IN SEARCH OF GOPAL BHAR
by Vincent Van Ross
Who was Gopal Bhar? Have you ever heard of him? Where can we find him now? What happens to folk heroes like him? Many of them are lost in the sands of time. They are here todaygone tomorrow!
It is an irony of sorts. Folk heroes dominate folk tales riding on the waves of glory while they are around. Then, they fade away from the collective memories of the very communities that celebrated them not so long ago, like retreating waves.
While Birbal and Tenali Raman still reign supreme in northern and southern India respectively, other folk heroes have not been so fortunate. Many key figures of folk tales in other parts of the Subcontinent are fast fading into anonymity. Gopal Bhar, Gonu Jha, Sheikh Chilli, Appaji Rao, Kunniyan and Gangaram Patel are some of the names that come to mind. There must be many more that have vanished from the face of this earth like dodos before I even got to hear about them.
For instance, Gopal Bhar was a jolly, pot-bellied barber who is believed to have served as a jester, as a reward for his wit and wisdom, in the court of Raja Krishna Chandra Roy in Bengal. He was similar to Birbal in the court of the Mughal Emperor Akbar.
Raja Krishna Chandra Roy ruled Krishna Nagar in Nadia, which was under the suzerainty of Nawab Mir Zafar of Murshidabad, during the 18th Century. Though the Nawab received rich tributes from Krishna Nagar periodically, he is believed to have kept the Raja on his toes, assigning him impossible tasks to assert his power over the kingdom.
Apparently, Gopal Bhar helped Raja Krishna Chandra wriggle out of sticky situations by putting his wit and wisdom to good use. Gopal Bhar was treated with great respect in the Rajas court for his uncanny ability to find solutions to impossible situations. These resulted in a number of interesting stories. On a rough estimate, at least four hundred stories were woven around his exploits. Such a popular folk hero is slowly but surely getting edged out of the memories and literature of the people of Bengal and the rest of India.
I was surprised to find that majority of Bengalis living outside Bengal are not aware of this folk hero Gopal Bhar. Perhaps this is because books on Gopal Bhar have been published mainly in Bangla. Many of them are poorly produced, costing as little as five or ten rupees. There are very few decent editions of Gopal Bhars stories.
As children grow, they are flooded by childrens literature from other countries. These include tales by Grimm Brothers and Hans Christian Andersen which account for nearly fifty per cent of fairy tales sold across the globe.
The other reason is that folk tales were once used by parents and grandparents as bedtime stories to put children to sleep. This is no longer the case. This time slot has now been taken over by television, computer and mobile phone. Also, most children do not live with their grandparents any more.
My search for Gopal Bhar ended in College Street of Calcutta (now Kolkata) several years ago. But, thankfully, some English and Hindi publishers have picked up Gopal Bhars books for publication over the past few years. This is wonderful news. If this trend continues, Gopal Bhar may get a fresh lease of life, not only in India but also in other countries. And, Gopal Bhar may once again emerge as a popular folk hero on both sides of the Indo-Bangladesh border!
The writer is a cultural commentator and editor, based in New Delhi.
