by K R Meera
I say this not only on the basis of reports from friendly sources, but also reports given out by the enemy radio . . .
‘I consider this my duty. Therefore I am not haggling.’
If there is any change in the war situation . . .
‘I wished to improve your life, Chetna. It’s my duty, I thought. Because I had decided to marry you.’
‘If there is any change in the war situation, I shall be the first to inform you.’
Sanjeev Kumar snatched the paper from my hand.
‘No, don’t! It’ll tear. It is old and falling apart.’
‘Answer me. Didn’t you want us to get married?’
‘Desire and decision are different things.’
‘Intense desires and decisions have the same result.’
‘Desires that are based on mistaken ideas aren’t valid. They can really be desires only when there are facts to back them up.’
‘I’m not here to argue with you; all I want to say is that if the world today knows of Chetna Grddha Mullick, that’s because of me.’
‘You gained more out of my fame than I did. You made lakhs out of it and gave my baba ten thousand rupees. But what did I get? My status as the symbol of the self-respect of Indian women and all women of the world?’
My eyes smouldered and smarted. They were full of the moment when he had arrived with his cameraman at SSKM Hospital to film Ramu da. Instead of helping us, he had sold our wretchedness.
‘Okay, okay, everything I did was wrong. Give me another chance to set things right.’
‘Sanjeev Kumar Mitra!’ I called him harshly. ‘I just want to know one thing. What do you need from me now?’
‘Chetna, you’ve misunderstood me terribly . . . ’
I picked up the paper and started reading again.
Therefore I want all of you to remain perfectly calm and unperturbed and carry out your duties in a normal way.
‘Please, Chetna.’
Sanjeev Kumar Mitra’s patience was wearing thin. The black telephone on the table began to ring. A few moments later, Nischol da appeared at the door.
‘My sister’s husband has passed away.’
‘Eesh . . . where are they, Nischol da?’
‘Maniktala.’
‘You should leave immediately, Nischol da. I’ll let Mano da know.’
Sanjeev Kumar left soon after Nischol da. I opened the window and looked at the red buildings of Thakurbari and saluted the invisible poet.Mano da said that Mrinalini’s private kitchen could be seen from this window. Her personal cutlery and dishes had been stored there. I had heard the story of how the village girl Bhavatarani had been brought to the city where she’d become Mrinalini. Thinking of the vast, empty rooms of that mansion made me afraid too. It was a mansion of not just words and colour, but also of death. Thakur’s older brother’s wife Kadambari Devi had committed suicide somewhere within its vastness. The poor girl who entered Thakurbari at the age of nine could not win her husband’s affection. She found in his younger brother a friend, poet and object of love. Her tragedy saddened me. Would she have cursed Thakur’s bride Bhavatarini, like Utpalavarna? As I mulled over it, Sanjeev Kumar came in again and tried to press me to his chest crudely. Completely vexed, I pushed him off.
‘What do you want? Out with it, fast! I have work to finish!’
‘Work ? Oh—very heavy work indeed! I have made a request to the chief minister to give you a good job, Chetna. Didn’t you know this government is interested in carrying out the death sentence? Wasn’t Banerjee’s act despicable? And besides, rapes are on the increase all over the country. Everyone in the cabinet feels that it is time to send out a clear and precise message.’
‘I don’t want to hear of it.’
When I was about to sit down again, he slipped into the small gap between the table and chair and tried to pull me out. I clung to the Bhavishyath’s ancient table and resisted him.
‘I want you to perform that hanging, Chetna. You’ll gain a place in world history. A man would not have received so much attention. Because you are a woman you’ll become a celebrity, just wait and see!’
He was tempting me, but I said, ‘I don’t want to be a celebrity.’
‘Just think—there’s not a single woman in the world with this job. It’s just you, you alone!’
I looked at him. The white skin of his neck was slightly bluish. The veins in his neck were tense. Suddenly, I remembered Maruti Prasad Yadav. The veins on his neck too had tensed when he held me tightly from the back. I tried to look intently into Sanjeev Kumar’s eyes. Behind the darkness of his spectacles, his eyes glinted the colour of fire, like an animal’s. His smile had now ceased to be charming. He took my hand in his and began to talk again. I pushed him away with my free hand.
