I had just
submitted my application form for the SSC Examination, when ‘a four feet one
inch cat-eyed Da Vinci’ Kalyani Pal, the Bangla teacher, declared that I
would not be able to take the exam. What was the reason? “You are underage, you
cannot take the exam at fourteen; you have to be fifteen.” But how was I
supposed to acquire a whole year? Disappointed, I returned home and informed
everyone that I wouldn’t be able to take the exam that year. Why not? I was
underage. After much deliberation Ma said “I have heard that many things can’t
be done because one is too old for them, you can’t join the University or you
can’t get jobs.” Maybe so, but for the SSC the reverse is true. If you are
underage, sit at home and grow old. Come back to take the exam when you are
fifteen. Towards dusk, Ma read the Esha Namaz and read two parts of the
special sixth prayer known as the Nafal Namaz as well, bowing her head
at the darbar of Allah. She informed the Almighty, in tears, that her
daughter was not being able to take her exams. However, she was sure that if
Allah chose, He could deliver her daughter from this terrible eligibility
problem; enable her to not only take the exam but also to pass successfully.
I do not know to
what extent Allah came to my rescue, but Baba certainly did. He went to my
school the very next day and scratching out the year 1962 from the SSC form, he
wrote 1961. He told me that from now on I had better glue myself to the study
desk and chair. I was to stop all gossip and mischief and concentrate fully on
my studies so that I passed my SSC exam in the First Division with four
Distinctions. If I didn’t, he would throw me out of the house he had said without
mincing words.
My age had been
increased by a year. A child, I would be taking the exam with elders. I was
overjoyed. Pricking my balloon of joy Dada said, “Who said you were born in
1961?”
“Baba did.”
“Rubbish. Baba had lowered your age.”
“That means I was
actually born in 1961?”
“Not 1961, you
were born in 1960. I remember seeing the parade at the Circuit House on 14th
August,
Chhotda got up,
and tightening the knot on his lungi and exposing his black gums, added, “What
are you saying Dada. How could she have been born in 1960? She was born in
1959.”
I was crushed. I
went to Ma and demanded, “Tell me my real date of birth, will you!” Ma said,
“You were born on the twelfth day of Rabi-ul-awal , the third month of the Muslim calendar
, I don’t recall the year.”
“All this Rabi-ul-awal
doesn’t work at school. Tell me the English year. The date.”
“Can one remember
years and dates after so long? Ask your father. He might.”
There were two
birth dates, Dada’s and Chhotda’s, written on the first page of Baba’s
Anatomy book. There was no trace of Yasmin’s and my birth dates or years in any
corner of any one of the twelve hundred pages of the book. In fact, they could
not be found on any scrap of paper in the house. Ma was born on Id, one of the
Chhota Ids. Which year? That was not known. Till today, no one has had the
courage to question Baba about the date or year of his birth. Most worried, I
was about to spend the entire day calculating anyone and everyone’s ages. Get
Ma’s age, by adding twelve years to Dada’s age and get mine by subtracting ten,
but Ma said “Leave all this and study. Years flow by like water. It seems just
a few days ago that I tied my hair into banana shaped plaits and ran to school,
and today my children are passing their BAs and MAs.”
Ma may not have
been worried about anybody’s age but I was. I asked any khala or mama from
Nanibari visiting us at Aubokash whether they knew the year of my birth.
No one did. No one remembered. I confronted Nani when I visited her.
Spitting a mouthful of paan juice into a spittoon, she said “Felu was born in
the month of Shravan, you were born the same year in the month of Kartik.
“Same year was
which year?”
“Who keeps track
of which year who was born! Kids have been born every year in this house. If
there had been only one or two, one could have calculated years and dates.”
I became obsessed
with as insignificant a thing as the date of birth. The matter induced a mood
of despondency amongst people both at Aubokash and at Nanibari. Nani
remembered that on the day that I was born, Koi fish spawn were cast
into the pond in her house. Runu khala remembered that Tutu mama
had been running between his room and the toilet that day, and had slipped and
fallen with a thud on the stairs, but she couldn’t recall which year that was.
Hashem mama remembered picking up four golden frogs from the courtyard and
dropping them into the well, but he didn’t have a clue about the date or the
year.
I had never before
felt this keen desire to know my year of birth. Baba had substituted 61 for 62,
ensuring that I took the exams. No one could complain about my being underage.
I was happy. I could experience the joy of studying in right earnest. But my
mind remained occupied with the unknown age factor. It was as if my age was a
person standing miles away from me. Someone whom I was always about to meet,
but never did, although the meeting was imperative. When I had enrolled at the
Ma came and sat on
the verandah. Since I did not like Jori’s mother’s answer about being nineteen,
I asked Ma about her age.
“She should be at
least forty or forty-two, could even be forty-five”, Ma said, looking
askance at Jori’s Ma’s loose breasts hanging from her limp body.
“How old is Jori,
Jori’s Ma?”
To tell us Jori’s
age her mother again straightened her waist and stood up. Ma scolded her. She
said, “Hurry up, sweep the courtyard and then go and eat. Then scour the
utensils, and put the rice for dinner on the stove.”
We all had had our
lunch. Only Jori’s Ma was left. She, alone, had to finish the cooking, feed
everyone, scour the utensils, clean and mop the house, and sweep the courtyard,
before she could eat.
To think of Jori’s
age, her mother needed to look up at the sky again. The reddish sky was filled
with flocks of birds flying towards their nests. Jori’s Ma had never been able
to return to any nest with her daughter. After the birth of Jori, she had been
bound to one house or another - bound by work.
“How old? Twelve!
Khala, won’t Jori be twelve years old?”
Jori’s mother
asked, looking at Ma helplessly.
“How can you say
twelve? She appears to be at least fourteen or fifteen.”
Ma did not know
when Jori was born. She had not seen her at birth. Jori’s mother had come to
stay in this house along with Jori only two years ago. Ma kept Jori’s mother
for this house, and left Jori at Nanibari to run errands for Nani. Whatever Ma
said about ages were all conjectures. Ma guessed ages looking at the physical
appearance of people. However, these conjectures were happily accepted by
Jori’s mother. From now on Jori’s mother knew her daughter’s age to be
“fourteen or fifteen”, and her own to be “forty or forty-two, or even
forty-five.”
Jori’s Ma gathered
the fallen leaves, branches and feathers in the courtyard and heaped them on
the garbage pile near the pond. She then lit a small oil lamp in the kitchen
and sat down to eat rice and aubergine curry. Meanwhile Ma sat on the verandah,
sorrowfully staring at the coops of swans and hens running about. I sat with my
legs spread out at her feet, listening to the whirring buzz about my head, of
the evening concert of dancing mosquitoes along with the sounds of ululation
drifting in from Dolly Pal’s house. I watched how darkness slowly fell from the
sky onto our cleanly swept earthen courtyard, like water droplets dripping from
the wet hair of a melancholy maiden.
Staring at the segun
tree behind the tin shed, I asked Ma softly, “How old is the segun tree,
Ma?”
Ma looked
strangely at the tree and said, “… seems to be three hundred years old.”
How Ma guessed
the ages of all human beings and trees, I could not understand.
“Why don’t people
live for three hundred years, Ma?”
Ma did not utter a
word. Darkness had enveloped her as though bats’ wings had flapped and covered
her face, which otherwise always had the carefree appearance of sea gulls
flying playfully over the waters.
