The Eighteenth Parallel

by MITRAN, ASHOKA

  Then he stood up. He had hurt his hands and legs as well. He began to run again, in another direction, towards the cemetery. He tripped and fell again. 'I haven't seen you even once!' He beat the ground again and again, raised his voice as much as he could and cried, 'Oh Gandhi! Gandhi!' He looked all round as if expecting Gandhi to materialise. He was amazed at his own frenzy.

  He then began to scratch the ground with his fingernails. It was hardened earth and didn't yield much—a handful of dust was all he could collect. He threw it up skywards. Then he got up again and dashed forward into another frantic, aimless run. When he fell down again, he began to bang his head on the ground.

  A car zoomed past on the road by the race course. It must have been a good half-mile away, but Chandru began to race towards it, running for all he was worth. But it was gone. Then he fell again. His whole body was burning though he felt the cold mist through his torn clothes. He tore them some more. He tripped near a heap of gravel meant for some construction work on the site and began to throw the stones about, until he sprained his right shoulder. The last effort to fling a stone made him cry out in pain. 'Amma!' By now his breath was like bellows, his whole body aching and sore but the frenzy in him hadn't drained. The pain that lingered was that of being tricked, cheated, betrayed. Looking at the sky, he hurled a stone at it, this time with his left hand. A short parabola, followed by a plop. That was all. The sky looked just as rt had always looked and the stars twinkled as they had always twinkled, winking among themselves like naughty children.

  As he lay flat on the ground, exhausted, the night seemed to take on different hues. A viscous layer of darkness floated above the air. He shot out his hands, slamming them on the ground. Then he waved them in a wilder arc. He realised he was lying on a cricket pitch. Perhaps a pitch he himself had played cricket on. Thoughts of home came to him. Would the lights be on now? Or would everyone still be groping about in the dark?

  Maybe they were asleep by now. No they would all be waiting for him, awake. Very confused about news of Gandhi, not knowing what really happened. They were probably crying. None of them would have the heart to eat. Dinner would be left untouched in the kitchens, for rats and roaches to have their fill. And the poor buffalo would be lowing away neglected.

  Lying in the open in absolute solitude was soothing. Wasn't it? But was it? Wasn't it? One thing was certain now, he had been betrayed, betrayed even by Gandhi.

  Anger and sorrow welled up, the wilderness become unbearable, and he began to run. All the pictures he had ever seen of Gandhi floated before him. Once there had been a photograph of Gandhi – a large one – stuck on the front of a decorated railway engine. That had been his last ever glimpse, his last ever contact with Gandhi. That had been the locomotive of the train in which Gandhi had toured South India. A locomotive just as black as the darkness now. And now here he was, panting and puffing like a locomotive. He stopped suddenly, screamed, and once again slumped to the ground, sobbing.

  3

  Nagaratnam had come home. Though delayed by a month, the university examinations had somehow been conducted. Only half the college students had paid their examination fees, and only half of those who had paid up had sat for the exams and God knew how many would get through. But Nagaratnam had done well. Her family had decided to leave Secunderabad. Her father had grown a moustache and beard under the pretext of being ill. That had taken care of the medical certificate needed for two months' leave. He had also managed a police permit to leave the State. It only remained now for the Twelve Down to take them up to Kazipet Junction the following Saturday. They'd reach Kazipet at night and wait there for four hours until the Grand Trunk Express came in and their carriages were attached to it. Anyhow, that was how it usually was. The hope was that things would remain the same this whole week.

  After that, it would be Bezwada at eight-thirty in the morning and Madras in the evening. That was freedom. If things improved in Hyderabad, they might come back. Otherwise, they'd settle down somewhere else. There were many colleges in Madras Presidency. 'Only my father will have to come back here,' Nagaratnam said. 'It's two years to his retirement. I came to say goodbye to all of you. Chandru, will you remember me? Why, what's happened to your face? You look awful. Will you write to me? I'll write to all of you.'

