The Varanasi bhavan where Hindus come to die — in 15 days

What saddens me the most about death is thinking about unfulfilled wishes. When I saw Chaturbhuj Jha, a 95-year-old retired teacher from Bihar, lying in a sparse room waiting to die, I wondered if he had any. But this, his grandsons told me, was indeed his last remaining wish — to die in Varanasi.“He used to say he would draw his last breath in Kashi,” Brajesh Jha, his grandson, told me. “The doctor had given him a week to live after a heart stroke. We rushed him here from Delhi in a car so he could die in Kashi.” A lot has been written about Hindus who come to Varanasi to live out their last days. But I did wonder what it means to face the moment one realises that they are about to die. Do they think about what their life amounted to? Do they wish they had done more, or differently? And do they actually come to terms with the end of life?In Varanasi, one thing did strike me — the many ways Hindus speak of death. Sharir shaant ho gaya (their body has gone calm), sharir chhor diya (they’ve left their body) or mukti mil gayi (they’ve found release). Because it is here, they have faith, that the finality of death ceases to matter.Chaturbhuj Jha was one such believer. And he was biding his time at Mukti Bhavan.Here, people come to live out their final daysAbout 2km from Dashashwamedh Ghat, concealed in a lane behind a bustling thoroughfare, is the Kashi Labh Mukti Bhavan. It was set up in 1958 by industrialist Jaydayal Dalmia.The rules are straightforward — a person of any faith who thinks they are close to death can live out their last few days here. At least two members of the family must accompany them. They pay a token Rs 20 a day as “electricity charges”. But if they can’t afford it, they are not asked to.They can stay on for 15 days. “If they don’t get mukti (die) in 15 days, we ask them politely if they can make other arrangements,” said Kalikant Dubey, priest at the Bhavan, who also manages the day-to-day operations. Chaturbhuj Jha had been around for 45 days at the time. “If someone is in a critical state, we allow them to wait,” Dubey said. It’s a subjective call, really. “The longest anyone has waited here was 108 days. It was a woman from Bihar, whose son said he would not leave until his mother got moksh.”Moksh. The idea that people are reborn into a cycle of life and death, and release from that cycle is the ultimate reward of a life well led. “Our scriptures say that if someone dies in Varanasi, they obtain moksh. That is what my grandfather always wanted,” said Brajesh, a journalist in Delhi. “We didn’t tell him his heart was giving up — there was 60% failure diagnosed — but he knew it was time.” Chaturbhuj, his daughter-in-law Anukula, Brajesh and two other grandsons of Chaturbhuj came to Varanasi from Delhi.The retired teacher from Motihari in Bihar had headed a strongly religious-minded household in his lifetime. “Ramayana and Gita would be read all day,” Brajesh said. “He lost his son — my father — six months ago. Father had a cold for half an hour, suddenly got sick and died before we could get him to the hospital. He didn’t suffer much. Grandfather is really suffering … Survive toh dedh mahina kar gaye (he has survived for a month and a half now).” The rest house where Hindus 'check-in' to attain nirvana...Brajesh was interrupted by a phone call. Chaturbhuj was trying to turn on his side. For every second of that movement, he groaned with pain. He stared at me. I could not interpret the expression — it seemed anguished. I wondered what he was thinking. But he could not speak. Not in a manner I could have understood.Later in the evening, I spoke to the most quiet member of their family, Anukula, while she was cooking for the four of them. She seemed like she was in her 60s. Had anyone else in the family said they wanted to die in Varanasi? “Just him,” she answered. Was accepting the proximity to death difficult? I asked. “I really don’t know,” she said. “He is in a lot of pain.”I had spent about half a day at Mukti Bhavan — in the morning and in the evening. For those running it, duties revolve around religious ceremonies. When I asked what they do for those about to die, Dubey said, “From 4am, there is mangal aarti. Between 5am and 6am, bhajans are sung. Around 10am, when the morning aarti end, moksharthi (those seeking moksh) are given Gangajal and tulsi leaves. This is done thrice — at 10am, 12pm and 3pm.” He continued, “In the evening, Ramayana is read from 5.30pm to 6.30pm. Then, till 7.30pm, bhajans are sung. From 8pm to 9pm, there is another aarti. We wrap up by 10pm.”Who takes care of the dying? “The family,” Dubey said. And the dead? “We help the family arrange everything.”The pandemic, he said, had shut things down for a while. They didn’t have the resources to handle the surge in deaths expected with Covid-19. “Two moksharthi were here when the first lockdown was announced in March 2020. One of them got mukti (died) in 10 days. Another felt they could get stuck, so they went back home in an ambulance,” Dubey said. The Bhavan opened again in April 2022. “Five people got moksh that month, 3 in May.”Dubey has been here for nine years. He studied scriptures at his village in Bihar and then came here to make a living. Does seeing death up close every day affect him? “It is a matter of joy when someone dies in Kashi. Why should it bother me, or anyone?” We were talking in an unoccupied room. “In this room, for instance, lived a man from Buxar in Bihar. He got moksh on May 16.” It felt melancholic to me. Not to him.The manager, Anurag Hari Shukla, said it was not sadness but a sense of lost time that catches up with people sometimes. “Some cry all night, others tell their families they should not repeat the mistakes they made. All things, bitter and sweet, flash by,” he added. “When my father used to manage the place (three generations of Shukla’s family have been managing the Bhavan), there was a moksharthi from Bihar. He asked if someone could find and bring his brother to him. They had fought over property and never reconciled. At the time of his death, he needed his brother.”Did his brother come? “Yes, with his family. They had a reunion. And then, he died happy.”For some, it’s a wait for ‘second death’“What will you do if your dead father emerges before you? Will you run to embrace him or run away in fear?” Dandiswami Jairam Ashram, a monk, asked me. I was taken aback. I had asked him what he used to do before he came to Varanasi. He was offended about the question. And I, having lost my father six months ago to a sudden cardiac arrest, was not in a mental space to hear this with any amount of objectivity. But I didn’t say anything. I was here to listen, not find an answer to my own torment ... The rest house where Hindus 'check-in' to attain nirvana...