Arghya

by Aparna Sachin Pendse

  Notion Press

  Old No. 38, New No. 6

  McNichols Road, Chetpet

  Chennai - 600 031

  First Published by Notion Press 2016

  Copyright © Aparna Sachin Pendse 2016

  All Rights Reserved.

  eISBN 978-1-946390-05-9

  This book has been published with all efforts taken to make the material error-free after the consent of the author. However, the author and the publisher do not assume and hereby disclaim any liability to any party for any loss, damage, or disruption caused by errors or omissions, whether such errors or omissions result from negligence, accident, or any other cause.

  No part of this book may be used, reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission from the author, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

  DEDICATION

  TO ALL THE SEEKERS OF LIGHT

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

  A lot of people have contributed to my journey in writing. For a very successful career in Marathi writing, I would like to begin with my parents, who gave me the confidence that I can excel in whatever I apply my mind to. My uncle, a good writer himself, who encouraged my childish attempts at stories. My history teacher from school, Mr Junnarkar, who made me take part in my first ever major competition. Post my graduation, Vidya Bal was the first editor to show her faith in me. When regular writing for magazines and newspapers became difficult due to other duties, All India Radio kept my writing going. Sushama Hippalgaonkar and later Uma Dixit allowed me to experiment with radio-plays and serials. AIR also gave me the opportunity to write for UNICEF. And not to forget all the readers who gave regular feedback and adulation. My mother-in-law was many a times my first reader.

  I am grateful to Ashok Mule for publishing my Marathi book, and known writer Sumedh Risbood for editing it. All the judges at Sarvajanik Vachanalay for giving a PN Pandit Puraskar to my very first book. For them, my stories were my introduction. They didn’t know who I was.

  This book has been possible due to people who helped me believe that I could publish my work in English too. I would like to mention Ms Sathya Saran, who published my first work in English. Subsequently, my colleague and trusted professional partner Mr Ghulam Sayeed, as well as my son Varun who were the first readers of my work in English.

  Special thanks to the entire team of Notion Press.

  PROLOGUE

  It was the late nineteenth century and a little community in Madhya Pradesh was torn between the ancient Hindu traditions and the modern concept of equality, fraternity and democracy.

  As she stood on the banks of the wide and deep Narmada River, she felt a deep sense of calmness. For now, she felt liberated from the shackles of her body and this life on earth.

  An eternal conflict between brain and soul, she tied her long hair in a loose bun, folded her hands in honour of the rising sun and said a few mantras.

  Quietly, she ventured into the water from the last step of the ghat and then continued deeper. Soon, even her shoulders were submerged.

  As she walked deeper into the water, the first visitors to the ghat only saw her saree’s pallu floating in the water, shimmering under the first rays of the sun.

  Everyone who saw it anxiously ran back, crying and shouting, to her village home to inform her family.

  Through the incoherent sobbing and crying of villagers, they understood that their beautiful daughter was lost forever.

  Her grandfather got up in a frenzy and collected the different manuscripts lying around in the different rooms of the house.

  In total grief and rage, he reached the exact spot from where she entered the Narmada Maiyya, and immersed all the manuscripts into the river.

  “Natak? From now on, no natak will be conducted in this village. No stage will ever be raised. No new scripts will ever be written. No performances will take place. No new dramatic music scores and props. No NATAK! NO NATAK!” he shouted.

  Kavita reached home right after sundown. It was not completely dark, but not very bright either. The dark sky boasted shades of grey with a soft orange tinge threatening to disappear. Time to light the lamps, was the term her mother would have used for this Sandhikal (a time when day meets night). The village of Vishrampur was small and had retained its rustic charm. Kavita’s contacts from Delhi University had warned her not to expect much from the hotel. It looked like any other village house, but it was cleaner and the meals were homemade. This suited Kavita’s requirement perfectly. After all, had she come here a couple of years ago, even this basic facility would not have been available either.

  But now, tourists had discovered this village and its 1000-year-old theatre tradition. There was a wildlife reserve nearby that helped in attracting even more tourists.

  However, Kavita had come here only to study its ancient theatre tradition. It was important for her to complete her doctorate and to earn a permanent teaching position at her university abroad. Without it, she would be forced to return to Mumbai, back to a life of poverty and drudgery. Vishrampur’s theatre tradition went back almost a 1000 years. It was very similar to Dashavtari from the Konkan coast or Yakshagana from the south. It predominantly dealt with mythological stories where good always triumphs over evil. The major focus was the Mahabharata. But the element that made Kavita fall for this particular tradition over others was the incorporation of props and music that they used to set the mood. This seemed like such a modern concept. Every generation of performers had experimented with new scripts and had tried to innovate age-old stories to fit modern times. Kavita found it fascinating that these people from remote villages experimented with their art even before the experimentation of modern theatre began in India. Fascination was one thing but even for mere survival, she needed to study this.

  Who would give her a full-time job for theatre studies in India? Besides, the pressing question was, where would she live? No, she had to complete her doctoral thesis before her grant period was over. This had become important for her very existence.

  She reached her hotel. It was in fact someone’s home – nothing more, nothing less.

