Mamta Kalia
Mamta Kalia Mamta Kalia
grandson, Surendra, visited my house in connection with some interview. He had obtained my address in the village. He stayed the night with us. My wife fed him a very nice meal, and while eating, he said, ‘Bhabhiji, you make such delicious food. No one in our family can cook so well.’ His compliment made my wife happy, but I was deeply disturbed for quite some time. The incidents of childhood began knocking at my memory’s door again. Surendra had not even been born then. His elder aunt, that is, Sukhdev Singh Tyagi’s daughter, was getting married. My mother used to clean their place. Starting ten to twelve days before the wedding, my parents had been doing all sorts of work at Sukhdev Singh Tyagi’s home. A daughter’s wedding meant that the prestige of the whole village was at stake. Everything had to be perfect. My father had gone from village to village to collect charpais for the guests. The barat was eating. My mother was sitting outside the door with her basket. I and my younger sister Maya sat close to my mother in the hope that we too would get a share of the sweets and the gourmet dishes that we could smell cooking inside. When all the people had left after the feast, my mother said to Sukhdev Singh Tyagi as he was crossing the courtyard to come to the front door: ‘Chowdhriji, all of your guests have eaten and gone ...Please put something on the pattal for my children. They too have waited for this day.’ Sukhdev Singh pointed at the basket 14 :: April-June 2010 full of dirty pattals and said, ‘You are taking a basketful of joothan. And on top of that you want food for your children. Don’t forget your place, Chuhri. Pick up your basket and get going.’ Those words of Sukhdev Singh Tyagi penetrated my breast like a knife. They continue to singe me to this day. That night the Mother Goddess Durga entered my mother’s eyes. It was the first time I saw my mother get so angry. She emptied the basket right there. She said to Sukhdev Singh, ‘Pick it up and put it inside your house. Feed it to the baratis tomorrow morning.’ She gathered me and my sister and left like an arrow. Sukhdev Singh had pounced on her to hit her, but my mother had confronted him like a lioness. Without being afraid. After that day Ma never went back to his door. And after this incident she had also stopped taking their joothan. The same Sukhdev Singh had come to my house one day. My wife had welcomed him with open arms, treating him with the respect due to a village elder. He had eaten at our house. But after he left, my nephew Sanjaya Khairwal, who is studying for his B.Sc. degree, said to me, ‘Chachaji, he ate only at your own house; at our place, he did not even drink water.’ My elder bother Sukhbir was a year round servant at Suchet Taga’s. I was in fifth class then. He would have been around twenty-five or twenty-six years of age. He was very dark complexioned, tall and muscular. One day a wild boar came inside the village. He had injured a lot of people with his sharp horns.
He had entered the cowsheds of the Tagas and injured the oxen, buffaloes and cows. All the people had climbed on the rooftops to watch this spectacle. No Taga showed the courage to catch the wild boar and throw him out of the village. Sukhbir was returning from Suchet’s field at the time. When he asked the screaming and shouting Tagas on the rooftops as to what had happened, they told him about the boar. Sukhbir drove that boar out of the village with just a stick. His confidence and strength impressed the whole village. They had discussed his feat for a long time after that. One day when he returned from work, his body was hot with fever. He was in bed for a week. He died without proper medication or treatment. It was as though lightning had struck our family. Everything had shattered. Pitaji was totally broken down by this tragedy. Ma was so overwhelmed by Sukhbir’s death that she would faint at short intervals. Bhabhi had become a widow at a very young age. Our family’s condition that had been improving because of my brother now took a turn for the worse. I remember that ever since our brother had started to work, no younger brothers, sister or bhabhi went to work in a Taga’s house. I never had to sweep anybody’s house. After my brother’s death, Pitaji and chacha had joined a road construction crew. They would take on whatever job they were offered. In our community, widow remarriage was an accepted practice. Unlike the Hindu tradition, we did not see widow marriage negatively. In the presence of relatives and village elders, my deceased brother Sukhbir’s father-in-law bethrothed his widowed daughter to Jasbir, the brother who was the next in line to Sukhbir. Everyone in our community accepted this arrangement. At that time my elder brother’s son Narendra was about one and a half years old, and bhabhi was pregnant. Devendra was born six or seven months after my brother’s death. After Sukhbir’s death the entire burden of the family had fallen on Jasbir’s shoulders. Whatever we could earn in the village was not enough to make ends meet. The financial condition of the family was precarious. One day Jasbir left for Adampur to work for a construction company, Tirath Ram & Company.’ In those days an airport was being built in Adampur, Punjab, for the Indian airforce. After some time that company had moved to Bagdogra, Bengal, to build the airport there. Jasbir’s letter came many months after he went to Bagdogra. Ma had thrown a tantrum when she heard the name of Bengal. Mother’s idea of Bengal was based on folk myths about black magic and casting of spells, about women who transformed a man into a ram with their magic and tied him up in their courtyard. Her Bengal was not the Bengal of Rabindranath Tagore or the revolutionaries. Ever since we got the letter, Ma cried day and night, ‘One son has left the world and the other April-June 2010 :: 15
