Exile

by Akhilesh

  A zestful demonstration by Chacha and Suryakant could be seen when they served guests on celebratory occasions. It was a time when leaf platters or steel plates were laid on tables, and young boys darted around to serve guests. If one fellow was serving dal, another would be serving vegetables with curry. If one lugged the pulav supplies, the other would be bounding from one table to another with a tray of papad. When women and girls sat down to eat, the zest, delight and agility of the youths was to be admired.

  The nephew made rounds to hover around the table where his favourite Didi or Bhabhi was sitting. He would appear promptly with the food item that lacked on Didi’s plate or leaf platter. Naturally, if he held the chutney one moment, he would be toting the dahi bara the next, and then papad, followed by the salad and ultimately, the load of kachauris. On a similar occasion, when he had snatched the four item holder from Chacha and when he went to return it to Chacha, he discovered him marching with a large plate of pooris near a table across which sat a striking looking girl. She already had pooris on her plate, but Chacha bestowed another four despite her protests and said, ‘Come on…just a couple.’

  But how could Chacha undertake these tasks at his own wedding? Suryakant was also now not naive enough to take Didi/Bhabhi as his lady deity or to carry out chores voluntarily. He went up to the roof to lay out the mattresses and bed sheets during Chacha’s wedding. So when everyone gathered for Chacha’s wedding, and the bustle was at its peak a couple of days before the ceremony, Suryakant came up and lay down on a mattress. His solitude was short-lived as several of the younger members of the family rushed there after dinner. As if an invasion was taking place, the entire roof was rapidly filled with boys and girls. They sprawled on the mattresses, covering themselves with blankets, boys and girls in straggling, separate groups.

  The girls were under the protection of a few Didi/Bhabhi sorts, and the boys were on the other side. Within a few minutes, they split up, and one group was engrossed in discussing the day’s meals, while the second ridiculed the others. The third group animatedly discussed the existence of ghosts, while the fourth censured its teachers and the seventh group occupied itself in defining true love. Every young man and woman was focused on their own gang, absolutely unmindful of other groups.

  The hundred-watt bulb hanging at the corner observed them in its muted glow. A wire, wound once across a nail in the wall and kitted with a holder, had been drawn from the floor below. The bulb struggled to illuminate the whole terrace, and it went out all of a sudden. The very next instant, darkness crept in. Children made a ruckus but soon fell quiet. The groups were absorbed by the blackout, the occupants of the roof were inundated in a single darkness.

  Hardly a hundred seconds had passed when they realized that it was not dark. Every inch of the rooftop was enveloped in a pearly, silvery light. They looked up and beheld the full moon. It was so near, so radiant – the lovely, spherical moon! Close enough to reach through a ladder!

  The brilliant night transformed every object on the rooftop into something simultaneously sublime and mundane. The walls, the wooden cloth pegs, door panels and the extinguished bulb appeared alive somehow. Children, youths, elders – everyone seemed more charming than they actually were. Sometimes, they looked like divine sculptures cast in milk-hued stone. As if they would instantly assume human form if touched!

  Somebody came up the stairs with a paraffin lamp and instantly, protests filled the rooftop. The fellow put it down and started pumping air into it which made it glow brighter. As he turned to leave, everyone yelled, ‘Take the gaslight away!’ He retraced his steps and went downstairs with the lamp.

  Soothing moonlight illuminated everything gently. Coolness and tranquillity spread in every corner. On this full moon night, all movement and sound froze – only the crickets’ chirps filled the air. And then a delicious, heartrending sound rose from the midst of the cluster on the roof and undraped slowly. Ajay, Suryakant’s elder aunt’s second son, had begun singing.

  Immediately, all divisions dissolved. The separate groups discarded their private spaces and formed a circle around the song, sitting closely in such a manner that the moon thought – this is the map of a newly-sprung nation on earth.