  It had a large door built in the compound wall. She banged the ornate door knocker or kadi as they would call it locally, to alert people of her arrival. After a few minutes, she heard horizontal bar that normally secured these massive doors being moved. The door opened and a middle-aged woman with a welcoming smile looked out. She raised her lantern up to get a better look of Kavita. Unable to recognize her, she nodded questioningly.

  “Namaskar, I am Kavita, I had booked a room.” Kavita was a bit hesitant.

  “Namaskar, Professor Madam.” greeted the woman, adjusting her cotton pallu over her head.

  “I am Pragya Verma. I remember that you spoke to me sometime ago. Your room upstairs is ready. This is not much of a hotel, but you will be comfortable. Follow me!”

  She held the lantern high for Kavita to be able to see properly. The inner courtyard or angan was small but clean and smooth. It boasted of essential trees like hibiscus, night-flowering coral and neem. The compound wall was covered in jasmine creepers. Kavita could even spot Raat Ki Rani (night-blooming jasmine) flowers.

  As they walked ahead they came to a traditional, long porch that had a swing in it. She could make out door that should allow them to go inside the house placed a step higher.

  Kavita looked up expectantly and found a wooden balcony and double windows on the floor above.

  “Pragya bhabhi, this is an old haveli!”

  “Yes, it belonged to our elders. But now it truly has become old. It needs some repairs, and maybe a coat of paint. We are restoring it slowly. Giving rooms to tourists helps in restoration work. What you see in front of you was not the original entrance to this ve
randah and the rooms you see inside were used by the ladies of the house. The bedrooms are upstairs to the side. Everything above the first floor is in a bad state.”

  They entered the room inside that the verandah led to and arrived at a narrow staircase, which was very similar to a wooden ladder.

  “Oh, I have seen these types of staircases only in my maternal grandmother’s house back in my village.”

  “Yes, they aren’t very common anymore. This has remained intact since this haveli was built. So you’re getting to see an authentic piece,” Pragya bhabhi smiled as she continued.

  “You have come to study the Mahabharata theatre tradition right? I have spoken to a person from the Trivedi family that has kept this tradition alive. Most people have moved to bigger cities and even abroad. Not much of the living tradition is left. In the current generation, only Niranjan Trivedi is left. He is trying to digitize as many old manuscripts as possible. He is also trying to save and restore old photos, newspaper cuttings, etc. He is your best bet.”

  Both women entered room that would be Kavita’s temporary home for the next few weeks. Kavita gasped at the beauty of the arched windows with enough space to sit comfortably. She loved this type of window only found in central and western Indian homes from when she was a little girl.

  “Wow Bhabhi, I love these windows. I’d love to sit by them and read.”

  “Yes, they are beautiful!” Pragya bhabi sighed. “But you don’t find them even in villages anymore. All the new houses are made of brick and cement. There’s nothing authentic, nothing original from this soil.”

  “True. Alright, let me unpack and settle down, Bhabhi.”

  “Dinner will be served at eight. For a few days, it’s just you and me. My husband works in Indore and will come home for the weekend. Today, I have made simple food – bland dal, lemon achar and rice.”

  “Don’t worry; I like simple, home-cooked food.” Kavita assured.

  “I am going downstairs now. If you need anything, ring the bell.”

  Kavita slowly unpacked. She kept her clothes folded in an old-fashioned cupboard built in the thick stone walls. Her books and other essentials were placed in a compartment next to it. She took out her laptop, and plugged it in to charge it. This was a place where there was only limited mobile connectivity and powercuts lasted for six to seven hours at a stretch under the pretext of load-shedding, so she didn’t want to take the risk.

  She removed reference books and notes that she would need everyday and arranged it on the writing table in the room. Newspaper cuttings and other reference material too were stacked neatly next to the books. Finally, she removed a bundle tied in red silk cloth with a golden border. She untied the knot to find a beautiful, old, handwritten manuscript inside. She touched it lovingly; it was the manuscript of an old musical, Sangeet Saubhadra. On the first page, she could read her grandfather’s name, written in his handwriting.

  Devi Saraswati Sangeet Natak Company

  Prof Govinda Pant Deodhar

  Tears ran down her cheeks. She slowly tied that Pothi (old manuscript) back inside red silk and kept it in the corner on her table. This red cloth was part of a larger cloth her grandfather used during their daily pooja.

  Kavita’s childhood was not particularly lavish, but they were not poor. She lived in a small two-room house in Mumbai with her parents, younger sister – Sarita and her grandfather. Till the age of fourteen, she mostly hung out with other girls her age in their chawl’s central courtyard. However, during her teens, she and her sister, Sarita, abandoned the courtyard for the terrace or the empty space below various staircases around the chawl.

  They had to fetch water from the common tap in the first floor, and had to bring flour from the local mill. They had to roll-out papad and prepare pickles during their summer vacations. Still, they were happy. They helped their mother prepare for every festival or when they received guests.

