Shiva, the millennial hero: Rebelliousness, non-conformism key to popularity

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Very few gods invoke the sort of feelings that Shiva does in India, a land of millions of divine figures. Adjectives flow freely while referring to him — powerful, revered, feared as well as gracious, friendly, benevolent.

While the magic of Shiva has kept millions in thrall in India down the centuries, the persona of Shiva has captured the imagination of urban millennials mainly through fiction in English, a phenomenon quite remarkable in modern times.

And the person who is perhaps singlehandedly responsible for this reinvention of the divine figure among the urban audience is author Amish Tripathi, whose Shiva Trilogy was the fastest selling book in the country’s publishing history.

The Immortals of Meluha, The Secret of the Nagas and The Oath of the Vayuputras – the three books that Tripathi wrote were published by Westland.

The CEO of Westland compared the popularity of Tripathi’s books to that enjoyed by the Beatles in the world of music.

According to the data released in July 2019 six books of Tripathi, including the Shiva trilogy, made it to the top-10 of the HT-Nielsen BookScan national bestseller list.

Significantly, the popularity of Tripathis works came at a point when after the wave of globalisation, people were trying to go back to their roots and reinvent heroes.

A bohemian, rebel and a destroyer of evil, Shiva’s attributes fitted the psyche of the youth to a T.

Former Union culture secretary and Prasar Bharati CEO Jawhar Sircar agrees. “Shiva continues to remain a fascinating Hindu deity down the centuries. He combines quite a few contradictions love and war; affection and vengeance; monogamy and sexual deviation; generosity and vindictiveness,” he says, adding that even English-educated urban youth, who often keep safe distance from what they view as “native” culture and religion, are becoming his ardent fans, thanks to authors like Amish Tripathi.

Who can be a bigger hero than a divine figure who is a perennial rebel like Lord Shiva?

“He is rebellious and a non-conformist unlike Vishnu who is more straight-jacketed and duty bound.”

Sircar also points to how in Bengal Lord Shiva has been lovingly portrayed as a humble potbellied peasant who smokes ganja and breaks into a dance with his companions. He is also chased around in the village by his wife Parvati. He emphasises how the peasant avatar became extremely popular among the farmers of medieval Bengal.

That the imagination of the country’s youth has been kindled by the divine figure is apparent from the fact that author William Dalrymple, who writes against the backdrop of history, wished people “Happy Mahashivratri” on his Twitter handle.

He also posted six pictures of Lord Shiva that he took in the past 10 days in Kalinjar, Nachna, Udaygiri and Gwalior.

Bollywood stars such as Amitabh Bachchan and Ajay Devgn, too, wished the people on Mahashivratri.

Nrisinghaprasad Bhaduri, Indodologist who is a specialist in epics, puranas and scriptures, however, agrees on the timelessness of religious and mythological figures though he does not agree with the style of presentation of modern English creative writers.

“I am not sure how well read are the writers in epics, puranas and scriptures. I am sure that most readers of the novels have not read the puranas at all. The writers are picking up characters and adding cinematic treatments to the narrative to sell their works,” said Bhaduri.