Sacred Waters

by Meira Chand

  Sometimes Prema joined them in the evening when she was off duty, entering the barracks in a flurry of energy, the screen door slamming behind her, exuding a strong smell of the lavender she used to repel mosquitoes. They each had their favourite repellent, and the strange medley of scents in the hut, of citronella, lemongrass, neem, eucalyptus and also the stench of the garlic oil Vasanthi insisted on using, filled the air with pungency, but only Prema used lavender, and it defined her difference.

  ‘Bats can eat one thousand mosquitoes in a night, so it’s good there are so many in the trees outside,’ she told them, sitting on a bunk while they gathered in a circle at her feet.

  Prema knew everything, and a casual hour with her always revealed some inner workings of the regiment, or an intimate glimpse of their as yet unknown future.

  ‘I should already be on my way to Rangoon, and then the new camp in Maymyo, but instead I stayed behind to take charge of you all and accompany you to Burma. The first batches of recruits are already getting advanced training there,’ Prema told them.

  ‘What is Burma like?’ Vasanthi asked.

  ‘Beautiful. The new camp at Maymyo is near the front line at Imphal. It is high in the hills and much cooler than Singapore,’ Prema explained.

  ‘The front line?’ Sita asked, the words conjuring up a narrow white path running through a jungle.

  ‘It is where they are fighting. The Japanese are pushing forward towards the Indian border, and our Indian National Army is fighting beside them. Together they are pushing back the British army,’ Prema revealed.

  ‘How were you recruited?’ Someone asked Prema.

  ‘My parents didn’t want me to join Netaji, but I heard him speak and I knew immediately that I would follow him anywhere. I was wearing gold earrings and when Netaji asked everyone to donate to the cause, I rushed forward to give him my earrings. A journalist took a photograph and my parents saw it in the paper the following day. They were shocked, but they could see how determined I was to join up, and eventually they let me go.’ Prema laughed.

  ‘When will we see him?’ Sita asked. She had expected to see Subhas Chandra Bose in the Bras Basah camp and hoped each day he would appear, just as she hoped Shiva might also suddenly stand before her in the classroom.

  ‘Netaji is in Maymyo, near the front, with the troops. You will see him there,’ Prema replied.

  Maymyo. The word was spoken often now. The place waited for them on a horizon towards which they crept closer each day.

  ‘It is time to make proper soldiers of you. Tomorrow you will be issued with your weapons,’ Prema informed them one day.

  The Armoury was a padlocked shed at the far end of the parade ground. It sat apart from the other buildings, as did the Magazine, a further locked shed a distance away, where they were told ammunition was kept; bullets, powder and grenades. Standing alone in an area that was off limits, these unassuming wooden sheds exuded a mystique out of all proportion to their humble appearance. Armoury, Magazine; the strange names rolled around Sita’s mouth like unwieldy stones. Within them, secreted away, the very essence of war lay hidden.

  The next day they marched towards the Armoury, to be issued with rifles for their first target practice. An officer from one of the men’s camps, Captain Ganguly, with the fat cheeks of a beaver, had come to instruct them, and strode smartly ahead with Prema, who unlocked the heavy padlock securing the shed. The door opened on rusty hinges, revealing a dark and windowless interior.

  The place was lit by electric light, the weapons stacked upright on rack after rack around the walls of the hut. When her name was called, Sita stepped inside the hot airless place, into a forest of metal trunks. The harsh smell of ammonia, oil and cleaning solvents surrounded her, and she realised this must be the odour of war.

  Captain Ganguly took a rifle from the racks and handed it to Prema, who then placed it in Sita’s hands. Looking down at the smooth satin wood of the butt with its gentle patterning, Sita was surprised at the weight and presence of the thing, and wondered for the first time, how would she hold it, how she would shoot from it.

  ‘These are magazine loading rifles with five round chargers. Think of your rifle as part of you now. In war it is as important as an arm or a leg to your functioning. Everything we train you for is found at the end of that gun. The same weapon will always remain with you; look after it well. You are your weapon, your weapon is you,’ Captain Ganguly told them.

