Children of A Better God

by usmita, Bagchi

  ‘No problem.’ Anupurba was beginning to feeling a little nervous.

  ‘You’ve met Ranjana, haven’t you? Ranjana Banerjee?’

  ‘I heard so many names at the Christmas party. Maybe we have met. I can’t remember.’

  ‘Well, that means, you haven’t met. If you had met Ranjana once, you’d remember. She’s our most popular teacher as well.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Listen, Purba. Go and see Radhika first. I’ll tell her you’re coming. She’ll make all the arrangements.’

  ‘But who is Radhika?’

  ‘The girl at the reception.’

  ‘Okay, Shobha. You don’t worry. I will be all right.’

  Anupurba opened her closet. Today, she could make her choice without any confusion. She had understood the dress code. She selected a mauve crêpe silk sari and walked out of the house quickly.

  It was her first day—she mustn’t be late. Bangalore traffic was unpredictable. But why blame the traffic—the roads were in such a mess! Flyovers coming up everywhere and there was no knowing when they would be completed. Roads being dug up endlessly on the pretext that they were being widened. The narrow temporary diversions were all choked. Traffic got jammed for the slightest of reasons. If she got held up in a jam it would take at least an hour to get out. It was best to get out of the house early. She carried a book in case she reached Asha Jyoti ahead of time.

  When Anupurba reached Asha Jyoti she couldn’t bring herself to take her car beyond the school gates, despite the watchman’s repeated instructions. The car was parked outside, as on the first day. She just didn’t think it proper to step out of her silver Honda City right in front of the reception desk.

  The last time when she was here for the Christmas party, there were so many cars and two-wheelers parked inside, but today everything looked empty. At a little distance, she could only see, parked on one side, the two yellow school buses. Two cycles were parked alongside. That was it. There was no sign of any human being around.

  Today, she realized that the walkway to the reception had beautiful flowering bushes on either side. Beyond them was a well-maintained garden. There in the middle of it she noticed the gardener, silently at work, unmindful that she was there. She walked up the ramp on to the veranda. Though she had seen ramps on the first day, today she noticed their profusion. Strange how every office, hotel and shopping mall in the world outside was full of staircases and no one ever thought about ramps in this country. They were such an oddity, quite unlike the many countries she had been to that were so much more handicapped-friendly.

  ‘May I help you, ma’am?’ The girl at the reception desk asked, with a smile on her lips, just as on the first day. What was the name Shobha had mentioned—oh yes, Radhika!

  ‘Hello, Radhika! I’m Anupurba. Shobha told me . . .’

  ‘I know, ma’am. Shobha Aunty left word.’ She smiled—not your professional receptionist but she was trying. She had tied her well-oiled hair in two plaits; the flowers she wore on her hair quite matched the purple dress she wore. She looked very much a part of the whole set up and her eyes sparkled.

  ‘Ranjana Aunty is taking a class. The next break is in another ten minutes. She’ll be here then. I’d have taken you to Shanta Aunty’s room, but she’s out too. We’ve got a new Health Centre, and that’s where she’s gone. I’m afraid you’ll have to wait a little, ma’am.’ She told Anupurba all this in a single breath. It seemed she was eager to tell her all she could.

  ‘Please don’t worry about me. I’ve brought a book along.’ Anupurba sat down and pulled the book out of her purse. She was halfway through this one by Jhumpa Lahiri and was trying to finish it so that she could start the new one by Vikram Seth.

  ‘Will you have some tea, ma’am? Or coffee maybe?’ Radhika bent forward, as though about to reveal a secret. ‘Our coffee is excellent, but our canteenwalla just doesn’t know how to make tea.’

  Anupurba laughed. She liked the way this girl spoke. ‘In that case, I’ll have coffee.’

  ‘Neela, get Madam a cup of coffee,’ the girl said to someone who looked like an attendant in a sky blue sari with a navy blue border that instantly told people about hierarchy in this country. Ayahs—that was what these people were called.

  The book in Anupurba’s hand was open, but her eyes were on Radhika. She couldn’t have been more than twenty. Not someone you would call beautiful, but she was very pleasant.

