This Could Have Become Ramayan Chamar's Tale

by Subimal Misra

  The zombie pops out

  from behind the green curtain

  ‘Yes, we shall take advantage of just this, misters, exactly like we did earlier. We’ll set the CPI(M) against the Naxalites and set the Naxalites against the CPI(M) – there’ll will be fratricide between the shits, and then we’ll come to power – ha ha ha.’

  The first wife looks like fire

  The middle wife a blessing

  The last wife’s a working cunt

  She shags by secretly glancing

  – ‘Tell me, the reference to the first wife, middle wife and last wife – what’s the meaning of all this?’

  – ‘That’s my question too.’

  – ‘I see you highlight social exploitation in your writing, but the conflict does not have a clear face, it’s almost as if there’s no analysis at all…’

  – ‘Perhaps there’s a lot that still remains unclear despite all the supposed awareness…’

  Just past the house, the rawk, past the rawk the road

  Confabulation all around

  Visible in a long shot

  a handcart bearing corpses,

  goes from Baranagar towards the Ganga

  ‘The newspapers are for the babus doing politics and for the bhadralok working in offices. We don’t read all that.’ An open, overflowing drain on the narrow dark alley in Pathuriaghata. Wasn’t it in some lane in Pathuriaghata that Saratchandra found Kironmoyi? Bihari works in the flour-mill – ‘Forget about bonus, I don’t get even my wages on time. Whether or not our girls and boys even have knickers to hide their shame, does that in any way affect the babus’ pleasure-seeking lives?’ Who do you mean when you say babus? ‘Exactly people like you.’ Bihari spits, and then says – ‘Those who spend hundreds of thousands of rupees every Durga Puja on lights, mics, pandals and fireworks. Here, in No. 31 basti, most of the people are workers in small workshops and factories, rickshaw-pullers, it’s where the daily-labourers live.’ There’s a quarrel at the water-tap. Bihari takes a burnt-out beedi and tries to light it a few times. Failing, looking directly into my eyes, he says, ‘Please give me a cigarette. My mouth’s gone rotten from smoking beedis.’ Bihari’s wife makes paper packets with old newspapers and works as a part-time maidservant in two homes. The twelve-year-old son has just started working in the coal-briquette factory, carrying a sack of briquettes on his head, to deliver from house to house. In a corner of the single-room house, a bunch of shiuli flowers spread on a wet gamcha. A seven-year-old girl – wearing a dirty torn frock – makes garlands. Through the opening of the button-less frock, her jutting spine can be clearly seen. Bihari says: ‘This is my middle daughter. Do you want to hear? She goes in the evening with her brother, Kartik, to Notunbazar to sell garlands. For ten to fifteen paise a piece. People haggle a lot, they look for the cheapest price. Three for four annas. Has to pay eight annas a week to the police, or else they won’t let her sit in the market. But that’s not all…’ Bihari takes a few deep puffs of the cigarette. ‘Do you know what happened one day? A babu passing by on a rickshaw took as many as eight garlands and strode into the rickshaw and went off in the direction of Sonagachi. Because she’s still a child, she couldn’t understand properly at first. After that, when she began shouting, not so loudly though, the rickshaw turned and entered some lane.’ The man spat again.

  Hearing the shouting, people gathered there. A babu in freshly-laundered clothes – his viewpoint: ‘All these girls are rascals. Full of lies. They cheat people. A girl like that passed off a rotten egg to me once. She’s hidden the money somewhere. Pull off her knickers and look!’

  Notunbazar comes into view. I observe myself as I buy garlands with my wife and her two sisters. The girl squats on her haunches. Her button-less back is clearly visible, the spine juts out. My two sisters-in-law on two sides, one in a Love Story frock, the other in an Ek Duje Ke Liye salwar-kameez – the three-hundred-rupee printed-silk wife behind us … ‘You tell me, can one get a decent sari – one that can be worn to go out sometimes – for less than two hundred and fifty to three hundred rupees nowadays? Tell me … After all, I’m not asking for a thousand- or thousand-five-hundred-rupee sari like the bourgeois girls of Ballygunge and Gariahat. – I too know a little bit about people’s hardship and suffering … don’t I? Tell me…’

  A close-up of a grain-seller in Sealdah comes into focus: ‘Aren’t you a bonus-receiving babu? You get a bonus of a thousand or a thousand and a half, and while buying eggplant for a kilo a rupee, you say – Hey, you’re asking too much, boy – fine eggplant’s selling for eighty paise a kilo.’