‘When I first saw you, you were barely a girl. Now you have ripened into a whole woman,’ he said hoarsely.
‘Betrayed girls grow up faster,’ I said. Outside, a bhelpuri seller’s bell rang. A passing tram’s whistle followed it. Beats and sounds rose up from the shop that sold musical instruments in front of the Bhavishyath office. Sanjeev Kumar tried to pull me out again.
‘Chetna, I never wanted to betray you. My only thought, then and now, has been to protect you. I missed you terribly in the days when we quarrelled and stopped talking. You never bothered to come looking for me then. Never tried to call me. I am no one to you—isn’t that true?’
I looked at his palms. He wished to grab me with both hands, it was clear. I caught hold of his right hand.
‘Sanjeev Kumar babu, leave me alone. Let me go and find a life.’
‘Answer my question. Haven’t you desired me?’
‘I did desire you. Your love . . . your house where the aparajita
blooms . . . your studio with its thousand lights . . . but none of it was real. It was my imagination. And so I’ve forgotten it. You too must forget.’
He fixed his eyes on me. Nearly said something, but swallowed it and retreated. The prayer bells and chants from the Shiva temple to the left of Thakurbari rang in the air. I came out from behind the table. But before I could reach the door, he pounced on me again, enfolded me in his arms roughly and tried to kiss me, pressing my body against the wall. I struggled.
‘Move aside! And tell me why you are here again.’
‘To see you. End your complaints.’
I laughed. I held him at a distance, pushing him back with my arms. ‘That’s just the means. Tell me what you are aiming for.’
A foolish expression appeared on his face. ‘Let’s go and meet the chief minister. He must be convinced that people support this.’
I pushed him away. ‘Public support to murder a human being?’
‘No ordinary human being. Someone who cruelly raped and murdered a young girl. Hanging him will be a great lesson to all criminals.’
I now laughed in scorn. ‘Sanjeev babu, my father hanged four hundred and fifty-one criminals. For robbery, murder, dacoity, rape. But each day, the number of criminals continues to rise. New offenders take the places of the deceased instantly. No, not death, the punishment should be something else. ’
‘Chetna, you speak like this because you don’t know a thing!’ He pulled me close again.
‘Tell me the truth, don’t you love me? Don’t you enjoy it when I embrace you like this? Aren’t you happy when you are near me?’ His voice sounded feeble.
I smiled sympathetically.
‘Why do you keep smiling like this, with no reason?’ His vexation was now beginning to show. ‘Tell me truly, don’t you love me?’
I laughed even louder. ‘Till sometime back. Not any more.’
‘Why?’ His forehead wrinkled.
‘I realized how small you are . . . ’
He released me and moved away. ‘What do you mean by that?’
&
nbsp; ‘You are a weak man. You have no strength . . . no honesty . . . no stamina . . . ’
Silence fell. There was just the sound of papers rustling. The sound of a mridangam or tabla wafted in from outside. We stood there looking at each other. Suddenly, he flew at me like a tiger and pushed me down to the ground. I thought he was trying to rape me. I remembered Amolika, and smiled again. Utpalavarna, who sought refuge in Gautama Buddha’s hermitage, gained enlightenment one day when she swept the prayer room clean and lit a lamp there. As she sat gazing at the flame that burned there, she entered deep meditation and became enlightened. When the other monks and nuns wondered how this had happened, she wrote a poem as an answer to the nuns:
We, mother and daughter
We became co-wives
We saw the tragedies of worldly pleasures
I left my home for Rajagraha
And thus attained homelessness . . .
‘Your blasted smile! I’ll teach you a lesson,’ he muttered, interrupting the poem in my mind rudely.
When Utpalavarna set out for the forest to meditate alone, a monk named Ananda, who coveted her, unleashed his lust on her. The other bhikkus carried her back to the Buddha’s residence. Seeing the severely wounded Utpalavarna, even the Buddha who had overcome all the sources of the world’s misery was sorrowful. He went to the king requesting that a nunnery be built in the middle of the city for devout women. Thereafter they were not permitted to go away to forests or lonely hilltops to meditate in solitude like the monks. For this utterly perishable body to be consumed by ants, termites and worms if buried under the soil—as Sanjeev Kumar Mitra’s fingers tightened brutally around me and his body pressed down on me, I thought—how they were afraid of it. Not just the unlettered sinner, Grandfather Devadatta, but also Gautama Buddha who had left behind everything. When it struck me that it was a puzzle how one could attain nirvana without conquering fear, I chuckled aloud.
