Ishwari | sitar player wife
She was not born into music, but somehow, it had always belonged to her. A girl of Banaras, raised in a household where expectations were simple: learn what is needed, marry when it is time, and live as women do. But the sitar called to her in ways she could never explain. It was not given to her, not taught in a way that was structured or planned. It was stolen in moments, listening outside the doors of ustads, watching hands move over strings in temple courtyards, and replicating what she saw with a secondhand sitar she had no right to own. She learned alone before she was ever guided. The city could be considered her first guru. The temples, the ghats, the musicians who played in passing, unaware that a girl stood in the shadows, memorizing their movements.