Anxieties about
age have continued to haunt me since then. I suddenly had the desire to
celebrate my birthday according to the date written on my SSC form. It helped
that Baba was in a good mood. As soon as I asked, a cake, a basket of malaikari
sweets, one packet of chanachur, one pound of sweet biscuits and a
dozen oranges arrived. In the evening I lit a candle on the cake. In the
presence of whosoever was at home and one single precious guest, Chandana, I
blew out the candle. I cut the one-pound cake with the only knife that could be
found in the kitchen – the long knife used for the Holy Sacrifice of cows. Who
would offer the first piece of cake to me was a matter of hot dispute between
Geeta and Yasmin. Geeta finally won. Her desires and wishes, she being the daughter-in-law
of the house, were given more importance than Yasmin’s. Yasmin moved away from
the cake, sporting a long face. Meanwhile, before the camera light could come
on, Geeta fixed a sweet smile on her face and offered me a piece, with her eye
on the camera. My birthday was thus celebrated in the midst of cake-cutting,
clapping, camera clicks, biscuits soaked in the malaikari, and lips
licking the white icing on the cake. In this house it was the first time any
birthday had been celebrated, and that, too, owing to my own enterprise.
Chandana gave me three books of poems as a present. Raja Jaye, Raja Ashei
(The King goes, the King comes), Adiganta Nagna Paddhwani (Bare
Footfalls Reaching up to the Horizon) and Na Premik, Na Biplabi (Neither
Lover nor Revolutionary). Dada gave me Rabindranath’s Galpaguchho
(Collection of Stories). This was the first time in my life that I had received
presents on my birthday. I couldn’t take my hands, my eyes or my mind away from
the books. Much later that night, Ma said with a parched throat, “You could
have broken a piece of sweet and given it to Jori’s mother. She has never eaten
a sweet in her life. She could have tasted some, too.” I suddenly realized that
not just Jori’s mother even Ma had not got a share of the birthday food. Ma of
course said that she could do without it. If ever a biscuit or handful of chanachur
was offered to Ma, she said “I really eat only rice. You all are kids, you eat.
You all peck at rice like birds, so you need to eat other foods as well.”
After my birthday
celebrations, Yasmin became very keen to celebrate her own. She caught hold of
Baba to find out the date and month of her birth. Baba kept putting her off,
but Yasmin doggedly persisted. After keeping her hanging for almost two months,
Baba told her it was the 9th of September. That was all she needed.
Before the 9th of September could come, Yasmin sent Baba a long
list, three kinds of fruit, two kinds of sweet, along with chanachur and
biscuits. She had already invited almost all the girls at school. When Baba saw
the list he said, “What is a birthday? There is no need for having birthdays.
Study hard and become a worthy individual. I do not want any celebrations in my
house.” Ma cajoled Baba, in secret “She wants to celebrate her birthday, let
her! Girls are Lakshmis, it is not right to beat and discipline them.
They too have some desires. She is being childish, but indulge her for once.”
Ma would use the respectful address ‘aapni’ for some time and then
switch to the more intimate ‘tumi’. The reasons for descending or
ascending from the familiar ‘tumi’ to the formal ‘aapni’ were so
numerous, that by now neither Baba nor we were even startled by the change of
terms. However, whether she used ‘tumi’ or ’aapni’, in a light or
serious tone, whether she cried or laughed, whatever way Ma voiced her desires,
Baba gave them the least importance. Ma knew this as well as Baba.
“Forget all this
meaningless fun and games. The daughter dances and I see the mother doing the
same… nothing but a dance of apes.”
Ma did not get
cowed down by Baba’s frowns. She continued to cajole him while massaging hot
garlic oil into his cold-affected chest and back. “Once you marry off the
girls, they go away to another home. Whatever dreams and desires they have,
must be fulfilled in their parents home itself.” Even if the garlic oil
softened Baba’s flesh, it certainly didn’t seem to soften his heart. Yasmin was
disappointed. Nothing was being done to celebrate her birthday. However,
surprising everyone – that afternoon, Baba sent us all the items in Yasmin’s
list. The girl danced with delight. Arranging all the food in saucers, all
dressed up, she sat staring at the black main gate all evening, awaiting her
guests. Since no one appeared, Yasmin had no alternative but to invite three of
her neighbourhood gollachhut playmates when the girls came to the
grounds late in the evening, and feed them the birthday feast.
When Chhotda
returned home at dusk, he was surprised to see the display of food. “Hey, what
is the occasion today?”
Yasmin laughed
shyly and said, “It’s my birthday.”
“Who said you were
born on this day?”
“Baba said so.”
Once Baba had said something, it did not behove anyone to utter a word in
contradiction; for everyone at home, whatever Baba said, was the truth. There
was after all no one more knowledgeable and intelligent than him.
“Okay, understood.
You needed a birth date, so you asked Baba for one, and he made up one.”
Yasmin was stunned
at Chhotda’s audacity.
That day too, the
one who did not get to share even a single piece of Yasmin’s cake was Ma. She
had left the house in the afternoon to return only at dusk. In her hand was a
brown paper packet, inside which was a red coloured dress material for Yasmin.
Ma was going to stitch a frilled frock for Yasmin herself. Having no money, she
had, without telling anyone, borrowed some from Hashem mama, and gone to
Gaurhari Cloth House and bought three yards of the material.
When I saw it, I
leapt up shouting “But it is not her birthday today!”
“Who said it isn’t
her birthday?”
“Chhotda did.”
“So what!” Ma
scolded. “Never mind if it’s not her birthday. The girl wanted to have a little
fun, let her.”
We never got
clothes except on the occasion of Id. Baba gave us clothes only once a year and
that was on Chhota Id. Before the next year’s Chhota Id could come, our dresses
would either tear or become small. If one requested Baba for new clothes he
would snarl and say, “Don’t you have two dresses, wear one and wash it when
it’s dirty, and wear the other. There is no need to have more than two
dresses.” Ma would increase the length of our short dresses with sari borders,
or any other extra piece of cloth and mend the tears. School going girls
normally had two kinds of clothes, one to wear at home and the other to wear
outside. If ever I wanted to keep my Id clothes for wearing outside, and asked
for clothes to wear at home, Baba said, “Why do you have to go out? If you have
to go out anywhere, that is to your school. For that you have your school
uniform.” At school, girls were given the liberty to wear clothes other than
their uniforms when a cultural function was held or a picnic organized. The
girls wore different dresses for different functions. Since I wore the same
dress for each and every occasion, one of my classmates asked me once, “Don’t
you have any other clothes?” I was so afflicted by shame that I ran and hid
myself behind a pillar for a very long time. Baba had never refused us our
school uniforms. He personally took us to Gaurhari Cloth House to buy the
material and then went to the tailor shop at Ganginar Par. When the tailor took
our measurements, he repeatedly instructed the tailor to make the uniforms
larger, so that they would last longer. Even at the shoe shops, Baba would say
to the shopkeeper, “Make sure the shoes are a little bigger, so that they can
be used for a longer time.” I found that even the clothes and shoes larger in
size, shrank rather fast. Ma said, “The clothes and shoes don’t get smaller,
you all outgrow them.” As we kept growing physically, I used to be scared that
Baba would get angry. Later when Dada was studying at
Yasmin was
delightedly jumping all over the house wrapped in the red cloth that Ma had
bought for her. Ma sat in the dark verandah with her hair hanging loose, and
watched the bright red Yasmin, who appeared rather beautiful in the glow of the
lighted room.
Chapter
Two
She came on
transfer from Comilla and took admission in the new school in Mymensingh. We
established eye contact the very day she joined class. Her almost wholly shut
eyes spoke volumes on that first day itself. Of course, on that day, she stuck
close to her paternal or maternal cousin sister Seema Dewan. She did the same
on the second day also. She sat on my bench on the third day, and after that
she did not sit anywhere else. Chandana’s complexion was like virgin paper, her
nose was as if chiseled by stone. Half her eyes were concealed by her eyelids.
