“huh..?”
“trust me..” and he winked at Neha, before floating away.
Exactly a minute later, the ghostess of love used her powers to materialize a stone before hurling it with great force at the door of the shack. It caused a sharp cracking sound to resonate around the alley.
Neha saw the two scoundrels becoming a little fazed at the sudden noise, alas, if only she was able to hurl that stone at one of their faces. She then noticed the door of the shack being opened, and promptly clicked her fingers to make the stone she had hurled disappear.
The third boy, looking a little shook up himself, came out of the shack, looking for the source of that sharp noise.
One of the scoundrels quickly ran up to him in order to assuage his fears.
“brother it was just a cat, only a cat..you go back..do it..relax..”
And so he managed to send him back in to the same snake pit from which he had crawled out of.
Meanwhile up in the air, Neha was being once again joined by Ankit.
“well, that was no stroke of genius,” she said with a shake of her head, clearly unimpressed at this childish plan of using a sudden noise to try and scare everyone away.
“Well the stroke has not been played yet…” Ankit rejoined with a mischievous gleam in his eyes. “Though it is going to be played any moment now, I think the batsman is on the crease, he has taken his stance..and here comes Waqar Younis from the pavilion end, running in full steam, and it’s a….”
“mother fuckers..you sister fuckers..what in fucking hells have you made me sniff..you bastards...” It was the boy in the shack who had just erupted out of it like an angry volcano.
“fucking hell..in this bitter cold you make me crawl out of the warm quilt for this shit..oh come Jaggi we will show you heavens..heavens my grandmother’s ass..” he was cursing and struggling to breathe as if suffering from some great irritation in his nose. “I am out of here you mother fuckers..take that fucking drug up your arse..” And he stormed off leaving the two scoundrels totally stunned. They had seen a variety of effects cocaine could have on a first timer but this was a reaction totally unheard of.
Up above Neha watched on, totally floored by this shocking turn in the proceedings. She looked beside herself for Ankit but he was already flying back towards Rakh Bagh.
It was over the eastern entrance of the park that she managed to catch up with him.
“Aren’t you going to tell me how you managed to pull that off?” she asked with her curiosity at a peak.
“well..when you made the noise, it distracted him..and I..I replaced his packet of cocaine with a packet of…” and he paused for a little effect.
“come on, packet of what?”
“packet of talcum powder..”
At this revelation she broke in to a rich musical laughter which began to echo in the whole of Rakh Bagh. Ankit meanwhile just kept gazing at her face, in joyous unrestraint or in tempestuous rage she was equally beautifully to him.
“Well that was some idea, I am greatly impressed,” Neha complimented when she had finally managed to control her laughter.
“Well, I did that..to impress you only..” he replied sheepishly.
And for a brief sincere moment, there eyes met and their conscience seemed to merge in to one, pulling them closer together, but not close enough for Ankit to steal a kiss from her plush white lips, for as he was about to, Neha pulled away, as if under the effect of some last minute doubts that had crept up in her mind.
“Kiss me later, first go and grow yourself a tree, you treeless Muppet,” she said shaking her head, forcing out a nervous little giggle. “Good night for now,” and with an inward sigh, she darted away.
Ankit was left behind shaking his head at the city stadium’s unlit flood lights.
“Girls, you can’t understand them when alive, can’t understand them when dead,” and he sighed, before fleeting away to try and find himself a suitable place for planting his mother tree.
*******
Chapter 2 – The ballad of Govind
Amar Pura is one of the oldest neighborhoods in Ludhiana and is situated on the southern bank of a black and putrid sewage stream, endearingly known amidst the residents of the city as ‘Ganda Naalah’.
The repeated failures of the local government to cover the Ganda Naalah, despite a number of plans and a great deal of public expenditure towards the same, meant that by mid 90’s most of the middle class families that lived in Amar Pura began to migrate away to other parts of the city. Strangely, two of the localities that attracted most of these families away from Amar Pura were Chander Nagar and Haibowal, suburban regions situated at the bank of another sewage stream, Buddha-Naalah.
At times the universe works in mysterious ways, making it impossible for us humans to explain some of its orphic doings, putting to us puzzling questions which baffle even the best of our minds, and this particular event in Ludhiana where a vast number of people sold off their houses near one open sewage stream and chose to live in the vicinity of another could perhaps be seen as another of universe’s mischievous attempts to perplex and ultimately humble the human intelligence.
Anyhow, this great migration of the middle class away from Amar Pura turned it in to a neighborhood of artisans and lower middle class workers, people whose economic circumstances just were not good enough for them to make the much coveted jump between the two Naalahs.
*******
On a pleasant September afternoon in the year 2002, in one of the narrow lanes of Amar Pura, a dreamy eyed ten year old kid sat upon the doorstep of his house. He was dressed in a pair of maroon knickers and a plain white shirt, a water bottle hung around his neck and a school bag was held by him protectively in his lap, only a little while earlier he had returned from his school and was now awaiting the return of his mother from her work.