  Chandru stood gazing at Nagaratnam's face. It had become customary with him to let those who spoke to him go on while he continued to watch their faces. It had been a long time since he had seen Nagaratnam at close quarters. When you saw a girl in a crowd, in a public place, you had an impression of her which stayed with you. Seen as close as this, Nagaratnam did not conform to his image of her at all. She was altogether too grown up and too dark. Her face was not all that silken and smooth—did she really have so many warts and blemishes? A fine growth of hair covered her forehead and cheeks so that her hair went beyond her hairline, much like the way she herself was now going to step beyond the limits of Hyderabad.

  'Why don't you say something?' Nagaratnam said, flashing an affectionate smile at him.

  'Just thinking of something.'

  'You're not listening to me, of course.'

  'I am listening.'

  'Impossible, you didn't hear a word of what I said, I'm sure.'

  'Shall I repeat everything you said?'

  'Oh forget it.'

  For a while neither spoke. Then Nagaratnam said: 'In a way, I'm glad to leave this place. But also afraid. Our relatives who stay in so many places are all so different from us. To think I must go and live among them—it's really frightening... But there you go drifting into your own thoughts again.'

  'Shall I say something?'

  'What?'

  'What's been on my mind.'

  Nagaratnam seemed to shrink a little. Chandru could see that her instinctive wariness didn't allow her to let him go on. Never before had she spoken to him for any length of time. She had always treated him like a child, patronisingly. What was more, she could communicate that that was all he was to her without her so much as moving a muscle on her face, or flicking an eyelid. All the while, she knew quite well that Chandru waited at all sorts of places just to catch a glimpse of her. But today, there was a new-found security in her imminent departure. She could be generous with him and talk to him. Why, it was only two months ago that there was a new rumour about her, that she had gone missing for two days. That a girl with such an experience behind her could say she was afraid...

  'Goodbye then,' she said and floated out, leaving Chandru a little dazed. She had walked in when least expected, spent an incredible ten minutes with him and walked out, leaving him no chance to prove the relationship. Just for a while she seemed so intimate and the next moment she was gone.

  I have no need for such girls, thought Chandru. I'm finished with them. Six months ago, if she'd spoken to me, it would have made my day. Women cannot rouse me any more. Nagaratnam was still in the house, taking leave of everyone. Chandru still had a chance to draw attention and he might just... After all, she was going to leave them for ever...But no, he didn't make the effort.

  The gulmohar tree in their garden was ablaze with red flowers. Great regulars for observing seasonal rhythms, these trees never let down the month of May. The rains of Hyderabad were as regular too. Come sixth or seventh June and you found the first rains knocking at the door. Not heavy rains, of course. If Hyderabad ever got real rains, you wouldn't find people subsisting on maize and custard apple, would you ?

  Quite unlike the radiant-looking gulmohar, the peepal, margosa and banyan looked withered. The grass on the ground had shrivelled to pale stumps. Thorny bushes had survived. There was even a yellow flower among the thorns. A mass of red flowers on the tree above, and on the ground, as far as the eye could see, a single yellow flower. These days, the jars and tins in the kitchen were all empty. One could barely manage to scrape together a little grain from the bottoms of the tins. Vegetables were available but little else for cooking—no salt, no chilli. Even groundnut oil had
become a scarce item because buses had now switched over from diesel to groundnut oil. The fares had been doubled to make up for the cost. There was one consolation in all this—there might be little cooking worth the name going on in your own kitchen, but you had only to go out into the streets to get the smell of a feast. Half the oil in the buses went up in smoke. But the smoke-smothered city was also enveloped in the smell of fritters—bajji, vadai, omapodi, karaboondi.

  The Nagpur refugees were still hawking these snacks and a lot of restaurants – Hindu as well as Muslim – bought up all they made. After all, everyone had to eat. No distinctions there. Father was going through a bad time in his office. A Muslim had taken charge. He spoke only Urdu and ran the office in Urdu. A host of others like him had been inducted into the Railway Department, which untill now was the preserve of the British, Anglo-Indians, and the Tamil and Telugu speaking peoples. It had now been taken over by the Nizam. The new recruits were largely from Maharashtra and Bihar. Each group spoke its own brand of Urdu. Father said they had problems following each other's Urdu.

