It was a couple of years before they found an old derelict Church hall on Wrexton Street, which was not too far from Belgrave Road. The Uncle had gathered a group of local Gujarati businessmen to pool together some money and bought the Church hall.
Dev remembers a lot of excitement in the house and there was discussion of what deities should be installed in the temple. There was an almost daily run of strange people appearing that Dev had never seen before, who came to discuss the planning and decoration of the temple. The Uncle was obviously a community leader of some sort and there were a lot of “volunteers” to help convert the Church hall into the temple.
The day that God Krishna’s idol was installed in the temple saw his mother wore her wedding saree and Dev was running around the temple. Ramcharan had bought him a new Kurta for the occasion. He seemed happiest while in the temple. That seemed to be a turning point for Dev. He was home. But after the first day, there were hardly any devotees coming into the temple apart from weekends when there was a Havan and free lunch from a chosen devotee.
Daily collection from the temple was meagre. If it were not for the grocery shop still running well, they would have starved. Soon they were moved into a house next to the temple, paid for by Uncle and his friends. Ramcharan noticed that Dev had started to spend more and more of his time in the temple. He would not go out to play like he did in Mombasa. None of his school friends came home with him either.
“There are no people here. They all speak a strange language. I don’t understand any of them,” Dev told his father.
“Give it time. They speak English with an accent. You will soon get used to it. There is a large Gujarati community here and most of them are from Africa. Either from Kenya, Tanzania or Uganda.” Ramcharan would reply. “Our temple is still new. Soon we will have a lot of devotees.”
He was right. Soon the word spread that there was a temple with a Gujarati priest and the first festival of stick dance (Gharba) was well attended. People started to come to the temple and it became a meeting place for the trading Gujarati merchant community of Leicester. They would ask Ramcharan for advice on matters of faith and religion. He was asked to perform several marriages. Dev took part in all the temple activities and appeared to thrive in it. Meera Ben was much happier now that she had made several friends. She had a privileged position as the wife of the priest and the elderly women folk looked up to her and even asked her advice about family issues. She made it a point to be at the temple every evening and all day during Sunday when the special Havan took place.
The little grocer shop on Harrison road was ticking along providing a small income and the temple had started to thrive with a large Gujarati community as its back bone. Kishen had started to spend some evenings in the shop while father went to the temple. Dev would help out some days in the shop during his school holidays, but he would rather spend the time at the temple. Ramcharan finally decided to make both his sons into priests. But there was no priest school in England. Dev and his brother were packed off to their grandparent’s house in Gujarat in India, and enrolled into a Priest’s school. Little Vijai was born while Dev was studying in India, much to the disappointment of both the boys. They wanted to come back to England to see the baby. But the Grandfather was a strict disciplinarian and would have none of it.
India was another experience all together. He had difficulty understanding the children when they spoke and particularly the grandfather. He got used to them very quickly however and found that he was quite comfortable conversing in Gujarati. He really enjoyed the Priest school and took to it like duck to water. He was a high flyer in his class and graduated with no difficulty. He would go to his Grandparents house for the holidays. The two years at priest school passed swiftly, maybe too swiftly for Dev. He did not forget to take Peter Ngyo’s note book and wrote diligently a couple of sentences everyday while he was in India. Graduation saw him pack his bags again back to England.
By the time Dev returned, the Krishna Mandir had become a leading temple in Leicester, quite close to the Indian enclave of Belgrave arcade on Wrexton street. The Krishna Mandir was not the biggest temple in Leicester, but it attracted enough clientele to be successful. Dev relished working in his father’s temple as his assistant to start with and soon became quite close to a lot of regular visitors to the temple. He would be in the temple almost every day after school. Quite often one would see him sitting in the corner of the temple doing his homework. He had filled Peter Ngyo’s notebook a while ago and he was filling up any empty spaces he could find. He used to write to Peter regularly and get a reply at least once a month. Lately the letters had become more infrequent. Peter Ngyo had gone on to become a vicar and Dev was invited to his ordination. Dev was very disappointed when he was told by his father that they could not afford an air ticket to Mombasa to attend the ceremony.
As he grew up past teenage years, Dev brought a young crowd into the temple. He was particularly liked by the younger generation as he spoke fluent English like a local and knew the language as it were of the young people. He had lost his African accent by now and it was hard to make out that he was of Indian descent over the phone. Dev became a “people’s person” and was always appeared to be surrounded youngsters of his own age and younger ones too. He left school with quite good grades and went to Leicester University to get a degree in Sociology. When he got a job as a Social Worker at Leicester city council, his mother had done a big ceremony in the temple and would go around telling everyone that her “Dev has got a government job.” For her, getting a “government job” was a pinnacle of achievement.