  But true joy came from the stories their grandfather told them about theatre and plays. He even took them for a musical, Mandar Mala at Sahitya Sangh Mandir. Both the play and the venue were very popular during those days. Sarita didn’t like it much but Kavita—

  She was fascinated by the props, background music, lighting, costumes, makeup, and ofcourse the storytelling that incorporated dance and music. Since then, her grandfather, Aajoba, started telling her one story about plays and theatre every night as a bedtime story. He even took her along to watch a few plays.

  Once Aajoba discovered that Kavita loved theatre, he smiled with pride. No one had seen such a joyous smile on Aajoba’s face before. Aajoba had his own musical theatre company steeped in musical drama, a tradition that started during the British Raj. Later, as people’s preferences changed, his company went bankrupt. But he had still kept a lot of things that he had collected over the years. On learning about Kavita’s interest in theatre, he brought down two big trunks from the loft. It was like finding treasure for someone like Kavita. A couple of backdrops, costumes, old photos, newspaper clippings, an old advertisement and even a few records of Bal Gandharva himself.

  He had a lot of scripts, handwritten, complete with the musical score. Play scripts from popular to not so popular productions. He began taking Kavita to Sahitya Sangh on Sunday mornings. A lot of old singers, actors, directors, technicians, and even makeup artists and lighting technicians gathered there. They spoke nostalgically about the golden era of theatre. Some sang, some acted out a few scenes, and one of them performed a famous soliloquy. They also recalled memories of the plays her Aajoba produced. Her generous and caring Aajoba treated the whole unit as his family and together, they fondly spoke of many things. Aajoba would wipe his tears with the border of his dhoti. She cursed her luck for being born in the last decade of the twentieth century. She did not belong to that golden era. These people’s lives carried a different zing. To them, theatre and classical music was a religion. No one was bigger than theatre, not the villain, not the small backstage artist, not even the hero." In front of the footlights, each of them felt a touch of the divine. They had an inspired life – almost spiritual.

  She and Aajoba could easily spend two hours among them. Most of the conversation was about why the new generation didn’t like their plays. They could not understand it. Eventually, all of them shrugged it off saying that maybe they were too old.

  Kavita had seen a few modern, contemporary plays lacking music with her mother. Her father never watched plays. But Kavita too didn’t like modern plays much, neither experimental nor commercial. Why? She had no idea.

  Among Aajoba’s manuscripts, she found unlimited treasure. It had everything, plays of Kirloskar, Khadilkar, Gadkari and even most radical plays by Savarkar. She read greedily. Throughout her schooling, her love for theatre grew deeper. After the ninth standard, when she began reading English Books, her school’s library just wasn’t enough.

  Aajoba understood this quickly and bought her a British Council membership. Kavita was thrown into the ocean. There she discovered not only Shakespeare, but Antigani and Media, Russian musicals, and even more surprisingly, Sanskrit work by Kalidasa, Bilhan, Bhartruhari and Vishakhdatta. She loved Bilhan’s romance and Kalidasa’s poetic justice and was shaken to core by Vishakh Datta’s political vision. None of the celebrated playwrights of the twentieth century could write such a scathing commentary on corruption and social oppression as Shudraka.

  She aspired to study theatre and theatre history and that became her life’s aim. She was living in a dream, till one Sunday, she was shocked and saddened seeing her own father’s hatred for theatre.

  However, this only deepened her passion for theatre. A life of buying clothes, cooking rice and dal and paying electricity bills was not for her. She didn’t want such a colourless life. She wasn’t born for it.

  It was her tenth standard SSC year. No one was ever tensed about the SSC examinations at the time. There was no pressure to take up tuitions either. Kavita’s mother had reduced her household chores and increased
her overall study hours.

  She and Aajoba still went to Sahitya Sangh every Sunday. The only difference now, was that she took him instead.

  One day Aajoba went out after his afternoon tea and returned after sunset. Kavita’s father was upset, and looked depressed from the time he came back from work. There was a strike by the workers at the cloth mill where he worked for many months. Her father worked in the accounts department, so he received a salary till then… But on that day, her father got the anticipated bad news that his mill had shut down. They wouldn’t receive a salary from the next month.

  When Kavita’s father, saw Aajoba coming in so late with his eternal smile on his face, he lost his temper.

  Baba shouted, “Your theatre ruined our lives, wasn’t that enough? My mother died due to poverty, wasn’t that enough? I couldn’t complete my education, wasn’t that enough that now you have lured my daughter into theatre, your religion, too. You will now ruin her life as if ruining ours wasn’t bad enough.”

  Aajoba was now shaking. He spoke in a quivering voice when he told his only son to calm down.

  “Narayana, Narayana! Where have I…”

  But his son didn’t hear a word, “My company closed down, my job is gone. Did you ever offer to help us with money? I still have to educate both girls and get them married. Vanita and I are growing old too. Did you ever ask if we needed money? Whatever allowance you got from government as an artist, you decided to blow on your useless old theatre friends, or wasted them on theatre books for these girls. You are making us beggars; you love being a beggar.”

  Suddenly, Aajoba lost his temper. He was very angry.

  “Narayana, keep your voice down while talking to your father. Any business can run into loss, and your mother didn’t die because of poverty. When my company was earning money, our family had a car, who had a car in those days? I educated you enough for you to get a good job. I gave you this house, it may be small but I bought it.”