‘Please gouge out my eyes, chop off my arms and legs, you must turn red with my blood,’ I called out.
His force withered away.
‘And most important—don’t hesitate to cut off the tongue!’ I said through my laughter.
‘Are you mad?’ he asked, disheartened, getting up and smoothing down his clothes.
The copy of the old Bhavishyath flew down from the table and fell a finger’s length away from me. I picked it up and read aloud:
‘We have to face any situation that may arise, like brave soldiers fighting for their motherland. Subhash Chandra Bose, Supreme Commander, Azad Hind Fauj, Syonan, 14 August 1945, 1500 hours.’
‘Chetna . . . ’ His voice was now soft as if he had admitted defeat. ‘Let’s stop this tamasha now. You must come and see the chief minister. The death sentence will be carried out only then. If it doesn’t happen, you’ll never be worth anything.’
I stared hard at him. For a couple of moments, our eyes were locked on each other.
‘What do you gain from it?’
He sighed. ‘Not just me, but all the different media. We’ve never had such sky-high ratings as we’ve had these last few weeks.’
I felt as if I had been gazing at the wavering flame leaping from a lamp lit in a room swept clean. Women do not need much time to attain enlightenment.
37
‘Phani da, did you hear, the central government has advised against accepting the mercy petition!’
I was busy correcting the proofs of Mano da’s autobiography. I had just reached the part where he describes in detail how he went with Jyoti Basu to Sealdah on Direct Action Day and found smouldering corpses everywhere along the way. Sanjeev Kumar Mitra’s cheerful voice disturbed me. He was shouting so that I would hear. Father called Ma to bring him some water. Ma gave the two glasses of water to me. Father and Sanjeev Kumar were waiting for me with beaming faces.
‘What did you take me for, Sanju babu? Didn’t I tell you that very day? That his name is on my list? But one thing’s clear, no point building castles in the air until the President’s made his decision. No one can predict death, Sanju babu—take it from someone who has hanged four hundred and fifty-one criminals.’
‘But this time it is very unlikely to be aborted, Phani da.’ Sanjeev Kumar Mitra threw a sidelong glance at me and took the glass, drank a mouthful, and caressed the glass which he held up. ‘Because the home ministry’s advice is on the decision to be taken regarding the mercy petition. The chances of its being rejected are very, very slim. That does mean Jatindranth’s days are numbered, indeed!’
‘Ma Kali! Bhagawan Mahadev! It was a terrible shame last time! After that entire hubbub, when it didn’t happen, you can’t imagine the misery that my family went through. It isn’t like the old days any more, Babu. We are now famous because of your TV.’
Father lit his cigarette.
‘If Banerjee’s sentence is indeed carried out, your fame will double. I’ll do everything I can. I’ve dug up the murdered girl’s family.’
‘We heard that they had consumed poison in a flat in Bombay?’
‘No, that was a yarn spun by some reporter. They are in Delhi now, living with their son. But have apparently not stepped out of their
house for the past ten years. If only we could get them in front of a camera . . . ah!’
Sanjeev Kumar drank up the rest of the water and handed the empty glass to me. Father had finished the other glass. I was about to leave with the glasses when Sanjeev Kumar turned to me.
‘I need your help again, Chetna. We must restart Hangwoman’s Diary.’
I paid no attention and walked off.
‘I’ll come, Sanju babu,’ Father said. ‘I have more tales to tell than her anyway.’ He stroked his moustache and smoked his cigarette. ‘Haven’t I told you about Surya Sen’s death? I still remember how they dragged him there. His teeth had been knocked out. His fingernails were bloody—they had driven nails into the tender flesh under them. They brought him to the gallows on a bamboo litter. We had to work very hard to fix the noose. I believe that he was brought there well after he had died . . . ’
He pulled in the smoke.