  At Gariahat crossing, written on a neon-lit shop: ‘Please don’t embarrass us by asking for cotton handloom saris.’ And at the crossing of Hatibagan market, in a readymade garments store, hangs an advertisement in big letters: ‘Limited Stock. Come with your ration card and pick up an original Love Story frock here.’

  ‘Ranu-di, for me Marxism is not a rigid ideology. Rather, it is a living philosophical inspiration. The dialectical inspiration of the analysis is what brings out its secret meaning. It does not confine us, does not keep us static, in one place. It takes us to the sky, but with feet planted firmly on the ground.’

  Now, in such a situation, the Naxalite youth who introduced himself thus, comes to Joba’s house to hide there. Joba is the name of a whore, she lives in Sonagachi. This Naxalite youth, on whose smoothly-shaved cheek even a fly would skid, who wears a watermelon-coloured punjabi – he actually wanted to be a poet too, at one time – this poet-cum-Naxalite-cum-debutante boy would, in the first instance, abuse his father, calling him an animal for giving birth to him, and in the second instance, weep in memory of his father and flood the stage. Wouldn’t be bad to lay out a revolutionary play like this, with Sartre’s respectable prostitute by one’s side, after all, how many people have read Sartre? Please tell me, dear reader, how would that be?

  Scenes from a cyclone

  A heated exchange began between the health minister, the relief minister, the chief secretary and the district collector, regarding the precise number of deaths. A week after the cyclone, the chief secretary announced that the dead numbered ninety-three. Immediately, the health minister declared: ‘No, the number is one hundred and forty-eight. I have visited the affected areas. I can present the names and addresses of the dead persons if necessary.’ When the health minister openly challenged the statement of the chief secretary in this manner, the chief minister was not in the capital, he was travelling in north Bengal on party work. Consequently, no one else wanted to open their mouths until he returned. There were only mutterings in chamber after chamber. The district collector alone continued to issue statements unilaterally: The government’s position, that only about ninety persons died, was incorrect. The health minister was unable to give the correct figure. ‘Actually, the number of the dead exceeds two hundred. Cholera and gastroenteritis are spreading rapidly in the affected areas, about fifty-six people have lost their lives, and yet the health department has sent neither doctors nor preventive medicines. There is no coordination between the officers of different departments in Writers’ Building, no one pays any heed to anything. Everyone carries on according to their own whims and fancies.’ Hearing the district collector’s complaint, the health minister was incensed: ‘All this is a conspiracy against me. Death can occur through three means – first, through cholera; second, through gastroenteritis; and third, through consuming contaminated food. Besides, people also die as usual. The fifty-six persons that the district collector declared dead – can he provide any evidence that all of them died of gastroenteritis? I challenge him: if he can prove it, I shall quit office.’ Calling another press conference, he announced: ‘No one went anywhere, mister, while I went from village to village and saw everything with my own eyes. Let a commission of enquiry be instituted to determine exactly how many people died of gastroenteritis, and I shall accept the report. Actually, people have died because of lack of relief supplies, which does not come
within the ambit of the health department. And the district collector is an idler.’ Immediately after the announcement, there was an uproar among the ministers. They split into three or four camps and began issuing statements according to their own positions. The relief minister and the minister for municipal affairs issued separate statements from their respective chambers regarding the number of deaths. Journalists began running from one chamber in Writers’ Building to another, collecting press releases. The final press release was issued by the chief secretary. He said: ‘The chief minister is now travelling in north Bengal on party work. Until his return, howsoever many statements may be issued, none of them can be considered to be correct.’ He was continuously shouting and screaming over the phone. He was very infuriated with the union leaders of a particular region. Matters went very far.

  There, one can see – dogs are eating corpses, decomposed corpses are being found even nine days after the cyclone. A tightly-clasped child in the crook of one arm of the mother, a broken branch of a tree in another. Mother and son, bodies bloated, a terrible stench all around. Beside the lake, one can see a dog tearing away and eating a little girl’s decomposed body. Lying dead, all of them, for nine days and nine nights. The government’s speedboats race around here and there, the roar of the engines of the racing VIP boats

  – ‘Are there parties where you live?’

