“8 Crossing Thresholds” in “Amma’s Daughters”
8
Crossing Thresholds
BANASTHALI, 1966–67
Banasthali Vidyapith was the tribute of a grieving mother and father to the memory of a daughter who had died too young, at the age of only twelve. From its humble beginnings in 1935, as a school for village girls, it had grown into a residential institute for women, offering education from primary school through to the graduate level. Amma had known the founders, Pandit Hiralal Shastri and his wife, Ratan Shastri, since before her Wardha years. In 1927, under the influence of Gandhiji’s philosophy of social uplift, Shastriji had given up a senior government position in the princely state of Jaipur to dedicate himself to rural advancement, advocating for peasants’ rights and for women’s empowerment in the region, and had later become a leading member of the Praja Mandal, a nationalist organization. When, in 1949, the various princely states of Rajputana were incorporated into the Dominion of India, Shastriji became the first chief minister of the newly formed state of Rajasthan, but he resigned in 1951, soon after the death of his mentor, Sardar Patel, and returned to Banasthali. Many considered the university his most enduring legacy.
An hour-long train ride took me to the dusty town of Niwai, which surrounded the campus of this women’s university—a cluster of modest buildings situated in a serene oasis of shady groves, trees-lined paths, and lush green sports fields, home to multitudes of majestic peacocks. This self-contained community had a library, a bank, and a hospital, as well as housing for the students, staff, and faculty of the institution. In its regimented daily routine, the requirement that we all wear khadi, and the focus on community work, campus life preserved a sliver of Gandhiji’s dream. We were regularly reminded of the privilege it was to be on these hallowed grounds in pursuit of knowledge, and we were exhorted to give back to our communities and country in any way possible.
My supervisor was the recently arrived Professor B. R. Deodhar, the new head of the Music and Dance Department at Banasthali. I was excited to learn that he had studied with the illustrious singer and musician Vishnu Digambar Paluskar, an iconic figure in modern music history. Touring Gujarat around the turn of the century, Paluskar had taken the unprecedented step of giving a public concert—a shocking event at a time when musical performances were still confined to the homes of wealthy patrons or, alternatively, to temples. Then, in 1901, he had established the first classical music school to be funded by public donations—the Gandharva Mahavidyalaya. This was where Professor Deodhar had studied, before going on to earn his own distinguished reputation. He was greatly respected for his work on vocal training and for his deep knowledge of both Western and Hindustani musical traditions, and he was also one of the country’s foremost advocates of the introduction of music into university curricula. His crowning credential, though, at least in the eyes of Amma and Babu, was that he had led a satyagraha of artists during the struggle for independence.
I was beginning to understand why Babu always insisted that music is the ultimate science—Ekam sangeet vigyanam, he often said—as I learned about the impact of music on human psychology and the formal complexity of the system of ragas on which Indian classical music is based. The origins of this system can be traced back more than three thousand years, to the Samaveda, a collection of melodies to which verses from the Rigveda were intended to be sung, attesting to the integral role of music in rituals of worship. But music also occupied a central place in classical Indian drama, as is clear from the Natyashastra, a Sanskrit treatise on the performance arts compiled from about 200 BC to 200 AD.
For many centuries, knowledge of music theory and practice was passed down orally, from guru to shishya, in an ongoing chain of transmission, and music remained closely associated with temples. During the medieval period, however, the music of northern India began to diverge, at least to some degree, from that of the south, largely owing to the influence of Muslim rule. Islamic tradition strictly prohibits the worship of idols, and early Muslim rulers often set about destroying Hindu temples and disbanding their retinue. Yet many of these rulers—the Mughal emperors, especially—were generous and enthusiastic patrons of the arts, including music. As a result, music became more secularized in the north, moving out of temples and into royal courts, where Hindu and Sufi musicians often mingled in a musical dialogue that enriched Hindustani classical music in many ways. At the same time, this system of patronage contributed to a weakening of musical traditions that had been kept alive in temples by devadasis and that continued to flourish in the wealthy temple-towns of southern India.
Only in the early twentieth century, however, were efforts finally made to develop a comprehensive theory of classical Hindustani music, one capable of knitting together a patchwork of local traditions. Credit for this accomplishment belongs largely to the Marathi scholar Pandit Vishnu Narayan Bhatkhande—a gifted musicologist, as well as a sitar player and vocalist, and author of the four-volume Hindustani Sangeet Paddhati. Bhatkhande, who was well versed in both northern and southern classical music, undertook a detailed comparative study of the ragas presently popular in northern India and, drawing on the southern Indian system of melakartas, devised a system of classification based on the concept of a thaat—an ascending scale of seven notes on which musicians then elaborate to produce new ragas. He also developed a standardized system of musical notation and wrote a series of school texts that I knew well.
One of the consequences of the oral transmission of music, in the absence of any standard system of musical notation, was, of course, that melodies could easily be transformed or lost, even when lyrics survived. I was thus beginning to appreciate the musical legacy of the bhakti poets, whose devotional songs Babu sang every evening. Emerging in northern India during the fifteenth century, the bhakti movement marked a turn away from asceticism toward a more emotionally charged form of worship that found expression in poetry and music. One of the most celebrated of the early devotional poets and singers was Surdas, who, according to legend, was blind from birth. Born in the late fifteenth century, Surdas is revered as one of the ashtasakha, the eight poets credited with creating most of the lyrical repertoire of the Pushtimarg sect, which is also known as the Vallabh Sampradaya after its founder, Vallabhacharya. Followers of the Pushtimarg worship Krishna, and the sect developed a well-preserved musical tradition.
Central to the Pushtimarg is the daily worship of an icon of Krishna, often as Shrinathji, one of the god’s many manifestations. I was somewhat familiar with the Pushtimarg tradition, not only because of Babu’s singing of bhajans but also because, even though the sect originated in Vrindavan, one of its most famous temples was in Rajasthan. The one notorious iconoclast among the otherwise temperate Mughal emperors was Aurangzeb, who ruled in the second half of the seventeenth century. So, in 1672, fearful for the safety of their venerable icon of Krishna, the Pushtimarg faithful undertook to move it some four hundred miles southwest, where it was installed in the now famous Shrinathji temple at Nathdwara, not far from Udaipur.
The Pushtimarg was known for its custom of nitya kirtan, or endless chanting, referring to the continuous daily round of worship, or seva, service to god, with devotional songs accompanying every ritual observance. Drawing on both local folk and classical forms, the adherents of this sect developed a rich musical tradition called the Haveli Sangeet, partially preserving an ancient musical form, the dhrupad, in the process. Since the time of Surdas, the uninterrupted transmission of the Haveli Sangeet had ensured the survival of a medieval musical tradition. Before the end of my first year at Banasthali, with my supervisor’s approval, I was developing a research proposal to explore the role of the ashtasakha poet-singers in preserving the musical traditions of the day.
Summer break took me home to news of the latest violence in the Naxalbari region of West Bengal, where a peasant uprising had been in progress for several months. Poor sharecroppers, backed by Communist Party workers, had seized land and had repeatedly clashed with wealthy landlords protected by armed police. A village inspector had been murdered, and now police had opened fire on a group of peasants, killing nine adults and two children.
In the meanwhile, Zakir Husain had been sworn in as India’s third president, and Amma wanted Babu to write an editorial for Praja Sandesh about the appointment of a Muslim as a boost to Indian secularism. But Babu’s focus was firmly on the uprising in Naxalbari. “This is what happens,” he declared, “when political independence stops short of social revolution. Colonial masters are eliminated only to be replaced by a homegrown set of rulers, whose goal is to preserve their own privilege. The result is a bunch of half-hearted land reforms that serve to create a new class of absentee landlords who find ways to evict tenant farmers.”
Amma agreed that land reform had been a slow process, especially in the eastern parts of the country, where feudal traditions ran deep. But she could not condone the violence. Babu argued that, in this case, such reservations merely denied the dispossessed the only real source of power available to them. “Can you blame the poor for resorting to violence? For not wanting to wait another century for genuine reform?”
Amma quoted Gandhiji: “There are many causes I am prepared to die for. There is not a single cause I would kill for.”
Babu countered, “Gandhiji also said that if the choice is between cowardice and violence, ‘I would advise violence.’”
I disliked listening to my parents argue, so I decided I’d rather go play with Neelu. He had grown into a handsome and rather large dog, weighing just over 30 kilograms and spoiled rotten. With a long, bushy tail and his indigo eyes hidden behind a tawny veil of coarse fur, Neelu needed regular brushing, but he wouldn’t allow anyone near him with a brush except me. He had been trained not to go into the kitchen, much to Mangi bai’s relief, but he stood like a vicious sentinel at Babu’s doorway once Babu’s food was served. He was equally fierce when it came to his own food bowl, which nobody other than Amma, Babu, or me could approach.