His mother worked as a maid in some houses located on the other side of the Naalah, and as her work there usually finished later than the end of his school day, he often had to wait upon her just like today.
Presently in front of him were three older kids playing with their pebbles, and every now and then the little kid would set his gaze in their general direction, attentively watching the movement of those pebbles as they raced around and collided with each other, then after a while he would feel bored and turn his vision towards the end of the lane looking for signs of his mother, doing this for a brief amount of time his mercurial attentions would then divert towards wiggling his bottom against the doorstep underneath to enjoy the warmth which the friction produced, and then suddenly he would break in to a popular Bollywood song of those times “unchi hai building..lift teri band hai..kaise main aaun..dil..dil..gaja..ganj hai...” in his childish dulcet voice, while bobbing his head from side to side and tapping his small feet to the beat of it, but abruptly he would stop with the singing and start watching the pebbles again, this time amusing himself by noticing the gleaming patterns that the sunlight made in them..and so he carried on skipping between these myriad of activities for an hour or so until his mother finally arrived home.
Govind, as was the boy named, greeted her with a loving hug and then followed her in to the house where she subsequently changed his clothes before she went off towards the corner of the room that served as their kitchen in order to make him some lunch.
It was while she was cooking that the young kid came up to her and started tugging at the hem of her kurti.
“not right now, I am cooking..” his mother said peevishly but he carried on with the tugging until she stopped what she was doing and gave him her attention.
“close your eyes..” he simply said with a sweet smile on his face.
“Do I cook this lunch now, or play your juvenile games?” she replied, still a little irritated.
“close your eyes now, cook later..” he suggested in a cherubic sing song, his sugary tone leaving his mother no choice but to accede to his demand.
“okay open them now..” he announced after a few seconds and as she reopened her eyes, she saw that her son was standing there with his small palm thrust up towards her face.
“I got a star today in English Oral test.” he revealed, his face gleaming in happiness. As his mother looked closer, she indeed observed that on his palm was a star, apparently drawn there by his English teacher for his good performance in a test.
Govind was one of the most intelligent students in his class, and often came back home with these stars on his palms, or in his notebooks, and whenever that happened his mother always became very happy, which in turn made him happy. She would embrace him with pride, give him a little money for buying toffees and make him one of his favorite sabzis in dinner, and today the kid was expecting more of the same, as he stood there with his palm up, waiting for his mother to put her arms around him.
But as it so occurred, the embrace never came, neither there seemed any joy on his mother’s face as she saw that star, in fact it rather had quite the contrary effect upon her, making her somewhat distressed.
“okay..good....” she coldly petted him on his head. “Now go wash your hand..and wash it well..”
This sharp contrast in his mother’s reaction as compared with earlier times along with her refusal to make any further acknowledgement of his star for the rest of that lunch left Govind feeling rather befuddled. But at an age like his, it is hard to remain focused on any one single notion for too long a time, and so it was that as soon as his friends came to call him for cricket after lunch, he instantly forgot all about this knick-knackery and was ready at once to hit some fours and sixes.
“mother, can I go can I go can I go?”
“okay..though..” but before she could even finish, Govind was heading out of the door, so that she had to rush to the threshold in order to get the rest of her message across.
“Come back home before your sister returns,” she shouted out to her son, who was already running off in the street.
“Yes mother,” he replied, looking back at her over his shoulder while he continued running. It was this momentarily distraction which caused him to clash straight in to a dark and portly middle aged woman coming from the other side.
“aye haye. Why don’t you go somewhere and just die?” The fat woman groaned, her lips twitching in anger as she cast virulent curses in the direction of the boy, who luckily enough managed to dodge them by darting off in the nick of time.
“aye haye Sushma behen, why don’t you do something about this boy of yours??” she now complained to the mother of the culprit, as she approached her with an angry sneer spread out upon her visage.
“let it go Prema Behen, just a child he is,” Sushma behen tried to defend her son, though without any real conviction in her words. She was as much afraid of Prema Behen’s anger as the rest of their neighborhood.
“aye haye child! He is no longer a child…keep it up and you will surely spoil him..ah what am I saying, he is already spoiled, it was all evident to me just now..” Prema behen scoffed while looking down upon Sushma behen’s maternal abilities with a degree of condescension. In her opinion, modern day mothers like Sushma behen completely lacked good judgment when it came to raising their children, and it was this belief that had inspired her, out of a greater sense of altruism, to assist these mothers from time to time with her own expertise on the subject.
“Anyhow, I came here to tell you that I have some good news for you. The place where my husband works, near it is another shop where they need an errand boy, send Govind there tomorrow, my husband will fix him up, maybe we could still redeem your boy after all..” she thus told Sushma behen with an air of pride the news of having successfully found a job for her son in the local market on the other side of the Naalah.