  ‘How long have you been at Asha Jyoti, Radhika?’

  ‘Who, me? Ten years, ma’am,’ Radhika said in a matter-of-fact voice.

  Ten years! Anupurba was amazed. ‘You have been wouking as a receptionist for so long . . . ?’

  ‘Oh, you mean on this job?’ She laughed. ‘Not even seven months. I thought you were asking how long I’ve been at this school. I came here the same day Ranjana Aunty started teaching here. Shanta Aunty gave me the receptionist’s job after I finished my tenth standard.’ There was pride in her voice.

  Anupurba looked at her with disbelief. Did that mean the girl was a spastic? Who could have guessed? Her speech was clear and from what she could see of her upper torso, she looked perfectly normal. Then she realized that the table hid her legs and Anupurba suddenly wanted to change the conversation.

  ‘You have a beautiful name, Radhika.’

  ‘Thank you, ma’am. Do you know, it was Ranjana Aunty who gave me this name?’

  Ranjana? How come? She was about to ask, but suddenly the phone on Radhika’s desk rang.

  ‘Asha Jyoti, good afternoon! How may I help you?’ Half child, half woman. Half student, half professional.

  ~

  ‘Hello!’

  Anupurba looked up to see a lady smiling at her. She was probably in her thirties though it was difficult to place where. She was a beautiful woman, draped in a yellow printed silk sari. Anupurba realized she had seen her at the Christmas party. She was the woman in a designer maroon silk sari that she had admired. With the long end of the sari tied around her waist she had been dancing with the children, sometimes swirling, sometimes in step. There was a vivacity in her that was unmistakable. Then she had stopping dancing after a while to greet the guests.

  ‘You must be Anupurba!’ she said.

  ‘Yes, and you . . .’

  ‘I’m Ranjana.’

  ‘Hello, Ranjana!’

  ‘I’m sorry you had to wait, Anupurba.’

  ‘No, no!’ she protested. ‘In fact, I came here early to avoid the traffic. Please do not be formal with me.’

  Ranjana laughed. ‘Don’t worry. Just give me a moment—I’ll be totally informal with you.’

  Her personality charmed Anupurba. No wonder she was the children’s favourite!

  ‘Let’s go then?’

  Radhika was still on the telephone. Anupurba waved to her and walked out with Ranjana. But somehow, something made her turn back to look at Radhika again.

  ‘What are you looking at, Anupurba?’

  ‘That girl . . . Radhika . . . is she spastic?’

  ‘Yes’.

  ‘But her speech is so clear ! And she looks like a normal person.’

  ‘Yes, she doesn’t have a speech problem,’ Ranjana said in a matter-of-fact way. ‘But what you said about her looks isn’t quite correct. You haven’t seen what she looks like below the waist.’

  ‘Meaning?’

  ‘Well, Radhika has practically no legs. Many children with cerebral palsy still manage to drag themselves around, but not she. For a long time she couldn’t even get into a wheelchair. Now, after a lot of therapy, she can just about wheel herself to the bathroom and even make it to the school bus.’

  Suddenly Anupurba remembered something. ‘Radhika was telling me you gave her the name.’

  Ranjana slowed down. She looked at Anupurba’s face. ‘Yes, that is true. She wasn’t Radhika before she came to the school.’

  ‘What do you mean?’ Anupurba was very curious.

  ‘It’s a sad story,’ Ranjana replie
d, resuming her walk. ‘Come, let’s go to the Art Room. I’ll tell you her story over lunch.’

  The name ‘Art Room’ was a gross embellishment. It was a square room that somehow looked awkward. It wasn’t big; maybe twenty feet by twenty feet. The walls were off-white. A few charts that had no reason to be there hung listlessly. A big window opened to an overgrown hedge outside and the first thing that Anupurba noticed was the very strangely designed grill on it. Between the window and the hedge, someone had stacked up plastic chairs that had seen better days. Inside the Art Room was a huge table with bits of coloured paper, glue and paint all over. There were probably a dozen or so chairs arranged all round it. On one side stood a smaller table with four chairs—probably for the teacher to help with small group-work. Next to it was a wooden cupboard with a door half open. Inside you could see drawing materials stacked up with reasonable care. Ranjana sat down on the teacher’s chair and Anupurba took a chair across from her.

