We climb on to the bus for Purulia. The teachers warn us that no one is to get off before we reach the terminus. They hand the tickets subsidized by the State of Bengal to the driver, who mutters about this army of children that he doesn’t get much for even though they fill the whole bus. In Purulia we walk a few hundred metres past dozens of stalls with appetizing dishes arranged in a geometric form.
Inside the museum there are several hundred of us. Most are pupils of the region and all are taking part in the cultural programme. In all, ninety schools are gathered together. Some have prepared performances of traditional dance, others are organizing reading or theatre workshops. One of the groups has come accompanied by a … python! It has to be measured with a measuring tape. I keep my distance from this animal that frightens me as much as it attracts me. My classmate Ashok is thrilled to bits. He throws himself on the reptile and strokes it as though it were an affectionate kitten. It is 1.95 metres long; the teachers ask us to convert the measurement into yards. Further away you have to smell some spices and foods in identical pots without labels. I am more comfortable with conversions of measurements than with smells.
Mr Kundu is there; he goes from workshop to workshop, joking with the pupils, encouraging those who are struggling to read the inscriptions in English and introducing the pupils to each other.
At the end of the morning we are all called into the big conference room. The deputy minister of labour announces the programme: there will be songs, dances and speeches. I’m scared to death at the idea of getting up on the platform and speaking in front of so many people. The first pupil climbs up, introduces himself and then launches into a poem in Bengali. The applause is richly deserved. Then my turn comes. I have a lump in my throat from stage fright. Mr Kundu says some encouraging words to me. I recite the verse perfectly. My voice is clear, the pupils applaud and I run back to my seat. My teacher congratulates me discreetly.
A few minutes later Mr Kundu asks me to come to speak at the rostrum. In front of the microphone my fear disappears. I introduce myself and say what I did before I enrolled in school. I talked about everything in detail – the work in the rice paddies, how I learned to roll bidis in order to help my father, that the plan was for me to go to the brick factory like my sister and her husband’s family. I also told them how I was happy at school, that the work there was not only easier but also more fruitful, because I feel sure that with the knowledge that I acquire there I will be able to earn more money than the rest of my family and give them a better life in the future.
I am getting carried away, and I begin to describe the proposals of marriage that my parents made to me as well as my refusal to obey. Am I right not to listen to my parents? I reply before anyone can interrupt me. Yes, because they do not realize that they are putting my future at risk. Am I against marriage? No, but it is too early for me to get married to anybody, no matter who he is. I have witnessed the distress of my sister, who didn’t even know that she was pregnant only a few months after her arranged marriage. I saw her give painful birth to four babies who all died. I didn’t want to go through all that myself. I say what I have felt all during these last years, motivated by the feeling that I am right to refuse my parents’ offers. I have no idea how much time has passed since the beginning of my talk. Half an hour, perhaps an hour? Every time I tackle a point, a new idea comes to mind.
At the end of my speech, the pupils applaud warmly for many minutes. I blush and I am staggered by their reaction. I go back to my place, but the kids get up and come to shake my hand; the girls give me a hug. I would never have thought that they would agree with me. I was expecting to be booed and treated like a bad girl. Mr Kundu tries to clear some space around me. He asks the kids to go back to their seats. He goes up on the platform, replaces the strand of hair and congratulates me at length for this speech.
‘What Rekha Kalindi is going through many of you are also experiencing. When a situation like this arises you should not hesitate to talk about it with your teachers. They have answers and can help you.’
After the speech a dozen journalists come up to see me. They ask me for further details about my story; they ask if what I said really happened as I described it. Several cameras are placed in a semicircle around me. The microphones are held out in my direction, and I repeat what I said on the stage. Arjun, Atul and Mr Kundu come one by one to congratulate me. The deputy minister tells me that we are going to see each other again very soon. I think of my parents’ reaction when they find out that I have put our lives on display in front of all these people …
I go back into the house quietly and go to the courtyard to be by myself, alone with my exercise books. Ma snatches the slate from my hands and orders me to go fetch some wood to use in preparing the meal. I comply with her orders without arguing. That doesn’t do any good when she’s in this state.
‘I’m on to your game, you little hussy!’
‘What game? What are you talking about?’
‘I’ve heard what the kids in the village are saying about you. In front of us you refuse our marriage offers, but behind our backs you go with boys!’
‘I don’t go with anybody! Who told you that? You shouldn’t believe those brats!’
‘Oh no? And why should I believe you? Because you’re so sincere and perfectly behaved, perhaps? I’m going to speak to your father, and you’ll marry the boy who’s chosen for you, whether you like it or not!’
‘I’m not marrying anybody. Leave me alone, you old witch!’
The words are hardly out of my mouth when my cheek is red from the slap. My mother takes me by the hair and continues to hit me. I try to get away, but she holds me tight with one hand while the other grabs a stick. I cry and I shout, but nobody comes to intervene. After several minutes she stops. I remain lying on the floor, shaking from fear that she might start hitting me again.
