Mrs. Sarita Bansal

Everything about her is pious. She is a much higher soul, who had taken this life to nurture and pull us up in our respective journeys. Her life and its roles were not for the faint-hearted. Her decisions seem to be guided by a force beyond self-serving logic.

She lived her intense life as if it was an offering to someone divine. She suffered a lot, laughed a lot, withstood a lot and still, gave a lot. Her sufferings seemed enough to be able to cut many lifetimes of accumulated karmas. She never asked for anything, neither from people nor from life. Just kept giving.  She still gives and guides. 

As for me, she brought me into this world physically. She also shaped me spiritually. From reading the Bhagwad Geeta to me as an embryo to the Art Excel course in childhood, the DSN and Vipassana in the 20s and Isha Yoga later on. She was the silent nudge behind all my spiritual explorations. My spiritual being was nurtured by her loving hands. She always knew when I was having a difficult time - my teenage turpitude or even decades later, my cluelessness before Zen. Her few words were enough to give me the zeal to move on. 

She was the one who, with her limited freedom and resources, touched everyone's life lovingly. A lifelong learner, She loved maths and was a self-taught creative content creator. Chatting away with her bountiful supply of sisters, brothers, friends and everyone in between. She was the first to shower their families with birthday and anniversary calls. She kept her sweet sisters, blissful family, Devashish family, Banasthali friends and innumerable other clans together with her CGI collages and videos. Sunshine or clouds, she did this every-day. Till the cancer entered her brain again. 

The disease did its best to be dreadful. Yet she hunted the cracks in its dread to give life her broad-nosed smile. The cancer melted the strong emotional walls she had built inside of her. One of those days when I was trying hard to lift myself up, Muskaan came and spoke to me about her. How she spoke about her made me realise how much I have missed about my mother's life. In the last 2 decades, I have been busy with my own worldly pursuits and whenever I met her, it was brief and about me. She had sewed her own web of relationships which she nurtured and tended to. Muskan showed me that. She was her first grandkid. And to protecting her sanity, she took her out shopping when the emotional weather was to traumatic for a child. When I had secretly and shamefully lost hope, Muskan used to say that "Dekhna, Maa will come out of it, she has fought it before successfully, that too twice"

After the imli chuski episode, when she chose to delay her departure, a lot of magic was happening around her every single day. She spoke extensively about her childhood and was frank and unafraid even around Papa. Often taking the liberty to joke around and cutting people short jokingly. Her last year was more to give us, her Lucknow family time to accept the ultimate reality. In the last one year of her difficult life, she closed the emotional loops of her key relationships. Her magic penetrated the toughest of walls. I still remember papa wearing sherwani on the last anniversary they celebrated together. He became more emotive, reminding her that he used to call her Sweetu while talking about their honeymoon. She enjoyed her time with Kabir who always knew exactly how to keep the whole family engaged. Ever talkative and observant, he always brought a smile to his Maa's face. These last couple of years of her life was all about creating wonderful memories with family. With Garv laying out the cards as Palash, Shubhi, Kaka Bhaiya and Niyati play along while she watched. Telling me how my guitar could be improved, posing for pictures in her most recently shopped hat and scarf. She nibbled on her favourite sweets as she narrated her childhood stories to Muskan and Nisha Bhabhi. All her sisters and brothers took turns to visit her, and her response to their obvious question was "Ekdum Badhiya hai Sab".

After multiple rounds of surgeries and chemo, came her first demand for herself - "Mera 60th birthday achche se manana" was what she told me after seeing one of her school friend's retirement party. I often feel that she purposefully gave us a chance to serve her before she leaves her body. She wished me on my birthday on 25th Jan 2024 and that was the last she spoke to me. 

Before leaving her body, she closed all karmic loops, to the extent that no one can feel good about her going. She was protective of me all through her life, till her very last breath. Protected me from the painful realities of life and death alike. She passed away, sparing me the trauma of seeing her go. She left her body with gangajal and tulsi on her lips. With the lord in her heart and "Hare ram, Hare Krishna" on her mind. She passed away as her husband and her eldest son held her.  After spending 60 years on earth, on the morning of Magh Purnima.

That gloomy night as her bereft body laid in the hall, the moon had its brightest shine in years. Celebrating her home-coming and telling us that her being's luminescence is there to stay, in one form or another.   

She came. She gave and she left. Even while dying, she showed us how to live. 

Yes, she was not that old. Yes, her abundance of love could be cherished by us for decades more. But now that the inevitable has happened, life gives me only one choice. In fact, mummy has already made that choice for me. The choice to face life, receive the abundance it has to offer, accept it fully and live willingly. Use life to reach the source of my being and extract the jewels stored therein. Bring them out and offer them to the world around. The huge void left by her is a black hole pregnant with possibilities. Possibilities that will give shape to the values she lived by. 

She lives on through all of us, her children. And she talks to us, tells us what she wants. Her secret diary reveals that she always had her children in her thoughts. Infusing the Guru force in their lives and rooting for their success. She is still doing the same.  Her life is soaked in ours. Manifesting through memories and our actions alike.

She wants her grandson Zen to never feel the lack of the super extra shower of love that she would have given, had she been around physically. She wants Niyati and me to take care of that. 

As for me, she wants me to define my own path, unafraid of the shadows of expectations of the world. She wants to see nothing but the ultimate realisation of my true potential. See my life burn bright with the exhaustion borne out of complete surrender. I must see her after this.  I know I must maintain access to Her. I will not distract myself from that. I want to be alone more often. To brew focus and invest it in my soul. She has left me with many a bigger job to be done. Now she wants me to direct my emotional energy and harness my life force in a way that allows me to fulfil my potential - as a father, as a husband, a friend and an officer. She wants me to make this life count. As for Niyati - she wants to see us as that couple who inspires millions to live meaningful lives, filled with kindness. Can feel her smile when watching Niyati hold Zen in her arms.

Most importantly, she wants all her children to remember her happy times and not the traumatic tremors. The times when she was truly alive. The times when she chirpily told her stories and happily shared videos of her family. When she connected people from across the world through her innocent concern and love. Her Zen and Kabir will know her for what she was - a strong, kind, giving person who was ready to forgive and move on. The coolest Maa in the world! Who worked and still works tirelessly to protect and nourish her own. 

One of those difficult days when language betrayed her, I found myself instinctively rubbing her forehead with my thumb. I was feeling like I was having a silent conversation with her. I gave her the news of her fourth grandchild and she mumbled something to herself. It is said that the soul takes home in an embryo after 3-3.5 months of conception. Just around her 61st birthday, 21 weeks after the shining moon. Zen was born. The math is clear.