  ~

  Ranjana explained how art worked as therapy for children with congenital disabilities and growth disorders. For them it was not just about learning how to draw and paint and enjoyment. It is actually therapeutic because these children, who have to constantly struggle with poor motor coordination, need to learn how to hold things, how to move their limbs, how to focus—unlike the normal ones who do it effortlessly. Some physically challenged children did manage to learn on their own with a little guidance, but more often it was very beneficial for them to work in pairs or as a group, to enable them to learn both motor skills and social interaction.

  ‘Sometimes a child simply refuses to sit and work with the others,’ Ranjana said. ‘They can be very moody you know. If they get upset for some reason they not only refuse to work but prevent others from working. Then we have to coax them somehow and get them to sit at a separate table.’

  She took a sandwich out of her bag. ‘Have half of it,’ she said to Anupurba. ‘No thank you, I’ve just eaten,’ Anupurba said. ‘But please go ahead.’ Biting into a corner of the sandwich, Ranjana returned to Anupurba’s question about Radhika’s name. ‘You were talking about Radhika,’ she said. ‘As a matter of fact, Radhika had no name at all.’

  ‘No name?’ Anupurba was not ready for this.

  Ranjana narrated the story of Radhika’s life.

  She was born into a really poor family. Her father was a daily wage labourer and her mother worked as a domestic help. They managed to survive, although theirs was a large family. Hoping for a boy, they had produced a succession of unwelcome girls. Radhika’s mother was pregnant once again. This time, everyone had offered her hope—from the priest in the neighbourhood temple to all kinds of pirs and mendicants. She had tried every device to placate the divine: prayers, vows, fasts. But no son came. On the contrary, the daughter that arrived, maybe because of the mother’s lack of nutrition or maybe because she was plain cursed, had no legs. Two lumps of flesh extended downwards from the thighs. They didn’t know what to do. Horror gripped them. They couldn’t afford any treatment—not that treatment would have made any difference. The child was brought up in utter neglect.

  She had no name then. She grew up rolling in the dust like a lifeless dummy, unwanted and uncared for. When she was only two years old, someone advised her family to beg at the intersections displaying her deformed legs. As soon as the traffic lights turned red at the crossroads of Indiranagar and cars came to a halt on their way to the airport, an older sister would dash into the middle of the road. Clutching the deformed child precariously in one arm, she would extend a palm towards the car’s window, making sure the occupants saw the two dusty lumps of flesh. One look at the child was enough to make stout hearts quail; some drew their heads in with a shiver, and then turned to look again at this child without legs.

  Pity came easy. Business was good.

  The crippled girl grew older. There was no need now for the older sister to hold her. The father had managed to find a small wooden cart with wheels. At great risk to herself, she propelled herself from one side of the road to the other, holding up her arms to beg. But when she was about eight, for some unknown reason, she refused to beg. She simply would not cooperate. That is when the torture began. They beat her, they starved her, and one day they dragged her out and abandoned her by the road side.

  Ranjana had seen the child quite often as she travelled along the road; sometimes, she would reluctantly give her a coin. Then one day, when she saw the same child, wounded and sobbing in a corner, she couldn’t take it any more. She stopped her auto-rickshaw, went to the child and listened to everything she had to say. Ranjana had just started working for Asha Jyoti. On an impulse, she picked up the child and carried her in the auto-rickshaw to a local orphanage. When they asked what the child’s name was, Ranjana simply said, ‘Radhika’.

  ‘Then I got her admitted to our school. She’s been here ever since.’

  ‘Has Radhika always been like this?’

  ‘Like what?’

  ‘Cheerful, I mean.’

  ‘Always. Sometimes I am amazed. If others had suffered the mental and physical pain she has, they would have turned bitter for life and would never have trusted another person on earth. But just look at our Radhika. Always smiling! Treating everyone as her own. Not a trace of mistrust in her. Last year she passed the class ten examination. We would have helped her to continue her studies, but Radhika isn’t a very bright pupil. She couldn’t have done much more academically.’