  For the first time, looking down at the gun, Sita realised that what she held in her hands was a killing machine, and she was being trained to kill. The realisation shocked, dismayed and also surprised her, for she had not understood this clearly before. She had been carried away by the rush to enlist and join Netaji’s army, by the excitement and romance of the venture, and overlooked the fact that the business of killing was integral to military life. It was at the heart of Netaji’s grand speeches, at the heart of Shiva’s need for revenge, at the heart of what she was doing in this camp. All the high talk of laying down your life for India meant only to kill, or be killed. When she stepped through the gate of the camp that first day, she had not realised to what extent she was entering an alien world. All she had wanted in her life was change, and the chance to follow Netaji.

  ‘Balance is everything. Align your shoulders to the target; left foot to target, elbow to body,’ the instructor roared.

  There was also, it seemed, no substitute for real bullets. After some sessions of dry firing, and learning the intricacies of their weapon, they were ferried to a nearby firing range where they were to shoot with live ammunition.

  ‘There is no substitute for marksmanship. No substitute for the weight and speed of a real bullet leaving your weapon; that is why you will not be shooting with blanks,’ Captain Ganguli yelled.

  They lined up to face the targets, wooden blocks pasted with the monochrome image of a man. Captain Ganguly strode up and down, shouting commands.

  ‘You will shoot in all kinds of weather. Watch the wind flag on the pole to your left to adjust your aim.’

  ‘Until the target nears, keep your trigger finger on the trigger guard. Left arm to body; take aim. Do not blink. Do not jump.’

  The unwieldy weight of the gun on Sita’s shoulder made it difficult to find a comfortable grip.

  ‘Shoot.’

  Nothing prepared her for the explosion in her ears, or the recoil of the gun that ricocheted through her body like a heavy weight rammed against her, throwing her back. The gun was a live thrashing thing in her hand, and fell with a clatter at her side. There were screams, and she saw that she was not the only one who sprawled on the ground amidst the crackle of gunfire.

  It was not easy, but by the end of the afternoon she could hold the gun steady and shoot, although she was unsure of where the bullets landed. The recoil blasted through her each time, the gun punching painfully against her shoulder, but she clung onto the rifle, determined. With each shot the sense that she was taming a wild thing grew stronger, and at last she was rewarded by seeing the paper target at the end of the range ripped by her improving aim.

  ‘Clean your weapon carefully and it will serve you well,’ Prema told them later, instructing them how to oil the gun and scour the barrel with a brush and rod before they returned it to the armoury.

  That night in her bunk her shoulder ached sickeningly and a large dark bruise spread across it. She could not lie on her side, and in the barrack most girls cried with the pain. In the bed above, Muni whimpered, but Sita gritted her teeth and made no sound, knowing this pain must be endured. Once it was behind her she would own her gun. It would be her thing and its power would be part of her, as nothing had been part of her before. In her mind she saw the target again, torn by the bullets she had managed to place accurately. If it had been a real man, she was aware her badly placed bullets would not have killed him. Lying in her bunk she wondered if, when the time came, she would even be able to kill. Could she learn to take a life, even if it was the life of
an enemy?

  Once, long before in the village she remembered a rabid dog. The villagers had managed to corral it in a corner, and a man with a gun had come. The dog snarled and barked and jumped at the fencing around him, but the man raised his rifle and without hesitation shot the creature dead. It slumped to the ground and Sita still remembered her horror as she stared at the lolling tongue, the foaming mouth and open eyes, staring now into nothingness. One moment the creature was viciously alive, and the next it was gone from its mad-dog life. The villagers had stared at the body in shock, but the man with the gun had shrugged and, with a half-smile, turned away.

  Now, as she recollected the incident, Sita understood the gunman’s casual gesture before the awed villagers, and knew that same authority would be part of her once the weapon was in her control. It had been nothing to the man to take that dog’s life. A strange excitement thumped through her, just by the touch of the gun she was changed.

