Exile

by Akhilesh

  Despite all this, Bhagelu felt he had made a mistake by not bringing his wife and children.

  The arkati had said, ‘Why don’t you take your wife along? You’ll need someone under the silken quilt.’

  ‘What about our children?’ Bhagelu has asked, expressing his doubt.

  ‘How many kids have you got?’ the arkati asked.

  ‘Two.’

  ‘They can stay with you.’

  ‘And my parents?’ Bhagelu recalled his greying mother and father.

  ‘What will the old ones do there? No, they can’t go.’

  ‘But even the children can’t work.’

  ‘That’s different. They will when they grow up.’

  The company recruiting labourers from India wanted the men to go with their wives and children, and the widows too. The idea was that if the women did not go or if their number was small, there would be violent brawls among the girmitiya mazdoor for women. Secondly, the work capacity of the men would reduce in the absence of women because they’d be moping. Thirdly, the families of the girmitiya would not grow, and there would always be a shortage of workers. Finally, if the family was together, the girmitiya would not think of going back to India.

  ‘I tell you, bring your wife and children to Calcutta.’ The arkati had only informed Bhagelu that he would get a job in Calcutta.

  Bhagelu was almost convinced. He felt that bringing the wife and the children would pose no problem. But finally, it was his concern for his parents that stopped him and he stopped thinking about going to Calcutta with his family to amass gold guineas. He left with the intention that when he came back, he would bring back a silken quilt and feather mattress.

  But, on the ship, he felt sad as he watched the families. The memory of his wife and children clutched him in a vice. He grew unsure. He wondered whether he was doing the right thing by going abroad alone. But that was his second dilemma. The first cropped up when he was in the train to Calcutta. It was filled mostly by the girmitiya. Some of them held their boxes, cartons, bags or sacks in their laps or hugged them to their chests or used them as pillows and slept; some people were awake, and some dozed. Bhagelu had mixed emotions in the chugging train. He was clutched alike by fear and fascination. Calcutta frightened as well as lured him. On the one hand, he trembled, wondering what fate awaited him there. If he lost his way or fell ill or was killed, who would take care of him? He had no answers. He quaked at the thought of the stories he had heard, about some Bengali witch using black magic, transforming him into a lamb and tying him to a stake. What would happen to his parents, wife and children? He kept wondering if there was a way of getting back into human shape again. He grew nervous thinking that he might be earning gold guineas or baying as a lamb while somebody from his family would be burning on a pyre at the same time. On the other hand, he also thought that if the arkati was right, seven generations of his progeny would enjoy food in silver platters.

  The last doubt raised its head when the five-year Surinam permit had expired. His fondness for his village, home and his family enticed him back to India, but the ground reality forced him to settle down in Surinam. He was haunted by the fear that the famine and the drought that had made him leave his country might still be persisting. Actually, he was still living in the time he had left India and the weather of those years had congealed in him.

  His earnings were satisfactory and he was now saving. He reasoned that he was leading a respectable life in this country and had hopes for the future. If he went back, he might have to survive only on his trade as a potter with a little farming. His family had found it hard to ensure two square meals a day. On top of that, they had to bear the ignominies heaped by the baniyas and the babhans – he had no prestige there. Here, at least this sort of discrimination did not exist, and secondly, everybody considered him a babhan, a Pandey.

  At first, he had felt quite awkward when some of the girmitiya touched his feet to show respect. But he had no option to accept this gesture, and he had grown accustomed to giving blessings. Now he was apprehensive that if he went back and if the Brahmins found out what he had done, they would send him to a bitter end. He quaked merely at the thought that he had cheated the Sarkar Bahadur and might be severely punished. He was terrified that the police would arrest him and start beating him as soon as he set foot on his native land. He imagined the various sorts of police torture and the scenes would always culminate into his being put behind bars. Eventually, he gave up his aspiration to return and decided to stay back in Surinam.

  This was the time when the nineteen-year-old Dadi, who was not a grandmother then, had lost her mother and was alone and her relatives were looking for a suitable husband for her. They finally found Baba, and asked him, ‘What’s your name?’