Neelu seemed to me like protector and destroyer rolled into one. He was a boisterous, playful, overgrown puppy who let me do anything to him and often sat on Babu’s lap, however uncomfortable for man or dog. When Amma was at home, he rarely let her out of his sight, trailing after her like a bodyguard. He understood that the ground floor was Shafiji’s domain and was prepared to be totally submissive, but this tolerance ended the moment that Shafiji came upstairs. And if Neelu ever wandered out of the house, he would aggressively chase after anything that moved, completely stopping traffic in our narrow street. Aside from the three of us, no one could touch him without eliciting a deep, threatening growl followed by a warning snap of his powerful jaws. Neelu had not yet bitten anyone, but I was terrified that one day he would.
All the same, I adored Neelu, and I loved playing with him on the terrace. His loud, joyous barks echoed throughout the house, when his strong jaws weren’t tugging at a toy in my hands. A few nicks and scratches seemed a small price to pay.
After I returned to school in the fall, I began my field research, which Professor Deodhar and I had agreed would be conducted primarily at the Shrinathji temple in Nathdwara. Amma had already spoken on my behalf to people she knew who had some connection with the town, including Rajasthan’s chief minister of state, Mohan Lal Sukhadia, whose family home was in Nathdwara. Amma also accompanied me on my first trip there, armed with letters of introduction. After meeting a number of politicians, as well as temple priests, I was eventually allowed to see original palm-leaf manuscripts containing song lyrics and early Pichhwai paintings depicting musical performances.
I felt deeply grateful, as I knew I might be the first outsider ever to see these manuscripts, which had been preserved by the same priestly family for generations. Although my access to the manuscripts was initially somewhat restricted, I was given unlimited permission to attend temple ceremonies. These were different for each of the eight subdivisions of a day, and the songs that accompanied them were supplemented by an additional musical repertoire that marked the numerous festivals associated with events in Krishna’s life.
My first task was to transcribe the verses sung in the Shrinathji temple. My research seemed to be off to an aupicious start when the head priest invited me to lead the singing of a kirtan one evening—a call-and-response form of devotional song common in the Pushtimarg tradition. He confirmed that I was indeed the first woman, and a non-Brahman at that, to have received such an honour, at least in his lifetime. It would take more than a few trips to Nathdwara over the course of the next several months, however, before I could correlate my collection with the available scholarly literature on the topic and complete my analysis. I was especially interested in the association of ragas with specific emotional states, and I hoped to explore the relationship between the performers’ reverence for music and their devotion to Krishna.
JAIPUR, 1968
Kamala mausi was dead. Pratap bhaiya and Kanti bhabhi’s regular letters had been conveying reassuring news of Kamala mausi’s health, which seemed to remain steady. Her own long, erratic letters told a different story, however, of the stifling, self-imposed silence of a caged spirit. The opinionated and independent Kamala mausi was a poor fit in the socially compliant life of her daughter—a young mother of three children who kept the peace at all costs, even if it meant sacrificing her own career, her personal comfort, and even her principles. Kanti bhabhi’s conformist choices were a constant reminder to Kamala mausi of her own willfulness and rebellion, and she felt the contrast acutely.
Kamala mausi wrote long letters addressed to both Amma and Babu, in which she expressed doubts about the wisdom of her audacity in going against the flow. Amma and Babu discussed these letters and wrote equally long replies, reminding her that audacity leads to creativity, without which the individual and the society stop evolving. Again and again, Kamala mausi would lament her decision to break from tradition—refusing to accept her fate as a young widow, charting her own course, and ultimately finding a lonely, uncertain future. Babu would remind her that we learn making from breaking, and Amma would ask what would remain to define us if we never veered from the expected path.
Now there would be no more letters. I was home on a visit, and Amma, Babu, and I were sitting around the desk in Babu’s office, reliving these conversations, rereading the telegram that had so bluntly announced the death of a woman whose life had been part of our own, and then waiting for the long-distance call to Wardha to connect. When the call went through, Kanti bhabhi was in shock, but Pratap bhaiya was at least able to speak. He haltingly explained that Kamala mausi had disappeared a few nights before. They had searched and searched for her and had finally found her unconscious in the forest of teak trees a few kilometres outside the town, not far from the Dham River. She had died within hours of being brought home. He could not understand why Kamala mausi would do such a thing. Physically, she had been stable, but she was fragile. She must have known that she was courting death by wandering so far in the chilly night. They were not even sure how she had managed to walk such a distance.
Babu could not bear the thought of facing the grieving family. It was pointless, he argued, to go all the way to Wardha when the funeral rites were already over. But Amma began making preparations to go. She was determined to make the trip, even if it meant changing trains several times and travelling in unreserved coaches.
After Amma returned from Wardha, her blood pressure was high again. I was worried about her, so I brought my research notes home to Jaipur, where I hoped to continue my work by focusing on the secondary literature that I needed to read, temporarily suspending my field trips to Nathdwara. Thus it was that I returned home from one particularly long day at the University of Rajasthan library to be startled by the sight of a bearded old man asleep on the divan in the drawing room. He sat up with a cat-like fluidity of movement as I entered the room and then smiled impishly. “Years of living in prison does this to you. How are you, Rekha?”
Babu joined us in the drawing room. “Rekhu, this is Pandit Parmanandji of Jhansi, my param mitra.”
I had never heard Babu refer to anyone as his “dearest friend.” Babu then explained that Parmanandji had been arrested in Lahore for his role in the 1914–15 Ghadar Conspiracy and had been imprisoned for a total of nearly thirty years, seven of which he spent in one of the tiny cells of the Kala Pani jail in the faraway Andaman Islands. I had read about the dreaded prison complex in my history books. The British had been exiling allegedly dangerous political prisoners to the Andamans since the time of the Indian Rebellion of 1857 and had constructed the so-called cellular jail at the turn of the century. Its seven three-storey wings radiated out in straight lines from a watchtower, a design based on Jeremy Bentham’s concept of the panopticon. It had almost seven hundred cells, in which prisoners were kept in solitary confinement—when they were not forced to labour in conditions so harsh that some of them died.
His years in Kala Pani had not broken Parmanandji’s spirit, however. Pandit Parmanandji was freed in 1937, but his incendiary public speeches continued to land him back in jail all the way up to the eve of independence.
He now divided his time between Jhansi and Delhi, when he wasn’t travelling across the country connecting with old comrades. Babu reminded me that Parmanandji had been a guest at Didi’s wedding, but I had little memory of the hundreds of guests who attended, given the chaos of hosting, organizing, laughing, and crying that had accompanied the several days of festivities.
Parmanandji’s eyes beamed bright in his gaunt face as he smiled from Babu to me. I was intrigued. “How do you know each other?” They exchanged a meaningful look before Babu continued his story.
“We met in 1940. I had just moved to Wardha and returned one evening to find this dishevelled man lying on my bed in my straw hut. I was about to scold him for appropriating the bed without my permission, but then realized that it was Pandit Parmanandji. We have been friends ever since.”
“But how did you know who he was? Did you know him from before?” I wanted to know more. Unlike the detailed descriptions of Amma’s eventful life that had filtered through her writings and other people’s recountings, glimpses of Babu’s past were extremely rare, and rather opaque.
But Babu was not prepared to give up any more information. “Are you going to keep interrogating me or make sure that our guest has something to eat?”
I returned from the kitchen with a tray full of snacks and hot tea for everyone. Parmanandji asked me what I did and took great interest in my research topic. Amma was not home yet, which was not unusual. At the mention of Amma, Parmanandji smiled and said something startling: “If I had known that Prakashwati would change her mind about marriage, I would have waited. And you, sweet girl, would have been my own daughter.”
His remark made me deeply uncomfortable, but it also sparked the memory of a train ride many years ago, when Amma had mentioned a persistent admirer who inundated her with ardent letters entreating her to marry him. Could this be the same man? I was offended by his depiction of my Amma as the object of carnal desire, but Babu merely sat unperturbed, sipping his tea. The two soon struck up a spirited conversation about the Vietnam War and the recent assassination of the American civil rights leader, Martin Luther King, Jr., both men evidently oblivious to my discomfort.
As he did every year on 21 August, Professor Deodhar marked the anniversary of the death of his illustrious teacher, Pandit Paluskar, with a concert that drew an impressive gathering of musicians and scholars whom the two teachers had mentored over the years. It was on this occasion, as I savoured the opportunity to hear some of my favourite classical ragas performed with exquisite emotional depth and technical mastery, that I learned about my research supervisor’s plans to retire. He would be turning sixty-seven in the coming year and intended to move back to Bombay. I was upset, since his impending departure meant that Banasthali would no longer be in a position to offer a doctorate, unless someone could be found to replace him. My anxiety subsided a bit when he told me that by the time I was ready to submit my thesis, the department of music at the University of Rajasthan would no doubt have introduced its long-awaited doctoral program, and I would be able to finish my degree there. He also agreed to continue to supervise my research to completion, but I was left to wonder about the cost of repeated excursions to Bombay.