7
PRESSURE
The wind was dry and cold. I heard the village children in the distance playing with a ball or trying to ride bicycles. Their carefree attitude contrasted with my state of mind. I daubed a little water on my bruises, but that didn’t make any difference to the pain. I rummaged in Baba’s things and found a little pot of camphor cream. I gathered my scattered exercise books and sat huddled up in a corner of the room. My finger followed the letters, and I read in silence for fear that I would be discovered.
My big brother Dipak came home sooner than expected. Since he stopped going to school, he has been running a little cardamom-tea shop not far from the statue of Hanuman beside the national road. He understands immediately that I have been hit.
‘Ma?’
I nod without saying anything. He puts down his two big kettles and the rest of his equipment before leaving the room, annoyed at not being in a position to reason with our parents about my projected marriage.
At the market one of Baba’s friends called to him and held out a newspaper.
‘This is your daughter, isn’t it?’
‘Yes, that’s Rekha. What’s she doing in the paper?’
‘How should I know? But look, she’s also in this paper and in this one, too.’
‘What’s it all about?’ Baba asked.
‘I haven’t the least idea. Just because I sell papers doesn’t mean I read them!’ says the merchant with a smile of complicity to his neighbour, standing between a mound of garlic and another one of red peppers.
‘But you know how to read, don’t you? Can you tell me what is written in this article under the photo?’
‘Give me five rupees first. If all my customers were like you, I’d spend my time reciting the information from these newspapers and go home in the evening without a penny in my pocket.’ He replied with the same mischievous tone, but turning this time to his neighbour on the left who feigned a friendly smile.
‘Here you are,’ my father said, giving him the money. ‘Tell me what’s in the paper now!’
The merchant took a pair of half-moon glasses out of h
is shirt pocket after throwing the coins into a box on the floor near a plastic sheet where magazines were displayed. He murmured for a few seconds while Baba fidgeted impatiently.
‘They say that this girl set off thunderous applause at the museum in Purulia when she made a speech that was incredible for her age …’
‘What did she say?’
‘Wait, I’m reading the rest of it,’ said the merchant as he continued to murmur to himself. ‘She says that her sister had several miscarriages because she was too young to have a child when she fell pregnant … It also says that her parents want to marry her off without her consent before next winter. She tries to refuse, her parents insist on the wedding taking place, mainly because they don’t want to feed her any more … Who does she think she is, this kid, talking about this kind of thing in public? If I were her father I would have given her a good thrashing long before this! That’s quite right, don’t you agree?’
Baba grabbed the paper out of his hands and rushed home. On his way, several people stopped him and asked if it was really his daughter they had seen yesterday on television. Baba couldn’t believe his eyes or his ears. Rekha had gone around talking about everything that happened in the family circle to the news papers and on television channels. In no time they will be the laughing stock of the whole village, the whole region and perhaps even of all of Bengal. Ma was going to be furious.
Kitchen utensils fly in my direction. Insults rain down. I get a ladle, some spoons and even the cooking pot. I try to protect myself by curling up into a ball, but my mother takes me by the hair and knocks me down. I yell, I cry, I beg her to stop hitting me. Baba holds her back, and my brother Dipak helps me up. He orders me to hide out at my uncle’s and not to move from there before he comes to get me. In the courtyard I spot a newspaper with a big picture of me. I realize that my words at the museum in Purulia have brought on my mother’s wrath.
I hear her yell at my father, ‘You see what your daughter is capable of? She’s humiliating us in front of the whole village, that little hussy!’
Baba tries to calm her down by saying that the damage is done, that now they have to think about what to do and say in their defence, especially as the authorities, the school and the panchayat might interfere. This is bound to be only the beginning of their problems.
It got too dangerous to listen to the rest of the conversation at the door. My mother was capable of wringing my neck in a fit of anger. I reassured my brothers and sisters, who were disturbed by the violence of the scene and the behaviour of our mother. She seemed to be possessed by demons. I took refuge, as my brother suggested, with my father’s family. On the terrace I spelled out the newspaper article. It mentioned everything: the miscarriages, the proposals of marriage, the conditions of life at home and so on. I understood why Ma flew off the handle. The journalists didn’t spare any detail. My older brother confirmed my fears.
‘Why did you do that, Rekha? It’s insane. Ma is beside herself. She’s furious with you.’
‘I just told the truth, nothing more.’
‘In the newspapers. On the telly. On the radio. You realize that everybody is going to know all this stuff? What are people going to think of us?’
‘I don’t care!’
‘You can’t say that. The whole family is going to be – and already is – the laughing stock of everybody. The situation can spin out of control very quickly, to say nothing of the problems this can cause.’
‘I said, and repeated several times, to our parents that I didn’t want to be married, but they didn’t even try to listen to me. They spent their time introducing me to suitors. However much I refuse them they just keep banging on about it. They threatened me for weeks. You see how they are. You, too, you were right about it, you know very well how it happened, don’t you?’
