This Could Have Become Ramayan Chamar's Tale

by Subimal Misra

the wife scurries around in concealment

  she doesn’t even want to come to grind masala

  actually, as they’re lowly folk

  they’ve still retained a bit of shame and decency

  the watchman has lit the lantern

  while the meat cooks he kneads flour into dough

  his two muscular arms move up and down

  all ten fingers seize the watery flour, and that babu-white flour paste

  slips so easily through the crevices between his fingers…

  A market for sex-love-perversion has been created in the country, and it’s happening very rapidly, posters come up of Smita Patil in the film Chakra, the scene of her bathing at a street-side tap ... Whenever the subject of sex arises, to say it’s bad – all these broad-brush, gross criticisms – given that which takes place flagrantly all day, the mentality of avoiding all that and escaping it is idiotic, but if the perspective of social conflict does not emerge from all this – if that is not elaborated upon – it’s nothing but a ploy to make money from the business of cheerful matters. When sexual titillation is the only objective – a rape scene: if it remains just a rape scene, if it’s not saturated with the economic backwardness and the conflict-ridden process behind the rape – if upon reading it, hatred towards the social system does not arise in the readers’ minds, if it does not make one aware of the terrifying nature of the capitalist scheme of things – the fundamental thing is the point of view, from which angle it’s being shown … just as the writer who denies reality is dead, similarly, the writer who merely writes about reality is also just as dead, and for the same reason I say, for the river-crossing scene, couldn’t it have been done without using all this coloured cellophane – it seems terribly childish.

  Those who used to go around waving red flags and enraging the bulls in the arena have moved the bull away in another direction.

  Pre-dawn breeze at the river, then.

  How unbearable it is to watch a Satyajit Ray film nowadays. Whereas there was a time when one thought they were so rich. I hang my head back, then I sit with my chin resting on the seat in front. I turn to the right, I scratch my wrist, I inhale, I exhale, deeply – the two hours just don’t seem to pass. In colour: a camel, with Soumitra Chatterjee and Jatayu on its back, keeps walking across the grey desert.

  It’s you who ought to shoot first

  It won’t do to wait for the other

  side to act

  The seed of socialism

  within the bounds of the Constitution

  The net-buoy moves a little bit, but neither rui nor katla come to the bait. These are the antics of the mrigel fish. Mrigel are like that, shrewd as hell. They circle around the bait, peck at it sometimes, and sometimes swim by with a light slap of the tail, but they never swallow the bait.

  Visible on the left, a few feet away from the buoy, a kingfisher dives into the water with a splash. It picks up a small fish and flies away again.

  And just beneath that incident, news stories suddenly begin appearing. A group of students from Delhi’s St. Stephen’s College took off their clothes and began singing and dancing, fully naked, in front of the hostel of the well-known women’s college, Miranda House. The female students did not feel ashamed or embarrassed at all by this, rather they enjoyed it, began singing along and, drumming the window panes in rhythm, they kept egging on the dancers; a progressive group of female students did not want to be outdone by male students under any circumstances. Amidst loud applause, they too removed their clothes and undergarments and joined the dance party. The singing and dancing reached a crescendo. Things descended to the extent of scissors

  Following the report that was submitted after making enquiries at police stations in north Bengal, Ramayan Chamar’s family chronicle, history, curriculum vitae and so on are known by now and so we – all of us – already know it.

  Maidservant

  …………...................... How much money the babus have – bundles and bundles of notes …………...............................

  Saheb Ali Mondal

  ‘My daughter is eight years old. She goes to the rail track every day to forage for coal. Tell me, what can I do? I’m poor, we can’t survive unless we do these things. Even after taking care of a family of six persons, there are two more mouths to feed. Around evening on Saturday, she was returning home, walking along the rail track. Suddenly a few people sprang up from the shadows of a clump of bushes and caught hold of her. They dragged her to the thicket nearby. At eight at night, searching for her near the thicket – I saw my daughter lying on the ground near the illicit liquor den. Without any clothes. No sound coming from her.’