There was a nominal tuition fee at Banasthali, which covered the simple accommodations and meals. But my frequent field trips, numerous extracurricular activities, and recurrent trips to Jaipur added up to a substantial figure each month. I thought it might be more than half my mother’s monthly salary, but I didn’t know for sure since Amma refused to discuss the cost of my education or the financial health of our household. Whenever I tried to ask, Amma just told me to focus on my studies and enjoy the privileges of being a student.
Now, however, faced with the prospect of this additional travel expense, I asked Amma’s permission to find some part-time employment, perhaps offering private tutoring to junior students. Amma looked hurt at my suggestion. “Do you no longer trust your mother to look after your needs?”
“How can you say that?” I countered. “I think I’m old enough to lend a helping hand.”
This time Amma raised an eyebrow with a smile. “Ah, you must have grown up overnight. Suddenly I am discussing family finances with my younger daughter!”
I was embarrassed to realize that I had never before wondered how Amma was able to afford the expense of raising Didi and me, as well as helping Babu set up the press, to say nothing of paying for Didi’s wedding and continuing to support my education. The sporadic income from the press was mostly managed by Shafiji, but I knew that it was often absorbed by the press’s running costs, if not sucked dry by Babu’s charity. I had only seen Amma make out cheques for repairs to the press and other such unforeseen needs; never had I seen any money travelling in the other direction.
Feeling somewhat guilty, I asked Amma to reconsider, but she determinedly rejected the idea. “I do not want anything to distract you from completing your degree. Finish your doctorate, and then use it for the advancement of knowledge. You can find employment at any point in your life. But the opportunity to inhabit the abode of Saraswati comes once in a lifetime. I don’t want you to squander it by worrying about trivial concerns such as money—not as long as your mother is alive.”
I was not convinced that money actually was inconsequential in our household, but the hurt in Amma’s eyes and the resolve in her voice stopped me from arguing any further. Instead, I began mentally to review ways I might be able to cut back on my extracurricular activities, reduce my trips between Banasthali and Jaipur, and use my field trips more efficiently.
Didi’s visits to Jaipur had been growing shorter and fewer as the year went on. Jijaji’s beloved project had suffered a major setback: his project manager has absconded with a large amount of cash that was meant for the construction of the factory. Unbeknownst to Jijaji, the manager had also incurred huge debts on the company account. Now creditors were contacting Thakur saheb, which offended him deeply, and he was preparing to sell a section of their farmland to settle the various debts.
Amma was grateful that Jijaji’s family was not holding Didi responsible for their ill luck or for not producing an heir yet. Thakur saheb continued to blame the ancient curse for Didi’s infertility and the evil eye of enemies for their financial misfortunes. He sought the help of a variety of priests and ascetics, who performed prayers and ceremonies of appeasement on his behalf.
In the meanwhile, there appeared to be little outward change in Didi and Jijaji’s routine of clubbing, marathon card games, and parties. But, in her phone calls and letters, Didi increasingly mentioned social causes. She was becoming more involved in local charitable trusts and boards that ran orphanages and educational institutions in Dhar. Amma was pleased, but she was much less comfortable with the recurring references to the performance of rituals designed to placate troublesome planets.
On her brief and hurried visits to Jaipur, Didi said nothing about her situation. But I noticed the way she avoided other people’s children and the longing in her eyes at the mention of anything related to a baby, and I heard the hushed whispers at social gatherings referring to her as baanjh, sterile. I wished I could hug away her sadness. It seemed to me so very unfair.
JAIPUR, 1969–70
By the time the new year began, I had resumed my field trips to Nathdwara, although I returned from them to Jaipur rather than to Banasthali. I was, as ever, concerned about Amma’s health, and, as I explained to her, the books I needed to consult were more readily available in Jaipur’s numerous libraries than at the college. My former regime of picnics in the parks and walks through nearby woodlands had thus been replaced by transcribing, reading, writing, and organizing copious amounts of notes, with an older and more sedate Neelu by my side.
My labours were briefly broken by a visit from someone Amma had known since her Wardha days. At the time that Didi was born, Maitreyi didi—our visitor—was a little girl living with her parents at Gandhiji’s ashram. After India’s independence, Maitreyi didi’s family moved back to their ancestral house in Jharia, in southeastern Bihar. Amma had a special place in her heart for Maitreyi didi and her departed parents, whom she regarded as among her many teachers and mentors, and they had kept in touch all these years.
On this particular visit, Maitreyi didi was on a mission. She had recently been introduced to a young man, now in his early thirties, who was, she told Amma, absolutely the ideal match for her bookworm of a daughter. He was the chief liaison officer at one of the mining operations in Dhanbad, and she had met him through a common acquaintance. She was terribly impressed by his exquisite manners and by the fact that he had an MBA from the Xavier Labour Relations Institute, one of the premier business management schools in the country. And he was very handsome.
Maitreyi didi always talked in a tone somewhere between bullying and imploring; her voice rose urgently when she got excited. This time, Amma listened to her rousing description in apparently indifferent silence until Maitreyi didi mentioned that the young man hailed from a zamindar family in Lahana, a small village in western Bihar. This piece of information sparked a comment about the persistence of feudalism in India, which escalated into a heated discussion. Amma pointed out that, despite the formal abolition of the zamindari system, large tracts of farmland remained under the control of landlords, especially in the eastern states of Bihar, Orissa, and West Bengal, where feudalism was deeply entrenched—a situation that was already fuelling outbreaks of violence. Witness the violence in Naxalbari two years earlier, with angry peasants forcibly seizing land. As for Bihar, she argued, the entire state remained stubbornly immured in paternalistic attitudes that had not budged in centuries. Maitreyi didi retorted that, when it came to clinging to outmoded traditions, Rajasthan was no better. Not only was purdah still quite a common practice there, but widows were occasionally coerced into committing sati.
Maitreyi didi continued to press her case for the young man, pointing out that his family’s caste matched our own—hastening to add that this was merely a lucky coincidence—and noting that the family had at one time enjoyed the patronage of the local Maharaja. Finally, fed up with her relentless badgering, Amma snapped, “I would rather push my daughter into a well than consider a marriage proposal from a zamindar family in Bihar.” Not one to back down, Maitreyi didi angrily pointed out that Amma was herself married to someone from a landholding family in Bihar. Then she chided Amma for judging the young man without even having bothered to meet him. He was not, she said, what his family background might suggest.
I sat in the dining room trying to concentrate on my notes while noise of this wrangling continued to rise and fall from Amma’s room. I was almost certain that this proposal could not be serious. These days, I was far more concerned about the departure of Professor Deodhar from Banasthali than I was about finding a husband—not least because, as I was painfully well aware, in the absence of a hefty dowry I was hardly the ideal bridal candidate. Despite myself, when I looked in the mirror, I still saw someone who was dark-skinned and too thin and wore glasses to read and paint.
True, I had had some suitors, mainly brothers or cousins of past and current girlfriends, who had sent messengers or notes to declare their admiration. Their interest had surprised me, and sometimes it made me feel flattered, but, rather than take it to heart, I had mostly felt annoyed by their attention.
Cinematic romance, I had come to understand, was a lie. Parks and gardens were spaces to cross quickly if you were alone, not places in which enraptured lovers break into song and dance. The movie paramour promises the sun and the moon, but I knew why movies always ended with the glorious wedding. I saw how the married lives of my friends consisted of the heat of cooking fires and the coldness of unrelenting domestic routine. Didi and Jijaji’s sweet courtship had lasted only until the marriage, before solidifying into what seemed like a well-oiled business relationship between two partners working on different projects. If there was any love in the joylessness of Amma and Babu’s relationship, it was very well hidden.
I often thought of Amma’s conversation with Gandhiji about the need for marriage. If she had not given into the pressure of those she idolized, there would be no husband to insult her in front of her colleagues. No family obligations would have prevented her from pursuing her calling—her desire to fight for justice and equality and to stand up for ordinary people in the corridors of power. There would have been no daughters to worry about. Amma could have actually been happy.
Instead, although her high blood pressure seemed to be under control, I wistfully noticed the exhaustion set permanently in Amma’s eyes. When Babu hadn’t temporarily vanished, he clung to his regimented routine. The two of them continued on, like parallel tracks of a lumbering long-distance train, never meeting, never arriving, forever condemned to each other’s company.
Much as part of me still longed to believe in romance, what I saw around me always brought me back to earth. Yet there I was, just a few months later, living out a scene from a movie. Although it hadn’t been easy, Maitreyi didi had finally persuaded Amma to consider the match, and now I was talking to a charming young man in my parents’ drawing room. His wide forehead, I noticed, was furrowed with gentle lines as he made hesitant small talk about the beauty of the walled city. He remarked on how close our home was to the LMB Hotel, where he was staying. His name was Bir Bahadur Prasad Sinha, but, with a boyish grin, he said that I could call him B.P.