The other half twinkled directly at me and lighted up my heart. When her loose,
long, thick hair freely tumbled down her back like monsoon rain, it secretly
soothed my entire body. Ever since Dilruba left, the seat next to me had
remained unreserved. Before I knew it, Chandana had taken over that place.
Every day Chandana’s sounds, smells, complexion and Dilruba’s absence hovered
over me like shadows. Chandana was not the only girl newly admitted to the
class. Flocks of girls from Vidyamoyee were coming in. They were
the same rebellious friends of mine. Yet the
fragrance of our relationship in which I was totally submerged, remained fresh
and unaffected.
The Residential
Adarsha Balika Vidyayatan or
While I was flying
high with Chandana in her wild ways, my SSC exams hung over my head like
Damocles’ sword, threatening to invade my home and enter every nook and corner.
Baba advised me to learn by heart and internalize each word on every
page of every book. My world was to be surrounded by nothing else but dark
black letters. However, my desire to follow Baba’s advice would vanish
as soon as Baba left the house or the sound of his snores became
audible. On the way to school the one-class senior boys of
Asma Ahmed, with
her nose and chest both up in the air, was a good student who kept herself
aloof from everyone. It seems even she had exchanged glances with one of the
good students from the
If Borodada was
with me, I would sit in the rickshaw with my head bent in shame because of his
appearance. When I raised my head, it gave me the opportunity to furtively look
at the boys standing on the road. A new plump boy standing next to Lutfer,
wearing blue trousers and a white shirt, set my heart aflutter again one day.
One glance was enough to excite me. I kept feeling I was drowning in love’s
bottomless waters. I kept feeling that the plump boy would be thinking of me.
That he would be standing on the road at ten, when I would go to school, only
to get one glimpse of me. He did stand on the road the next day. When I saw
him, I was sure there was no one more handsome in the world than this
roly-poly. I was amazed at how my whole life now seemed centred around him.
How, if I didn’t see his smiling lips and eyes everyday, my life was futile.
Then suddenly one
day the mind switched from these instant love affairs, without which I had
thought I would surely die, to the books in the library. My eagerness to finish
reading as many books as were on the shelves gained the momentum of a hungry
shark. Once the books within our reach had been read, the ones beyond our reach
were obtained by either standing on our toes, or using ladders, and were
gobbled up by Chandana and me. These books were kept under our textbooks,
pillows, mattresses, in spite of the fact that our exams were looming ahead.
The home tutor Shamshul Huda, taught me physics, chemistry, biology, mathematics
and all the seven kinds of sciences. He would slap me almost every evening as a
routine. But despite that, as soon as Shamshul Huda had disseminated scientific
knowledge to me, had his tea and biscuits and left the house, I would bend over
those unwholesome books. Chandana was far ahead of me in this. Where I finished
two books, she finished seven. In the race to read books, I was always behind
her. It was my belief that Mamata, the bookworm, too could not keep up with
Chandana. The library books were called ‘outbooks’ by the girls at school. On
wanting to know what ‘outbook’ meant I was told that any book outside the
syllabus, was an ‘outbook’. Girls who read ‘outbooks’ were not looked upon very
favourably by the quiet, serious-minded good students. Those who read
‘outbooks’ were considered to be the kind who did not concentrate on their
studies. Their minds were restless. Most importantly, such girls were not good
students and got marks resembling zeros in their exams. This was the general
idea current in the school. Why this was so, I was unable to fathom. Even after
proving that I could read ‘outbooks’ and still do well in my exams, this idea
was not dispelled. Our addiction to these other books created a different world
for Chandana and me. Now, personal love stories of students or teachers did not
drift into our ears, they got stuck somewhere midway. The air around us was now
heavy with the tears of Parvati, the sound of Rajlakshmi’s bare
feet, Charulata’s loneliness and Bimala’s dilemma.
It was not that the
air was always heavy. Once in a while it cleared up with pure laughter, and
became free from gloom. Such an unblemished smile played often on our librarian
Syeduzzaman’s lips. He taught Islamiat once in a while. For this subject
the school had no teacher. Whenever a teacher was free, he came to take Islamiat
classes. Syeduzzaman’s unadulterated smiling stretched up to his ears in the Islamiat
class. His smile had value, because this class was less important than all
other classes. Kalyani Pal taught us Bangla wearing a Monalisa smile.
Such a smile had use in the savouring of the essence of literature. Suraiyya
Begum also exuded the scent of rajnigandhas through her toothy smile.
Could the scent of a flower be transmitted through a smile? Chandana said it
could. Our Mathematics teacher came to class with a grumpy face. Just as well.
Encouraged by Syeduzzaman’s smile, even if we sat in the Islamiat class
gazing abstractedly at the sky, writing copies full of poetry, spending
half-an-hour instead of five minutes in visiting the toilet or drinking water,
it did not make any difference. Syeduzzaman, too, spent more time on telling
stories than teaching Islamiat. His tales were not totally uninteresting
either. However, he repeatedly told us that as a subject Islamiat was
not entirely to be ignored, as it was a scoring subject. If one could write the
Surah Fateeha more or less correctly or give four names of the Asmani
books, one could
For the Mussalman
girls in class there was Islamiat readings, for the Hindus, Sanatan
Dharma teachings. In the whole school there was no one to teach Hindu
Religion either. Just because Kalyani Pal was a Hindu, she was constantly
pushed into that class. She would tell her students that instead of wasting
time with religion, they should spend time with mathematics that will be more
useful. The Hindu girls therefore got a big holiday in their Religion class.
They didn’t waste any time on mathematics and went straight to the grounds to
play, or spent time in adda , gossip in the empty classrooms. Since
Chandana was a Buddhist, she too should have left the class. When there
was no teacher for Hindu Religion, there was no question of there being a
teacher for Buddhist Studies. But she remained motionless in the Islamiat class,
either deep in some storybook, or in poetry. Sitting next to her I could
neither concentrate on Islamiat, nor open a Niharranjan Gupta under
Syeduzzaman’s nose. I would just scribble or compose verses.
“Syeduzzaman
fires a cannon
Loading a
religious horse on his shoulder
He speaks
whatever nonsense he can find
He not only has
a cough, he even pants.
He also puts a
cap on,
But does he
really believe in the Quran, the Hadith?
Or is it all a
put on?”
Having ripped
Syeduzzaman into shreds, I felt bad later. He was a thorough gentleman in shirt
and trousers, whose pate had not been adorned with any cap. Why had I slighted
him so! Actually it was not about Syeduzzaman at all. I could have done this to
anyone. A person looking like a puny tangra fish could safely be
converted into a wide-mouthed booal fish, especially with a little
indulgence from Chandana. When the Bangla teacher Suraiyya Begum would
waddle along, Chandana and I would follow her like two ants. Chandana would
whisper – “Olo Suraiyya, picking flowers, turning your face.”
I would add – “How
much longer will you waddle, the day has almost gone.”
Chandana, feigning
a deep sigh would conclude, “By the time you reach, you will be gone too.”