  God of life

  On the day of the fire ceremony, Yama, the Lord of Death, descended to earth and wrote the fresh-faced youth’s destiny on his forehead. Whatever he wrote became sacred precept, no one could avoid or undo that script. On the high-born boy’s forehead, he wrote: House and car, you’ll be a doctor-engineer if you wish, a seat shall be reserved for you in a reputed English-medium school, you will always benefit from your mother’s family – judge, barrister, minister, MLA, you don’t have to worry about anyone. On the forehead of the low-born boy, he wrote: You’ll starve to death, won’t have land or property, won’t have work, lacking any ‘source’, you won’t be able to enter anywhere unless you pay the requisite fee, under the table –

  On my forehead, he decreed I would be a fool –

  All this – everything – is the fruit of past lives. No one can efface that. Brahminicide in the earlier life finally returned as foeticide. You’ll be a mlechha in this life. You’ll join the band of heretics. You’ll eat cow. Finally, you will have to become a communist. You won’t even have money to eat two kochuris in the evening. There’ll come a time when even smoking a Charminar will seem a luxury, you’ll puff beedis.

  Officer-in-charge

  ‘We know there are illicit liquor and prostitution rackets here. But tell me, what can we do? Every time we carry out a raid, we are unable to catch anyone. Besides, this is a troubled area. We have to confront so many kinds of hassles here. The force is not available at all times, so we cannot send for them as soon as we get information.’

  Ramayan’s village-woman

  A sattu-wallah sits under the shirish tree, sattu basket and shiny washed brass plates arranged in a little bit of cleaned-up space. A group of rickshaw-wallahs crows around him. Cars move along all four sides of the Maidan now

  Arithmetic and development

  ‘We serve the entire land. We always abide by God’s commandments. If we are told that a green-coloured revolution is happening in the country, we prepare our reports accordingly. We quickly prepare graphs and charts. Even if the production of rice does not increase in the fields, it rises in our graphs. Even if the crop dies and rots in drought and rain, we can show record-making production. Only hoarders say we can’t see anything. If you wish, we can prove just now that prices in our country are falling dramatically. Tell me the per capita income you want and I’ll send you the report within three days. The entire progress of the nation, every kind of progress – gushes out from our pens.’

  Aloka

  ‘I couldn’t get a job even after a lot of effort. Finally, I was called for an interview in an advertising company. Sitting on a revolving chair across a massive desk, the boss said: “The work is not the main thing, it’s the personality that’s the real thing.” After saying a few things more, he leaned forward a bit and inquired: “Your figure is splendid – would you like to be a model?” Being of simple mind, I said: “Why not?” Then he said, “In that case, open your blouse – I need to see the bustline properly.”’

  Felling the foe by smashing his balls, meaning, castration of the bull

  In the cluster of four villages, it was only in the Choudhury household that there was a gun. An ancient musket. After paying the annual fee and renewing the license at the district headquarters, the gun was taken to the shrine of Vishalakshmi a
nd a puja was performed, with sindoor and bel leaves, applied with devotion. In times of difficulty, the Choudhurys lent money to needy folk against their possessions. They took ceremonial utensils, silver necklaces and brass pitchers in mortgage. When people had nothing to give in lien, the Choudhurys began taking their land. Money was lent at an interest of ten paise per rupee every day. If the interest was not paid, they took away the cow. Debtors had to work gratis in their fields in exchange. The debtor’s wife, even if she was pregnant, came and boiled and dried the paddy in their courtyard, she also pounded and husked it. Wiped the floors. Come night, the husband watched over the house until dawn, with the help of a kerosene lamp. And also a five-battery searchlight. Dacoits were rife in the countryside.

