Passport Baba

Jamshedpur’s Passport Baba Dargah has many takers, all keen to leave the country for greener pastures, reports GOUTAM DAS

If you are aspiring to travel abroad for higher studies or hunt for job opportunities in a 'phoren' country, there is one place where you must place a copy of your curriculum vitae - the revered Hazrat Miskin Shah Dargah, in the steel city of Jamshedpur, where passports and applications in the form of letters hang from a peepul tree in thousands or even more. One application and vrooooom! You fly to your dream destination! Baba is there to fulfill your dreams. Not surprising then that this dargah situated at the Berdih Kalubagan kabrsitan has earned fame as the resting place of "Passport baba" over the years.

Does that sound weird? Perhaps weird it is, some even say it is stupidity, but in a country which is known globally for its mysticism and superstitions, the Miskin Shah Dargah has become the destination for students, parents or anybody who has ever dreamt of a passport to foreign shores, be it the Gulf countries, UK or US. The blind belief, that your prayers for a job will be answered - if a mere written application to Miskin Baba and copies of passports are tied to the branches of the tree which hover over Baba's samadhi or tomb - is perhaps also a classic example of the growing despair among the educated unemployed youth who now have fallen back on saints and fakirs for a solution to the malaise. The extent of the belief, or the malaise, can be judged by the fact that the branches of the tree have to be cleared and cleaned once or twice in every six months so that it can accommodate other applications and passports in the waiting!

Transcending caste and community, people from Orissa, West Bengal, Chhattisgarh and even far off Punjab make a beeline here with their offerings, letters and passports on the sprawling campus of this cemetery, interestingly, built in a Hindu locality. On Thursdays the number of devotees swell up to at least a thousand or perhaps more. Sardar Surjeet Singh is one such devotee who has come all the way from Punjab with his small family to pay his obeisance at the dargah. "Call it superstition or call it a miracle, but a mere prayer at Baba's dargah can make the impossible possible for you", said Singh. This Sikh who was unemployed and had applied for a job in UK, after his efforts for a job in the country had proved futile, had heard about "Passport Baba" from a friend living in Jharkhand . Singh decided to come to Baba praying for a job in London immediately after he applied for it. Singh who is a commerce graduate came down all the way to Jamshedpur and tied his CV as well as his passport to the tree. "My surprise knew no bounds when within a month I received a reply from the concerned company asking me to join as soon as possible. Imagine, here I was almost on the throes of starvation after begging for a job at every possible door, but one application at Baba's door and I land a job, andthat too in the UK!" The miracles of Passport Baba should be experienced to be believed, he exclaimed.

Peer Mohammad, who came to settle here after his marriage some decades back, and has been in charge of the Dargah since Miskin Baba died in 1934, says that the Baba had crossed here from Lahore some 100 years back. "I have not seen most of the people whose applications hang from this tree, he said pointing at the peepul tree but the huge donations and offerings that we receive here is a pointer towards the fact that prayers of devotees have been answered by Baba, said Peer, who has involved his entire family in Baba's 'sewa'.

A passport issued in 2005 in the name of Pradeep Sharma of Jalandhar hangs from the tree. Another in the name of Anjali from Bhubneshwar and Sanjiv Kumar from Patna. The letters and passports arrive here by post or courier in thousands and the family takes pains to hang every bit of paper on the tree, if not tied personally by the applicants. "When the prayer is answered the devotees come and perform their thanksgiving, said Peer. "Furniture, fans tiles and bricks…. everything in this dargah has been donated by devotees" he added.