We knew the
teachers at the Residential Adarsha Balika Vidyayatan were not to be
disregarded. Nevertheless, we indulged in limericks, which rarely remained
secret, private or unknown. Other schools would recruit BA’s, but, if you
wanted to teach at the Residential, you had to be an MA, the qualification for
University teaching. None of these Vidyayatan teachers were from this
town. They came from very far, mostly from
Even the
auditorium in this school was worth a look, and so were the functions that were
held there. This auditorium was not a hencoop like in the other schools. It had
dimensions of a cinema hall. At the press of a button, heavy velvet drapes
moved from one end of the stage to the other. The stage itself was a revolving
one. The audience seating arrangements were extensive .The kind of plays,
dance-dramas, musical concerts and other functions that could be performed on
this stage could not be bettered by any other school. If not every month, at
least every two months cultural functions were held, apart from the various
festivals that were observed all the year round. If one solicited enough,
formidable teachers would come out of their shells and sing in amazingly
tuneful musical voices. There was no need for bombs to be thrown, requisite
amounts of tickling could bring forth poetry from the innermost recesses of
many, in fact even from that of the Maths teacher. It wasn’t as though apart
from these concerts we spent our time listlessly. Suraiyya Begum teaching Bangla
poetry, would very often recite the poems she had composed. Suraiyya
Begum’s heart may have been as soft as clay, but Jinnatoon Nahar’s was as hard
as a rock. She taught us English. Actually, I had never liked the English
teachers. The teachers of English were as tough as the subject was difficult. I
loved Bangla, so did Chandana. One day, as was our routine, we reached
school in the morning and stood in class-wise rows in the grounds. We completed
our daily exercises, and sang our National Anthem ‘Amar Sonar Bangla Aami
Tomai Bhalobashi , my golden Bangla I love you’ in front of the
Bangladesh National Flag. Then we went to our classes. As soon as we entered
our class room, our Principal informed us that writer Kazi Motahar Hussain was
visiting our school at that time and, if we wished to, we could meet him. Our
hearts trembled with excitement. Kazi Motahar Hussain was our Principal’s
father. He wrote very well, played very well, as it was with most intelligent
people – competent in every field of knowledge. He had fathered quite a few
talented children. Except for this Wabaida Saad, the others were all quite
renowned. His son Kazi Anwar Hussain was a famous writer. Daughters Sanjeeda
Khatoon and Faimida Khatoon, were both celebrated Rabindrasangeet exponents.
But, in going to meet this famous father of famous children, Chandana and I got
into a very embarrassing situation. At first we kept peeping through the door.
Soon we opened the door softly with eighty-five percent fear and fifteen
percent courage, and entering his room, we saw him laughing, waving his white
beard. His eyes were bright with curiosity. We entered the room,
saying in submissive tones that we had come to meet him. He listened to us,
smiled sweetly, and switched on a radio set kept on the table. The volume was
very loud. The radio remained on for quite some time. Chandana and I kept
exchanging astonished looks. His white-haired and bearded face glowed and he
continued smiling radiantly, with his ear glued to the radio. We again informed
him of the reason for our visit. This time he nodded his head, meaning that if
not then, now at least he had understood why we had come. Then immediately he left
the room, not just the room he left the house and walked rapidly towards the
school. Following him we found he had, Oh Ma, gone straight to
his daughter and was asking her, ‘You called for me?’ Wabaida Saad was stunned.
She had certainly not called for her respected father. What was happening? The
respected father was hard of hearing. How were we going to carry on a
conversation with him then! Wabaida Saad could not find any solution to our
problem. We had no alternative but to silently hurl our reverences at this
dignified figure of a much venerated, respected and saluted man. It was the
first time I had seen a living writer since I had grown up. I had heard from Ma
that when I was six months old, Rahat Khan, a writer friend of Baba, used
to visit us. He would rock me in his arms, and sing songs of his own
composition. The songs were dedicated to Farida Akhtar, a school friend of
Ma’s. “The mendicant maid of my dreams lives near a festering pond, but
I sailed my barge and went and saw her...” Rahat Khan was a master at
Ma was not as keen
as I was to hear stories of Rahat Khan. To a well-read girl, a writer was
someone great… someone who lived on a different planet. That those who wrote
books were human beings like us, that they too urinated and excreted, that
their noses too, once in a while, got stuffed with cold, that if they blew
their noses thick yellow mucous would come out, was something I could not
believe. I had the same belief about film stars. They led beautiful, elegant
lives, lived in a starry world, rode in shining cars and wore dazzling clothes.
They lolled on bolsters like kings and ate apples or grapes and they slept on beds
as soft as cotton-wool. They did not exude any physical smell, let alone that
of sweat. From them emanated the scent of roses. They never made even a single
mistake in their work, never spoke untruths and never caused anybody pain. They
were what could be called noble. I was as much a bookworm, as I was a cinema
addict. Chandana was the same. I would request and cajole Dada to take me to
the cinema, and we would pick up Chandana on the way. After a lot of trouble
and effort on our part Dada would arrange once in a while, to show us a movie,
but for my first chance to see a film magazine at home, I owe thanks to
Chhotda. Chhotda was a young man who could not concentrate on studies, who
roamed all over town; a jack of all trades, he was married rather prematurely.
Every week he would return home late in the afternoon with a Chitrali in
his hand to while away his leisure hours. Chhotda had no wealth, but he had a
heart. As soon as Chhotda’s recreation was over, my curiosity would be set
free. What was written in that paper with pictures? I was the kind of girl who,
whenever she saw printed words, would read them immediately. On the way to
school, in case there were no boys around, I would read anew all the signboards
I had read a million times before. After buying nuts, I would read what was
written on the packet while eating the nuts. After eating tamarind pickle, I
would lick the remnants and even decipher what was barely readable in the
oil-smudged paper. Why would a book worm like me allow a journal full of
amusement lie unread, because it was in pictures! It became a habit to look at
Chhotda’s Chitrali. The habit gradually descended to an addiction.
Or grew in to one, who knows! If Chhotda forgot to buy the magazine,
then what! Saving the rickshaw fare to school, I would buy the magazine and
read it from cover to cover. I’d go to sleep at night with all details at my
fingertips regarding the houses, cars, meals of all the heroes and heroines,
along with news of their love affairs and separations. In my dreams, I would
see one of the heroes meeting me on a starry night on the banks of a moonlit
lake with a soft breeze blowing. That hero would dance and sing for me as he
swore that he could not live without me, with the trees, skies, air, lake
water, moonlight everything as his witness. Unless I had the magazine in my
hand on Friday I could not digest my food, at least Ma thought so. I was not
worried about my digestion at all. However, if the magazine arrived while I was
eating, I would push my plate aside and get up. Or, I would be holding the
magazine in one hand and eating with the other. The hand holding the magazine
was invariably faster than the hand eating food. Chitrali had the power
to not only make me forget food it could even make me forget my parents.
This started when one of my articles was published in the Readers’ Page. I had
just sent a piece, on why the ethereal-voiced Sabeena was being ignored; given
the sweetness of her voice, Runa’s voice was harsh in comparison and so on.
That was the first time ever any article of mine had been published in a
magazine. Before sending the article, I had asked Chhotda whether Chitrali
would publish something I sent. Chhotda had said “Stupid” and pushed me away.
Apparently, Chitrali got five thousand letters a day. Four thousand nine
hundred and ninety two were never opened, let alone read, they were thrown into
the wastepaper basket. So if I sent a letter it would go straight to that
basket. Although Chhotda had extinguished with one puff, my chandelier of desire
and had heaped sacks of despair over my hopes, I had still secretly sent my
article to the Chitrali address, testing my fate. Quite delightfully, it
actually got published the very next week, the photograph of Sabeena Yasmin and
Runa Laila inserted. There was major excitement at home. I floated in the
currents of hip-hip-hurrahs. My name was printed in the magazine, an
unbelievable event indeed! Chhotda, after remaining totally open-mouthed for
sometime, finally stuttered “Wow, y-your wr-writing has been
pu-published!” As though I had accomplished the impossible! A victorious smile
was stuck to my lips like red ants on a sugar-candy. I brandished the magazine
innumerable times before everyone’s eyes except for Baba’s; in fact even before
Jori’s Ma’s eyes. Jori’s mother looked at the magazine with astonishment. “But
this looks no different from thongar kagoj, paper packets”, she said.
