Debasis Tripathy |
Fiction by Debasis Tripathy
One fine day, a young boy was found outside the panchayat office in Baidipada village.
He would have been around five or six. The village sarpanch, a kind man in his fifties developed a liking for the boy
and took care of his food and other needs, while allowing him to sleep in the
only room of the office, during the night.
The child did not remember anything much from the
past except that he had been stolen by a guniya
few months back and had been wandering ever since he escaped from his cruel
custody.
Four weeks passed and yet no one came to claim the
boy. There was a farmer couple who were childless. The sarpanch called the old farmer to the office and suggested to him
“Chakara, you two have no one the world and it seems to me that God has sent
this child for you. Why don't you bring him up as your son? He will take care
of you when he grows up."
Chakara was undecided. They had got used to life
without a child of their own. He said “We are poor people. We rarely get two
meals a day. How can we take care of a third person?”
The sarpanch replied
“I urge you to go and speak to Lakhi about this boy. There is no hurry. As such,
he has a home in panchayat office.”
Chakara and Lakhi, his wife sat up very late that
night, not knowing what to do. Finally
Lakhi said “If we wait to have our own child, we will die childless. But now if
we take a plunge into parenthood, there will be someone to lit fire to our
bodies when we die”
The decision was made. The next day the boy entered
their house as their own and was given a new name – Bimbadhara, Bimba in short.
They both loved and cared for Bimba, enwrapping him in a closeness which you
will associate with grandparental love, pampering him as much they could. They
were unwilling to let him be out of their sight.
Bimba was sent to the
village primary school, where impressed with his learning curve he was given a
double promotion to class 3 after just a year. Two summers passed and he was in
class 5. That summer a Jatra party came visiting and set up
their tent just outside the village. After staying awake one night and watching
a play, Bimba was utterly captivated by the performances. Not finding their son
in the house, one day, and after Chakara had made a lasting search for him, he
found him among the Jatra actors, who
were enjoying their beedis, outside
the village temple.
Chakara slapped him for
the first time ever and dragged him back to their hut. Lakhi rebuked the young
boy threatening to beat him to death with the broom that she grasped tightly in
her hand. It was quite a scene that followed for the next couple of hours
before the sad sun drowned and the family went to sleep after a meager dinner.
Two days later, just as they were waking up to a new
day, Chakara and his wife found that their son was not in the house. They
looked for him in the fields, near the river, in the panchayat office and the rest of the village. Not encountering him
anywhere, Chakara ran to the outskirts of the village where the Jatra was camped shouted at the top of
his voice, “Bimba…”
But there were no tents, no Jatra performers. What remained were ashes from the makeshift hearth
and the wheel marks of the truck that had carried away the troupe to some unknown
address.
Chakara started running to each door, each house in
the village calling endlessly “Bimba, Bimba re Bimba, hey Bimba”. There was no
reply.
He was not willing to accept that his son, the gift
of god could vanish like this. Illiterate and not knowing how to read the
writings of fate, he decided to seek the help of the person who had passed on
the child to him. He rushed to the sarpanch
who was equally lost and clueless as him. Chakara felt more helpless than
anyone else.
He sprinted along, his wife chasing him, like a
madman until cockcrow, when the broken night had lost hope of finding his son.
Even the light of the day could not discover the lost child. Together with his
wife, seated on the clay steps of their home, they sobbed until the night
appeared again.
They did not find their son. Each day, thereafter,
seemed like a year and they both aged posthaste in their deathlike dejection.
Someone told them that the Jatra party was in Bhubaneswar, where the owner of the troupe was
based out of. They made a distress sale of their land and their house and set
out to the town in a quest for their son.
They inquired about the troupe and with the police
and other authorities and at the hospital in the town but seemed their boy had
been lost to them forever and no one had any clue about him or the troupe. After
a long spell of hopelessness, when a little hope sneaks in and that is lost, it
induces a kind of hopelessness which has no cure. Finally, you yield in. The parents
wept in silence, having lost all hope.
The town was an expensive affair for the poor
villagers and they had no heart to return back to their village, where anyhow
they had nothing left. Ahead of time, all their money came to an end. To ward
off their hunger, the occurrences of which had turned rare, they did menial
work was offered to them. In days, they became so discouraged and depleted that
people mistook them as beggars and got something to eat without actually having
to beg.
In this miserable state, they reached a temple, near
the hill in the suburbs. The temple was small and not very popular with the
worshippers who were spoilt with many choices within the convenience of the
town’s boundaries. This place became their new home, albeit a roof and walls.
Monsoon came, it started raining heavily. The temple
priest who by now had come to know the hapless story of the couple gave them
shelter in a tin house adjoining the temple. They spent their days in the
temple premises, gazing at the very few people entering and leaving - their eyes
still searching for that one familiar face.
On few occasion Lakhi would shout out “Wait, Bimba,
stop”, only to realize a little later that it was again a case of mistaken
identity.