This suggestion caught me off guard. I bent down to stroke Neelu’s relaxed but attentive head, leaning against my leg, and to consider this delicate question. Although Amma was an exception in this regard, very rarely did wives address their husbands by name. To do so would be to acknowledge the existence of intimacy. Nor could I imagine using someone’s name without adding ji or some other honorific. Even Amma appended saheb to Babu’s surname—which, by coincidence, was also Sinha. After struggling for several long moments to balance the force of tradition with my urge to challenge convention, I decided simply to follow her example, despite the odd parallel. And so I explained that, in view of the ten-year age gap between us, the informality of “B.P.” made me somewhat uncomfortable, and I would prefer to address him as “Sinha saheb.” I tried hard to sound nonchalant, but my stomach was in knots and my throat drier than the Thar Desert.
Sinha saheb seemed to me even more attractive in person than in the photograph left behind by Maitreyi didi. He peppered his schoolbook Hindi with English words, which made him seem quite cosmopolitan. I gathered that, especially with the land reforms of the post-independence era, his formerly powerful zamindar family no longer had much land to lord over. An illustrious ancestor, Dewan Rai Bahadur Jai Prakash Lal, was once the chief minister of the Maharaja of Dumraon and was credited with establishing several public institutions in the Maharaja’s name in the late nineteenth century. But, after the Maharaja died, the family fell out of favour with the royals. Their fortunes slowly dwindled, and their estate in Lahana was now limited to an orchard and a one-hundred-year-old mansion with a doorway big enough to allow an elephant to pass through.
Sinha saheb explained that he had three brothers, two older and one younger, as well as an older sister and a younger sister. Their father, Bindeshwari Prasad, had been his parents’ eldest son and so claimed first rights to the ancestral property, but he was a rigid, domineering man and had managed the estate poorly. Sinha saheb’s uncle, Gupteshwar Prasad—the first in the family to leave the ancestral home—had encouraged Sinha saheb to emerge from the circle of shadow in which his highly traditional father lived and had supported his education, first in Varanasi, then in Patna, and finally in Jamshedpur, at the Xavier Labour Relations Institute. Much to his father’s disapproval, Sinha saheb had charted his own course, joining a major coal mining company in Dhanbad as a liaison officer. For the past several years, he had been successfully dodging the marital alliances proposed by concerned family members.
I wanted to ask why he was interested in me. Instead, my mouth formed a question about his views on women who aspire to professional careers. Sinha saheb did not miss a beat, reassuring me that the accident of his birth had not tied him to any antiquated social ideas about a woman’s place. His family had yet to accept his quest for an equal partner rather than a compliant wife with a big dowry. That was one of the reasons why he would not let anyone else represent him. Maitreyi didi, I thought, had prepared him well.
Throughout our conversation, I was perched on the edge of my wicker chair, never comfortable leaning against its broad, rounded back. Neelu had parked himself protectively between me and the stranger. Sinha saheb sat on the adjacent divan, knees crossed, fingers interlocked above his top knee, a picture of poise. In order not to appear insolent, I made eye contact only when I spoke. As Sinha saheb talked in his deliberate way, my eyes mostly fixed on the fulcrum of his lean fingers. I compared their much lighter skin tone to the dark skin of my long fingers, half-hidden in my lap. I averted my eyes from this reminder of my darkness, glancing to his black penny loafers and his narrow pant leg with its sharp crease.
When he spoke of how much he enjoyed travelling, making new connections with people and places, rather than bearing the tedious burden of family obligations and social expectations, I looked up briefly, to agree with a quick nod. That was when I noticed the slight curve in his otherwise straight nose—from a football injury long ago, he explained, as a glint of pride made his eyes sparkle. His deep-set eyes were almond-shaped, so unlike my slightly hooded eyelids. His gentle reassuring gaze made my heart pound oddly faster. I dared not look at his lips.
For this awkward mutual interview, we had been left alone in the drawing room. Yet we were surrounded on all sides by human activity—the sound of people talking and walking, the muffled clatter of elaborate preparations in the kitchen, the clanking of the busy press on the floor below.
When I asked him about his university studies, Sinha saheb’s response was short and matter-of-fact, but when he asked about my research topic I became animated, passionate, articulate, and confident. I was at home in this territory. Sinha saheb genuinely appeared to enjoy my verbosity, interrupting only briefly to acknowledge his recognition of a musical tradition or composer’s name. I was pleasantly surprised by the extent of his familiarity with classical musical traditions.
Amma’s footfall sounded particularly loud as she paused on the other side of the drawing room curtain before entering the room and asking us to join everyone in the dining room for some snacks.
Milky tea, infused with spices, accompanied my favourite winter sweets—almond barfi, sesame gajak, gwarpatha laddu—and spicy savouries freshly made by Mangi bai, including dal kachori and moong pakori. Didi, who had come to Jaipur especially for the occasion, graciously helped to serve food. This was the first marriage proposal for me that arrived at the stage of a face-to-face meeting. I wasn’t sure whether anybody had expected things to progress this far, least of all me.
Babu had joined us in the dining room, but he sat quietly in a corner with his eyes closed, his back ramrod straight and his long arms resting in his lap. Maitreyi didi’s husband, who had accompanied Sinha saheb from Dhanbad to make formal introductions, ate with admirable gusto, clearly enjoying the hospitality. Sinha saheb politely attempted to refuse endless offers of more food, while I self-consciously toyed with the lone sweet on my plate. Amma was not eating at all, just watching the proceedings with slightly furrowed brows.
When it was clear that no more food could be piled onto our guest’s plate, Amma picked up her cup of tea. “Bhaiya, in my experience, marriage is the end of the aspirations of many gifted and educated girls in our society. My bitiya here has been working very hard to leave the prison of her parent’s home. But I am not sure she knows what that freedom will look like.”
I squirmed uncomfortably, embarrassed by Amma’s frankness, and was thankful for Didi’s interjection. “Our Rekha will be the first in the family to earn a doctorate. Our Amma is worried about any break in her education.”
Sinha saheb assured us that travelling to Bombay from Dhanbad would be even easier than getting there from Jaipur, as the train service was better.
“My worry is not for the means,” said Amma, “but for the will to continue.”
Sinha saheb’s next words made me stare at him. “If your daughter has the will, I will find a way.” His face wore an earnest expression, unperturbed under Amma’s gaze.
My heart jumped into my mouth. Slow down you fool. Keep your head clear. Don’t get so taken by this total stranger so quickly.
Amma sounded unsure. “I raised my daughters to be self-reliant individuals and nurtured their many talents. But I must warn you, Rekha’s knowledge of cooking and housekeeping is largely theoretical.”
“I am looking for a life partner,” Sinha saheb responded, “not a cook.”
Didi hastily added a word about how quickly she had learned to supervise the bustling kitchen in her husband’s home. I could attest to Didi’s swift and thorough transformation into a domestic goddess. But I could not see that happening to me.
Amma looked equally unconvinced. “It is easy to be idealistic when you are young and independent. What about your family’s expectations from a daughter-in-law?”
Sinha saheb solemnly declared his well-established status as the renegade son who lived his life on his own terms.
There were no more direct questions and answers. Curious and concerned, Jain saheb had joined the little party in the dining room. He had struck up an easy conversation with Maitreyi didi’s husband, even drawing in Babu by asking him to explain the history of this or that in Jaipur. The inherent awkwardness of such a visit was gradually overtaken by an easy bonhomie, accompanied by rounds of tea until it was time for supper. I held back on my own involvement in the conversations, my heart intent on the moments when Sinha saheb spoke a few short, polite sentences.
Following this visit, Maitreyi didi and her husband went to Dhanbad to inspect Sinha saheb’s house and to meet his uncle Gupteshwar and his family. When she phoned us afterwards, she could not stop talking about the warmth and courteousness with which they had been received. After hearing an account of his nephew’s meeting with me, accompanied by photographs of the prospective bride, Gupteshwar chacha had approved the match. He had also promised to speak to his older brother, Sinha saheb’s father, about the wedding.
It thus came as no surprise to us when, within two weeks of Maitreyi didi’s phone call, a letter arrived for Babu from Sinha saheb’s father. However, the contents of the letter were utterly unexpected: the writer formally introduced himself as the groom’s father, described the family’s high social standing and Sinha saheb’s advanced qualifications, and then included a long list of goods that he, as the head of the family, considered worthy of the proposed matrimonial alliance. Of course, no mention was made of the word “dowry.” Rather, the quantities of jewellery and other valuables intended for the groom and his family were merely gifts that would earn honour for the bride and the family of her birth.
“What were you thinking?” Babu angrily threw the letter toward Amma and stormed out of the house. Amma did not resist when I took the letter from her. As I read it, I became more livid with each line.
Amma looked puzzled. “I have never been such a poor judge of character. The young man sounded so earnest and honest about his progressive views. How could he possibly think that gold and silver can measure a person’s worth?”
A short while later, she was on the phone with Maitreyi didi, reading the letter aloud to her. Maitreyi didi was convinced that Sinha saheb could not possibly know anything about the letter, but Amma dismissed her protests and told her to call the whole thing off.