After this
unbelievable event took place, another equally unbelievable event occurred.
Next week, I found that several responses, both favourable and unfavourable, to
my article had also been published in Chitrali. My enthusiasm bubbled
like boiling rice. I began sending my articles not only to the Reader’s Page,
but also to the Letters section. Those days a new magazine called Purbani
modeled on Chitrali, was making its appearance in the world of
star-entertainment literature. I was not so heartless as to neglect Purbani.
I just had to have both Chitrali and Purbani every week. If
either of them carried my articles, Chhotda would say with a thin smile on his
lips, “Yes, it’s been published,” and if it was not he would say, “What
happened, didn’t they print your article?” Chandana did not have to be pulled
into this world. Struck by glamour she entered the arena herself. More was
written about me than I wrote myself. I was becoming like a member of the
group. It seemed the person who gave the replies to letters in Chitrali,
known to everyone as Uttar (answer) da, dipped into a pot of syrup while
composing his replies. As I continued to write, this unseen Uttarda began to
feel like my own Dada. After a small hair-pulling battle between Yasmin
and me over a pencil, I wrote to Uttarda to inform him of my unhappy
state of mind. Even if I was full of good spirits, I had to inform him first.
Plucking a phrase from the Golpukur adda, Chhotda one day said,
“Twenty springs of my life have passed by and not a crow has cawed let alone a
cuckoo sing here”. Cuckoo meaning the cultural luminaries, while crows stood
for the smaller fry in the cultural scene. I quickly picked up the phrase and
sent it to Uttarda. He was so upset to hear it that he chased all the
crows in
After my articles
were published in Chitrali, quite a few letters came in my name to the Aubokash
address, from various cities of the country with requests for pen-friendship.
This had never happened before. Till then, no letter had come for me from
anyone outside our relative circle. I was quite excited on getting these
letters. Pen-friendship was quite a unique affair – to know people far away
only through letters, and then to gradually get to know them almost as
relatives and friends. Jewel from
Chandana had begun
to read another magazine, ‘Bichitra’, apart from Chitrali and Purbani.
One of her articles had even been published in the Reader’s Page. On hearing
that women were to be recruited by the Police Force, Chandana gave a proposal
for the uniform the women police could wear. The Burkha. Remaining under the
Burkha would be in accordance with religious requirements and at the same time
the activities of thieves and robbers could be observed through the eye-holes.
No passerby would suspect she was a policewoman. Bichitra had published
her article along with a Burkha-wali’s cartoon sketched next to it. I
had to save four to six annas from the school rickshaw fare, to buy Chitrali
and Purbani. It wasn’t always possible to have the money to buy Bichitra.
I would perpetually beg for it from Dada. Dada enjoyed seeing my
outstretched hand, and once in a while, dropped some coins into it. With that,
I would buy Bichitra like an addict. To buy meant that I had to make
Yasmin or Jori’s Ma stand at the black gate, or stand there myself in order to
call a hawker as soon as one appeared. If there was no hawker, I would send
Yasmin to the Ganginar Par turn, and she would buy one. Since I was grown up I
was not allowed to walk alone on the streets. The prohibitory order had not
been imposed on Yasmin, so at bad times I had to depend on her. It wasn’t just
the expense of buying magazines, to write for the magazines and reply to the
pen-friends was also expensive. If one gave Chhotda the letters, even
the money for postage stamps had to be counted out. In case Dada’s mood was
off, the option was to sell “old glass bottles and papers”. Next to Aubokash,
hawkers would call out all day and pass along the three roads that went in
different directions— one towards Golpukur Par, another towards Durgabari and
another towards Sherpukur Par. They would call out melodiously- Sari and
kapod-wala, badam-wala, chanachur-wala, aachar-wala, churi
and pheeta-wala, ice-cream-wala, hawai-mithai-wala, ghee-wala,
murgi-wala, kabootar-wala, hans-wala, kotkoti-wala,
muri-wala, glass-bottle-paper-wala. As soon as I would hear the
hawker calling the last glass-bottle-paper-wala, I would send whoever was at
hand to catch the fellow. On his head would be a big basket. Before the basket
was lowered from the head, bargaining would be on. “How much?”
“Newspaper three
taka a ser, books and copies two taka.”
“What do you mean
by three taka? If you will give four taka, tell us.”
“Four taka would
be too much. You can take three and a half.”
“Are your weighing
scales okay?”
“Sell only after
you are satisfied.”
Once the hawker
lowered the basket and sat in the verandah, I would forget my fascination for
the old magazines under the bedroom cot, and get them out. I even hunted out
old books and copies. After selling them, I would get about ten or fifteen
taka. Even ten-fifteen taka made me feel like a king. Chhotda too
sold magazines, Ma sold old glass bottles after hoarding them, even torn scraps
of paper found in the courtyard while sweeping, were dusted and stored. The two
paise Ma earned from broken glass and torn paper, she kept under the
mattresses, or tied in the corner of her sari aanchal. This she was able to put
to use and stemmed at times Yasmin and Chhotda’s extreme penury. Chandana was
never lashed by poverty. In spite of living in a rented green tin house in
Panditpara, Chandana easily procured money for magazines every week. Chandana
may not have been able to go to the Town Hall premises full of men but she
would manage to do some amazing things without warning. She arrived one day at
the crack of dawn riding on her younger brother, Saju’s, cycle. On seeing
Chandana, my heart overflowed with joy. The rest of those at home scrambled out
of bed and stared open-mouthed at her. How daring a girl had to be to take a
cycle out in the streets of the city, whether early in the morning or at
deserted
While I was in
this frame of mind, almost every evening, after finishing his work, Shamshul
Huda would come to tutor me. As soon as I saw Huda’s face anywhere near the
black gate, I would start trembling. On a delightful evening I would have to do
sums, delve into physics and almost drown in the pond of chemistry. When
Rabindranath Das came to teach Yasmin, I found it quite enjoyable. Rabindranath
taught Yasmin for fifteen minutes and chatted for forty-five minutes. He did
not chat with just Yasmin, but with me too. He had a daughter, Krishna and a
son, Gautam, growing up in the Kaliganj
The SSC exams were
close at hand, in fact they were literally at the tip of my nose, so to speak,
and there was no option but to stay put in the house. Out of twenty-four hours,
I was at my study table for eighteen. Suddenly I became the most important
person in the house. If I went for a walk, everyone stood aside to give me
space. If I went to the toilet, Ma would herself go and place a pitcher of
water there for me. No one had to be told to fill my bucket of water, before my
bath it was always filled. Since I had to sit up at nights preparing for the
exams, special delicacies were cooked for me to eat. Ma was actually
feeding me with her own hands. Every so often, Baba would return home
with fruits and would caress me. There was pin drop silence in the house day
and night. The inhabitants in the house whispered amongst themselves so that no
sound disturbed my concentration. When the Puja songs started in the para,
Baba personally went and told the Chairman of the Puja Committee,
that the songs had to be stopped any which way, as his daughter was taking her
SSC exam. Understanding the importance of the SSC exam, Dilip Bhowmik actually
stopped the music. In case he had to play them, the mikes were turned the other
way. Next to my open books and copies on the table was also an open box of
biscuits. I was to eat them whenever I felt hungry while studying. Ma came and
gave me hot milk twice a day, saying, “Milk helps the brain to function and
helps remember all that is memorised.” One of the girls of this house was
taking the SSC exams, what could be bigger news, or of greater significance
than that? As the days drew closer, I got the feeling that the Angel of Death,
Aajrail, was coming to seize me forcibly. My heart trembled. My body, hands and
legs shook. At two or three at night, Baba would awaken me and say, “Splash
some water in your eyes, and sit down to study.” I would do so and sit down.