His interest in the temple work increased and he would work on the scriptures whenever he got the chance. He had come out of the shell he had cocooned himself during his school years in Leicester and enjoyed making new friends and going out. He started doing the Aarti every now and then with the help of his elder brother Kishen, particularly when there was a young crowd in the temple. This made a difference to the youngsters attending the temple for the first time. Most of the young Hindus identified well with him as he was seen as one of them. Dev would try and explain the rituals and meaning of the hymns in English to the devotees, which was immensely popular with the younger crowd. There were a few eyebrows raised when he started to mingle with the crowd in the middle of the rituals as Kishen continued at the altar.
“Hinduism is not a religion, it’s a way of life, a way of thinking, a way of disciplining oneself, physically, spiritually and emotionally.” He would say to the youngsters, who were mostly his own age. “The word religion has been attached because there isn’t any equivalent word to the Hindu Dharma in the Oxford dictionary, so the nearest thing to dharma in English is religion. It is a way of life. It is a faith. It embraces you if you embrace it.”
He was passionate about his religion and wanted the younger Asians to grasp the meaning and the essence of the Sanatan Dharma or eternal faith, as he would call it. He mixed with the young generation of Leicester quite freely and did the same things as everyone else did. He did not agree with some of the practices within the temple. He would try to stop the segregation of women in the temple during temple rituals. He encouraged them to sit together with families along with men. He also detested the way the widows were treated within the temple and also in the wider community.
“A woman needs to be helped and nurtured when she loses her partner. This ostracising of widows destroys their lives and it must stop.” He would say. “It is not their fault that their husband’s died. That is nature and God’s will. There is no need to punish them this way.”
It did not go down very well with many of elders in the community. There were minor rumblings and arguments behind closed doors. This only made him more determined and vociferous. He dreamed big and ‘wanted to be somebody one day.’ His younger brother little Vijai, looked up to him and followed him everywhere while in the temple. It was not unusual for Dev to go ‘out on the town’ after the day’s work at the temple and Aarti at n
ight.
Dev had made a lot of friends while studying at college. He had joined the National Association of Hindu Priests as well as the Hindu Federation. He was very active in both the organizations and he soon found he was climbing the ladder in both the organizations. It meant a fair amount of travel, not only in the UK but also abroad. He was being noticed by the local councillors as well as the local Member of Parliament, Fred Homuz. He became quite close to Fred Homuz and would often meet him socially. They would speak to him with any issues concerning the Hindu community in the city.
He was very vocal on social issues and he was quoted by media regularly on some controversial issues. When the news of a club in London for Asian homosexuals and lesbians was being named after Kali, he objected vehemently.
“I have nothing against gays and lesbians but people are trampling all over the image of the Goddess.” He was quoted by the local newspaper. “They are people like you and me. But they should not offend any religion or community.” He went to the local councillors and the local Member of Parliament and managed to stop the name. He was in the forefront of the protest marches both in Leicester as well as in London.
Dev would go out of his way to help others in need. An episode where he bought food for a bunch of homeless refugees in the middle of Leicester hit the headlines in local newspapers and TV. He was on his way to the temple after work when he saw a bunch of eastern European refugees huddled together in the cold trying to keep warm with a fire on a rubbish heap. He stopped the car and reversed to take a closer look. They were mostly women and children in ragged clothes. When he stopped the car, he could see the look of desperation and fear in their eyes. He got out of the car on an impulse to speak to them. They started to pull back at his approach holding onto their children tightly trying to protect them.
“Don’t be afraid. I just want to help if I can.” He said. “Who are you people?”
None of them could speak proper English. One of them said, “Romania. Hungry.” She went on to say something in Romanian which Dev could not understand. She put her right hand out palm upwards still holding onto her baby tightly.
“I don’t understand what you said. You wait here and I’ll try and get you some hot food.” Dev was gesticulating to the group hoping they would understand. He got back into the car, still signalling them to wait there and sped off towards the little take away near the temple. He bought several bags of food, got one of the boys from the take away to help him carry and returned to the group who were still struggling in front of the fire. The two of them distributed the food to a grateful bunch of women and children on the pavement.
“I will try and speak to someone in the council and see if we can find some accommodation for you.”
They did not understand what he said. But they just nodded with broad smiles on their faces. They were so happy to get some hot food. They probably had not eaten any hot food for days. The take away owner spread the word to the local rag and the news hit the headlines the next day.
“I see you have made the local newspapers,” his workmates at the council said. Dev smiled and explained what had happened.
“I felt really sorry for them. They were mostly women and children in rags. It did not look like they had anything to eat for days.”
“Unfortunately there are a lot of such immigrants from the eastern European countries and many of them are scattered around Leicester. Our council can’t cope with the numbers coming into the city.” His colleague, George Crawford had said.
“But we have to do something for them.” Dev said. “I felt horrible when I saw all those women and children huddled on the footpath.”
“We could meet the manager and bring it up at the next meeting.” George said. “You would be lucky to get anything done. Our system is so much bogged down in bureaucracy that by the time any money is released they would all be dead and gone!”
“But we can’t just leave them like that.” Dev insisted. “There are women and children there.”
George sighed deeply and said, “I know what you are saying. But you know how tight it is with the council. I would be surprised if the manager agrees to spend any money.”