  ‘Bhagelu.’

  ‘Caste?’

  ‘Babhan, Pandey.’

  ‘Village?’

  ‘Gosainganj.’

  ‘Father’s name?’

  Baba lied in reply to all the questions except the names of his village and his own. And thus, he was betrothed to Dadi.

  Finally, when Ramajor Pandey told Suryakant and Bahuguna in the capital of UP, Lucknow, in India, almost a century later that his Baba had not returned to India because he was in love with Dadi and that he had been born in a Brahmin family in Gosainganj, it was sheer falsehood. But Pandey was innocent of the crime because he had not invented the lie but had received it as the ultimate truth from his grandfather. However, the point remains whether Baba can be held guilty for telling the lie in the first place.

  6

  HAULI HOOCH AND GRAM FRY

  ‘There is a Gosainganj each in three districts of UP. Which one of these is Baba’s Gosainganj?’ Suryakant sipped the remainders of his fourth drink.

  ‘I have no idea. Baba never told me,’ Pandey replied.

  ‘See, Baba had been hiding certain things from you all the time, and it is quite possible that he might have lied about this as well.’

  ‘Quite possible,’ Pandey was unruffled. He had consumed as much wine as Suryakant had whisky and was as drunk.

  ‘Then where is the evidence that Baba belonged to Gosainganj?’

  ‘It is you who have to find the evidence, and it is you who have to prove it.’

  ‘And how will you help me?’ Suryakant’s voice rose and wavered.

  ‘I shall pay you very well.’

  ‘And you also want a book authored on Baba’s life.’

  ‘I was not interested in the book at first. It was Bahuguna’s idea, but I liked it. It will be a wonderful thing to have a book on my clan.’ Pandey wiped his wet lips with a handkerchief. ‘My chief interest is that I should discover and reach my ancestors’ village. To adorn my head with its soil. To be happy.’

  ‘The whisky is over,’ Bahuguna tried to change the subject.

  ‘I’ll order some more.’ Pandey moved towards the phone but toppled over. Bahuguna picked up the receiver and ordered. The waiter arrived with whisky, soda and the ice tray, poured the pegs and left. The next round was ready.

  Pandey lifted his glass but he put it down as if refusing to drink it. His head hung low. ‘I won’t drink this. Take me to a hauli.’

  ‘Why?’ Bahuguna asked with a smile.

  ‘Because when my Baba was in India, he used to drink in the hauli. Native liquor. What d’you call it? Tharra–a-a-a!’ He said again, ‘I’ll drink in the hauli.’ He weakly pushed away the table laden with food, ‘I’ll eat chana fry with tharra. I’ll have it in a dona and spoon it into my mouth with a leaf.’ He tried to stand, ‘Why aren’t you people taking me to the hauli?’

  Suryakant wanted to say something but Bahuguna pressed his hand to signal silence, whispering, ‘It seems that the guy has gathered information about all the things of this country – hauli, hammam and harem.’

  Pandey’s voice drew his attention, ‘However rich I’m today, but I’m still the son of the poor man who used to drink hooch in the hauli a hundred years ago …’<
br />
  Bahuguna held Suryakant’s hand and whispered, ‘Did we have haulis in those days?’

  ‘Go ask your excise correspondent,’ Suryakant said, and pulled his hand free. ‘Pandeyji, are you happy with the fact that during the famine when people did not even have water to drink, your Baba drank alcohol?’

  ‘I simply want to drink liquor in hauli. I want to enjoy fried gram with the hooch. I want to drink and loll on the road, in the drains. I may belong to the generation after Baba and I’m rich but does that make any difference? I’m just like my Baba. I was born in Suriman but how does that matter? In fact …’

  Both Bahuguna and Suryakant thought that Pandey would now say, ‘In fact, I’m an Indian.’