  As the weeks of training went by, the gun appeared to lessen in weight, and she handled it with greater ease. The sense of the bullet leaving the gun and speeding towards its target filled her with pleasureable satisfaction; and her aim was always sure. Just as Captain Ganguly had predicted, their weapons become part of them. They learned to throw themselves to the ground while holding their rifles, to catch a tossed gun, and to shoot as they ran.

  Eventually, bayonets were fitted to their guns for a different kind of practice. The gleaming knife filled Sita with a discomfort she had not felt when using bullets. Now, on the parade ground of the camp, straw dummies were set up for them to attack. Some were stuck solidly into the ground on a wooden strut, but others swung freely from a rope, as if to dodge attack. The dummies were painted with rudimentary faces, black slashes for eyes and nose and a grinning lopsided mouth, confronting the recruits in a defenceless row.

  ‘Imagine the enemy is ready to kill you. Aim for the stomach. Grip your weapon with both hands. Charge,’ Captain Ganguly yelled.

  At last, it was her turn. Sita heard the order and sprinted forward, feeling the weight of the gun in her hands, the blade at its tip glinting in the sun. Each bound brought her closer to the waiting target, its makeshift face alight with inane welcome. She must stab the bayonet deep into the straw innards and, closing her eyes, she imagined the blood that would spurt in a real situation, the blade striking bone, the intestines spilling out; the cry of pain. As she ran she raised her eyes and saw the sky, the green bank of trees, heard the call of a koel and the cry of a food hawker from the road, the impatient honk of a car, and wanted these things to gather her up and lift her free of the earth so that the moment she ran towards would never come. Then, the grinning straw face was before her, and she slowed her pace. The sheer solidity of the straw body surprised her, the bayonet refused to penetrate, and the gun slipped in her hand.

  ‘You’re dead!’ The officer roared as she turned away.

  To Sita’s surprise, it was Muni who excelled at this simulated killing, more than anyone in their squad. Muni, whose bayonet appeared disproportionate in size to her slight frame, charged forward each time with an aggressive yell, eyes on the target, unwavering in her commitment to the task. She stabbed as if her life depended upon it, the blade disappearing deep into the straw. Where she got the strength to do this, Sita did not know. Afterwards, she caught sight of Muni’s face, and found it filled with such an expression of exaltation that she turned away, feeling she had glimpsed something in Muni that she had no right to see.

  17

  SINGAPORE, 1944

  The hard metal quilting of the grenades reminded Sita of the pineapples she had seen on her first day in Singapore, a day that now seemed long ago.

  ‘They say a woman cannot throw a grenade. You must learn to, because if you make a mistake you will kill yourself,’ Captain Ganguly told them.

  For practice, they were given empty grenades without a pin, and although it seemed no more difficult than throwing a ball, many did not make it over the wall into the burned earth of the grenade pit.

  ‘If these were live grenades, you would be dead. Reach further, throw harder,’ Captain Ganguly roared.

  ‘In Burma your training will continue. There they will give you the real thing. Are you going to blow yourself up when you get there?’ he asked, shaking his head.

  Soon route marches began twice a week, and in spite of their hardened muscles, these were difficult for all of them. They must carry a loaded rucksack of fifty or sixty pounds. Eventually, these would be filled with kit, but for now they must load them up with bags of sand. Once full, the heavy sacks could not easily be hoisted up onto their backs. They must sit down to shoulder the load and then stand up. It surprised them all, the amount of weight they could carry, if it was on their back. Rifles positioned across their shoulders, they were ready at last for the march. They were transported to the far end of the island where thick jungle and undergrowth predominated, where snakes and large monitor lizards basked in the sun, and mosquitoes swarmed about them; they were all on quinine. From these places, the platoon must walk back to the Bras Basah camp along predetermined routes that they had to find with a compass.