  Father was also afraid, afraid of some indistinguishable menace. A policeman had snatched away his walking stick and taken him to the police station the other day for carrying a dangerous weapon. The sub-inspector warned him and let him off, but didn't return the stick. There were other walking sticks at home but Father gave up carrying a stick. It was sad to see him go out without his stick.

  He then stopped going out at all, almost. Everybody at home had stopped going out too. People seldom ventured out in the whole town, for that matter. Nagaratnam had come out by herself, brave girl. Her people at home may not have known. The times were such that formal leave-taking before one went out had to be given up.

  Mr Kasim next door was shouting for Father. Chandru peeped out and said, 'Father hasn't returned from the office yet.'

  'There's no water in our tap,' Kasim shouted. 'You've tampered with something, haven't you?'

  In normal times one never heard Kasim's voice, and his radio could be mistaken for being the sole occupant of his house. But for some days now he had been shouting at Chandru's father, intimidating him.

  'But we've done nothing,' Chandru said. 'Actually, we haven't been getting water either.'

  'You want me to believe that? When I can hear the water all the time? What are you people up to?'

  'But we haven't done anything at all—' Before Chandru could finish Kasim had jumped over the wall that separated the front- yards of their two houses. He pushed Chandru aside and went into the house in his slippers. Chandru followed him.

  Hurrying past the prayer room and kitchen, Kasim reached the tap in the backyard. Every two adjacent houses in Lancer Barracks shared a connection from the water mains. The supply was very poor these days. Kasim went to the tap and said, 'See?'

  Chandran didn't find anything wrong with it. His mother peeped out timidly from the kitchen.

  'You seem to think you can leave your tap open all the time, don't you ?' Kasim closed the tap, screwing it tight with all his strength, then looked round the backyard. His eyes fell on the buffalo's trough.

  'Look at that!' he cried. 'Wasting water on animals when we don't have a drop for humans. Listen. This creature should leave the place by nightfall today.'

  Mother showed a bit of herself and said placatingly in Tamil, 'It's mostly swill from the kitchen that we feed it, not fresh water ever.'

  Kasim turned upon her, 'You people seem to think you own this place! These are railway quarters. How dare you keep a buffalo here? If I reported it, you would be thrown out with all your pots and pans in two days. So look out.'

  As he was leaving, Kasim said to Chandru, 'When your father comes, ask him to see me.' The buffalo grunted just then. Kasim went in again, gave it a vicious kick and came out. When he had gone, Chandran went to bolt the front door shut. Pyari Begum, who was standing in Kasim's garden, gave him a secret smile. Perhaps she had no idea of what her father had done just now. Kasim had never behaved that way at any time in the past. Chandru bent his head and closed the door. What had happened was not unusual. There had always been arguments with maids, milkmen, sweepers, carpenters, tailors, tongawalas. They had even quarrelled with Kasim's family several years ago. That sobriquet for Pyari Begum as a special kind of sow dated from one of those fights. But Kasim had never involved himself in any of these neighbourly fracases. Now he was spoiling for a fight.

  Mother and daughters sat in a huddle. When Father came home Mother told him, 'We knew terror stalked the place but today it actually entered our house.'

  What were we going to do about the buffalo? At a time when most of the milkmen had fled the city, the buffalo had kept us supplied with milk. It would give us milk for another four or five months before it went dry.

  'Anyway, you said Kasim wanted to see me. Let me go and meet him,' said Father, his face going rather pale. Then he called softly from our veranda 'Mr Kasim!', then called again. There was no reply. So he went out through our gate and in through theirs. He stopped at their threshold and called again 'Mr Kasim!'

  Mr Kasim put his head out and asked, 'What is it?'

  'I've come to see you.'

  Kasim hesitated a bit before letting him in. Everyone in Chandru's house was nervously watching. Kasim's voice went on booming for a long time. Then Father too said something. When he came out, Father was sweating profusely.