  But Pandey said, ‘In fact, I’m a Hindu. The Hindu blood flowing in my veins pulls me to India.’ He got up and said, ‘I’ll prove it.’ He opened the lid of his suitcase, ‘See, here is Bholenath.’ He held out a picture of Lord Shankar, ‘And there is more.’ He pulled out a few popular religious texts, ‘I recite them during my prayers in the morning. I don’t eat before finishing my pooja.’ There were other things worth looking at in the box – incense sticks, a Hanuman statuette, a brass bell, rudraksha beads. Pandey pulled his shirt up along with his vest. He spoke from under the veil of his clothes, ‘I also wear the janeu.’ He really was wearing the sacred thread.

  Pandey’s manner reminded Suryakant of Sampoornanand Brihaspati, chairman of the state tourism department. He wanted to ask Pandey, ‘Have you also gained mystical powers from Durga Maiya?’ But before he could decide whether to ask the question or not, Pandey commenced another charade. He opened a different bag and took out a bundle of bidis and a lighter. He lit a bidi and put it between his lips, saying, ‘I adore bidis. A century ago when I was within the soul of my Baba in India, I used to smoke these.’

  He went on to enlighten them and said, ‘Whenever I return from India, I take back large quantities of two things – hooch and bundles of bidis. Once, I went to France from here, and there were three guests in my hotel room that evening. From three different countries – an American, a French and a German. There lay before us expensive single malt whisky and my beloved Indian hooch. I filled a glass with the hooch and I said, “I’ll drink this.” The three asked in unison, “What’s this?” I told them, “A lovely liquor from my country, drawn from the mahua flowers fallen from trees.” I served them the mahua and they enjoyed it very much. But not everybody likes bidis!

  ‘I gifted seven bundles of bidis to a Dutch friend from Paramaribo. The idiot told me on the phone the next day, ‘What’s this shit? It doesn’t light, how do I bloody smoke it?’ I was irritated that he had insulted my bidi. I immediately drove to his office. The imbecile was trying to light it like a cigarette. He had the notion that if he puts it between his lips and sucks in, it will light. I held the bidi between two of my fingers and held its mouth to the lighter flame. It was lit! Idiot, lighting a bidi and to keep it alight till they finish is an art.’

  ‘You’re a maverick,’ Suryakant sounded irritated.

  Bahuguna sensed his irritation and changed the topic again, ‘Yes, Pandeyji, when we started talking, at the beginning, what was it that you had mentioned?’

  ‘I said it then and I said it earlier too, I’ve been saying it for a hundred years, ‘Take me to the hauli.’

  Now, there has been so much adulteration in the self-expression of the character that the narrator is forced to intervene. The logic behind the intervention is that the way characters have the liberty of modifying the author’s narration and revealing the truth, the author, as the introducer of reality, has the authority to rein the characters in if they become anarchical, spin tall tales or indulge in cheating. Even if Pandey is bragging, the truth is that his Baba had never touched liquor before leaving India. He started drinking only a few years after arriving in Surinam.

  An act was passed in 1895 to enable a girmitiya who wanted to settle down in Surinam to acquire citizenship. Those who decided to stay back were also given arable land. The delight and exhilaration Baba experienced after receiving land under the act was rare. It was the realization of an impossible dream. Baba had become a citizen of this country and the master of fields. When he went to plough his own field to cultivate sugar cane, he sat down in the middle of the field and broke down. He found it unbelievable that the huge field he was ploughing was his. He would be the master of the entire yield.

  Several Indians who saw him crying, quit their work and walked up to him. When they discovered the reason for his tears, they too joined in the weeping. It was a memorable sight – eight to ten Indians blubbering loudly in a field in the afternoon. These were cries of joys, tears of ecstasy. The best sugar cane crop in the entire region was produced in Baba’s field that year. This engendered the superstition that the reason behind the good yield was Baba’s blubbering in the field. The gods had heard his cries and taken pity on him. For years afterwards, the Indians in the area would weep while ploughing their fields.

  How beautiful life was! The Indians had already been getting lentils, rice and vegetables, and now they had the joy of receiving the title of the land! They arranged a celebration with much singing and dancing, and liquor was consumed aplenty before dinner. Baba drank wine for the first time that day. It was not easy to drink in Surinam because a permit was required. But a permit holder had handed him a few passes secretly. It was Baba’s good luck that nobody noticed he was drunk. Anyway, it was his first slip-up and it had gone unnoticed.