  ‘Then?’

  ‘The school needed a receptionist. Suddenly it occurred to us, why an outsider? We thought about it and then Mrs Mathur offered the job to Radhika. That’s what you see now.’

  ‘‘Where does she live? Is she still at the orphanage?’

  ‘No, she can’t live in an orphanage for children—she’s past the age. Someone told us there is a home for disabled girls like her. That’s where we could have tried to place her. But shortly after she started working here, her parents came to know about it and they took her home. She’s the family’s bread-winner now.’

  ‘And Radhika agreed?’

  ‘I told you—she’s a very positive person. She has forgiven everyone.’

  ‘What about you? You let her go?’

  ‘Who was I to stop her?’ Ranjana was lost in her thoughts for a moment. ‘People who hadn’t bothered to trace her whereabouts for ten years suddenly turned into loving, caring parents. Only out of greed, what else? I knew what the reason was, but what could I have done?’

  Then as if reading Anupurba’s mind, she said, ‘My own life is full of uncertainties. I don’t know how long I can continue working. How could I have taken Radhika’s responsibility?’ Towards the end of the sentence, her voice quivered.

  But Ranjana regained her composure before Anupurba could ask any questions. She smiled. Then she said in a cheerful voice, ‘Well, the issue is simple. Radhika needs to live somewhere. Who on earth would make a home with her? Can we find her someone who would marry her without any greed? And if that is the case, it is probably better to stay with a greedy family than a greedy stranger. In the end, it is so difficult to say what the right thing is. So we left it to her—we let her decide.’

  ~

  The bell rang. The lunch break was over and the children would be returning soon. Ranjana collected herself. ‘Anupurba, this is not one of our regular art classes,’ she said. ‘You will find children of all ages here. This class was formed by bringing together all the children in whom we spotted a special talent for drawing. This was done specifically with the art exhibition in mind. But that doesn’t mean the others don’t have talent, or that they are not good enough to participate in the exhibition. Our regular art class will also continue alongside, just as before. I will, in fact, show you the paintings done by the other children. If you feel any of them deserves to be part of this special group, we can move the child to this class.’

  The children for the special art class had started arriving one by one. Some leaned on ea
ch other for support; some crawled on all fours; one child came in a wheelchair. Two others had to be carried in by the ayah. There were eleven in all. Anyway, it wouldn’t be too large a class.

  But Anupurba felt a churning inside her. Was she nervous? She wasn’t a novice art teacher. She forced herself to look into the eyes of the children. Why wasn’t she able to make eye contact? Try again, Anupurba, try again, she told herself. Ranjana had probably expected this and that was why she had offered to come along.

  ‘Okay children, this is Anupurba Aunty—say good afternoon to her,’ she instructed.

  All of them chorused, ‘G-uuu-d afternoo-oon, Aunty’.

  Anupurba smiled self-consciously but felt better now.

  The individual introductions took quite a while. Anupurba was slowly gaining control over herself.

  Ranjana suddenly asked no one in particular, ‘Where’s Uma? I saw her this morning. Where did she go?’

  Someone said, ‘Her father came late. That’s why she’s late for this class.’

  ‘Oh, all right. I want all of you to draw something and show it to Anupurba Aunty. You tell them, Anupurba—what should they draw?’

  Anupurba hesitated for a moment. ‘Let them . . .’ she began.

  Looking into her eyes, Ranjana whispered, ‘Anything. They may not be able to hold a pencil or a paint-brush but they understand everything.’

  ‘Okay,’ Anupurba said. ‘Very well, children. If the impossible could be made possible, what would you like to be, or would you want to do? Can you draw that for me?’

  The children’s faces bent low over their sheets of drawing paper.

  ‘Impossible made possible,’ someone said.

  ‘Yes yes,’ repeated a small girl with laughing eyes—she probably came from a well-to-do family because she looked healthy—even among the children who were united in their crippling disability, one could tell which ones came from a more well-to-do home.

  A grown-up boy who looked too big to be in school and had the face of an eighteen-year-old, with small eyes, rough hair and the outline of a moustache, made grunting noises when Anupurba gave out the brief—he sounded happy.