Dharna

Name for a rite intended to compel
another party to address one’s grievances; the rite is usually adopted when
all other options have failed. The word
dharna comes from the Sanskrit (sacred
language) verb that means “to hold” or
“to maintain.” One element in the dharna
rite is just that—the persistent public
presence of the supplicant in proximity
to the people to whom he or she is
appealing. Thus, an aggrieved civil
servant in modern India may hold a
dharna near the Parliament building
in Delhi, and in some cases people
have camped there for months in an
effort to publicize their plight and
mobilize public opinion. In the same
way, people may hold a dharna at the
temple of a deity to seek guidance or
help; the most prominent example of
this is at the Tarakeshvar temple in the
state of West Bengal.
Aside from persistent presence,
dharna’s other common characteristic is
self-inflicted suffering, usually done
through fasting (upavasa) or other
forms of ascetic self-denial. Pilgrims to
Tarakeshvar refrain from eating or
drinking until the god Shiva grants them
a vision, although in practice the temple
priests often limit such exertions to
three days. On the political level,
Mohandas K. Gandhi perfected the “fast
unto death” as a tool to help attain his
political ends. One of the cultural
assumptions that helps make such selfinflicted suffering persuasive is the
ancient Hindu belief that by voluntarily
enduring physical suffering (tapas) one
can generate spiritual and magical
power. The other working assumption
that makes the dharna effective comes
from the declaration at the rite’s beginning. On the human level, dharnas are
usually undertaken to address very specific perceived injustices, which are
made public at the start. It is generally
believed that should the person performing dharna die, then the person
against whom the dharna had been held
will be assessed the karmic demerit for
causing that person’s death. Such dharnas are generally only undertaken when
one has no other alternative. Because of
this assumption, they remain a powerful
resource, even in contemporary times.