  Baba did a few things that he had not done here earlier after his first harvest. He planted a tulsi plant inside the house and a neem sapling outside the house. He also built a small temple in a corner of the house. He went to the market to buy other things. There he bought a charpoy and its strings, a mirror and clothes. After shopping, Baba had two desires – the first was that he should buy a Surinami sweetmeat. He had enjoyed gatta, batasha, laddu, khaja, anarsa and chotahi jalebi. Here, he wanted to indulge himself but he postponed fulfilment till the next harvest. He thought it was sensible not to overspend.

  After marrying Dadi, Baba realized that his married life was a victim of inequality. He was in a strange plight. In fact, the moment the wedding was settled, love for his children and wife in India overwhelmed him. He often suspected that they knew he was marrying again and were cursing him. As he was going around the sacred fire, performing the bhanwar ritual, he suddenly heard the voice of his first wife after completing the fourth round, and after the seventh, he saw his children holding hands together under a tree in front.

  Stranger things happened after the wedding. While copulating, he remained in protracted coitus with his wife, but was unable to ejaculate. It was a peculiar malady which always wore Dadi out, and she would try to break free of Baba. Finally, she would cry out loudly and Baba would tumble down unrequited. He began to believe it was nothing but the curse of his first wife. He started looking extinguished, sad and helpless. Soon, Dadi too began to look miserable because everyone taunted her that she was barren and would remain barren. How could she explain that if the seed was not sown, the crop would not yield! But people had their own beliefs. They used to pity Baba that it was his rotten luck that he was married to a sterile woman. They advised him to marry again.

  But Baba knew the truth, so how could he take another wife? Baba and Dadi prayed to a host of gods, observed holy fasts and religious festivals to beget a child. Today, after a century, it may sound funny that Baba and Dadi did not pray to God that Baba should ejaculate and Dadi should conceive. They thought it a sin to use such language and make such a demand in God’s court. They were afraid that God might be irate at such a shameless prayer, and instead of giving them a child, He may snatch away the ability of erection from him. So, their prayers to gods were simply for children. They were convinced that God could produce a miracle. He could make a stream gush in the desert and grow an orchard on barren land. If He was willing, Dadi’s womb would bear fruit even without Baba’s s
eed. They had really begun to wait for a divine miracle.

  This time, they were quite happy and felt that God had listened to their prayers. Two days of Dadi’s expected periods had passed, but there was no sign of it. When Dadi informed Baba, he was overcome with emotion. ‘It seems Almighty above has taken pity on us.’

  Dadi said, ‘I find it hard to believe that I have conceived.’

  Baba replied, ‘Wait and watch – after nine months, you will be a mother and I shall be a father.’

  Dadi grew bashful and this night, Baba and Dadi talked about their future child for a long time, sometimes seriously, sometimes absurdly, sometimes funnily, sometimes emotionally. Baba began behaving as if the child had grown large in Dadi’s belly and had started moving. Dadi put her leg on Baba’s thigh and Baba removed it very delicately so as to not put any pressure on the child. But in the morning, Dadi had a stomach ache and soon after, she started menstruating. When Baba stood before her, she felt so defeated and unhappy that she wished that the earth should open up and swallow her. She was also afraid that Baba might get mad if he knew. However, he was not angry but shared her loss and sorrow. He consoled her saying, ‘Don’t worry, you’ll beget a child ultimately.’

  ‘And even if I don’t, I won’t be the first woman in the world without a child.’

  Baba caressed Dadi’s forehead, and at this moment his love for her gushed and he had an overwhelming desire to break free from his first wife’s curses and evil prayers. But nothing happened, and life’s cart moved on the same ruts. Baba and Dadi fucked for hours but he failed to ejaculate. However, the bad spell ended finally. One afternoon, the two went to the field in which Baba had cried. It was going to be the first yield for Baba and Dadi’s combined labour, a harvest of which only they were the rightful masters. Baba’s excitement could be gauged by the fact that while the sugar cane were in the field, he used to measure their growth almost everyday. Dadi teased him and said, ‘The joints on the sugar canes are the imprints of your fingers.’