One day, poet Amir Khusro saw a group of merry women wearing bright yellow and carrying mustard flowers close to where Humayun’s Tomb stands today. They were singing and playing a dholak and going somewhere.

“Hazrat Amir Khusro asked them the reason for such merry-making. They said that it was Basant and they were going to the temple. Khusro then put on a yellow robe, started playing a dholak, and went to Nizamuddin singing and dancing,” Nizami narrated. Accounts say Khusro dressed up like a woman, though Nizami disputes this. But it must still have been quite a spectacle, the oddity of which brought a smile on Nizamuddin’s lips. When Nizamuddin asked him why he was dressed that way, Khusro replied that it was to bring back the smile on his face.

Journalist Meher Murshed writes in his book, Song of the Dervish: Nizamuddin Auliya: The Saint of Hope and Tolerance, that Basant is celebrated at Nizamuddin’s dargah every year to “mark the day Khusro got the master’s smile back from the depths of grief and depression”.

The tradition has continued for over 700 years. On Saturday too, the dargah will don a yellow look for Basant Panchami and devotees will come in their thousands wearing yellow and carrying mustard flowers to greet the patron saint of Delhi, who, in his lifetime, found happiness in a Hindu spring festival. “This custom has been followed at other dargahs too,” said author Rana Safvi. “Dargahs are places where all are welcome and the saint becomes part of the devotee’s family. So, it makes perfect sense for devotees to celebrate their festivals with the Pir and the dargah to celebrate with them.”

Nizami shared another tale he heard from his elders: “Once Hazrat Nizamuddin went to the dargah of Qutbuddin Bakhtiyar Kaki with his disciples, including Amir Khusro. On the way, they saw a farmer draw water from a well in a field and sing in Hindavi, ‘Ram manaiyo, baarhi laiyo’ (please bless me, Lord Rama, with rain). Nizamuddin was pleased to hear this and told his disciples that every faith had its own way of finding god.”

That thought later found utterance in Amir Khusro’s poem: ‘Har qaum raast raahe, din-e-wa qibla gaahe’.

The importance of Nizamuddin’s dargah in the Indian conscience can be gauged from the fact that during the turbulence of Partition, when there were fears of an impending communal attack on the dargah, the then home minister, Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel, personally visited the dargah after telling his colleagues, “Let us go to the saint before we incur his displeasure.” No harm came to the dargah and its people.

Nizami said the Sufi saint’s 13th-century message of peace and amity still has meaning today. “With so much polarisation happening in society, the dargah provides an alternative. It has always given space to people of all faiths and their different ideas,” the peerzada said. “Basant Panchami is a Hindu festival celebrated at a Muslim’s shrine. It is part of our Ganga-Jamuni tehzeeb. It unites us. There is a need to spread its message. Yeh Hindustan ki barkat bhi hai aur taqat bhi (this is India’s blessing and strength).”