‘Meera, I am genuinely sorry to put you through this.’
‘I wasn’t … I am not prepared for this.’
‘With all due respect, I’m going to disagree with that. You were born prepared. You could enthrall this crowd even if you woke up in the middle of the night and started singing. That much I know.’
‘How can you be so sure?’
They reached a door which Abhimanyu tried opening, but was unable to. He struggled with it a bit, mildly grimacing as he twisted the knob. Meera could see his body stiffen a strand of his slick hair hang over his forehead. For once, things weren’t going as planned for the prince. For once, he wasn’t in total control. That made him oddly human to Meera; someone she could relate to. Finally, after a violent yet controlled pull, which surely must have broken a rusty lever, the door opened and in came a coastal whiff of the sea. Abhimanyu held the door ajar for Meera as she walked out to the verandah, crossing him within inches, such that she could feel his breath on her neck. Despite herself, Meera was distracted in the moment. There she was with a strange, rather handsome man – a prince. Standing under the stars, she could see the ocean water sparkle in the distance, under the moonlight. A Bombay she didn’t know existed. It felt like a dream. A clichéd dream with an imploring prince looking right at you. Only that it was all real. Meera was amazed at herself, thinking about how much her opinion of Abhimanyu had changed over the course of a few days. She had come to see the stiff prince of Ranakpour in a whole new light.
‘They say a true artist doesn’t need an audience. But an audience makes you a better performer,’ she heard Abhimanyu say as she tried shaking off a muffled heartbeat in her ear.
‘I am neither an artist nor a performer.’
‘Well, that’s not for me or you to decide. Come on over,’ he said as he walked across the verandah to the other end. Meera followed him.
They entered another large hall, and in the middle of it sat Pandit Bhairo himself.
‘Ah! Abhimanyu Singh, I thought you’d never come,’ the maestro welcomed the prince like a long-lost friend while gesturing to his staff to leave the room.
‘How could that be, Panditji,’ Abhimanyu said, touching Bhairo’s feet.
‘And this must be Meera?’ asked Bhairo, looking at her.
Meera instinctively touched the Pandit’s feet as well.
‘I am afraid Meera wouldn’t be able to open for you today,’ Abhimanyu said, looking down.
‘Why not? Are you feeling alright, Meera?’
‘I am not nearly good enough for the task, Panditji,’ said Meera, embarrassed and apologetic, all at once.
‘Don’t be so sure, Meera. I trust Abhimanyu’s judgment. Always have. He speaks highly of you.’
‘He’s being kind.’
‘Far from it. He’s a ruthless critic of music, all thanks to his mother. I would know – I have been at the receiving end of it.’
‘Only for that one performance, sir,’ said Abhimanyu. He couldn’t help but smile, recalling the day when, as an unabashed fourteen-year old, he took Bhairo’s performance apart when asked for his opinion after a royal court performance his mother had arranged. His naiveté had been on full display in the presence of the stalwarts of his mother’s gharana.
‘Anyway, Meera, you can’t be good tonight,’ said Bhairo.
Meera looked puzzled.
‘Or else you’ll spoil my act.’ Abhimanyu and Bhairo laughed at seeing Meera blush.
Bhairo had put her at ease, enough for them to briefly chat about music. A genuine discussion with one of the greatest Hindustani classical vocalists did wonders for her confidence. Soon, she realized that she couldn’t let go of this incredible opportunity.
A few moments later, Meera sat by the microphone, ready for her big moment, as the curtains opened to reveal a crowd of hundreds. But she could spot Abhimanyu in an instance, looking right back at her with a reassuring smile. On that day, as he took in that diminutive figure on the stage, her nervous heartbeat ever so perceptible through the dull thumps of her slender, ivory neck, Abhimanyu knew that Meera Apte was finally where she belonged.
The fact that Meera’s performance was well received that night didn’t come as a surprise to Abhimanyu. There were some initial jitters, but she held her own. Abhimanyu could have told her about being more aware of the acoustics of the room – singing in a bedroom was not the same as performing on a stage. He could have given his honest feedback on how she could improve her riffs, or how to avoid the Marathi pronunciations and inflections that crept into her vowels. He could have dissected the performance in great detail. Instead, he professed his love to her in the ten-odd minutes he had with her while walking her from the backstage to the crowd that was waiting to congratulate her.