I fixed my eyes on the floor, trying to contain a burning mixture of incandescent anger and inconsolable grief. With a deep sigh, Amma put a calming hand on my head. “He seemed so perfect for my bright little girl.”
I did not want Amma to see my angry tears. “Maybe it’s for the best, Amma.”
“Maybe,” Amma said uncertainly. Not knowing what else to do, we retreated into our lonely rooms, hoping to find sanctuary of some sort in a world of books—inanimate objects, incapable of wounding us.
I jumped out of bed as the shrill ringing of the phone reverberated through the silent house. It was five in the morning. A phone call at such a time surely meant bad news.
“Mr. Sinha, calling from Patna,” the operator announced. My anger pumped blood into my ears. I was preparing to give him a furious lecture before slamming the phone down on him. But all I could manage was a throaty “Hello.”
My pulse quickened at the sound of his voice. “Surekhaji, please listen—give me a moment to explain. Maitreyi didi phoned me about the letter your parents received from my father. I had no idea he had sent it. I drove all night to see him. I wrote him a blank cheque, and I told him he could use it to buy whatever he wants. I can promise you that this will be the end of it. There will be no demands for dowry from my family.”
Amma was standing in the doorway of her room looking at me quizzically. Now she took the phone out of my unsteady hand with a stern “Who’s this?” She listened to Sinha saheb intently for the next few minutes, then ended the call with a brief but pointed account of the pain his father’s letter had caused, especially to me. It had, she said, revealed an unpleasant truth about the family into which her daughter would be marrying.
She stared at the phone for a while after the call was disconnected, then said to no one in particular, “We will see how this goes.”
It took several more phone calls, both from Sinha saheb and from Gupteshwar chacha, to convince Amma that Sinha saheb was as pained by his father’s attitudes as we were and that he would do everything in his power to shield me from any further distress. Her confidence more than restored, Amma happily declared that Sinha saheb was indeed “solid gold.” And I was happy to agree. Babu did not object to the proposed marriage. Tears filled my eyes when he proclaimed his faith in his daughter’s ability to handle whatever came her way.
Our wedding date was set for the day after my twenty-fourth birthday, less than five months away.
I was discovering new meanings in songs from old movies. Verses woven around the sweet pangs of separation and longing felt like they were written for me. A doting man drove well over seven hundred miles just to see me briefly. Sinha saheb brought a Philips reel-to-reel tape recorder as a gift on his visit in the New Year. It had state-of-the-art controls to improve the quality of recording; the sound quality was better than I had ever heard from such a small machine. He taught me to operate the tape recorder by asking me to sing. He said he wanted to keep a recording of my songs to fill his lonely evenings with, until we were together.
In deference to Amma’s wishes we spent most of his short visit in the drawing room, where he asked me to sing or to tell him about the progress I was making with my research. He was a man of few words, so I happily did most of the talking, trying with my lively chatter to drown my thudding heart. Sinha saheb had won over every member of the household except for pouty Neelu. He stopped growling at Sinha saheb after I scolded him, but he physically wedged himself between us whenever we are alone.
I was the last one of my friends to be engaged to be married. Most had been married long since; some were already rearing multiple children. Our lives barely intersected except for boisterous social occasions where we met warmly, briefly. The only exception was my friend Karuna, who was also enrolled in a doctoral program.
Since her own marriage, Karuna had been dividing her time between her parental house in Jaipur and her husband’s house in Delhi. Our long visits had been replaced by long phone calls and letters, but our bond remained the same. Since she was spending more time in Jaipur at present, trying to finish her dissertation during her first pregnancy, Amma enlisted her to chaperone us should Sinha saheb wish to plan a movie or dinner date some evening.
But Sinha saheb had other ideas. He asked my permission and help to plan an excursion, affectionately insisting that Amma and Babu accompany us. Babu’s outings were never social events, so he refused our request resolutely and rather rudely, as I thought he would. Amma, however, gave in to my entreaties with mild amusement. So we went for a picnic in the Nahargarh Fort Hills, with Amma, Karuna, Jain saheb, Mangi bai, and Shafiji.
After a vigorous walk around in the sprawling fort, we settled in the mild winter sun near the edge of the massive baoli, or stepwell. Amma asked me to sing a bhajan. Then Karuna and Sinha saheb took turns asking me to sing songs from Hindi films. Sinha saheb made appropriately sedate requests for classical songs, but, with a mischievous twinkle in her eye, Karuna chose romantic songs laced with seductive innuendo.
I was spared further embarrassment by the appearance of Mangi bai’s potato-stuffed parathas and spicy mango pickle, complemented by hot tea in flasks and sweets from the market. After our delicious meal, Jain saheb and Shafiji animatedly acquainted Sinha saheb with the landmarks of Jaipur, visible from the lofty heights of our picnic spot. Amma was watching Sinha saheb with an approving smile. Karuna tugged at my braid playfully. “You are actually enjoying this family-friendly style of romance!”
I stuck my tongue out at her, but my heart did not stop singing.
My last field trip to Nathdwara felt like an auspicious ending. It was spring, and the most colourful festival of the Hindu calendar, Holi, was celebrated for a whole month in the temple town. The white marble temples, with statues clad in white silk and many attendees in snowy-white clothing, bore unmistakable marks of the celebration of Krishna’s mischievous side. Clouds of colourful gulal, a powder made from fragrant dried flowers, sandalwood, and ground roots, were flung at devotees during the festival, speckling everything in joyful shades of pink, yellow, and green. I recorded two full days of narrative songs and kirtans rendered in classical ragas, celebrating the various moods and activities of Krishna, eight times a day.
Armed with these treasures, I then returned to Jaipur to work on the draft of my dissertation. I locked my room to shut out the world, but the distraction was within. It was hard to stay focused on my work, to not give in to daydreaming. I would wait for Sinha saheb’s phone calls, and then I would think about our conversations long after we had stopped talking. These sometimes scratchy long-distance calls came frequently, and our conversations were often filled with long companionable silences and sighs. I protested sometimes that he need not make these expensive calls so regularly, while secretly wishing that he would call every day.
Meanwhile, Amma and Shafiji embarked on the wedding preparations. As expected, Babu remained disinterested. Sinha saheb had requested a small and simple celebration without any dowry. Since final exams would be finished by mid-April, the trustees of Amma’s school had given her permission to use the school building for the wedding and for guest accommodations as well. The catering, decorations, and music arrangements were the same as for Didi’s wedding, but my trousseau was larger, since both Amma and Didi were contributing to it.
Despite all these distractions, I managed to finish writing the first complete draft of my dissertation: three hundred pages of description and analysis in eight chapters. After I posted the bulky tome to Professor Deodhar’s address in Bombay, it hit me hard that the life I had known so far was about to change irrevocably. I had not yet completed my doctorate. I still had to navigate the process of transferring my degree program to the University of Rajasthan and finding a new supervisor there. But Professor Deodhar had made good on his promise to oversee my fieldwork, and that was the heart of my dissertation, which was now awaiting his feedback. It could take several months, he had said on the phone. I was disappointed at first, but then I realized that it might be for the best. I was leaving my whole world behind for a total stranger, and I would need time to adjust to living with a husband.
That was when Amma found me sitting in the dusty library on the terrace, crying. She kissed my forehead, her tears mingling with mine. “You will be fine,” she kept repeating, as the dusk gave way to darkness. “We will be fine.”
The stars were exceptionally bright on this moonless night. Amma pointed to the saptarsi constellation, the seven sages in the sky, guardians of eternal knowledge. “Whenever I will see them in the sky, I will believe that my sweet daughter is watching the same corner of the sky at that very moment.” I held my mother’s hand and promised to return to Jaipur as soon as I could.
Amma regained her pragmatic composure. “Of course not! You need to build your new life, a new home with a loving and wise man. I can see that he sees you for who you are, adores you for who you are. I am so proud of you both. I have never been happier.”
We stared into the dark bowl of stars that blinked away above our heads. Amma mused, “What’s seven hundred miles? They are sending missions to the moon and to Mars. Surely we can manage this short distance.”
My heart had two halves, one as sad as the other one was happy.
DHANBAD, 1970
I have few clear memories of the days just before the wedding. All I remember is being tired, exuberant, poised, nervous, happy, and sad, all at the same time. Once again, out-of-town guests started arriving days in advance, but Didi and Jijaji were there to take over much of Amma’s burden of welcoming and looking after visitors. Two days before the wedding we moved to the school building, for complete immersion in elaborate rituals and raucous celebrations.
My body was painted with turmeric paste, and my hands and feet were adorned with henna. I had not slept much over the past several days, uncomfortable with all this attention being directed at me. The piercing music of the shehnai floated above a constant buzz of noise—men and women talking, laughing, singing, children running around. The fragrance of essential oils that permeated people’s clothing mingled with the sweet scent of the floral canopy over the wedding fires, both dizzily competing with heady aromas that wafted in from the kitchen.