  Is it dawn yet, boy

  Yes, stay awake

  Exert your body, do the work, miya, plant for harvest, the day shall come

  Yes, yes, the day shall come

  So the day shall come

  Joint exultation and dancing

  Yes, yes, the day shall come

  So the day shall come

  Operation Barga’s started

  The land now belongs to the one who ploughs

  A gorment of the poor

  [Of course, he does not know what exactly ‘gorment’ means]

  The day shall come

  Yes, yes, yes

  So the day shall come

  But brother

  Don’t try to take the law into your own hands

  Year after year the budget session in the assembly takes place

  prices of things rise

  the salaries of babus in jobs rise

  and as for their kind of people

  for three-fourths of the cuntry’s people

  only their cries of distress rise

  Chorus

  Whatever you do brother just see

  that you don’t try to take the law into your own hands

  Ramayan Chamar

  But our democracy is like a brassiere’s elastic –

  One can expand or contract it at will.

  Diary

  It’s raining at the pond the first rain of this monsoon

  water accumulates on the pathways

  water accumulates over water water

  Now he discerns the difference between fresh and old water

  Mediyabari police post,

  where Ramayan will be kept in custody

  Encircled by the shadows of sal trees, there are no quarters in this police post. Bungalow-type structures on all sides, with elevated verandas. Tin roofs. A table is laid in the veranda, a sub-inspector, who is the officer-in-charge, sits there. The lock-up is at the back. Metal cots on one side – for the constables. The OC’s family doesn’t live here, their quarters are in the police station in the district headquarters. He’s here on patrol duty. Lunch is over by afternoon. The OC, Makhan babu, sits on the table in the veranda, smoking a cigarette, signing important files. Mishra-ji, a havildar, stands beside him. There is some kind of salacious talk about the breasts and buttocks of the Adivasi girl walking by on the road. He twirls his moustache and laughs aloud. In the lock-up room, an imprisoned cow-thief and a Naxalite youth. Birju, the sweeper, lies on a string cot, knees drawn, his legs shaking.

  Diary

  It was two at night on College Street – he runs fast along Mahatma Gandhi Road, sprinting further ahead, he turns at full speed and enters the lane at Mechua market. Crossing the narrow strip of Bidhan Sarani, he staggers past the boundary walls of the university. A police picket had come up near the circular tank after Vidyasagar’s head had been knocked off for a second time. What are you doing here – so late at night? What do you think you’re doing? … The road curves towards Harkata Lane. Opposite Medical College, just across the road, a bakul tree. Astonishing, he’s been in this neighbourhood for twenty-five years, and yet, never observed this in daylight. Daylight, they say – but is it that? He is thrilled at this midnight discovery on the way to Harkata Lane. He bends down and picks up some flowers strewn on the road. A half-moon hangs over Bowbazar … the continuing darkness that Bhikhu and Panchi collected from their mother’s womb, hid inside the body, arrived on earth with … does anyone collect and bring these things from the mother’s womb, Manik babu, or is it incorrect … somewhere…

  Tape

  ‘But the Naxalites spew venom at your writing…’

  ‘Yes, a lot of CPI(M)-folk too.’

  ‘Don’t you get it? You’re completely isolated.’

  ‘I don’t think so…’

  ‘You write for the people, but the people don’t understand it…’

  ‘It’s not exactly that … they are not allowed to understand … they are frightened away by it being called difficult at the very outset … this is a planned process … the reader is not allowed to think … if one thinks too much, if they fathom the relation between exploiter and exploited – as in their own situation – then…’

  ‘Whatever you may say, you’re a failure…’

  ‘No, I don’t believe that’s true…’

  Diary

  The woman had a Sicilian kind of nose. A lot of diamond jewellery hangs around her neck, like it hangs around the virgins’ necks when jatra companies enact historical dramas. Blue eyes, a lot of make-up around them. It’s difficult to say what she really looks like under all the embellishment.