  – ‘Parties?’

  – ‘The ones who say, “Vote for us”.’

  – ‘Yes, there are babus.’

  – ‘Do people go?’

  – ‘People go when there’s a meeting.’

  – ‘Don’t you go?’

  – ‘No … I went to Calcutta once, a long time ago, the babus took me.’

  – ‘Did they give you money?’

  – ‘Who gives money … but yes, they gave us rotis…’

  – ‘Which party?’

  – ‘I don’t know, sir – do we know all that?’

  ‘You see me as a business executive, don’t you? A huge office, air-conditioning, expensive furniture, a pretty secretary, a hefty cheque at the end of the month. But this is the tiger’s cage of the whole circus – heavy steel rods on the outside, no way out. Only work and more work. And responsibilities. It’s been ages since I looked at the sky. Trees and greenery? Look, I’ve arranged cacti and leafy plants in brass tubs in the drawing room.’

  Babus’ houses are built in the city, the man works as a mason’s assistant. Been doing that for the last twenty years. Carts bricks on his head all day long, at night he snores on a jute mat spread on the damp earth. His home is in Canning. Gets one day in the week off, and after receiving his wages, he goes to visit his family. Look, there he goes, look –

  ‘I don’t need to know what Marx said, tell me what Jyoti Basu says. Don’t try to bring in foreigners at the slightest pretext, look at the soil of your own country instead –’

  ‘I had a tea-shop at the bus stand. It was removed. Started another shop on a kerb in the neighbourhood, but the number of people buying on credit began to exceed those paying each day. It soon became a den for the neighbourhood’s wayward and emerging mastaan boys, who sit on the wobbly bench all day long. I got angry a couple of times. They threatened me in return: “This is public land – you don’t pay taxes, you think you’ll get away with free income? If you make too much noise, we’ll kick you out.” Another person advised me: “Do you think the shop can run merely by selling tea? Sell booze. The night-time customers are the real customers…” So I’m thinking of selling booze now.’

  – ‘And you?’

  – ‘Cine-journalist.’

  – ‘Doesn’t that mean you write features about whether Uttam Kumar picks his teeth after eating, or which side Rakhee likes to sleep on?’

  – ‘Yes, I write that, because that’s what people want to know. The public shows greater enthusiasm for reading about all this, rather than your revolutionary stuff…’

  – ‘I don’t believe that.’

  – ‘I say this from my experience of twenty years as a journalist. People are more keen to know about gossip pertaining to Uttam Kumar than about China’s political situation after Mao’s death. And we survive by selling all those news stories. And so our newspaper sells too.’

  – ‘Even now, in 1981?’

  – ‘Definitely.’

  – ‘In all these years, haven’t people attained a minimum level of political awareness?’

  – ‘That’s for you to think about. Do you remember that the publication of various obscene sex magazines shot up like anything in West Bengal at the very time of the Naxalite movement? Let me tell you a story, a story from our own profession of journalism. The police recovered a girl’s dead body from Dhakuria Lake. It looked like a case of murder. I reported the news. “The dead body of an unidentified woman was recovered from the lake yesterday. From the marks of injury on the body, the police suspect it to be a case of murder. Nobody has been arrested yet.” Our rival newspaper printed in bold letters on the front page: “Lovely Lady’s Dead Body in Lake – City Agitated.” After that a one-and-a-half column story, half crime report and half akin to a thriller. The editor called me and said: “What do you think you’re doing? The rival newspaper’s scored over us. Has the ink in your pen run completely dry, or what?”’

