GUWAHATI: An engineer by designation and an entrepreneur by profession, Hemanta Kumar Sarmah is a Guwahati based vaastu expert.
Born in Digboi town of Assam, Hemanta did his early schooling from Bhaskar Vidyapith School Guwahati before pursuing higher education from Mahadev Agarwala Higher Secondary School in Mariani. He went on to study Pre University in Science stream from Cotton College (Now Cotton University) prior to doing graduation in Civil Engineering from Birla Institute of Technology and Science (BITS) Pilani.
Right after graduating in 1983, Hemanta landed a job at the Assam Pollution Control Board which he quit in 2 years to start up his own business. Collaborating with three of his friends from college, he started off as an industrialist manufacturing ‘Cleen-X’ cleaning powder. The product did pretty well and was marketed for around 10 years. Alongside, they ventured into the fabrication industry by opening up a medium scale power loom unit that manufactured grey fabrics.
Like most other vaastu practitioners, Hemanta too learned vaastu out of curiosity after visiting a fellow expert. Recalling his introduction to vaastu shastra back in 1995, Hemanta told G Plus, “When we were industrialists, our business wasn’t doing very well and we consulted a vaastu expert who apprised us of the fact that there were defects in our vaastu which was causing problems. We took his suggestions only to realise that vaastu did play a role. It was then that I decided to study vaastu shastra in depth.”
Hemanta has been studying, practicing and experimenting with vaastu shastra – the science of architecture – for over 2 decades now. Among the hundreds of companies and individuals he has consulted, around 85% are now satisfied with the results.
In the urban spaces, hardly 5-10% people know about vaastu while merely 1% actually implements it, he informed.
A lot of people believe that vaastu is different for different people but Hemanta clarifies, “Vaastu is same for all – no matter what your name or date of birth is. Although there can be some differences based on a person’s own energy level. Some people are strong enough to withstand vaastu defects, while others are affected by even the smallest vaastu defect.”
Hemanta informed G Plus that among the most common and prominent vaastu items are yantras, pyramids and feng shui items. He further added that although some feng shui items like mirrors, crystals and laughing buddhas are used by vaastu experts as well, vaastu and feng shui are indeed very different.
Vaastu is a traditional Hindu system of architecture that revolves around five elements – earth, water, fire, air and sky; feng shui is a pseudoscience originating from China that revolves around wood, fire, earth, metal and water.
Apart from practicing vaastu, Hemanta is also among the very few practitioners of alternate medicine ‘pranic healing’ in Guwahati.
A passionate musician, he is the founding member of Spreading Roots – a blues and rock music band – formed in 2011. Hemanta, who is a guitarist as well as a pianist, has been participating in various shows and competitions ever since he was a class 6 student. The winner of All India Cultural Festival at BITS Pilani in the year 1980, Hemanta informs G Plus, “Had I not done engineering, I believe I’d have been a musician.”
Hemanta is also a sports enthusiast and a member of the prestigious India Club, Guwahati where he plays Tennis regularly. Earlier, he used to play cricket and has also represented school and college at various tournaments. Further, he has also led the Assam Bridge Team (Contract bridge, or simply bridge, is a trick-taking card game using a standard 52-card deck) for 3 years, represented Assam nationally 4 times.