  Neighbour

  ‘When will I read your story? There’s a huge problem hanging over my head now. It’s our ground floor tenant. He is in the party, he has contacts in Writers’ Building. I’ve been trying to get him evicted for the last ten years or so. Do you know, even now the rent for the three rooms is just eighty-five rupees? Just think about the situation … The matter has gone to court. The water supply was stopped, later they found a way around that by themselves. I’ve tried talking to a lawyer time and again, but there’s nothing to be done. He’s told me, get the dadas of the neighbourhood on your side first. And then set goondas on him. Nothing will happen through legal means. You’re writing stories about chamars and so on, why don’t you write about me, it’s such an important and real problem…’

  Kuldip Nayar

  ‘Each member of parliament has to spend five to eight hundred thousand rupees on the elections, there’s no hope of winning with less than that. A major part of the money is mobilized by industrialists and businessmen. Later, by utilizing their candidates, they recover the money, together with interest. Every big industrialist has five to ten obedient MPs. There’s no need to talk about MLAs.’

  Diary

  Pay attention to Ramayan’s statement: ‘But our democracy is like the elastic on a woman’s brassiere, one can expand or contract it at will.’ The debate can begin from here, what’s generally called a political debate. It does not end with imputing a measured name, after going here and there you finally have to return to the same place: the relativity of liberation. And is this why Ritwik Ghatak had to say before he died: ‘I am confused…’ Or did I say something wrong? Rather, one could also say that just the seeing, only that, was not confined like this, here. I feel like looking at Pablo Neruda’s Memories once again now. Specifically, the part written about Stalin. And not wanting to go around itself means choosing something or the other, meaning, in simple terms, a pit. Which is actually about fixing the level. Barricades are laid across lane after lane.

  Police report

  A youth has been injured in a bomb explosion in No. 3 Line. The local people think the youth is an extremist – that he was careless while making a bomb. He lay in the field all night long. He was still alive. He divulged something, and so, around dawn, five or seven people came and hacked him to death.

  Ramayan’s patrimony

  [This extract from the diary was supposed to be used as an introduction]

  I see the boy returning every day by the 9:33 local train to Canning. A key – in lieu of the ritual piece of iron – hangs around his neck from a cord made of rags. He wears a half-dhuti made of sing
le cloth. A month’s unwashed dirt on him. Dry hair that had never seen oil. Falling all over the face. An earthen begging bowl in hand, some loose change in that. Seeing him, one would surmise from the ritual garb that his mother or father had died a few days ago. He goes around begging. Not ordinary begging, but for parental funerary duties. I see him every day, I’ve been seeing him for one and a half years – ‘For how long have you been mourning your parents, boy?’ He didn’t get alarmed, not the slightest bit. ‘Tell me, what can I do, the babus don’t want to give alms for nothing. I thought about it a lot and chose this way of begging. Please give me one of your cigarettes.’ ‘You smoke?’ ‘Why, shouldn’t I smoke? Can’t we have tastes and desires?’ ‘What do you do with the money, boy? Do you give it at home or … all these tastes and desires…?’ ‘Why won’t I give it? … My dad took another woman and went away. I live with Mother. With Mother and my small brother and sister.’ ‘What does your mother do?’ ‘Mother’s not well now, she has a bad disease. She’s in bed all day long. That’s why I’ve chosen this line. When Mother was well, she used to come to sell toddy in the street in Calcutta.’ ‘Do you drink toddy too?’ ‘Yes, of course I do, all of us drink. The youngest one, my brother, is eight months old now … Mother has no milk … so when he cries too much, Mother gives him toddy. He becomes calm when he drinks toddy. Why, is drinking toddy bad, babu? So many sons of bhadralok, all of them gulp down glass after glass … Mother said all the bhadralok have only foul things in their mind.’

  ‘Your mother’s illness?’

  ‘Do you want to know what the illness is, babu? It’s a very shameful thing. Mother was returning home from Calcutta by the last train, after selling toddy. It was a night in the month of December. There was no one in the vendors’ compartment. Finding an opportunity, two home guards and their pals raped my mother. Mother told me everything, she wept her heart out on my shoulder. She told me a lot that day. She said it’s the rule of the big folk, no one cares about the poor. The police and everyone else are there only for the suited-booted bhadralok and moneyed big folk. Give money and turn the case around, there’s no one to protest. Let me grow up a bit, let me get strong … Mother’s told me it’s I who have to take revenge.’