I vaguely remember being dressed up from head to toe, the arrival of the small procession of Sinha saheb’s family and a few of their friends that was preceded by a brass band, the long parade of wedding guests to bless the bride and groom, the lengthy wedding ceremony in front of the sacred fire, the teary farewell from Amma and Didi, getting whisked away in a white Ambassador that was heavily laden with floral garlands and a canopy of suitcases on its roof, and the absence of Babu toward the end.
Two of Sinha saheb’s oldest nephews—Kunwar and Anil—sat in the front seat next to the driver. Sinha saheb sat in the back, between his younger sister and me. I held his hand and battled with sleep most of the way to Agra, our first night’s stop. There we were received with much warmth by Hari mama and Suman mami. The affectionate attention of everyone ruled out any possibility of privacy, but I was not complaining. I was happy with stolen glances, meaningful smiles, and spine-tingling accidental contact.
We made the obligatory trip to the Taj Mahal, with the whole entourage. The blistering heat of the white marble flooring made me ever so thankful that Didi, who had taken charge of my packing, had thought to include lightweight kota-doria and chiffon saris along with the heavy silk and brocade ones that I was expected to wear for the next several weeks.
By virtue of my marriage, I had earned a new series of relational epithets: one nephew called me mami, the other called me chachi, and my sister-in-law—Sinha saheb’s younger sister—called me bhabhi. She was youngest of the six children, but she was a couple of years older than me and already a mother of four.
With an endearing intimacy, Sinha saheb addressed me as “Rekhuji,” but I still couldn’t find an adequate equivalent for him. Some of his family called him “Munmun,” but this seemed too childish for a grown man. I tried out a number of variations on his name, but my tongue insisted on stumbling over any term that did not contain a respectful suffix. So, in the end, I decided that I would just continue to call him “Sinha saheb,” even when we were speaking to each other privately.
We drove from Agra to Kanpur the next day. A journey of well under two hundred miles took nearly the whole day, our progress slowed by narrow roads that shrank into rugged paths through the twisting ravines of the Chambal badlands, home to notorious bands of dacoits. Our otherwise alert driver did his best not to be distracted by the the two nephews in the front seat, who promptly invented a new game: spotting possible dacoit dens.
Finally, just before suppertime, we arrived in Kanpur, where Sinha saheb’s second eldest brother lived. He and his wife, Prabha didi, had been at the wedding but had returned to Kanpur ahead of us by train. Now she lovingly welcomed me into their home and on the next day replaced Anil, their son, in the car. Sinha saheb moved to the front seat to sit with his older sister’s son, Kunwar, while I shared the back with his youngest sister and Prabha didi, who liked to talk and giggle all the time, telling us jokes, asking us riddles, and generally being happy.
We reached Varanasi the next evening, just in time to witness the reverberation of hundreds of temple bells and conch shells in prayer along the mighty Ganga River. One of Sinha saheb’s college friends, Vijay bhaiya, was our host for the night. He lived with his wife and two young children in a brand new house, still surrounded by construction. Aside from my own, this was one of the few non-multi-generational households that I had encountered, and their home seemed remarkably spacious. There was no need to convert the drawing room into a dormitory-style guest bedroom or to hastily empty out a room for the newlyweds; instead, there were three whole spare rooms for our travelling party.
After supper, as everyone was getting ready to retire for the night, Vijay bhaiya broke out a celebratory bottle of scotch, fixed a drink for Sinha saheb, and teasingly invited me to join them. I suddenly realized that I had neglected to inquire about this particular detail. I turned to my husband and asked, “You drink?”
“Only socially,” said Sinha saheb.
Vijay bhaiya tried to make light of the situation. “Come on, bhabhi, my brother here is a modern man. We need to move with the times.”
“All right then,” I replied, as I reached for the drink he had made for Sinha saheb.
Vijay bhaiya was startled. “Actually,” he said, “I was just joking.”
“But why?” I asked. “Do you have different standards for modern men and women?”
Sinha saheb laughed. “What did I tell you, Vijay? Don’t just stand there. Mix her a drink.”
Vijay bhaiya handed me a tall glass of soda with a shot of whisky in it and did not take his eyes off me until I took a sip of the foul-smelling concoction, which I managed to do without sputtering. I could feel the cool liquid trace a warm path down my throat as I sat sedately next to Sinha saheb. He looked triumphant but whispered in my ear, “I promise—I hardly ever drink, and only to keep a friend company.”
Sinha saheb emptied his glass slowly. But when Vijay bhaiya filled it a second time, he nursed his drink for the remainder of the evening. A few sips of my own drink later, I was self-consciously checking to see whether my hands were steady—so far, so good. I could not bear to think what Amma or Babu would have to say about our intemperate ways.
The two friends had been reminiscing about their college days, and soon the conversation turned to music. Sinha saheb asked me to sing his favourite khyal. I protested that it was too late, and half the people in the house were already in bed. In response, Vijay bhaiya gathered the half of the household who were not yet in bed and also pulled out a set of tabla to accompany my singing. After the classical song that Sinha saheb had requested, I chose popular movie songs that everyone could join in on—except my dear husband. He could not hold a tune in a bucket; even his clapping was arrhythmic. But his eyes were fixed on me, and he did not stop smiling, which made me blush, especially when I sang Baiyan na dharo o balma, “Let go of my arm, my darling,” in which, as darkness gathers, a woman rather feebly protests when the man she loves tries to prevent her from returning home. As I sang, the room fell still. The music went on until far into the night, and we got only a few hours of sleep before continuing our journey east.
Leaving the bustling banks of Varanasi, we crossed an unbroken series of fertile farms that framed small clusters of straw huts or, sometimes, brick houses. It was lush and green with fields and orchards as far as you could see. I realized how much I had missed these tall, dense, and ancient trees of the east. The next leg of our journey took us to Lahana, Sinha saheb’s ancestral village, a little southwest of the point where the graceful Ganga meets the temperamental Son River.
Despite my familiarity with Maithili, I struggled to understand Bhojpuri, the language spoken in western Bihar. The only thing I knew about Bhojpuri was the legend of Lorik and Chanda, a popular folk story about an Ahir warrior, Lorik, who leaves his first wife to elope with a wealthy landlord’s beautiful daughter, Chanda. I had read the Hindavi version, Chandayan, written by the fourteenth-century Sufi poet Mulla Da’ud, which I had found in Amma and Babu’s eclectic collection of books. In Mulla Da’ud’s telling, the erotic entanglement of a man and two women was interpreted to represent the mystical relationship between God, the Sufi, and the world. But my literary knowledge was of no use when it came to deciphering Bhojpuri itself.
After driving several miles along what was essentially a path for bullock carts and foot traffic, our bumpy journey finally ended in front of a long wall broken by an imposing gateway. Sinha saheb’s ancestral home sat haughtily on a height of land amidst a sea of farms and orchards dotted with straw huts. Various members of his family had gathered there to welcome the newlyweds, and an even larger group of curious onlookers crowded around the entranceway.
Before we had set out from Varanasi, Prabha didi had ensured that I was wearing an appropriately heavy silk sari and had warned me to keep my head and face demurely covered when I met the elders of the family for the first time. Now, as I tried to pull the pallu of the sari away from my eyes so that I could take in the place and the people I was here to meet, Prabha didi kept yanking it forward to cover my face. I whispered to her, “How will I see?”
Guiding me by hand, Prabha didi whispered back, “You can see all you want after the welcoming rituals are over.”
A group of women, led by Sinha saheb’s mother, took turns blessing Sinha saheb and me by placing pinches of sindoor in my hair parting and sandalwood tilaka markings on his forehead. Before I crossed the threshold, a young woman asked me to knock little pots of grain inward, to ensure that the new addition to the family would bring Lakshmi’s blessings of prosperity on the household. Then we passed through the gateway into a large courtyard. A group of women from the nearby village, young and old, sat in a corner of the courtyard, playing the dholak drum and singing songs that—as far as I could tell—described Sita’s wedding to Ram.
I was led to a dimly lit room to sit in front of idols of the family deities. A silver container of sindoor was thrust into my hands, and my mother-in-law said to me, “Start with a chutki and pranam to Prabha. She is the eldest of your sisters-in-law present.” I wondered for a moment what the significance might be of pinching an elder sister-in-law before touching her feet in respect. Prabha didi sat in front of me with her head slightly bent and her hands folded in her lap. An impatient female voice from behind urged me, “Do chutki.” So I dutifully but delicately pinched the flesh on Prabha didi’s arm before touching her feet, making her burst into a laughter that brought tears to her eyes.
I was confused and a bit alarmed at the note of grumbling disapproval I heard from the crowd behind me. It took a long minute for Prabha didi’s laughter to give way to a sentence. “The new bahuria does not understand Bhojpuri.”
“But I spoke to her in Hindi, didn’t I?” My mother-in-law replied rather indignantly.
“Yes, ma, but chutki means ‘pinching’ in Hindi, not a dab of sindoor as you meant.”