- Page 1 and 2: A Journal of Mahatma Gandhi Antarra
- Page 3 and 4: Contents Focus LANGUAGE DISCOURSE W
- Page 5 and 6: Editor's Note Those who have a pass
- Page 7 and 8: Focus JOOTHAN Om Prakash Valmiki Tr
- Page 9 and 10: unwarranted. Ram Singh and Sukkhan
- Page 11 and 12: angry that his dense moustache was
- Page 13: place where uplas or cow dung cakes
- Page 17 and 18: that she kept with great care with
- Page 19 and 20: to lose touch with those companions
- Page 21 and 22: It rained a lot in the year 1962. A
- Page 23 and 24: was cooked at home, we all got very
- Page 25 and 26: Discourse JOOTHAN: A DALIT LITERARY
- Page 27 and 28: in the present. These are memories
- Page 29 and 30: sun and the needle pricks of the sh
- Page 31 and 32: as well as the rhetorical use of th
- Page 33 and 34: he used to come to our house in Alm
- Page 35 and 36: although drawing its special charac
- Page 37 and 38: the forests, or the discovery of la
- Page 39 and 40: oth the above-mentioned tendencies
- Page 41 and 42: enterprising elements with more cap
- Page 43 and 44: quite opposite to them. This has on
- Page 45 and 46: considerable “reverse flow”, th
- Page 47 and 48: on the basis of a new model. This n
- Page 49 and 50: Our mind Clouds with the din of Loo
- Page 51 and 52: He’s not born in any castle- In t
- Page 53 and 54: Such Is The Time Such is this time
- Page 55 and 56: manning machines returning home, af
- Page 57 and 58: I have to tell them each time that
- Page 59 and 60: Said—I used to love this man. Had
- Page 61 and 62: Poetry FIVE POEMS Nilesh Raghuvansh
- Page 63 and 64: How dear it is to hear him so! His
He had entered the cowsheds of the<br />
Tagas and injured the oxen, buffaloes<br />
and cows. All the people had climbed<br />
on the rooftops to watch this spectacle.<br />
No Taga showed the courage to catch<br />
the wild boar and throw him out of<br />
the village.<br />
Sukhbir was returning from Suchet’s<br />
field at the time. When he asked the<br />
screaming and shouting Tagas on the<br />
rooftops as to what had happened, they<br />
told him about the boar. Sukhbir drove<br />
that boar out of the village with just<br />
a stick. His confidence and strength<br />
impressed the whole village. They had<br />
discussed his feat for a long time after<br />
that.<br />
One day when he returned from work,<br />
his body was hot with fever. He was<br />
in bed for a week. He died without proper<br />
medication or treatment. It was as though<br />
lightning had struck our family.<br />
Everything had shattered. Pitaji was<br />
totally broken down by this tragedy.<br />
Ma was so overwhelmed by Sukhbir’s<br />
death that she would faint at short<br />
intervals. Bhabhi had become a widow<br />
at a very young age. Our family’s condition<br />
that had been improving because of my<br />
brother now took a turn for the worse.<br />
I remember that ever since our brother<br />
had started to work, no younger brothers,<br />
sister or bhabhi went to work in a Taga’s<br />
house.<br />
I never had to sweep anybody’s house.<br />
After my brother’s death, Pitaji and<br />
chacha had joined a road construction<br />
crew. They would take on whatever job<br />
they were offered.<br />
In our community, widow remarriage<br />
was an accepted practice. Unlike the<br />
Hindu tradition, we did not see widow<br />
marriage negatively. In the presence of<br />
relatives and village elders, my deceased<br />
brother Sukhbir’s father-in-law<br />
bethrothed his widowed daughter to<br />
Jasbir, the brother who was the next<br />
in line to Sukhbir. Everyone in our<br />
community accepted this arrangement.<br />
At that time my elder brother’s son<br />
Narendra was about one and a half years<br />
old, and bhabhi was pregnant. Devendra<br />
was born six or seven months after my<br />
brother’s death.<br />
After Sukhbir’s death the entire<br />
burden of the family had fallen on Jasbir’s<br />
shoulders. Whatever we could earn in<br />
the village was not enough to make ends<br />
meet. The financial condition of the<br />
family was precarious. One day Jasbir<br />
left for Adampur to work for a<br />
construction company, Tirath Ram &<br />
Company.’ In those days an airport was<br />
being built in Adampur, Punjab, for the<br />
Indian airforce. After some time that<br />
company had moved to Bagdogra, Bengal,<br />
to build the airport there. Jasbir’s letter<br />
came many months after he went to<br />
Bagdogra.<br />
Ma had thrown a tantrum when she<br />
heard the name of Bengal. Mother’s idea<br />
of Bengal was based on folk myths about<br />
black magic and casting of spells, about<br />
women who transformed a man into a<br />
ram with their magic and tied him up<br />
in their courtyard. Her Bengal was not<br />
the Bengal of Rabindranath Tagore or<br />
the revolutionaries. Ever since we got<br />
the letter, Ma cried day and night, ‘One<br />
son has left the world and the other<br />
April-June 2010 :: 15
Change language