Question of faith

<div class="section0"><div class="Normal"><span style="" font-size:="">Daboo and Meera have come back from Vaishnodevi. Though they''ve made the pilgrimage many times, their sense of inner rejuvenation on their return remains as fresh and wondrous as if it were the first time. You''ve never been, have you, Daboo says. No, I haven''t, I reply. He doesn''t seem surprised.Not all have faith, he says. I know what he means. People generally assume that when it comes to religious faith I don''t count myself among the believers. Perhaps it''s a perception that someone who''s made it his business to be a humorist, a sceptic who laughs at everything — starting with himself — must also surely laugh at something as subjective and blindly uncritical as faith. It''s true that I personally don''t have religious beliefs. But faith? That''s another story.</span><br /><br /><span style="" font-size:="">You could say it began years ago when, as a result of a disagreement I got into with a glass door which I smashed open with my bare foot, I severed my Achilles'' tendon, totally immobilising my right leg from the knee down. The examining doctor in the nursing home where I admitted myself, hopping on one leg, was impressed. He said that in 30 years of medical practice he''d never seen anything quite like my case. I''d managed to cut my tendon with surgical precision. They did an emergency operation, stitched together the cut tendon. Then came the bad news. I was told I was lucky not to have lost my leg. I''d be able to walk, but with a pronounced limp and the help of a stick. Run? Dance? Play sports? Forget it. For the rest of my life. Tough news to digest when you''re 33 and in your physical prime. I heard the sentence being passed, the clang of the steel doors slam shut in my mind, imprisoning me in my incapacity with no hope of parole.</span><br /><br /><span style="" font-size:="">Back home, I practised walking, lurching round the sitting room, leaning heavily on my stick. The thought of falling, of tearing my tendon again, terrified me. Months passed, without progress. Then the family decided to go to Simla for a holiday. Go to the hills in my condition? My physiotherapist frowned. All right; if I absolutely must. But mind. No walking except a little on level bits. Or I''d do myself irreparable damage.</span><br /><br /><span style="" font-size:="">On my second day in Simla, I woke early and, hobbling with my stick, stole out of the house. I''d found out that the highest point in Simla was Jakhoo peak, 3 km and some 400 metres up from where we were. I found the trail and began to climb. The endless path got steeper and, impossibly, steeper still. Quivering with strain, my right leg seemed to be on fire. What if it collapsed under me? How would I ever get off this hill? Panic froze me.</span><br /><br /><span style="" font-size:="">Then I noticed I wasn''t alone. Others were climbing with me. Most were young and fit. But not all. An old woman bent almost double, a human question mark. A frail man on crutches. A heavily pregnant woman, followed by a small girl carrying in her arms an infant almost as large as she herself. The old lady saw me look at her and smiled. As if to say, Don''t worry, we''ll both make it. If she can do it, if they can do it, so can I, I told myself, and climbed on.</span><br /><br /><span style="" font-size:="">By the time we left Simla three weeks later, I''d long discarded my stick. I was doing the climb easily, and I''d run all the way down. I''ve never felt fitter in my life. And ever since, my leg has never given me any trouble. I never went into the Hanuman temple on the hill, which is where all my fellow travellers were headed. I never felt the need to. For I''d found a faith far stronger than any I could have in any belief of my own creation. I had found faith in that most miraculous of things: I had found faith in the faith of others. That kept me going then, and does still, as fortunate as the most fortunate of pilgrims.</span><br /><br /><br /></div> </div>