  Ajay finished the song and there was enthusiastic clapping and the clamour for an encore swelled. Ajay sang another song. And so, a session of antakshari began. Team 1 began the contest with the words – ‘Samay bitaane ke liye karna hai kuch kaam. Shuroo karo anthakshari lekar prabhu ka naam.’ Since the last sound of the couplet ended with the ‘m’ sound, the other team had to sing two lines of a song beginning with the sound. Team 2: ‘Mera naam hai Chameli, main hun malan albeli. Chali aayi main akeli Bikaner se’. It was the turn of Team 1 to take up a song with the sound ‘s’. Team 1: ‘Saamne ye kaun aaya dil mein hui halchal. Dekh ke bas ek hi jhalak ho gaye hum paagal’. Team 2: ‘Leena O Leena dil tune chheena.’ Team 1: ‘Na jao sainyan chhura ke baiyan, kasam tumhari main ro paroongi.’ Team 2: ‘Geet gaata hun main, gungunata hun main, maine hansne ka vaada kiya tha kabhi isliye ab sadaa muskurata hun main’ Team 2: ‘Mere sapnon ke raani kab aayegi tu, biti jayegi zindagani kab aayegi tu, aai rut mastani kab aayegi tu, chali aa tu chali aa.’ Team 2: ‘Aa meri raani le ja chhalla nishani.’ Team 1: ‘Nazar laagi raja tore bangle pe, nazar laagi raja tore bangle pe. Jo main hoti raja ban ki koyaliya, kuhuk rahti raja tore bangle pe! Team 2: ‘Parde mein rahne do, parda na uthao, parda jo uth gaya to bhed khul jayega’. The contest continued for long. A few hours and five-hundred-and-seventeen stanzas later, the race was still neck and neck. Neither of the groups had won, and neither had yielded. The game stopped, or was brought to a halt, when the bulb suddenly snapped into life and outshone the moon. Rajesh and Manoj approached the bulb to tackle the nuisance. Manoj drew out a handkerchief from his pocket and covering the bulb with it, screwed it out of the holder and placed it safely in a nearby alcove. Applause resounded once darkness fell again and the moon’s radiance re-emerged. Chacha came up to the rooftop. He looked at his wrist watch and said, ‘It is 1 a.m., and you owls are still awake?’

  ‘We’re singing and enjoying ourselves, but why are you up, Chachaji?’ Chunni said, her eyes danced.

  Babita welcomed Chacha by singing a song:

  ‘Banna banni se pooche kahan milogi kahan,

  Usi mandap ke neeche aadhi raat ko.

  Banna harwa bhi layaa, bindi bhi layaa,

  Banna banni se pooche pehnogi kahan,

  Usi mandap ke neeche aadhi raat ko.’

  (Groom asks the bride where she will meet him

  ‘Under the marriage canopy at midnight’.

  Groom brought the necklace, groom brought the bindi.

  Groom asks the bride where will you put them on,

  ‘Under the marriage canopy at midnight.’)

  Chacha, abashed, began to retrace his steps. Laughter from those on the rooftop chased him. Hardly had Chacha taken a few steps back when Suryakant caught him and said, ‘Come, please join us!’

  Manju trilled ‘Bekarar karke hame yun na jaiye … Aapko hamari kasam laut aaiye.’

  Suryakant blocked Chacha’s way and recited a couplet by Faiz Ahmad Faiz … ‘Gulon mein rang bhare baadaye naubahar chale, Chale bhi aao ki gulshan ka karobaar chale.’

  Chacha returned, and popular demand obligated him to recite something. Chacha cleared his throat and tried a misra from a ghazal like a shayar in a mushaira, but the audience protested vehemently and said, ‘A film song! Sing us a film song!’ Chacha relaxed. There was a time when he was disenchanted with film music and melodies and had started considering ghazals, folk songs and literary poems much more appealing. He had started pretending that film songs were inferior, and had quit going to any movie that featured songs. He watched the occasional art films with enthusiasm, but it was sheer bad luck that such films were rare in Sultanpur. He sometimes went to watch a ‘melody packed’, ‘action packed’ or ‘grand family drama’ film at Suryakant’s insistence, but whenever a song began, he
walked out of the hall for a piss or a smoke.

  Suryakant was piqued and said, ‘What a charade! Chacha is so melodramatic!’ It was proof that Chacha had remained a regular listener of the sixteen-song Binaca Geetmala on the radio.