A stately woman pushed her way to the front of the crowd. “Let’s get this done with. Welcome to the family, Rekha. I am Munmun’s chachiji. Munmun has told me all about you and your family. You can put sindoor on my head or pinch my arm, I don’t mind. But do be sure not to pinch the rest of the women waiting here.” I was grateful for her good humour, but my hand trembled when I heard a disembodied female voice from the rear of the room complain: “Has her mother taught her nothing?”
I fought the urge to unleash a rousing defence of my upbringing without religious rituals, in this alien world of unfamiliar people. It helped to feel the protective pressure of my mother-in-law’s arm on my shoulder and to hear Chachiji’s scolding. “Chup karo! We are also her mothers and sisters now. She will learn with time.” Resentfully, I listened to a wise voice in my head telling me to keep quiet as well, for now.
Several chutkis and pranams later, I was led back into the courtyard to sit on a divan next to Sinha saheb. We played a series of ritual games that were supposed to predict our future, the dominant one in the relationship, and the number of children we were likely to have.
Most of my numerous cousins-in-law and sisters-in-laws were older than I was; many had teenage children. The teenagers were all solidly on my team, encouraging me to win the little games and cheering loudly when I did. Sinha saheb was not even competing, letting me win game after game.
Switching to Bhojpuri appeared to transform Sinha saheb into a talkative person, full of sass, reveling in his popularity among his siblings and cousins, flirting with me openly. I was thankful for the privacy offered by my pallu in these awkward moments.
The singing ladies and their drums went at it for hours. An elaborate feast had been organized for the family as well as for visiting villagers, who would keep arriving in small waves until halfway through the night. There was a huge array of vegetable dishes, variously sautéed, fried, gravied, and mashed, served with fragrant basmati rice and enormous flaky puris. But there were also many meat dishes.
Chachiji assured me that the main kitchen was strictly vegetarian and that meat was cooked in a separate outdoor kitchen. As she explained, many of the family members refused to eat meat on specific days each month, in honour of various deities. With this assurance, I was handed a plate laden with more food than I could possibly hope to eat, a display of bounty that reminded me of my Bhagalpur visits.
This time Sinha saheb came to my rescue, waving off his own heaped-up plate, choosing to share the food on mine, and forgoing the meat dishes. He was also very effective in warding off the pressure to accept additional servings, as his word appeared to carry a lot of weight in this household.
After supper, the young nieces and nephews brought out the dholak and harmonium for a session of antakshari, the same singing game I had enjoyed with my cousin Suresh so many years ago. Two teams were formed, and nearly all the young ones joined my team. Each team had to sing a full verse of a song. The last syllable in the verse had be the same as the first syllable in the next song, and the team that could not come up with a song beginning with the right syllable lost points. The game went on and on, in the light of kerosene lamps, our voices rising into the starry night.
It was hardly a fair fight. The other team, made up of older women and a few men, could not hope to match the extensive repertoire of film songs that a group of young people jointly possessed. Even after our team allowed them to include songs that none of us could recognize, some of which we suspected they made up on the spot, they lost so many points that we stopped counting after a while. Their resounding defeat did not weaken their enjoyment of the game, nor did it deter the young ones from teasing them incessantly. The game ended only when some of the non-playing older relatives started to snore on distant cots in the courtyard.
In the morning, before we left on the final leg of our journey to Dhanbad, I finally had a chance to see my husband’s ancestral home. It was majestic, at least twice the size of the house in Bhagalpur, but in a sorry state of disrepair. For the occasion of our visit, nearly fifty members of family had gathered at the house, but only one of Sinha saheb’s four uncles actually lived there, and only intermittently, to ensure minimal upkeep. There was a well in one of the courtyards but no running water or reliable supply of electricity in this remote rural area. The main courtyard was surrounded by several large rooms with vaulted ceilings, on two floors. But this was the only part of the house that still stood strong. Two additional courtyards attached to the building were in various stages of crumbling decay.
Even in the morning, the heat was intense, and I inwardly groaned at the prospect of draping myself in yards of heavy silk brocade. Sensing my plight, Sinha saheb suggested that I choose between my usual salwar-kamiz or a chiffon sari. Under the circumstances, a sari seemed more appropriate, and, in any case, I wanted to get more comfortable with wearing one. So, for our departure, I chose an olive green georgette sari with a thin gold border running its length, one of Didi’s many tasteful gifts.
Sinha saheb made me pose for pictures all around the house, leaning against an elaborately carved door frame, sitting on a step in the courtyard against a lotus pillar, and standing in a large window on the second floor adjacent to the imposing elephant gate. One of the young nieces complimented me on my poise, comparing me to the film star Vaijayanti Mala. I was not sure how to react, unused as I was to such compliments.
There was another round of farewell rituals to send us off, and then Sinha saheb and I were the first to leave the ancestral house. The driver had to fight off a milling crowd of onlookers from the village, stick-thin children in raggedy clothes, shrivelled old men and women, the occasional young woman with a baby on her hip. Most able-bodied people were already working in the fields that spread as far as the eye could see. As we drove away, the moss-covered house gradually dissolved into the expanse of surrounding greenery.
Crossing through paddy fields and over rivers, we entered the heart of the great coal belt of eastern India. The rich coal reserves had brought major railway lines to the area, followed by large-scale industry, including coal processing plants and steelworks. Dhanbad had grown rapidly from a mining town into the coal capital of the region, a modern city bustling with commerical activity. Outside the city lay vast swathes of lacerated landscape, occasionally interrupted by swift rivers, placid lakes, and clumps of deciduous forest. All this destruction, I thought, in the name of industrial progress.
Our house was a modern bungalow surrounded by a neat little garden. It was situated in one of the newer “Officers’ Colonies,” a cluster of similar bungalows huddled together, edging out lush farms and thickets of tall trees. A burly older man guarded our front gate, a rifle on his shoulder. Sinha saheb assured me that Man Singhji, the sentry, had the softest heart and that the rifle was just a deterrent.
“Deterrent against what?” I asked in alarm. But we were interrupted by an eager young man with a perpetual grin jostling with the gardener to unload the suitcases tied on the roof of the car. Nandkishor was the domestic helper, about sixteen years old—who, I was pleased to discover, spoke Maithili, a language more familiar to me than Bhojpuri. While he ran about to serve us tea and snacks, Sinha saheb tried to explain the lay of the land to me.
I learned that a network of trade unions, labour contractors, and moneylenders ran the many legal and illegal coal mining operations in the area. As liaison officer, Sinha saheb’s job was to mediate among the miners employed by his company, the brutal moneylenders to whom they were indebted, and various trade union leaders and politicians who were vying for control and intent on expanding their power. His day started late, he explained, just before the first shift of miners returned from work, their bodies tired and their ragged pockets warmed by the day’s pay. Between the thugs hired by the moneylenders, who forcibly extracted exorbitant interest rates, and the toddy sellers who set up shop at strategic locations, little money stayed in the hands of the mineworkers for even the most basic necessities. This led to more indebtedness, much drunkenness, and sporadic violence. In addition, there were often violent clashes between ambitious union leaders, in which the mineworkers served as cannon fodder.
“But unions are meant to protect worker’s rights,” I protested.
Sinha saheb shook his head. In the coal belt, many union leaders were thugs, in the pay of political masters. To retain their control, they would kill, maim, kidnap, or torture. But, he reassured me, they left you alone if they thought you were a bigger scoundrel or had a larger gun.
I was appalled. “So are you a bigger scoundrel?” I asked, not certain I wanted to know.
Sinha saheb smiled mischievously. “The day they find out the answer to that question will likely be my last. As for you, my nightingale, I’ll let you decide for yourself.”
Then he went on to explain that, in this very traditional society, respect was born of fear. In order to do his job, he needed to make it crystal clear to company mineworkers that he was their superior, and this meant treating them at all times as his inferiors—even, if need be, as scum. He could not afford to allow that hard line of separation to soften: doing so would place him in an impossible position. The truth was irrelevant, he said. If he expected to have any authority, he had no choice but to behave like a heartless brute.
I was reeling from these revelations when a troupe of about a dozen women abruptly descended on the house. These were wives of colliery executives, bearing gifts to welcome me to the neighbourhood. A woman called Mrs. Rai made introductions. Everyone was “Mrs. So-and-so,” but I insisted that they call me Surekha.
A woman wearing bright red lipstick teased Sinha saheb about losing his most-eligible-bachelor-of-the-company status. A fleshy arm covered in gold bracelets helpfully handed me a roster of card parties, club parties, chaat parties, and picnic parties. A bouffant-haired head leaned close to my ear, instructing me to keep my jewellery in a bank locker and never to go out alone with only the driver in the car.
I was feeling sick to my stomach. Sinha saheb noticed my discomfort and rather rudely dismissed the gaggle of ladies. They dispersed as noisily as they had arrived, their sudden departure accentuating the quietness of the house. Sinha saheb held my hand to guide me to a large but sparsely furnished bedroom and suggested that I get some rest while Nandkishor made supper and he went to his office to check on some work.