‘Are you interested in a controversy, Sanju babu? Here: I, Grddha Mullick, the hangman, say Surya Sen was dead even before he was hanged. Why, isn’t that great stuff for news? But make sure I am paid well. ’
Sanjeev Kumar Mitra was impatient. ‘The demand of the hour is for Jatindranath Banerjee.’
Not interested in listening any more, I went back to my proofreading and began to flip through the pages. I was thinking of the widow, Savitri Devi, who hid Master da—that is, Surya Sen—when he lived in hiding in the Chittagong Hills after Jugantar and the Dhaka Anushilan Samiti merged to form the Jugantar Anushilan. The British forces were out to capture Surya Sen, Pritilata, and Kalpana Dutta. They surrounded Savitri’s house. The three fugitives escaped, shooting the British officer Cameroon who came up the steps. The hills were combed for them but they continued to evade the British and carry out daring raids on their armouries. That made the British announce a reward of ten thousand pounds on Surya Sen’s head. Lured by the prospect of so much money, Surya Sen’s relative, Netra Sen, invited him home for a meal, after informing the police. When Netra Sen’s wife was serving the food, the police surrounded the house and arrested Surya Sen. But Netra Sen was not fated to receive the reward. The next day, when Netra Sen was at his meal and his wife was serving him, a member of Jugantar crept in with a large chopper hidden behind his back and hacked him to death.
When the police asked Netra’s wife if she knew who had killed her husband, she pulled the edge of her aanchal over her face, fixed her gaze on the floor, and testified: ‘I saw my husband being killed with my own eyes. I was serving him his meal. He was sitting here, on the floor, and eating. I was sitting on this side, fanning him. The killer entered. My husband was taking up a ball of rice when the man raised the chopper. My husband sta
rted violently and the rice fell on the floor. Before he could get up, the killer had upset the dishes, stepped on the curries, and had him by the neck. He hacked him down in a second. Blood splattered everywhere; my head was completely drenched. But don’t ask me who killed him. I won’t utter the name.’
‘Why? It was your husband he murdered, or wasn’t he?’
‘He betrayed the desires of a whole people. That moment, he ceased to be my husband.’
The British tried to intimidate and threaten her, but to no avail. She refused to reveal the killer’s name. I remember how Thakuma would puff up with pride when she told us children this story: ‘She was truly a woman!’
I was holding the page in which Mano da described going with Jyoti babu to Chittaranjan Avenue to rescue Bankim Mukherjee, Nirad Chakrabarti and Abdul Momin and his wife who were being held by a mob. He described very evocatively how they found a single Muslim sentry holding off an entire crowd by himself, how they had to struggle hard to rescue the four, and how the sight of burning corpses littering the entire way back made him almost lose consciousness. Tired of reading about death and faith, I turned the pages again randomly. That led me to the description of the mass murder of seventy farmers during the Tebhaga Uprising. I turned the pages again. But whatever I did, words like lathi charge, teargas, Naxal attacks, Emergency, the Bijon Setu massacre thrashed about in my eyes as if hung by nooses. Deaths, murders, mass killings, suicides. But the killings of Ananda Margis and refugees happened in the time of Jyoti Basu who had once sorrowed at the killings of farmers and activists. Feeling sick at heart, I set aside the manuscript and went into the kitchen. But seeing Ma and Kakima sitting with their backs turned to each other, cooking the same thing, reminded me of the description of Partition in Mano da’s autobiography. I thought I’d walk to the Ghat, but the long free-food queue opposite the house put me off. I stood leaning against the salon’s wall.
‘Those days, it used to take till noon to finish work and get back home, Sanju babu. Many would be hanged by the same rope. My baba would stand by the lever, ready, chest out and muscles tensed. I used to tie the arms and legs, and put the mask on the condemned man. When Surya Sen was hanged, Richard sahib told me to leave . . . I can’t remember his full name. But the face I recollect very well. Below his brows, there were two well-like cavities. You’d notice that they held two eyeballs only if you peered hard. His sepoy went up to Baba and said, when you get out, don’t tell anyone about the condition in which the prisoner was brought to the gallows. Only say that he was laughing or crying.’