  'What he says is quite fair,' Father began. 'We mustn't leave the tap open all the time. Let's close it once we've collected our water.' No one responded to Father's statement. There was water in the tap for only a few minutes each day. Keeping the tap open or closed was not going to make any difference.

  'Did he say anything about our buffalo?' Mother wanted to know. 'Are we supposed to beg his permission to have cattle in our house?'

  'Shhh, softly,' Father warned. 'I told him we won't give it any water.'

  The tap couldn't be opened at all. First Chandru and then his father tried and gave up. Kasim had closed it very tight. 'A few knocks with the hammer may do the trick,' Mother suggested. But that could invite more trouble from Kasim. So Father went to Kasim's for the second time and called, 'Mr Kasim!'

  Kasim refused to come. 'Where's the hurry ? I'll come tomorrow and open it for you.' Which meant that Father was expected to go and wait at his door the next morning. It was the last day for buying the month's ration of sugar. Father and Mother had been enquiring every day at the ration shop but stocks of sugar had not arrived as yet, the shopkeeper said. He had promised to give them one seer if they came on the last day at closing time. One seer was just two pounds. If they went now and caught the shopkeeper in the right mood and acknowledged receipt of six seers of sugar, they might get one seer. 'You'd better go with your father,' said Mother. So Chandru set out, walking silently with his father.

  Many houses in Lancer Barracks were locked. Guard Naga-bhushanam had managed to get a railway pass without a police permit and the whole family had left. Only the houses of Jafar Ali, Mannas and Kasim still had families in them.

  Instead of their usual shortcut through Manohar Talkies to the ration shop, Father and Chandru now went through Charles Street and the Regimental Bazaar Police station. The dimly lit police station wore a sorry look. Like all other bright lights in Secunderabad, the mercury lamp in the police station had also been removed. The ordinary bulbs were all fitted with tiny black skirts, reminding one of the blackout of the World War years. This was a precaution against Indian air attacks. Though there were still six months left of the Standstill Agreement, Hyderabad was in the grip of a phobia. War conditions prevailed in the area.

  They had to go past the Rajasthani oil store. Monda was nearly empty. The oil shop was closed. The boy from the shop who belonged to the Arya Samaj had been badly beaten by the police. Someone from Chandru's house had gone to the shop the other day and had returned without oil. The boy was there, his face horribly swollen.

  Chandru walked silently with his father. To think
that he used to look forward eagerly to these visits with Father to Monda until two years ago! They would discuss everything they could think of by the time they reached Monda and would meet a lot of people there as well. When Father met an acquaintance on the way, they would start talking in the middle of the road, then would keep moving out inch by inch, still engrossed in their conversation, till they finally stood on the verge of the road. Chandru would feel bored listening all the while, but it had all given him glimpses of worlds beyond his ken. Today they had walked two miles to the heart of the city but there wasn't a soul to talk to...

  The man at the ration shop collected their ration card and money and went into the house next to the shop. Ten minutes later, he came out with a small packet in a bag. They would have to make do with this sugar for a whole month. Father asked the shopkeeper in Telugu if rice was available—even five seers would go a long way.

  'There is some rice, very poor quality rice. But I heard you get good rice in the railway rations.'

  'Oh no. It's that awful reddish rice that we get with lots of stones. Gives you diarrhea. You feel like making do with maize rotis. But somehow we never seem to get used to these rotis.'

  The shopkeeper whispered, 'Hyderabad doesn't get any supply of rice or food items. The planes are bringing in only guns and tanks. That white man's plane seems to have landed in Malakpet even today.'

  'Is that so?' said Father.

  Not that Father didn't know. Chandru had also heard all about the Australian gun-runner Sydney Cotton who had purchased arms abroad for the Nizam's forces and had managed to smuggle them into Hyderabad under the very nose of the Indian Army. Rumour, which had at first numbered these forays as two or three had now increased the score to dozens of times. Panic spread when it was also rumoured that he had brought in a tank by air.