  When Balwant Kaur left for Bhatinda, Chacha’s heart shattered into shards and he was filled with a cavernous depression, these films helped him wade provisionally out of his misery. Chacha did not want to eat, drink, talk or laugh during those dismal days. He lay alone, miserable in some dark room. And then one morning, on the spur of the moment, he twisted the knob of the transistor, squirming restlessly, or perhaps on whim. The next moment, he was listening to a song and Chacha felt he had discovered a divine instrument to help him grapple with his grief. Whenever a film song played, he would close his eyes and imagine how the hero and the heroine were behaving. For instance, if the song was ‘Kajra mohabbat wala, ankhiyon mein aisa daala, kajre ne le li meri’, he would visualize that the heroine points at her breasts when she says ‘meri jaan’ and then sways up and down twice immediately after. These imagined scenes were so irrelevant and ridiculous that Chacha would break into a grin.

  He did not practice this remarkable pursuit in the initial phase of his moping. He did not nurse a desire to rid himself of the pangs of separation. He tossed and twisted, pierced by the heartache of unrequited love, the sorrow of separation, but he also relished the emotional torment. He drew an indescribable pleasure from it. He experienced a vulnerability as well as a strange delight, but he had accepted this life. However, the game of alternating grief and contentment came to an end quickly because ultimately, there remained only unhappiness and boredom. He discovered this technique during this very period, visualizing scenes as he listened to songs. These daydreams were so powerful that he would break into a smile and chuckle! Once, he whooped so loudly with laughter that Suryakant was alarmed – had grief driven Chacha crazy finally?

  Chacha had not revealed this singular prescription to anyone but Suryakant. However, when the nephew tried, it went awry. Suryakant started imagining extremely lurid scenes. The genital area in the heroine’s body occupied a central place in his imagination. But Chacha was not slack and used the remedy ever so often. He even memorized some of the songs in the course of time. So, when young boys and girls collected around him that moonlit night, Chacha crooned the golden oldie, ‘Maine tere liye hi saat rang ke sapne chune.’

  This confused the nephew – was the song addressed to Chachi or to Balwant Kaur? But Chacha turned intensely morose after having sung the song and Suryakant was convinced that Balwant Kaur was on Chacha’s mind while he was singing. So when the nephew’s turn came, he selected a song and dedicated it to Chacha, ‘Jab dil hi toot gayaa, hum jee kar kya karenge.’

  It was a night when everyone belted out a number. Shibbu took up ‘Khai ke paan Banaras wala, khul jaye band akal ka talaa’, while Nupoor sang, ‘Tora man darpan kahalaye’. Nilima didi intoned, ‘Afsana likh rahi hoon dile bekaraar ka’. Babita broke the pattern and did a few card tricks in the moonlight. Dinkar mimicked dialogues from Pakeezah and Mughal-e-Azam and Hansa, Shobha and Ajay acted out an impromptu comedy.

  Mandakini put up a memorable dance to the tune of ‘Mohe panghat pe Nandlal cher gayo re’, tying her dupatta at her waist. The significance of the dance had multiplied because it was her first performance at the age of eighteen. She had never trained or danced, doing it only in her dreams until now. Authoritarian family control, her bashfulness, timidity and the fear of failure – one or the other of these factors had posed a hurdle in the articulation of her talent. However, the full moonlight mesmerized her and her feet acquired rhythm spontaneously.

  Joy and contentment drenched the moonlit night. It seemed the moon was fixed over the roof. So, when Awadh Narayan appeared with his lota of water to shake Suryakant awake, he discovered that neither Suryakant nor the guests had slept. The moon too looked drowsy but wakeful.

  However, there was a difference between the wedding night spent awake and the one that Suryakant would endure years later. This one was spilling with moonlight, and the other occurred in the dark.

  13

  THE SILHOUETTE OF A WOMAN IN WRINKLES AND NERVES

  Babuji and Amma left for their room. In a bed on the rooftop, Dadi, inside the mosquito net, was fanning herself with the handheld fan. For Shibbu, Kamana, Nupoor and Kamana’s daughter, Roli, it was TV hour. Suryakant suggested, ‘You go watch.’