Baba would say, “If the water does not work, apply mustard oil.”
The first day was
the Bangla exam. I had never felt afraid about Bangla ever
before, but on the day of the exam I kept feeling I would not pass. Every
morning Ma gave me a fried egg to eat, saying it was good for me. But on an
exam day, an egg was not allowed, because if one ate an egg one scored an egg
too. A banana, too, would not do. Not even a kochu. Getting a banana or kochu
in the exams was the same as getting a rasgolla. Although bananas, kochu
and rasgolla were my favourite foods, I had to forego them while the
exams were on. I was the one having exams but Baba was more restless
than me. The night before, he hadn’t slept a wink. Seeing him, it felt as
though Baba was taking the exams. He repeatedly wanted to know if
I had memorised the whole book or not.
Ma was
tying two banana shaped plaits with my oily hair on my oily head. Now all that
was left was to tie the threaded paper with a knot in my hair. My eyes were
spilling over with tears of shame, but still Baba caught hold of me and
tied the small paper packet to my hair. Chhotda was in splits on seeing
me, so was Yasmin. Chhotda said, “You can’t possibly pass your SSC, but
with the power of this amulet you might.”
Baba handed
me not one or two but four new fountain pens and a new bottle of Pelican ink.
In case, the ink in my pen finished while writing, I was to fill up and
continue to write. Although everyone had been catering to the moods of the
examinee, no one listened to my ‘No’ regarding the amulet. That amulet surfaced
like a Kholshey fish on my oily hair. Chandana also took her exams at
“Mother Earth,
please swallow me up without further delay,” I prayed fervently for only the
second time in my life. But the Mother Earth did not comply.
“If I am to pass I
would do so anyway, not because of any amulet,” I said as soon as I returned
home, pulling it off my hair with one stroke.
Ma objected,
“It will help you remember your lessons.”
“I can remember
what I had learnt anyway,” I said gritting my teeth and suppressing my sobs.
Baba rebuked
me and said, “You can remember because this is on your head, otherwise you
wouldn’t.”
I stared in astonishment.
I could not believe that this man who had faith in blessings, obeisance,
amulets and charms was my father.
Everyday that
talisman was put on my head. None of my rejections were heeded to. Full of
shame, with my head bowed I had to go everyday to the
Chapter Three
TA TA THOI THOI – DANCING AWAY
Chhotda re-entered
Aubokash with his wife, just before my exams. This happened because of
Ma. She had been inconsolable in her grief over her son. When her appeals and
requests to Baba failed, she sent Hashem mama to fetch Chhotda and
his wife to the city, from some shanty in a village in Islampur. However,
reaching the town was no guarantee that he would get permission to enter Aubokash.
Baba straight away declared that they were not to even look towards Aubokash
even in the distant future. Ma cajoled Nani, and a room next to the well in
Nani’s courtyard, the room that used to be our dining room, was cleared out. A
wooden cot was laid out for them. Once Chhotda began to live there with
his wife, Baba issued orders by which at least Yasmin and my visits to
Nanibari had to stop. Ma, however, regularly visited Chhotda’s family.
Obviously she never went empty-handed. For the welfare of her son, rice, daals,
vegetables, whatever she could collect from Aubokash, she carried with
her. Whenever Baba was not at home, Chhotda dropped in at Aubokash.
He, of course, never dropped in without reason. He came only when he needed
something. Ma would think of Baba’s cruelty and say, “Is
he a man or a stone?” But her untiring efforts softened Baba a
bit one day and he agreed to allow Chhotda and his wife to enter Aubokash,
but they were to only stay in a small room in the corner. They were not allowed
free access to the rest of house. Baba only agreed because he wanted to
see (since Chhotda was already married, although there was no
justification for marriage at this age) if he could complete his studies and
earn his own keep. Ma arranged the small room that she occupied for
them. To hang their clothes, she placed a clothes rack in front of the door
adjoining Dada’s room that she kept shut. Chhotda’s old cot was brought
from Dada’s room and placed in the small room. Chhotda insisted
that the dressing table be moved into his room. Nana had gifted Ma this
dressing table along with the pots and bedspreads for her wedding. Wooden
flowers and leaves were carved around the mirror and at the bottom and they
swung if the table was moved. It had two small shelves on both sides and two
drawers. This leonine four-legged table was dragged from Baba’s room by Ma
herself and put in the small room. She wiped the dusty mirror with her sari
aanchal. Geeta would spend an hour before the table, getting ready, and would
go out with Chhotda almost every evening. I looked at them with longing eyes.
If only I, too, could do the same!
Baba had
sworn he would not look at Chhotda and his wife. However, within two
days of their coming to stay at Aubokash permanently, he called for me
after having his morning bath. Clothed in his shirt, pant, shoes and tie, with
a head full of curly hair, combed and doused in mustard oil, he was sitting
cross legged in the drawing room. When Baba called, it meant that wherever you
were, whatever you may be doing, you had to drop everything and rush to stand
before him. As soon as I stood before Baba, he said, “Call those two.” ‘Those
two’ were which two? I had the opportunity to ask that question, but didn’t.
Since Baba had given orders, I had to figure out which ‘two’ in the
house were ‘those two’. Why only me, everyone at home had to know which ‘two’
Baba could summon at this time. I figured out who were ‘those two’.
Entering Chhotda’s room I said in hushed tones, “Go, summons have come, not
only for you but for both of you.” Chhotda’s face turned pale in a
second. He got out of bed in a hurry, tying the knot of his lungi.
He asked Geeta, a
score of times to accompany him. She sat motionless on the bed, while
agitatedly Chhotda moved back and forth between the bed and the door.
“Nasreen,” – with a weird sound the second call came from the drawing room.
This meant why ‘those two’ were taking so long! Finally, when the ‘two’
mustered up enough courage to drag themselves up for the audience and stand
before him, I pressed my eyes, ears and nose to a crack in the door. Geeta bent
down and touched Baba’s feet. For a Hindu girl, kadambusi, much like a pranam,
was nothing new. Baba coughed to clear his throat, although there
was no such cough filling up his throat. Looking at Chhotda with eyes as
red as it was possible to make, he said, “Have you thought about your life? You
have got married so your studies have been abandoned. You went to set up house
in the village with a hundred taka job. What job was this, may I ask? A
coolie’s work, right? What else would you get but a coolie’s job with your education!
You have dug your own grave. Has it hurt anyone else? Has anything happened to
me? Nothing has happened to me. It has to you. Even a madman understands
himself, but you don’t. If you ask a madman for his money, will he give it? If
you ask him for his food, will he give it? No, he won’t.”
Baba paused
for a while. I don’t know whether he was waiting for words of defense from the
‘two’ embodiments. Then he said, “Go and take admission in Anandamohan. You
have a third division in the intermediate, so your chances are dim, but go and
try at least. When you go, take money from my chambers.” Baba now turned
to Geeta, and screwing up his eyes and nose said, “What were you thinking of
when you did this? You did not think even of your own future, did you?” Geeta’s
eyes were not visible as they were cast down, her hair arrangement could not be
seen because of her aanchal-covered head. Geeta’s mouth was a small one
and in her small face the mouth looked smaller. Baba paused again, cleared his
throat in spite of the absence of cough, and said, “Geeta, both my daughters
have to study. Let me not see you chatting with them. Have you understood?”
Geeta nodded her head to convey she had understood. Baba got up noisily
and loudly closed the door adjoining my room. Leaving orders that they were to
use the inner verandah door only, he opened this door noisily and left equally
noisily. Chhotda had no option but to follow Baba’s orders. He secured
admission in Bangla Honours at Anandamohan and returned home.
