Sacred Waters

by Meira Chand

  Muni was taken straight to a hospital and her condition was cause for anxiety. Sita sat with her through the first night, refusing to leave her side. Her fever raged and she had difficulty breathing, each inhalation drawn in through painful rasps. Coughing racked her thin body, and much of the time she babbled deliriously. The doctors and nurses who came and went said little. Sita pressed a cool cloth to Muni’s burning forehead, willing breath into her slight body; there was nothing she could do but wait. Finally, Muni opened her eyes, and asked where she was, and seemed to remember little of the journey to Bangkok.

  After their arrival in Bangkok, things moved quickly. They were told the Rani of Jhansi Regiment was to be disbanded and soon after they arrived, they had to surrender their weapons. In the barracks they cleaned them for the last time.

  Sita picked up the long bristle brush and passed it through the barrel of the gun until it emerged from the muzzle. Her weapon, she realised, had become a part of her, an extension of her being. Already she felt bereft, as though with the loss of the gun she would lose the person she had become. The acrid odour of the solvent and oil filled her nostrils as she drew the brush back and forth until the gun was clean, and then polished the soft patterning of the wooden butt, caressing its warmth, remembering that first powerful recoil that had thrown her to the ground and made her shoulder ache. With this gun she had killed the Chin guerrilla on that green slope in Burma. In her mind she saw the man again, saw him blown high, twisting and turning against the sky, his white thighbones protruding from his ripped flesh like a pair of ivory chopsticks, a sight she could never forget. Whether he had died from her gunshot or the exploding shell did not matter, she had pulled the trigger intending to kill him. Had she hesitated a moment longer, he might have turned away because he could not kill a woman, he might have moved beyond the shell and, like her, might still be alive. Nothing made sense to her any longer. The memory of Valli and Shivani stacked in their wet and muddy grave returned to her so forcefully that she sat down on a stool, the gun in her lap. She had been trained to kill; yet life and death appeared to balance on a knife’s edge, observing laws beyond her comprehension, beyond the paltry power of a gun.

  The next day, when she held out her rifle, surrendering it to Prema, who was in charge of collecting their weapons, her hand tightened about the familiar weight before it was lifted away from her and stacked with the other guns. Staring down at her empty upturned palms, it was as if an essential part of her had been ripped away.

  There was some time to wait before they could be sent back to Singapore, and while they remained in Bangkok Sita volunteered to work in the hospital, in the hope of hearing news of Shiva. One by one units of INA men were arriving in Bangkok from distant locations, and at last the remnants of Shiva’s unit arrived. They had journeyed across high mountains, through forests and jungle, marching for months and covering over one thousand miles. Suddenly the hospital was full of starved, ragged and emaciated men, but Shiva was not amongst them.

  At last a stick of a man with an overgrown beard heard her asking about Shiva, and beckoned her to him. He raised himself on an elbow and reached out to grasp her wrist, staring up at her, his voice a painful rasp. Looking down, she saw the thin claws of his fingers, the uncut nails as long as talons, locked about her arm.

  ‘I knew him. He told me his parents were killed in Jallianwala Bagh. That was why he was fighting this war. All he wanted was to set foot on Indian soil. He told me his wife was in the Jhansi Regiment; he was worried where she was, what was happening to her. One day he was there and another he was missing. We could not go back to search for him. Later I saw his name on a list of the dead.’ He let go of her arm and fell back on the bed, breath twisting through his chest.

  His words sank through her, and she realised she had known for a long time what this man was now telling her. At last she walked away, through corridors harsh with the smell of antiseptic and illness, and out into the street with its pungent odour of drains, incense, dried fish, rotting vegetables and the blossoms of the frangipani outside the entrance. She squatted down beneath the tree and stared up into the mass of flat-fingered leaves and soft white flowers. The dark tangle of boughs was embedded with a jigsaw of light, where small patches of sun shone through the gloom. She remembered the picture of the devi she had folded into Valli’s hands, and wished she had it now. A fallen flower lay in the dirt beside her and she picked it up, cupping it in her hands, closing her eyes, seeing again the devi on her tawny tiger. To one side of the picture of the goddess, there had been a frangipani tree such as the one she now sat beneath, studded with flowers, bright as stars. What would she do now without Shiva? Once again she was a widow. This time, she vowed, she would never wear white, or shave her head again.