  Shibbu replied, ‘Don’t worry, Bhaiya. We can catch the repeat telecast in the morning.’

  Kamana had started a garden on the rooftop. There were plants in the pots and there were flowers blooming on the plants. One of the walls was covered with vines. A table fan swung its head at four chairs and a small table in the middle. The gust of the air touched all of them in their chairs one by one. Roli had fallen asleep on Shibbu’s lap, and he laid her by Dadi’s side inside the mosquito net and came back. And so, another night spent awake began.

  Suryakant said, ‘Shibbu, bring my black bag.’

  Soon, the black bag sat atop the small table in the middle. ‘What’s in the bag?’

  Suryakant attempted to make a joke. Shibbu and Nupoor kept quiet and looked at Kamana, who smiled and said, ‘Bhai Sahib, I know.’

  ‘Go on.’

  ‘What If I am right?’

  ‘Let’s have a hundred-rupee wager!’ Suryakant’s anxiety and sense of dilemma diminished. He relaxed.

  ‘Bhai Sahib, you’ll lose the wager, I’ll tell you that.’

  ‘Bhaiya, you have lost your hundred,’ Nupoor joined in. ‘She has the power of seeing through everything.’

  ‘Let’s test her power then,’ Suryakant challenged her.

  ‘It contains gifts you have brought for us from Lucknow!’ Kamana laughed.

  ‘Great! You have won the hundred.’ Suryakant handed over a hundred-rupee note to Kamana and opened the bag. There were several polythene packets inside.

  ‘Bhaiya, Kamana can reveal which plastic bag carries what,’ Nupoor revealed.

  ‘You are spinning yarns!’

  ‘Let’s place another bet.’

  ‘Fifty for each bag. Okay?’

  ‘Agreed,’ Kamana smiled.

  ‘What’s in this one?’ Suryakant picked up a bag.

  Kamana’s eyes considered the bag and her face quivered, ‘A sari for Mummyji.’

  It was indeed a sari for Mummy. ‘What’s in that one?’ Suryakant asked.

  ‘Another sari for Mummyji.’

  She was right. ‘What about this one?’

  ‘Bhai Sahib has brought four saris for Mummy,’ Kamana picked up the fourth bag without prompting.

  ‘This?’ Suryakant picked up a small packet.

  ‘A watch for Papaji.’

  ‘This one?’

  ‘Beautiful earrings for my munh dikhai.’

  Shibbu held Suryakant’s hand and said, ‘Stop this game, Bhaiya. You have no idea of her powers.’

  In the beginning, when Shibbu did not know Kamana well, he was perplexed by this talent. Theirs was not a ‘love marriage’, but he fell in love with her right after the wedding. They had exchanged mobile numbers while putting rings on each other’s fingers. From the next day onwards, whenever he rang her, the word ‘Sathiya’ would be displayed on his mobile.

  After fifteen days, they had started meeting each other and one evening, Shibbu bought her a shawl and went to meet her, hiding it inside a plastic bag. They strolled for a while and then Kamana laughed, ‘Why don’t you give me the shawl already? I’m really fond of the sky blue colour.’ He was startled. It was the beginning of an amazement that grew stronger with time.

  On their nuptial bed, he asked Kamana, ‘Can you see what’s inside one’s heart too?’

  Kamana replied, ‘No, I know only about the body.’

  Then Shibbu suggested, ‘Let our bodies talk now.’

  ‘The body is fortified behind clothes,’ Kamana laughed, but her laughter wobbled with nervousness. />
  Shibbu was aroused more by the quiver than by her statement. He grew all the more excited when Kamana’s fingers undid the topmost button of his kurta. He clutched her hands in excitement and said, ‘Me first.’ He caressed Kamana’s bridal garments; Kamana lay on her stomach and closed her eyes. A unique sport began. As he bared her body gradually, she commented on the corresponding part of his body as she lay with her eyes closed while Shibbu was fully clothed.

  When he bared her back, she said, ‘Shibbu, you have such a smooth but hard back.’ When her hips were uncovered, she cried out, ‘Shibbu, what is this wound on your right hip?’

  Shibbu argued, ‘How do I know? I can’t see my back and hip!’