‘I have a confession to make,’ said Meera as they reached the verandah on their way back. ‘I am good at reading people, but I couldn’t have been more wrong about you. You’re not like others like you. You genuinely care about my family, and for that I am thankful. You might not think much of giving me a chance to sing tonight, but it means the world to me. For the past few years, all I ever wanted was to have a foot in the door. And despite of training so much and being so focused, those opportunities never came my way. You took a chance on me tonight – I cannot thank you enough.’
The usually shy prince was not bereft of a certain romantic flair when he gently put his finger against her lips, so close but still not touching her. Even in the darkness, Abhimanyu caught the glint of a tear in her eye. ‘Enough. You’ll walk out of this door with the world at your feet,’ he said. ‘You will have anything you want, any man you want.’ He paused to drop his finger and let his hands hang by his sides, palms open. ‘You said you can read people. Well, I’ll be an open book. From here on out, there’s nothing in this world I want more than to be with you, to wake up to your voice and see your face till the sun sets and beyond.’ Meera stood there motionless, except for the tear rolling down her cheek. ‘I am bad at this, Meera. So this is me humbly asking for you to consider a life with me. If you agree, I promise you my dedication towards you. If you don’t, you’ll see the last of me tonight. But know that I’ll be happy for playing a small, inconsequential part in your destined success.’
‘I do, Abhimanyu. Please stop. I do,’ said Meera, falling into his arms. Years would pass until Abhimanyu would realize what a leap of faith she had taken in accepting his proposal that night, and the gravity of what she had meant by ‘others like you’. What was not lost on him that night, though, was the realization of what it meant to be a true royal. It meant putting others before himself and helping them. Values that his father had tried teaching him. But up until then, he’d never understood its true meaning. He was prepared to lose her that night, but he would have still been at peace knowing he did what he could to help her. He had finally understood what it meant to elevate the people around him using his own position and privilege.
There at the verandah, overlooking the cricket field at the edge of the sea. They spoke to each other openly, honestly and without fear. Quaint words best left out of these pages lest I sully that special moment of love and longing, if only their subsequent lives had held the simplicity of that night. The athlete and the songstress; the prince and the commoner. Two different worlds stood together at the southern-most tip of Bombay, with hopes and without a plan.
Chapter 5
Before long, Abhimanyu and Meera started bonding deeply over their shared love for Indian classical music. She, the serenader, and he, the consummate listener. It was a truly transcendent relationship – Abhimanyu’s status didn’t come in the way of them speaking to each other freely. Each moment with Meera made Abhimanyu forget about his own tribulations. As for Meera, she was happy to converse about music, perhaps for the first time since her father’s death. Abhimanyu offered a constant loop of praise, criticism and advice – something that had been missing in her family. She opened up to him about her dreams and struggles. He would hear
her talking giddily about her idols in classical and playback singing, and how she would give up everything just for a chance to perform alongside them. The reproachful girl at the maidan had metamorphosed into a passionate conversationalist, eager to share her world with him, testing out her theories about breaking into the industry, unfazed by a string of rejections. He coaxed her to try out smaller projects like singing jingles in advertisements.
‘And be banished from the singing community forever?’ she said, only half jokingly.
‘Well, they are no custodians of all art,’ Abhimanyu said.
‘Selling soap is an art?’ Meera said after taking a sip of fresh Irani tea.
‘Yes, why not? Besides, look at it as a stepping stone to bigger things!’