  The petals of the frangipani were thick and soft as pieces of flesh, and she rubbed them between her fingers until the sweet smelling juice was moist on her hands. She had been a soldier, she had fired a gun and killed a man; she had lived the way of the warrior, careless of death. She had crossed the threshold into the world of men and written her name in blood. The force that drove her forward was without a name, but she knew it resided at the very centre of her being. She was one-in-herself, dependent on no one, and would find her own strength.

  Before leaving Bangkok, Netaji called upon the remaining Ranis of the Jhansi Regiment. Standing before them, jovial as always, his high boots polished and gleaming, he adjusted his spectacles before speaking.

  ‘The Japanese will surrender soon. The war is ending, and our position is no longer viable, but this is just a temporary disbanding. You must remain ready to regroup. Until then go back to Singapore, to your homes and families.’

  Outside, the revving up of Netaji’s car was heard. An aide approached, to remind him of the time and Netaji nodded, anxiously adjusting his spectacles once again. At the door he turned to wag a finger playfully at them.

  ‘Promise not to go back and hide in the kitchen! Keep the fire of freedom burning in your hearts and pass it on to your children.’

  Then he was gone. There was the slam of a car door, and the roar of the engine as he was driven away.

  They could not sleep, worried now about a future they could not see clearly.

  ‘I cannot go back to that plantation. They will force me to marry some old widower who wants a young girl for a wife.’ Muni whispered to Sita that night, as if even saying the words aloud was to conjure them into reality.

  Muni sat on her bed, hugging her knees, and Sita put an arm around her. Muni’s fear brought before her the spectre of her first husband again, even though the experience was long gone.

  ‘You need not go back. I am alone now. You can stay with me in Singapore.’

  The idea flooded Sita’s mind. Muni would share the room off Norris Road, they would work together, find some business to do. In the morning they went to speak to Prema, to inform her of the new arrangement; but Prema shook her head.

  ‘The INA is responsible for returning all the girls to their families. We must have written permission from a family to send you to a different destination. Go back to your family first, and then with their permission you can join Sita in Singapore,’ Prema told them, turning away quickly to another task, unaware of the effect of her words.

  News that the war was over came at last. Soon Japanese soldiers were everywhere, moving out of the town with trucks of looted goods and weaponry, just as British troops began victoriously entering the Siamese capital. Muni and Sita, with the remaining Ranis from Malaya, were to accompany a regiment of INA men returning by train to Singapore. The girls were to begin the journey together, travelling over the Siam border into Malaya before going their separate ways. Those girls, like Muni, from up country estates in Malaya would be transported back home from there, and those whose destination was Singapore would travel on with the INA men.

  Eventually, the train reached Alor Setar, a large railway junction Sita remembered passing through on the way to Burma. Ther
e, Muni and a group of other plantation girls climbed into waiting trucks that would take them to their respective estates, while Sita and the remaining girls stayed on the train. Even before the train drew to a halt at Alor Setar, Muni was sobbing uncontrollably.

  Sita stood at the end of the platform as the distraught Muni was led away, and watched her climb up into the back of a truck. She waved for as long as the truck was in view, remembering how, so long ago, Dr. Sen had waved to her on a station platform as she began her journey to Calcutta. Then, the truck turned a corner and was gone, while behind her the stationmaster blew his whistle, readying the train for its onward journey.

