Why did she adopt the name of Naina Devi? The story of how and why she chose this name has been told many times but it bears repetition, not only as a re-defining of her essential and individual identity but also as a poignant reminder of how she turned to this name for anonymity in her time of need. In her childhood her mother used to take her to Benaras to visit her grandmother who lived there. Early in the morning her grandmother used to go to the Ahilyabai Ghat to bathe in the Ganga accompanied by her little granddaughter who would sit on the steps of the ghat gazing up at the alcove where a beggar woman lived. She was fascinated by that old woman, by her shorn hair, which brought into focus her large and expressive eyes, by her white sari which marked her out as one who had renounced all and given up the world. Most of all, she was fascinated by the song she used to sing to the river,

It was a plaintive cry from the heart. Help me, my Lord, give me your protection for I have lost the will to live. Who was this woman so sang so beautifully, with such devastating truth in her voice? Later, she found out that the beggar woman was once a well-known tawaif of Benaras who had renounced the world. “This left an indelible impact on my mind,” she wrote. “I could not sing under my own name because I did not want to offend my family members and so I sang incognito under the pseudonym Naina Devi…. I decided to take the name … after her beautiful sad eyes.”

In the following four decades Naina Devi achieved the rare heights which belong to only those people who find at last what they have sought for so long. Perhaps the greater truth she realized was that to gain something you have to lose something. That when she took on the mantle of Naina Devi, the lady known as Rani Nina Ripjit Singh would recede into the background.

In her eyes, she was no longer Nilina Sen nor Nina Ripjit Singh but only Naina Devi, an identity which she had created, which she had nurtured and which she had to endure. This was her refuge and music was her sanctuary. Neither the trials and tribulations of the past, nor her personal strife could rob her of this identity which she had adorned to define her own existence; Naina Devi, with her soul rooted in music.