When Dipak was about ten years old and Josna was already married my parents tried to find him a wife. He systematically refused them all. He always found something to hold against them: one was too dark skinned, another wasn’t pretty enough, another was illiterate, still another was taller than he was and so on. Our parents finally threw in the towel, and tough luck if the dowry would be less than they had expected. Why don’t they treat me the same way? Is it because I am a girl and a potential risk to the family honour? And even though they want to free themselves from their responsibilities, why not wait until I finish school?
My brother Dipak is very understanding. He always supported me when the chance of going to school came up. When I don’t study enough or my marks are a little less good he orders me to work harder, to do my homework more seriously. He advises me to read and to have a look at the lessons of the curriculum before the information is brought up by my teachers. He himself is sorry not to have continued at school for longer. He gave it up around the age of twelve to begin – like all of us – to earn money. However, I can see that he is unhappy with his job because he is not cut out for physical work; on the other hand he is blessed with a very quick mind. Some years later he regrets what he did. The tea stall brings in a little to help the family, but not enough to start a family of his own. It’s thanks to him that we have been able to put electricity in the house. He pays the bills so that my parents can devote their income to buying food.
That evening he advises me to stay with our uncle. There’s no point starting the conflict up again by going back home, since my mother is probably still furious. I agree with him. He promises to bring me my school things early the next morning.
It is after eight o’clock, and I’ve been up for nearly two hours. Dipak is late in coming, and I’m going to be late to school. I go to the house hoping that Ma will be away. I see her in the courtyard weaving bamboo baskets. She sees me and looks daggers at me. Her dark, piercing eyes are fierce, her lips pursed. Dipak takes me by the hand and tells me that my mother no longer wants me to go to school. Her decision is final, and neither he nor Baba has succeeded in making her change her mind. She will not tell me directly because she has sworn not to speak to me again.
All right then. I go back into the room, grab the tobacco basket and go plonk myself down at the other end of the courtyard near Budhimuni’s house. In one morning I make more than five hundred cigarettes. I have so much experience that I can work with my eyes closed. If I keep on at this rate, in no time I’ll beat my father’s production figure of a thousand bidis a day. There is also a high probability that my back will be wrecked and my fingers bent before I’m married. And it’s not impossible that my mother and I will never speak to each other again.
I hear the children chattering in the street, and I recognize the voices of Budhimuni, Ashok, Pinky and the others. Atul asked them to find out why I haven’t been to school. I reply briefly that I had to drop everything and help my parents. The conversation very quickly turns to the newspaper articles that all the parents in the village are talking about. I really underestimated the impact of my speech. I am under no illusion now that the whole country knows about my talk. Budhimuni is the only one who understands the extent of the damage. She advises me to talk about it with the teachers at the school. For the time being I don’t want to make the situation worse, even though she is undoubtedly basically right – but I have no idea how to get out of this mess I’ve created. I ask her to lie to Atul and Arjun and tell them that I had to go to my sister’s in Sampur. I don’t want to get them mixed up in this business. I have already hurt my family enough by giving them so much bad publicity.
Baba dismisses the children who are clustered around me. He is livid. He confirms what Dipak told me before with regard to the school. From now on my main activity will consist of either making bidis or else going to the brick factory where my sister works. I reply calmly that I prefer to follow his line of work because I don’t feel like learning a new trade.
‘Tomorrow we will go to the dealer to get double the amount of tobacco and eucalyptus leaves,’ he says with finality.
Several days went by, but my mother didn’t get
over the shockwave that I caused in the press. She spent a lot of time squatting in the courtyard brooding over the shame that I had brought on our family. She didn’t open her mouth except to insult me. She told me that from now on she would no longer feed me, that she was going to make my life so difficult and unbearable that I was soon going to look back longingly at the time now gone by when she loved me with all her heart. So that she would be certain not to come face to face with me she wove her baskets in the neighbouring courtyard with the other women.
I took advantage of the fact that she wasn’t watching me to go for a walk down the main street. I couldn’t take a step in the village without hearing remarks or being asked questions about my speech. I brushed off those remarks and claimed that it was nothing to do with me, that there had been a mistake. Most of the people had only a very vague idea of what had been said. Nobody had really read the newspapers. I found it strange that my neighbours were interested more in my marriage than in me myself.
At home I tried to redeem myself by bringing in some extra income to supplement my father’s. I worked all day without a break. In the evening, at dinnertime, my mother forbade me to enter the house. I stretched out under the little window where I shivered with the cold. Dipak discreetly brought me a small portion of rice, which I devoured in a few seconds. I waited until everyone was asleep to sneak indoors without making any noise.
I was woken up by kicks, blows with a stick and insults from my mother.
‘Get out of here, you little bitch! Who told you you could sleep inside? Clear off! You worthless brat! You dishonour your whole family, but you still want to take advantage of its generosity and its hospitality. Who fed you from her own breast when you were only an infant? You want to make decisions by yourself, eh? In that case, you will never sleep under our roof again!’
Strength to Say No Page 6