Hearing of this, Baba went around with a sarcastic smile on the corner of his
mouth for a week saying, “How many men have succeeded studying Bangla? Bangla
graduates are qualified, at the most to drive bullock carts, not much
else.” That was all he said. Baba had seemingly given up hope,
and did not drag Chhotda to get him admission in some science subject.
Chhotda safely kept spending his married life in Aubokash. Once
in a while carrying a copy in his hand and a fountain pen in his pocket, he
would go to college, and return with a despondent face.
In spite of Baba’s
strict orders, Yasmin’s and my friendship with Geeta grew. When the elders were
not at home, I was normally the one who was ‘the leader of the mischief makers,
the King of Lanka’. We would play in the grounds or climb up the terrace and
survey the world. The world meant the dozens of different people on the
streets, the houses and courtyards of neighbours, the holy Tulsi corner ritual,
the evening incense, and the singing of kirtans with the accompanying music
of the cymbals. It also meant watching the procession of women, each clad in a
single wrap of coloured sari and carrying bell metal pitchers, led by a hired
band, heading towards the
“You won’t be able
to climb the banana tree, will you?” I asked once. “What do you mean won’t be
able to?” Even in a sari she would climb up the banana tree and go straight up
to the topmost branch. Perched precariously, she would even eat the guavas
which were within her reach. The neighbours could see the new bride of the
house perched on the tree from the streets. We were awestruck at Geeta’s
antics. We stuck to her like a tail. I had no knowledge of climbing trees,
Geeta initiated me. She taught me many other things as well. When it rained, it
was our old habit to run around in the courtyard and grounds and get wet, climb
up the stairs to the terrace and dance all around it. Geeta was not satisfied
with just running and dancing in the rain. Drenched like a wet crow, she would
climb up the thatched roof of the hut and sit there.
I was sitting in
the verandah watching her and saw her fall. She had heard the sound of the
black gate, and in her attempt to clamber down she had fallen. What was worse,
she fell on the broken brick laid courtyard. Having slipped on the wet roof,
she had rolled down like a ripe pumpkin torn from its stalk. Yasmin too was on
top of the roof. Seeing Geeta fall she was not sure whether to laugh or cry.
Geeta sat in the courtyard, with a pale face and a wet crumpled sari. Meanwhile
Ma had come and was hanging up her wet burkha on the clothes wire in
the verandah. She was shocked to see the bride of the house sitting on the
macadam. She exclaimed, “Afroza, what are you doing there?” Geeta said, “No,
Ma, I’m doing nothing, Yasmin is up there on the roof, so I am sitting here and
watching her.”
“Yasmin has
climbed the roof?”
“Yes, see, there
she is, sitting. I told her so many times not to climb, she will fall, but she
didn’t listen.”
Yasmin came down
from the top of the roof when Ma scolded her. Geeta, meanwhile went to the
bathroom, changed her sari and came back looking completely innocent. Ma cooked
khichuri ,a concoction of rice and lentils, in the afternoon and poured
some onto Geeta’s plate. Heaving a sigh of relief she said, “Since you are
looking after the two girls, I can now peacefully go to Naumahal sometimes and
hear the Quran Hadith”. Geeta said, “Ma, you don’t worry at all, I’m looking
after them. I will see that they do not get into any mischief”. Ma served
Geeta three pieces of meat instead of two, with mango pickle on the side. Geeta
said, “Ma you have cooked delicious meat. How do you make such tasty
pickle?” Ma served her more meat and pickle and carried on
enthusiastically, “I will teach you how to make the pickle. It’s very simple.
Cut the mango into slices and soak them in a jar with mustard oil, a few pods
of garlic, and a few dried chillies. Once in a while you must put out the jars
in the sun.” Geeta stared wide-eyed and said, “Really?” Geeta seemed to fall
from the skies in surprise. Once Chhotda’s childhood friend Khokon had come
from
Geeta not only
looked like a small baby, she also sounded like one. A heavy burden of hair was
on her head. Her nose was as sharp as a parrot’s beak. Her lips were like
Aphrodite’s, actually closer to home, her lips were more like split chillies.
She had small teeth like mice and a lean neck, like a crane. She had tiny
hands, tiny feet and a petite body. No one called a dark girl beautiful, but we
thought she was the most beautiful girl in the world.
When the big drums
heralding the Pujas began to
beat, we whispered to our baby, “The Pujas
have started from today.” Geeta fell from the sky. “Really? I didn’t know!” she
said Clucking our tongues in sympathy, we felt that having married into a
Mussalman household, she was not being able to enjoy the Pujas. We could
attend all the Pujas throughout the year, moving from one community
celebration to another. On Ashtami and Rath Melas, we could buy
sugar candy toys and wheat crispies. However, since Geeta had converted from
Hindu to Mussalman, we felt very sad for her as she would no more be able to do
so. Suddenly, Chhotda came running and said, “Its late Geeta, quickly,
wear that sari of yours”.
“Which sari?”
Geeta asked in surprise.
“The one I bought
yesterday, that one”.
“The one you
bought yesterday? Which one?”
“Arrey,
your Puja sari!”
“What do you mean
by Puja sari? What all you say!”
Having noted my
presence with a slant of his eyes, he laughed in embarrassment and said, “You
know that blue sari you have, the one your mother gave you, wear that one”.
“Say that then.
Instead of saying that, why did you say that you had bought it? Where do you
have money that you can buy anything! You can’t earn a penny and yet you talk
big!”
“Hurry up, its
getting late”.
“Late for what,
where are you going?”
“We have an
invitation at Babua’s house, have you forgotten?”
Dressing Geeta up
like a fairy in blue, Chhotda left. These outings happened quite often.
Visits to the houses of old friends, Chipachosh members and new friends
at the Golpukur Par adda sessions. But they didn’t only spend time
visiting friends’ homes. They attended various functions also and enjoyed
themselves at music concerts, dance recitals, theatre, and cinema. In fact,
they didn’t even miss jatras if possible. Seeing all this I was filled
with longing. Chhotda had sold his guitar. The reputation he had in town
as a good guitarist was disappearing like cotton wool in the wind, but it did
not seem to bother him at all. He was living and eating in his father’s hotel
with his wife but that there was another life beyond, for which he should be
looking frantically for a job …
After the Pujas,
Yasmin returned from school and gave me some news secretly. On Puja day
one of her friends had seen Geeta entering her parents’ home in Peonpara.
Followed by Chhotda. I talked to Chhotda about the incident, and was
cautioned that no one, not even the birds, should get hold of this news. The
birds did not get to know. The birds did not even get to know that very often
when Baba went to the bathroom in the morning, Chhotda would
stealthily enter his room as if he had to fetch something he had left
there. Or, as if he had some very important matter to discuss with Baba; his
face would have such a calm yet serious look. Meanwhile, from the pocket of the
trouser hanging on the rack, he would pick the change, whether ten taka or
twenty. His hands did not shake to remove even fifty. Ma saw everything,
but pretended she hadn’t. I trembled with fear at Chhotda’s daring. To gauge
what would be the outcome, if he got caught, required the kind of courage which
neither Yasmin nor I had.
The tree-climbing
Geeta not only jumped on trees, she jumped under them too. In order to teach us
dance, she would make Yasmin and me get up from the study table and move around
the whole house tapping ‘ta ta thoi thoi’, with our feet. If Yasmin and
I did not believe that we were soon to become ‘great danseuses’ Geeta certainly
did. As soon we heard Baba return, we left our dancing and ran
helter-skelter to sit at our study tables. The disturbance caused by our
rushing around touched Baba’s body like the wind. Almost every night, before
going to bed, he would call me and ask in a cool voice, “Have you eaten?”