Chakara would scold her "O sterile woman, stop
these histrionics. Allow me some peace"
Eleven monsoons later, the couple had not entered
the temple once. By now they knew that that god is one which creates illusions
of false hope in human minds. No matter how much ever faith you put in god, he
will always do what he feels like. He derives pleasure out of human
disappointments.
The old couple had got used to their new life – near
the god, yet so far. They liked the silence surrounding the place. They didn’t
wish to break the silence and rarely spoke to each other.
One unusual day, there was a lot of activity, a stir
of people around the temple. No one asked the priest, but he spoke unsolicited
"In a couple of days, we'll celebrate Megha
Mela and this year they are arranging a Jatra
completion here in the open ground, behind our temple”
The mention of the festival brought back a swarm of
memories to Lakhi’s mind.
The next day, a group of people came visiting the
temple to seek blessings of Maa Chanddi,
the reigning deity. They were the Jatra
actors.
As they were leaving Lakhi felt she had sighted
Bimba.
She exclaimed “Haiyo,
Did you not see Bimba? I am sure it’s him!”
Chakara stayed unaffected. He had heard his wife say
this many times before. But this time her reaction was way more hysterical and
besides she had not said anything like this in the last few years. She had
accepted and got used to the loss.
Not getting any acknowledgment from her husband, she
went to the priest. The priest, not in a mood to disappoint the poor woman said
“The Jatra owner has invited us to
today’s show. Let’s go and check for ourselves”
The priest ordered Chakara to join them and the
three of them were welcomed by the owner and allotted the front seat with the
best view.
The play started after some singing and dancing to
pre-recorded music. There were constant and loud cheers. But the loudest cheer
was yet to be herd. Then entered the lead female character and the crowd went
berserk.
The girl on the stage looked so beautiful. Yet she
reminded her of Bimba, a farmer’s rustic son. Lakhi uneasily and headstrongly
tried to rewind her frail memory.
She finally gathered courage and whispered to
Chakara “Did you see him? I am sure. If our Bimba grows up it will be like him
… but this is a woman!”
Chakra looked again on to the stage. She did look
like Bimba. Lakhi was right.
The old couple was so affected that they could not
speak for the next few minutes. Lakhi looked intensely at the pretty woman
ruling the stage.
“There he is, my son Bimba” suddenly shouted Lakhi
in frenzy. With her blurred vision and with a showery screen of colored paper
bits, the mother could still spot her son.
“You mean the heroine?” queried the priest.
“Yes, yes. I am sure that’s my Bimba” retorted Lakhi,
with a conviction like never seen before.
“Ok, ok, we will find out” the priest added, happy
for her and confused himself.
The play seemed to last for an eternity, but it had
to end. The three of them were backstage even before the play finished.
After some wait, they got a chance to meet the
actors. All of them had washed their
faces and appeared more believable without makeup. All of them were male!
The old woman, who was shuddering in anticipation
blurted:
“Bimba!”
One young man paused and looked back at her with an
expression that oozed familiarity. She raised her voice, now more sure of
herself “Bimba!”
The others around them looked at them, bewildered.
An actor in the group tried to correct Lakhi “This is Radha Rani”
Radha Rani, the man with his face close to Chakara
and Lakhi, and as a memory of his childhood flashed on him said “Bapa, Bou”
He had forgotten many things from his past but there
was no way he could forget his Bapa
and Bou. He continued while sobbing “I’d come back but
you’d left the village by then”
He knelt down to the floor, on the old man’s knees,
and he wept, then holding both his father and mother, completing the triangle,
in a shock of excessive elation.
***
Legend
Sarpanch - the head of a village in India
Guniya
– an occultist who claims to be a believer of Kali, the dark Indian goddess and in the existence of the
secret, mysterious, or supernatural agencies.
Jatra
(also Mancha, opera) - is a style of moving theatre performance in the Indian
state of Odisha, performing play, music, and dance. The troupe travels to
villages and places. When this story is set, often the female roles were
portrayed by male actors who were the main crowd-pullers.
Beedi
- is a thin cigarette filled with tobacco flake and commonly wrapped in a dried
leaf
Magha Mela – A festival celebrated in Odisha during the Indian month of Magha (roughly in January) for around ten days, when the Jatra party kicks off as a part of the fair and festival.
Magha Mela – A festival celebrated in Odisha during the Indian month of Magha (roughly in January) for around ten days, when the Jatra party kicks off as a part of the fair and festival.
Haiyo
– An old form of addressing husband by the wife in Odisha, where the wives are
not supposed to take their husband’s name.
Bapa
– father in Odiya
Bou
– mother in Odiya~~~~~~~~~~~ THE END ~~~~~~~~~~~
Thank you!
ReplyDeleteVery touching
ReplyDeleteThe old couple loved the child so! Nice story.
ReplyDelete