“Be that as it may. I am going to give it a damn good try.”
“We can certainly try. I am just warning you so that you won’t be disappointed.”
The two of them tried to speak to their manager regarding the plight of the refugees who were clogging up the footpaths of Leicester with no luck.
“Thank you for bringing their plight to my attention, Dev.” The manager had said. “You are right, we can’t leave them to starve like that. I’ll tell you what. You do a report and a feasibility study and bring me the recommendations and I’ll see what can be done.”
No amount of cajoling from Dev and Stuart helped. The manager wanted everything done according to the rules and wanted everything written down on paper.
“It is going to take time to get all this done. Are we going to leave them to starve in the meantime?” Dev was losing his temper.
“There are several charities who deal with this kind of problem. I am sure they will look after them in the meantime.” The manager had insisted.
Dev decided to do something about it himself. He would drive around the areas where the refugees appeared to concentrate and try to help. He would spend his own money to buy rice and groceries and cook for them. He became a familiar face around the Belgrave area. The homeless and the refugees looked up to him. The news was picked up by a local rag and he became known as a sort of a ‘saviour’ for the refugees.
He wrote diligently in the notebook from his friend Peter Ngyo. He had figured out a way of adding pages to it and now it was nearly twice the size it started off with. He would write profusely on the days he was angry or stressed. The day his request for help with the refugees was refused he was scribbling patiently until after midnight. He had a neat handwriting and he was very proud of it. He still hid the notebook under his bed and checked the place every time he came into his room. The plastic sleeve he covered the notebook was stained in sweat and now looked more brown than white. He would often go to the beginning of the book to reminisce about old days and it would bring tears to his eyes.
Stuart Davenport
Ramcharan felt that Dev should have a job to fall back on if the temple was not successful enough to support all of them. So Dev had joined Leicester Social Services department as a Social Worker and he appeared to be thriving on it. He had progressed swiftly become the Manager and was in charge of Social Services for helping people with learning difficulties. That is where he met Stuart Davenport who He was also a Social worker at the time, but with big ideas. The two of them were part of a team looking after people with learning disabilities in their ward. Stuart was also a self-styled businessman and landlord. They would go out for a drink on a Thursday night and talk about their dreams.
“Have you seen the state of that care home on Loughborough road?” Stuart said to Dev one day.
“Terrible!! Not very good at all. Last time I went there was nearly a year ago and I did a report about the bad conditions. Nothing seems to have been done about it. It broke my heart to see the state residents are made to live in.”
“You are right.” Stuart agreed. “I did a report as well. Spoke to the Manager at the office. She says there is no funding to increase the staffing at the centre.”
“I just don’t understand how though. The number of staff in the centre in Spinney Hill is exactly the same and their residents seem to do well.”
“I tell you, you should be the manager and things will change.” Stuart had laughed out loud.
“I have finished all my exams now and even got the Diploma. Next time there is a vacancy, I am going for it.” Dev had said with a passion.
“Best of luck to you. I hope you get it.”
“It is time these places are run by professionals who know their job. Not just by any business with cash to throw.” Dev said with some feeling. He ha
d worked hard with his books and attended courses to get his diploma and certificates and felt that his expertise would make a difference.
“You know I do have a couple of houses down near Loughborough. They are now rented out to the college kids. We could easily convert them into the care home.”
“That would need a lot of money!” Dev replied. “Where are we going to find that kind of money?”
“Leave that to me. I will arrange the cash, if you would go into partnership with me. I can’t do it on my own.”
“Give me some time to think about it and let me speak to my father too.”
“That is fine. But don’t take too long about it. We know the ropes and we can make it big in time if we work hard.”
Well, that is how it started. Stuart had taken Dev to see the houses he had near Loughborough. He was impressed with what he saw and said yes as soon as he saw them. The two of them worked hard day and night with builders and got the place turned into a care home for people with learning disabilities. Dev had spoken to the Manager at Leicester Social Services and the application for approval passed through without much hassle. Dev never asked Stuart where the money came from. But they were able to expand with two more Care homes, one more in Leicester and one in Milton Keynes. Money started to pour in. Dev soon developed a flamboyant lifestyle. He bought a silver BMW, which became his pride and joy. He spent money on flashy clothes and shoes.
His mind often wandered to Mombasa and his childhood. He could still remember the time when he had only one pair of shoes to go to school in. He would walk everywhere else bare foot. Apart from the customary school uniform, his clothes were mainly hand me downs from his elder brother, Kishen. Now that he was ‘rolling in money,’ he was going to make the best of it. He still had not forgotten his friend Peter Ngyo, who was a Priest in Mombasa now and from his letters was doing very well indeed. He still wrote in the ‘little notebook’ – which had become quite a big notebook now. He did not write as often as he did during his school days. But he would find time at least once a week to note down what happened. He would ask Peter Ngyo to come over to England in every letter. He would tell Peter about the little note book and the entries in the notebook in every letter.
The Retribution Page 4