This subject had been under discussion between the two ladies for a couple of weeks now, beginning with Prema Behen’s original suggestion that Govind should take up a job as an errand boy in one of the shops to help Sushma behen in the running of her household, and although Sushma behen had initially been averse to it, Prema Behen like some seasoned lawyer, with her assemblage of arguments and counter-arguments had gradually worn down the hesitant mother’s frail defenses and convinced her of the verity of the idea, and now had brought the matter to a successful completion by locating for her son a suitable job, for which she was expecting some lofty words of gratitude and appreciation from the young mother, but Prema Behen was to be disappointed as all she saw was a disconcerted frown on Sushma behen’s face in reply to the excellent piece of news she had broken to her.
“my heart is not allowing me to do this Prema Behen, may be its best if we turn this down, I don’t want to discontinue Govind’s studies,” the young mother muttered feebly, the image of her son’s happy face from a while earlier, when he had shown her the star on his hand, now flashing in front of her eyes.
“aye haye..have you lost your freaking...” Prema Behen was about to break in to an angry tirade, but then quickly checked herself. She knew that she had to stay calm, for a flickering flame cannot be a guiding flame.
“When did I say to stop the boy from studying, of course he can carry on with it, he can study at night after returning from work. Tell me when these schools were not there, did people not use to study?” she argued as she stepped up and put her arm around the disquieted mother. “listen, your husband’s already walked out on you, by great difficulty you are managing to make ends meet for your meager household, in a few years time you will have a daughter to marry, if Govind starts working now, you will be able to save at least some money for Chinki’s wedding, a woman should adjust herself according to the demand of times. Now my husband is endorsing your son, the owners of the shop are good people too, my husband has made sure of that, who knows later, there might never come an opportunity like this for you people. It isn’t like I am trying to force you or something; I just say all this for your own good. Look at Saji if you want, the boy who lives next door, he makes 2000 rupees every month now and on top of that he has also learnt a lot about the fabric trade. He too was Govind’s age when he started working.”
Like a good attorney, Prema behen went on with her monologue, putting forth many more facts, circumstantial evidences and precedents along with a barrage of advices interspersed with ample doses of emotions, and last but not least the bleak picture of the dystopian reality that would become the family’s lot if her advice was not followed, and so a little within an hour, this seasoned campaigner managed to break down the ill-advised frivolity that had cropped up in Sushma behen, thus helping yet another mother make the right choice for her child’s future.
That evening after returning home, Govind was told by her mother that from tomorrow onwards he was not to go to the school and instead was to emulate the path of Saaji-veera from next door by working in one of the shops in the market , and although the mother’s heart was laden with grief and guilt as she broke this news to him, his own remained perfectly at peace, for while he felt a little sad at the idea of not going to school anymore, he had complete faith in the good intentions of his mother towards him.
“don’t worry mother, I will do all the work they give me..” was the simple promise he gave to his mother in the end, before he went off to fetch some rice needed for dinner from a nearby grocery store.
*******
It had been five long years since Govind first came to work in the shoe store of the 5th kuchcha market. From an errand boy put to use in the elementary tasks of sweeping, fetching, and dusting, he had gradually progressed to an expert salesman who knew everything there was to know about shoes.
The market where he worked was a flourishing hub of economic activity, where people from various regions of the state came to buy all sort of goods at wholesale prices. All in all it saw a turnover of no less than 25 crores a month, and out of those 25 crores, a meagerly sum of 5000 was bestowed upon Govind as compensation for the 13 hour grind that he went through daily.
r /> His work that began at 9 in the morning and lasted well in to the evening until the hands of the clock stuck 10, was done mostly from behind a glass counter, where he dealt with customers, exhibiting to them the various footwear available in the shop before jotting down their orders for the same. These orders were then passed on to a crop of younger boys, who would then immediately start working towards their dispatch.
This evening incarcerated once again behind that glass counter, with his weary form exhausted from the day’s hustle and bustle perched over a wooden stool and his aching head slumped over the counter top in front, with his dull listless eyes staring towards the entry of the shop and his tired fingers fiddling with the pen he used for jotting down orders, he seemed a person in dormancy who would kick in to full action at the first sight of a potential customer.
Meanwhile, on the other side of the counter stood a bedraggled looking older man, who was presently in the middle of some sort of an enthusiastic narrative.
“One only needs God’s good grace and then one’s business just runs by itself, after the fruit season I will totally invest all my money in shoes and then leave it on God’ mercy. I will buy from this shop, go to the nearest villages and announce ‘the shoe seller is here’ on a loudspeaker, the rest will happen by itself, one only needs God’s good grace.” This man had entered the shop half an hour ago and although Govind had paid him his due attention in the beginning, it had quickly become clear that he was not interested in buying any shoes but was here to only survey the market. At the revelation of this fact, he was now being quietly ignored by the tired salesman whose head kept nodding out of drowsiness, but interpreting these nods as a sign of interest, the man continued to rather vociferously expand upon his future plans before him.
“Though things always take time to settle down, the wise ancestors were not joking when they said..pehle saal chatti….duje saal khatti..te fer putra teeje saal pendi hai hatti..(A Punjabi maxim which says that it takes three years to establish a business, first year you eat out of your resources, second year you break even, and only in the third year you start to make surplus),” he declared rather perspicaciously, imparting his wisdom to the youth.