They were sitting in a corner booth at Bandra’s Lucky Restaurant. A steady stream of mill workers filed in to get their first meal of the day before heading to town. Abhimanyu had never stepped inside a restaurant before in his life. The hum of chatter and shifting chairs that filled the hall were all too foreign to his cloistered upbringing, but he took it all in. Men with sunken faces stuffing pavs into their mouths, barely taking the time to chew as they planned to tackle the day’s work, were a far cry from the leisurely pace of the palaces and clubs he was used to. Some shared pages of the morning newspapers, passing them around when they were done in exchange for a new one. Outside, a horde of workers stood listlessly in hopes of getting odd jobs. Every few minutes, a truck would come along and the driver would announce the jobs he had, along with the wages. Road maintenance in Mahim – 6 rupees. Construction work in Andheri – 8 rupees. A bunch of workers climbed the truck, gobbling down the last bits of their bun maskas. A few men shook their heads at the low wage, but climbed on anyway. Some didn’t have a clue about the work or the wage, but went along just to stay with their friends. A few others took their chances and continued to wait for a better deal to arrive.
‘You know, the songs in advertisements.’
‘Are you serious?’ Meera raised her voice. Some of the men looked their way. She didn’t particularly enjoy their rendezvous in rundown restaurants, but acknowledged that it was the best way to keep their relationship under wraps. No one would expect a prince from Ranakpour and a middle-class Bombay girl to be at Lucky’s together.
‘What’s wrong with that? They pay well, I hear,’ he said, puzzled by her reaction.
‘It’s not about the money.’
‘Then what is it?’
‘Look at them, Meera,’ Abhimanyu said, gesturing at the workers outside. ‘You think this is what they aspire to be in life? Doing odd jobs? Yet, they go on, day after day. There’s dignity in all work!’ he announced. The grit of Bombay was rubbing off of him.
Meera let out a chuckle.
‘What?’ Abhimanyu asked her.
‘It’s easy for you to say that. Romanticizing work is simple for someone who …’ Meera stopped abruptly.
‘Someone who?’
‘Never mind.’
‘Hasn’t worked a day in his whole life? Go on, say it.’
‘Abhimanyu, I am sorry. I didn’t mean to say that.’ She put her palm over his mouth – a bold move given where they were seated, and that she was the only woman in the restaurant. ‘It’s just that … I thought being on stage with Pandit Bhairo would amount to something.’
‘It will. You did very well.’
‘You’re too kind to me.’
Far from it. Abhimanyu demanded more from her. Partly because he knew her potential and partly because he wanted to live vicariously through her, with her, as they charted a future together. It was Abhimanyu who yearned for the dignity of achieving something of his own. He projected his deepest desires on Meera in the hope that her success would inspire him to reach for the skies.
Slowly, doing well in his chosen game was no longer enough. He recognized that he had to change the way cricket was played in India. That way, he could achieve what he really wanted – making a contribution to this new Indian society that was so willing to discard him like a relic of the past. He became more proactive and began building connections beyond Bombay. From the idyllic grounds of the Orient Club grew a rudimentary domestic circuit of western India. With some help from Ranjit Singh, he reached out to teams as near and far as Pune, Baroda and Rajkot. Calls were made and good players hunted down. Abhimanyu paid for the best batsmen and bowlers to come down to the Orient Club as trainees and play with his team. When people turned down his offers to come to Bombay, he, along with Ranjit Singh, Kamal and others, visited them where they lived. The disparate group set about building a real Indian team from the ground up as the national team of nawabs and merchants travelled the world with moderate success. To him, the time had come to build a team that represented the raw, chaotic energy of the new nation. It wasn’t lost on him that the real irony lay in the fact that he, the royal prince was aiming to build a people’s team.
*
‘Wake up,’ said Abhimanyu as he stood by Ranjit Singh’s bed at his Nepean Sea Road home one night at 11 p.m.
‘A knock would’ve been nice,’ said a bleary-eyed Ranjit Singh.
‘Locking the door would have been better.’
‘I didn’t lock the door? Oh my!’
‘I don’t blame you, Ranjit, when’s the last time you touched a door in Songadh?’
Ranjit Singh shook his head.
‘Anyway, we’re going to Baroda. Now.’
‘Not again,’ Ranjit Singh protested.
‘The Gaekwads – I’ve heard good things about them. The match is in a couple of days.’
Abhimanyu lifted up a bag and Ranjit Singh’s cricket kit, all packed and ready to go.
‘Who else is joining?’ asked Ranjit, rising slowly from his bed as he knew Abhimanyu would not take no for an answer.
‘Just you and me, my friend.’