  Sita sat in silence, listening to the other girls chat and laugh as the train ploughed through a lush green world. The bleat of the whistle sounded and Sita knew she journeyed towards yet another change of direction in her life. Once, as a small child her father had given her a book from his shop. The pages were blank except for some numbered black dots strewn loosely about on a sea of white paper. Dev had given her a pencil and showed her how to join one number to the next. She learned quickly, and it excited her how a picture would appear just by joining one dot to the next. It meant the picture was there all the time on the page, but she could not see it until she had journeyed with her pencil from one point to another. Her life seemed something like that, its shape invisible but already determined, waiting for her to find it.

  Eventually, the train halted at a station, and at the stop everyone left the carriages and walked about the platform, glad of the break. Food hawkers appeared, and also sellers of hot tea and sticks of hard, chewy candy. The INA men relaxed, and a group of officers set up their field radio on the platform to listen to the latest military news. Soon the stationmaster appeared, blowing his whistle as always, and they began boarding the train to continue the journey. As Sita turned to climb into the carriage, one of the INA officers from the group around the field radio came running along the platform, waving his arms and shouting. People turned to the man with expressions of disbelief, and at last his words became clear to Sita.

  ‘Netaji is dead. Netaji is dead.’

  Everyone was shouting and crying at once. Those people who had already boarded the train began disembarking again, porters with bags stacked on their heads put down their loads in horrified incredulity, stray dogs began barking at the commotion. Up and down the platform people turned to each other in stunned disbelief, unable to absorb the news.

  The officer continued to run wildly up and down the platform by the train, his voice collapsing then rising again.

  ‘Netaji is dead. Netaji is dead. Killed in a plane crash in Taiwan.’

  25

  SINGAPORE, 1945–1947

  To Sita’s surprise, Dev was at the station to meet her. He had made regular enquiries at the Bras Basah camp about her regiment and which trains Sita might possibly be returning on, and had gone to the station to meet each one. As the crowd of INA soldiers left the platform, Sita saw him standing alone at one end, anxiously craning his neck for a glimpse of her. She ran towards him, remembering his waiting figure at the dock when she first arrived in Singapore, and how she had not at first recognised him. Now, gaunt and prematurely balding, he had aged in a way that shocked her, but her heart lifted at the sight of him.

  ‘I wrote many letters,’ Dev protested when she commented on the length of time without news of him.

  ‘I received only one, with the news of your marriage,’ Sita replied.

  From the station, waiting INA transport took Sita and others from her regiment to the Bras Basah camp. Everyone was nervous; no one knew exactly what would happen to them now, and the rumours swirling about were unsettling. The British were back in authority again in Singapore, and the INA was classed as part of the enemy. It was whispered that many of the civilian INA recruits had discarded their uniforms and melted away, returning unobtrusively to their former lives. However, the professional INA soldiers, who had once fought for the British but had been turned over to the Japanese as POWs at the time of the surrender, were now back with the British Army, but as their POWs. They were to be tried for treason in India, accused of ‘waging war against the King’.

  When at last Sita and the other girls arrived back at the Bras Basah camp, they found Major Pandey was still there, helping to officiate the handover to the British. She had not been harassed for her participation in the INA and was confident they would not be arrested like the men.

  ‘The British are gentlemen; they look upon us as foolish women and don’t really know what to do with us. Let them think what they wish, it frees us to regroup later if there is a need,’ Major Pandey confided.

  A British officer was at the camp to interview and assess the returning women of the Rani of Jhansi Regiment. He was a middle-aged man with a clipped voice and a fulsome moustache, who did not even bother to interview them individually, but hurried through the process, seeing several of them at one time, as dismissive as the Japanese military.

  ‘I don’t mind telling you that the British government sees you as misguided women carried away by romantic ideals. We are not a nation that likes to punish foolish women; some of you are no more than children. Go home to your families, get married, have children of your own,’ he reprimanded, before continuing:

  ‘This is not of course how we view the rest of the INA. Your men are a pack of traitors. They will be returned to India, to Delhi, to stand trial, and will get the hanging all traitors deserve.’