  ‘In war, more than shooting and combat, you will have to march. You are receiving the same basic training as your INA brothers. At the front, your brothers are forced to march under load, all day, all night, along mountain roads and through thick jungle, pushing forward against the enemy through rain and drought, uphill and downhill. The first thing an army must learn to do is to march. March. We march to liberate Delhi. Dilli Chalo!’ Captain Ganguly shouted.

  It was an ordeal of heat and biting insects, of thirst and no rations or rest, of aching muscles and the heavy loads they had to carry. At first it seemed relatively easy, five miles in the morning under the fiery sun was managed with ease, but quickly the distance was increased to ten, twenty, twenty-five miles. The straps of the heavy sacks sank deep into their shoulders, the barrels of their rifles burned hotly in the sun as they strode forward like men in their heavy boots.

  ‘In action a forced march may be a tactical necessity. Then your life may depend on your ability to march; thirty-two miles in twenty-four hours, even forty miles in eight hours may be asked of you,’ Captain Ganguly informed them.

  The singing of military songs kept them buoyant. Sita liked the hard beat of their boots on the road as they marched; the rhythm of their stride pushing them on mile after mile, everyone moving as one under the heat of the sun. They were one seamless body with many legs, like the giant centipedes Sita remembered in her childhood home. As they marched they sang:

  Kadam kadam badhaye ja! Khushi ke geet gaye ja

  Ye zindagi hai qaum ki! Tu qaum pe…

  Valli had a voice that rang out above everyone else, deep and strong as a man’s, leading the tempo. The singing emptied them of emotion. Sometimes they even sang in English, a language they did not understand, random incomprehensible verses taught to them by the drill sergeant, the words rolling strangely on their tongues:

  Lay me down in the cold, cold ground

  Where before many more have gone…

  Or,

  It’s a long, long way to Tipperary. It’s a long way to go…

  Sita did not know what the words, cold, cold ground meant, or where far away Tipperary might be, but it did not matter. The beat of the rhythm pounded through her body as she stamped her feet down on the road, shouting the words to the heavens, emptying her body and mind. The platoon marched three across and Muni was always beside her, her voice soaring up beside Sita’s own, her face alight as they sang. Sometimes, she turned towards Sita and caught her eye, and Sita knew the same unloosed emotion sparked through them all.

  Then, once daytime foot marches had become routine and they could cover any distance, night marches were introduced. Whatever the ordeals of sunlight, they must now march through a black world drained of sight and colour. The easy rhythm they were able to attain by day was impossible by night, and they could no l
onger sing as they marched. The night demanded stealth and restraint. Marching was slower and more focused; they must avoid stumbling in the dark, or bumping into each other, relying heavily on a compass and the moon for direction. Although they all carried torches these could not be used, as in any action they would alert the enemy to their presence. They followed Prema’s single lead torch and the dark outline of those marching ahead of them. They kept closer together, only the hammering of their boots on the road breaking the silence, binding them together. In the darkness, the black jungle pressed upon them on either side of the road, alive with the noises of nocturnal animals, of hoots and snufflings, and the occasional crack of breaking branches. As they marched, Sita noticed Muni staring fearfully into the undergrowth, and gradually edging out of formation, moving closer to Sita.

  ‘Its all right. We are all together,’ Sita whispered reassurance.

  Even as she spoke, Muni stumbled on the rutted path, falling to her knees with a groan. The formation did not stop but moved on, flowing around Muni’s prone form like water about a rock. Sita stepped out of rank to stand at the side of the road until the platoon had passed, and then crouched down beside the trembling Muni. Within a short distance, Prema called the platoon to a halt, aware of the disturbance behind, and walked back to the injured Muni.

  ‘Stay here with her. When we get back to camp I’ll send a truck to pick you up.’ Prema shone her torch on Muni’s swollen ankle before turning back to the platoon.

  Soon the dark phalanx of bodies was gone, the sound of their marching boots growing fainter and fainter until at last there was only silence. In the coolness there was the fresh earthy smell of vegetation around them, the perfume of the night.