And off they went on what could barely be passed off as a single-lane road. The railways were a gift from the British, Abhimanyu used to say; the roads, on the other hand, were Indian to the core. One could chart the metamorphosis of India with that of its roads. Right after Independence, the roadways were fragments, not dissimilar to the princely states that made up the country. Each kingdom was in charge of the upkeep of their roads. The town centre had the best roads and as one ventured out, the boundaries blurred and so did the roads. So while Abhimanyu’s Maserati zipped through parts of the journey, it hit miles and miles of dirt every time a state’s boundary ended and another started. The journey then would become excruciatingly slow and dusty. The Gaekwads had arranged for them to stay at a circuit house in Vapi, where they stopped for a break and were treated like, well, kings. A wholesome lunch and a warm bath was enough to see them through the rest of their journey. About thirty-six hours later, Ranjit Singh found himself taking guard as an opener on the palace grounds of Baroda, right after getting out of the car.
He did well for a weary traveller. Abhimanyu got a couple of wickets as well. He wasn’t there merely for the play though. Mighty impressed by the Baroda team, especially their wicketkeeper, Abhimanyu started putting his cricket diplomacy to work. At the post-match dinner arranged in their honour, he laid out his plans for a quadrangular series of top teams from western India to be held in Bombay. The tournament, he said, would precede ten-day training camp with English coaches and a grand prize money for the winning team. The offer was too good to pass for the Gaekwads, who signed up before dessert arrived. For Abhimanyu, it was a big win to get a real tournament underway.
The euphoria lasted till the next morning. As the two Bombay players got ready for a day of sightseeing in Baroda, news started trickling in about Mahatma Gandhi’s assassination. The news wasn’t public, but the Gaekwads had worked their channels for a confirmation and informed the visiting princes, stating that it was best for them to stay within the palace grounds for safety.
Bewilderment – not shock or anger or despair or grief – bewilderment was the dominant emotion that swept
through the country after Gandhi’s assassination. This, despite the fact that over the years, there had been more than one attempt to murder the Father of the Nation. Despite Gandhi himself foreshadowing his death in numerous public and private conversations. ‘If I am to die by the bullet of a madman,’ he had declared, ‘there must be no anger within me, God must be in my heart and on my lips.’ And yet, as he breathed his last with ‘Hey Ram’ as his parting words, the people of India just couldn’t fathom that their Mahatma was no more. Stupefied, they stood at Birla House as Gandhi slumped to the ground. It was an American vice counsel who had just arrived in Delhi, and who was there to visit Gandhi’s prayers out of curiosity, who moved across the frozen crowd, as if they were statues, to apprehend the killer. Even the people who had explicitly called for Gandhi’s death stayed silent upon hearing the news, wondering what would come next. Abhimanyu felt rattled as he found himself glued to the radio again. Once again, Nehru’s quivering but familiar voice floated through the airwaves.
‘The light has gone out of our lives and there is darkness everywhere.’
Wrong. India had lit up, alright. The streets burned bright. ‘The first thing to remember now is that none of us dare misbehave because he is angry,’ said Nehru, but no one paid heed to that sage advice. Angry mobs lit up houses, vehicles, anything they could get hold of. The Mahatma’s pyre was lit a thousand times over across the country. A number of minds churned across the princely states, wondering if this was a chance to get their kingdoms back. Maybe, just maybe, they thought, this grand experiment called democracy had failed.
When the king, Bhimji Gaekwad, summoned Abhimanyu to the main palace court to inform him that everything was all right in Ranakpour, and that there was nothing to be worried about, he stood dazed in the centre of the packed hall. Why would anything not be okay in Ranakpour, he thought. He didn’t understand that the aftermath of the assassination would be a violent one, and that no place and no one was safe. Not the Brahmins who came under attack after the news spread about Nathuram Godse, the killer, being Brahmin. Not the Muslims or Christians or Sikhs who fled their homes, moving to adjacent towns or villages, not knowing whom they could trust. Abhimanyu had heard about the horrors of the Partition with unease, but now the violence was hitting home, and its ugliness had spread over to the streets he knew intimately.
The Prince and the Nightingale Page 4
