Bengal’s Baul -voice against homogenization, struggling for the divined oneness: Transition over changing time

Pages: 333-337
Amitava Sengupta (Department of Psychology, University of Calcutta, Kolkata )

Baul s are ‘a group of mystic minstrels of Bengal, both a syncretic religious sect and a musical tradition’ always searching for divined oneness. Baul apart from being a mystical tradition of sadhana, is also a life philosophy that practices simple living and rejects many things that are believed to be essential for modern life. Baul philosophy has its impression on Bengali culture, and is still surviving despite the blandishments of our consumerist society on it. The religious origination and practice of deha-tattva (body-worship) among Bauls, their understanding of philosophy of austerity, and in this age of all encompassing consumerism how Baul music is also getting appropriated in the ‘fusion-music’ were some of the issues addressed in this study. As Bauls always remained ‘other’ to all kinds of moral codes and institutional structures they faced serious threats and marginalization from the mainstream religious communities; the present ethnographic study also found them in the historical context of resistance/movement of the social-religious out-casts of Bengal.