  The publishing medium of the arts

  and the social system

  which uses the media

  for serving their interests…

  A mouse races

  over the lines

  All of us know that, among the birds, the eagle and the vulture are the ones that fly the highest in the sky. We read in the papers that quite a few planes are damaged each year by vulture-strikes. That a pony was born of a calf, that the sahibs love to eat daal and chochchori – some papers lovingly publish such news, using bold type, right on the front page. That the crow was not behind any other bird in the matter of flying high – I read this story in the newspaper the other day. When members of an expedition set out on a Himalayan trek, besides all their materials and the sherpas, the companions accompanying them were crows. Greedy for food, a crow can easily fly to an altitude of nineteen or twenty thousand feet. The crow is a very strange creature. It can eat anything, from dead, decomposed rats to murgh massallam, with equal relish. This incident happened fifty-five years ago. The Everest expedition was on. The members of the expedition were setting up camp, one after another. They reached an altitude of 27,000 feet. No sign of anything living. The climbers had masks on their faces and oxygen cylinders strapped to their backs. Only ice everywhere. The temperature steadily fell below zero degrees Celsius. At this altitude, even in that frightening environment, the climbers saw a bird. Jet black in colour, the sun’s rays gleaming on its body. Greedy for food, a crow hovered behind them that day. So think about what a creature the crow is!

  When we find it very difficult to give a donation of five rupees to the party fund, they laughingly donate one hundred rupees. The dadas in the neighbourhood who are into politics mind their ways a bit. When we go around the houses to collect donations, we are invited inside and requested to sit. Offered tea. They eagerly ask about what we do, how far we’ve studied, and so on. And then before we can ask, they take out a crisp fifty-rupee note and give it to us with a soft smile: ‘I can’t give any more than this today, brother…’

  The young beggar girl stands on the pavement on Chowringhee and gazes with astonishment at all the captivating things in the stores – all these things, so many things, what do people need them for? The young wife had come to beg, a nice body, small pox scars on her face. From her womb would the future hoodlum – begotten by a babu – be born. The unbearable length of desolate Mahatma Gandhi Road would be left behind.

  Future hoodlum

  Yeh haath nahi, phansi ka phanda hai

  You must hear Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony here, conducted by Toscanini, if you can get it. Of course, listening to the Ninth would be the best, the hair on your head will stand
on end. To understand the difference, and to remember it, it’s also necessary to hear Mendelssohn and Schubert, here, in this environment … A lifetime’s perspiration will break out on your body, you’ll keep perspiring.

  – ‘What you write – shouldn’t one be able to understand it?’

  – ‘A story about Picasso used to be in currency at one time. An American youth came to Paris for a visit. He met a beautiful young woman. After they became intimate, the youth took the girl to his hotel room. Switching off the lights, he was unable to locate the appropriate parts in the appropriate places. The boy became terribly angry. Seeing his rage, the girl smiled and said: “This was bound to happen, after all I’m Picasso’s model…”’

  A thousand multiplied by a thousand

  From the drops of blood that trickled down to earth from the body of the battling Raktabeej, ever new Raktabeejs were born, and they joined the battle immediately. Their battle cries resounded in the air and sky. Although Chamunda Devi was bewildered, she did not pause. Without letting the contagious drops of blood fall to the earth, she sucked them up to her heart’s content – so that the multiplication of Raktabeej offspring could be brought to an end.

  In the course of all this, everything is coming true. Water flows under water, all the houses are being inundated speedily. They appear to tremble beneath the water. After a while, he advances. The road in front is entirely submerged under water, a powerful current of flowing water, chest deep. Ranu-di’s laugh, just then, at that very moment … After that, he is alone again. A day without rain, but stormy winds, sitting beneath the Monument, peanuts – absent-mindedly breaking the shells. That day, on that very day, under the Monument, some people … Reporters find an opening: ‘Altercation between two Naxalite groups under Shahid Minar on the issue of the May Day programme venue!’ All the bright neon signs at the cinema theatre explode one after another, making splashes of sound. A sandstorm blows, while in front, all the people from the light of some erstwhile dawn, who buy garments of colours that match the advertisements. Darkness descends in its own way. In every direction, far below the honeycomb-like apartment blocks, the open drains of bastis and densely-packed tin roofs. ‘Everything exchangeable for money is exchanged’ – a signboard hangs in front of mysterious buildings. He bravely pushes the door and enters … The pages torn out from the diary slip out and begin to flutter, then fly – although inside that mysterious room there is a gentle, cool breeze. The pages of the diary flutter and fly uncontrollably and chaotically, on and on, impossible to retrieve them, titters of the heavily made-up and lipstick-smeared Ranu-di’s laughter, in the mild darkness.