Clutching the
drapes of the door, I would reply, “Yes”
“Have you
studied?”
“Yes”
“Have you played?”
The answer ‘yes’
was almost at the tip of my tongue. Swallowing in time I would use another
word, “No”.
“Have you
gossiped?”
“No”
Baba looked
at me in astonishment. “Why not?”
Forget the other
word, no word came to me at that moment.
“Why haven’t you
gossiped now that there is no dearth of friends in the house?”
I began to twist
the curtains on the door around my finger.
Baba said,
“Adda is a good thing. You don’t have to study, or pass exams. Look at
Chhotda, what a beautiful life he leads! He has to do the useless job of
studying no more.”
I was now
untwisting the drapes from around my finger.
“When I leave home
tomorrow, you will sit down to gossip, have you understood! Till I return, you
will continue to gossip, have you understood what I am saying?”
Normally, when
Baba made you understand something, you had to nod your head and say,
“Understood”. But now I clearly realized it would be very dangerous to say
that.
Baba feared
that in Geeta’s company our studies would suffer badly. He had already got the
door in my room adjoining Chhotda’s locked. So they were using the verandah
door. However, the day Chhotda’s friend Khokon spent the night, he slept
on Chhotda’s bed. Consequently, Geeta had to sleep on mine. It was only a
question of one night, nothing much. Though, it may have been nothing much to
us, it certainly was not so to Baba. He woke up late at night to drink some
water, and was pacing from one room to another, when he discovered Geeta in my
bed. He screamed, shouted, threatened and roared and turned the silent night
into a clamorous afternoon. Geeta was compelled to spend the rest of the night
on the same bed as Chhotda and Khokon.
Even though Baba
tried his best to remove Geeta forcibly from our proximity, our attraction
did not diminish, instead it grew. We would ignore our studies and wait on her
all day just to make her smile. If she asked for her shoes, or comb or water I
would put it before her. If she broke her glass, I would tell Ma it had broken
because my hand had knocked it over. I saved her from many other misdemeanors
as well. One evening she called us all to the terrace and lit candles on the
railings for Victory Day. She then walked on the railings like any circus girl.
She knew that if she slipped even a little, she would surely fall and crush her
head, still she continued. In fact, she incited us to do the same. Lying
horizontal on the railing, she reached into her blouse and took out a packet of
cigarettes, and a matchbox. She lit the cigarette and took a puff, leaving us
stunned. The people on the road saw her openmouthed. Geeta said, “Let them
look. I don’t care! It is my wish if I want to smoke. Who has anything to say?”
In our house no one smoked cigarettes. I had not even seen any male relatives
do so. In these circumstances, a woman, and that too a new bride, was now
smoking in full view of the neighbours and passersby, lying openly on the
terrace railing. If this reached Baba’s ears, it would be horrifying. Just
visualising what this unmitigated disaster would result in, made my body turn
cold. Geeta said, “Arrey, nothing will happen. Come on, take a pull!” My
voice shook, as I replied “Baba will kill me if he comes to know!” Geeta
was least bothered about what would happen or not if Baba got to know.
She taught me how to smoke. Inhaling deep mouthfuls of smoke I would throw it
out towards the smoky clouds covering the blue sky. My cold body would slowly
turn lukewarm. I felt an odd attraction towards things denied me. “Where did
you get the cigarettes from?” I asked. Geeta just said, “Got them,” wearing
only a slight smile on the corner of her lips. She never said anymore than
that. In this smoke of cigarettes and mystery, Geeta appeared like Devidurga.
I came down from the terrace, washed out my mouth to remove the smoke smell and
I sat down with lips locked. It was not only Geeta I saved from minor household
incidents or accidents, I saved Chhotda as well. Chhotda, out of
dire need, had completely stopped going in the direction of
“Don’t have five
taka.”
“Then give me
four”
“Don’t have four
either”
“Okay, then give
me three at least”. If not three then two taka, if not two then one, if not
even that, Chhotda did not even leave eight or four annas. He
swooped down to pick up anything he could. Secretly, he even removed medicines
from Dada’s medicine chest. Even though we knew, we kept these incidents
to ourselves. It was like allowing pinworms to eat up our stomachs. Dada went
to the bathroom in the morning. Since he normally finished his toilet, shaving
and bath in one go it took him at least one hour. Chhotda could at this time,
pick the loose change from Dada’s pocket without any fears. Taking money
from Baba’s pocket entailed a big risk. Baba had his bath so swiftly,
that exactly when he would come out was never known. Moreover, Baba’s room
directly faced the bathroom. In comparison, Dada’s room was some
distance away, across the verandah and beyond another two rooms. Chhotda’s needs
were never satisfied. Under the wood apple tree, where not even the fallen
leaves would get to know, Chhotda would walk soundlessly towards the
black gate. He would carefully open it and leave, carrying either big paper
packets or shopping bags full of medicines under a panjabi or a loose shirt.
Initially, he said he needed medicines. There was no end to his physical
ailments. However, I questioned him when I saw him taking the medicines out of
the house. “Where are you taking these medicines?” Chhotda’s melancholic answer
was, “Friends ask for them; they want vitamins”.
Chhotda did
not stick to vitamins for too long. Very soon he was removing medicines not
only for cough and fever, but even stronger medicines for very serious
diseases. Why? Friends want. Why? They want medicines, some for cough or fever,
and others for stomach problems, even ulcers. But are friends sick throughout
the year!
“Do I have only
one or two friends?”
That was true,
Chhotda had countless friends. The people who came home looking for
Chhotda varied from journalists, poets, playwrights to Chipachosh
friends. From students, businessmen and executives to the unemployed - all
kinds of friends came. Their ages and sizes varied from ankle high to head
high. Some even higher than the head by a couple of feet. I watched them from
behind the drapes, watched and wished that like Chhotda, I too could chat with
them. That I had neither the courage nor the opportunity to do so was something
I realized very acutely.
“You say your
friends are always so sick, but they look quite healthy.”
“It’s not just the
friends. Their fathers and mothers too are sick. They have no dearth of
relatives!”
One day I
confronted him. “What do you really do with these medicines, Chhotda!
Tell me truthfully!”
Chhotda smiled
mysteriously and said, “Why what happened?”
“Nothing, but
first tell me what you do with them, otherwise I will tell Dada.” My threat
worked.
Chhotda said,
“I sell them”.
Chhotda’s words
worked, too. I melted in sympathy. I would myself take out expensive medicines,
two at a time, from Dada’s chest and hand them to Chhotda, so would
Yasmin. As soon as Dada left, Chhotda would immediately enter the
room and apart from medicines, would look for any money Dada might have
forgotten in his room. Finally, he would take a shirt from the clothes rack,
wear it and leave the room. Dada had innumerable shirts, so he never
found out. By chance if they met face-to-face at the black gate or on the
streets, Dada’s face would darken and he would ask, “What Kamaal? Why
are you wearing my shirt?”
Chhotda would
say, “I have worn it, but don’t worry I will take it off and keep it back.”
Another day, Dada
would ask “Achcha, where is my blue Tetron shirt?” With a vest on top of
his trousers and socks on his feet, Dada would go around asking the
whole house about his shirt, looking here and there stupidly.
“Who knows, Ma might
have taken it for washing”.
“Arrey no.
That was already washed and ironed”.
“Then I don’t
know.”
“And where is the
white shirt, by the way? The one on which Sheila had embroidered flowers on the
pocket?”
“Didn’t you wear
that yesterday?”
“Arrey no,
yesterday I wore a red shirt”.
“Ask Ma, I don’t
know.”
Dada would
ask Ma. Ma wouldn’t know either.