  Along with the other girls, Sita was briskly discharged and stripped of all INA insignia. As she had no alternative clothes she was allowed to leave the camp in her khaki uniform. At the gate, Sita again found Dev waiting for her. He hailed a rickshaw and they climbed in for the journey back to Serangoon Road. So much had happened to her since they last met, and she waited for her brother’s interrogation. To her surprise, after a few brief words of condolence, he avoided the subject of Shiva’s death, eager instead to reveal the changes that had occurred in his own life. When Krishnaswami and Sons reopened under a Japanese licence, Dev had returned to work there, and was promoted to assistant manager. One of the senior managers at Krishnaswami, who had a young daughter, had approached him with a proposal of marriage.

  ‘At that time all fathers were worried about their daughters. Japanese soldiers were roaming about, pulling young girls from their homes and using them as they wished. Many marriages were arranged quickly to keep girls safe,’ Dev explained, as they bowled along in the direction of his new home.

  ‘Rohini is a good wife,’ he added with a self-conscious smile.

  As they rode along Sita observed the ravaged town, strewn with bombsites and rubbish. People hurried about, heads down, a stance learned in their years of fear and deprivation under the Japanese. Food was still scarce and the ubiquitous tapioca still sprouted in the smallest space. Although she wore her INA clothes, Sita realised she was now a part of this crushed world, and must navigate her life within it.

  Dev occupied a street-facing room in a tenement house near Krishnaswami and Sons. Rohini had been waiting at the window, and hurried down to meet them, throwing herself upon her new sister-in -law almost before she climbed out of the rickshaw. Sita extricated herself from Rohini’s tight and clammy embrace, and saw before her a buxom woman in a purple sari, with a flat plain face and determined chin. Rohini appeared to be about her own age, but Sita met her sharp eyes and knew she must be wary. Rohini silently examined her, taking in the masculine military uniform, her eyes slipping from Sita’s breasts to her belted waist, the crease of her crotch and the swell of her thighs beneath the crumpled cotton trousers. Her face appeared to close in disapproval, her voice becoming suddenly formal after the excited embrace, and Sita knew that in some way she did not meet Rohini’s expectations.

  The amount of light and air flowing into Dev’s new home seemed to reflect his newly elevated prospects. Rohini boiled up tea on a primus stove, and unwrapped snacks purchased from the food stalls below to welc
ome Sita home.

  ‘Eat, eat,’ she insisted, pushing food before Sita.

  As she bustled about, Dev talked of their wedding and his work in the shop, but glanced frequently up at Rohini, as if seeking her affirmation. At last, Rohini sat down and Dev smiled apprehensively, and after a nod from his wife, began to outline their plans for Sita now that she was back in Singapore.

  ‘This room is big enough for three. It will be a help to Rohini to have you with her while I am at work.’ Dev’s voice was bright, but the hollowness of his feigned optimism sat upon them all.

  ‘We have bought bedding for you,’ Rohini announced, pointing to a new sleeping mat rolled up in a corner.

  ‘I will stay here tonight, but tomorrow I will go home.’ Sita answered firmly, after expressing her thanks.

  ‘We bought that mat and other things for you only yesterday,’ Rohini protested, full of muted affront.

  ‘I am your brother, I will look after you now,’ Dev’s face creased in concern, and beside him Rohini nodded emphatically.

  ‘You are a widow now, how will you live alone? What will people say?’ Rohini reminded Sita, her voice low but determined.

  ‘Tomorrow I will go home,’ Sita repeated, controlling her irritation, equally determined, remembering how Dev had once before, many years ago, taken charge of her life on her arrival in Singapore. Things were different now; she was confident she could support herself and live her life independently.

  Rohini gave a sudden grunt of exasperation and stood up to make more tea, her lips pursed in displeasure. Already, Sita sensed the rules for their lifelong engagement were being silently laid down. Dev would now have to make choices, and whether he liked it or not, his wife’s opinion would inform his every decision.