I woke up with a start just as the high ceiling above the bed started to cave in on me. I had barely finished feeling grateful to be released from my nightmare when the entire bed shuddered. I jumped out of it and cleared the several yards to the door in two leaps. Nandkishor’s startled face peered out from the kitchen door, “Memsaheb, did you feel the bhuchaal—the faltering step of mother earth?”
I sighed with relief. Sinha saheb had warned me to expect periodic tremors, caused by the depth of the mining activity in the region. My composure returning, I gave Nandkishor a smile and asked him to call me “didi.” Then I entered the kitchen to inspect his supper preparations. I liked the small but tidy kitchen with counters and cupboards, although I noted the absence of anything other than a gas fire for cooking—no earthy charcoal or smoky wood to add additional flavours to the food.
Proudly, Nandkishor displayed the variety of dishes lined up on the kitchen counter. He had made a curry of peas and paneer with gravy and a platter of fried okra. My favourite yellow moong lentil was flavoured with fresh coriander from the garden, and the fragrance of basmati rice was barely contained by the steel lid on the brass pot. Another pot held a cluster of gulab jamun floating delectably in saffron-infused syrup. Sinha saheb had remembered my favourite foods and had instructed Nandkishor not to cook any meat. I was impressed, but I also felt a touch of guilt for obliging my husband to abstain from meat.
The dough was kneaded and covered, and Nandkishor was ready to make piping hot rotis as soon as we were seated at the table. But it was past seven and Sinha saheb was not yet home. Although I told him that he could return to his quarters in the back of the house, Nandkishor insisted on sitting in a corner of the kitchen to wait so that he would be ready to serve hot food whenever Sinha saheb arrived.
I walked around the quiet house, gazing at the clean but bare walls along the passageway, the bare stone floors everywhere, and the two empty bedrooms. The living room and main bedroom were the only furnished parts of the house, obviously the abode of a bachelor who came home only to rest. I tried to shake off a sense of isolation and loneliness by reminding myself of the impending visits of Maitreyi didi and sundry relatives. I had a harder time trying to referee the battle between hunger and fatigue.
A gentle caress on my head woke me up with a fright. Then I smelled his musk cologne. He had returned from the office after nine o’clock to find me sleeping in a chair at the dining table and Nandkishor curled up on the kitchen floor. We did not talk much over the meal. I pointed out that we needed a lot of things for the house to host the many guests we are expecting. Sinha saheb told me to make a list but also said that the guests would have to wait. We were going to Nepal for our own holiday, just the two of us.
I was shocked by this announcement. There was so much to do—unpacking, setting up the house. And what of all the people who had already made plans to visit us? “Sab ho jayega,” Sinha saheb replied. “All will get done.” I just didn’t know how. But my anxieties were swiftly overtaken by the sweet excitement of visiting a new place with my new husband.
The next morning we were on the train to Calcutta and then aboard a flight to Kathmandu. It was the first time I had ever flown, as well as my first trip to another country. Sinha saheb said that most of his trips to Nepal were made by road, through Raxaul, often to spend a weekend away from work, but this had to be a special trip.
We spent an entire week in Kathmandu—the city named for the wooden temple, built without using any metal nails or supports. Philosophically, it is sometimes hard to tell where Hinduism ends and Buddhism begins, and in Nepal this overlap was especially evident. We devoted a day to exploring Durbar Square, with its numerous stupas, temples, and palaces, some of which dated back to rule of the Licchavi dynasty in Nepal. On a balmy morning, we visited the sprawling Pasupatinath temple complex, my unbelieving self thanking the gods for these new beginnings and silently praying that their outcome would be happy. We spent an afternoon among the throngs of visitors to the towering Boudhanath stupa, collectively inhaling the fragrant blessings of incense and prayer flowers.
Early one morning, we left for the long trek to the Swayambhunath complex of stupas and shrines. Climbing 365 steep steps led to to a large white dome that represents the world, being watched over by the compassionate eyes of the Buddha. The stupa sat on a green hill overlooking the Kathmandu valley below, surrounded by the Himalayan range in the distance. We spent most of the day exploring the otherworldly beauty of this place, absorbing the unbroken history and sacredness of the space, and being entertained by the pert monkeys that abound in the area.
Every evening we returned to our hotel by the river to recharge for the next adventure. Our room had a gorgeous view of the snowy peaks of the Himalayas, which were never too far from us in Kathmandu. I was touched by Sinha saheb’s thoughtfulness in finding this hotel. The family-run establishment was superbly located and tastefully appointed, and it also specialized in incredible vegetarian food. Most evenings, we had supper overlooking the river or on sunset boat cruises.
One exceptionally lazy morning we had breakfast on the cruise boat. We had made friends with another newlywed couple from Calcutta who joined our table on the upper deck. The other new bride was appropriately clad in an ornate silk sari and a small ton of jewellery, the bright red bangles on her wrists nicely complementing the flame-red sindoor in her hair parting and her scarlet lipstick. In my case, the only signs of my newlywed status were the burgundy henna patterns still staining the palms of my hands, a vermillion bindi on my forehead, and a gold mangala sutra around my neck. Perhaps I seemed underdressed in my simple khadi salwar-kamiz outfit, but, if so, it didn’t bother me.
The Bengali man suggested that, as the only vegetarian in the group, I needed to start to widen the horizon of my palate, perhaps beginning with eggs for breakfast. My polite declining invited his scornful reminder of the vast array of tastes and textures I was missing out on. So I gave the table a lecture on the variety of vegetarian cuisine that I had encountered in my travels around the country. The young man dismissed my spirited sermon and ordered poached eggs for the table. His rudeness drove me to channel Amma, expounding on the Gandhian reasons for vegetarianism.
Before long, the waiter approached our table with a tray perched precariously above his shoulder. He tried to wedge himself in a corner behind the young woman, but just as he began to serve us the boat made the slightest of lurches, and a plate of toast and poached egg flew off his tray into the fast-flowing river. Stopping mid-sentence, I witnessed the scene with wide-mouthed wonder as Sinha saheb let out a guffaw. Sinha saheb merrily accepted his plate and asked the waiter to get me a menu.
Our new friend was no longer very friendly, pouting through the remainder of breakfast. His timid wife tried desperately to placate him. I ignored him over my spicy potato-stuffed paratha and freshly churned butter. Sinha saheb’s adoring gaze hardly ever left my face, making me squirm and beam simultaneously.
I hadn’t been feeling very well for the past couple of days. I thought our incessant travelling in the humid heat was taking its toll, making me weak and nauseated. Nevertheless, within two days of returning from Kathmandu, we were expecting our first guests. I had very little time to furnish the two empty rooms in the house to convert them into comfortable guest bedrooms.
The young driver, Mauji Singh, was a very polite Nepali, who spoke halting Hindi interspersed with words from too many dialects that I did not understand. His open face betrayed no impatience as I tried to decipher the message that he had returned after dropping Sinha saheb at his office to take me and Nandkishor to the market. We spent the better part of the day buying fabric, furniture, and provisions for the house, Mauji Singh and Nandkishor watchfully not letting me out of their sight.
I was impressed with the variety of goods available in this small town, some from faraway Europe and America. Still recovering from its colonial experiences, India restricted imports from other countries; however, landlocked Nepal had far fewer restrictions on imports of all kinds. So it was not surprising to see some of those imported goods illegally making their way into India, particularly in areas relatively close to the border with Nepal.
Mining also made Dhanbad very cosmopolitan for its size. The numerous private coal mining companies were owned and operated by people from all over the country, while the mineworkers themselves hailed from various tribes and villages in the region. This diversity was reflected in the assortment of foods and textiles. To my delight, I found the most exquisite rolls of fine jamdani muslin, from Bengal, a weave that uses an extra weft of thicker cotton yarn to produce floral and geometric patterns.
The next day, while Nandkishor was setting things up and making sweet and savoury snacks that could easily be stored, I sewed curtains for the whole house. Despite Sinha saheb’s protests about my working so hard, I kept at it until I finished, late at night.
Maitreyi didi was our first guest, accompanied by her husband and their young daughter and son. Armed with baskets of Nandkishor’s sumptuous sweet and savoury dry dishes, we had a lovely picnic at the nearby Bhatinda Falls. While the children frolicked in the water and her husband struck up a conversation with Mauji Singh about the politics of the day, Maitreyi didi and I reminisced about the few holidays we had spent together growing up and the prospect of being able to see each other more often.
Maitreyi didi was very proud to be the mediator for our marriage and had nothing but high praise for Sinha saheb. Even when, two days in a row, word arrived to go ahead with our supper as he would be late getting home from the office, Maitreyi didi used his absence as an opportunity to expound on the importance of his work and on what a good job he was doing. Long after everyone else had eaten, Sinha saheb returned home to his very hungry wife and dutiful cook. Maitreyi didi stayed up to keep us company, inadvertently becoming a buffer against my rising annoyance with Sinha saheb’s long office hours.
Sensing my displeasure, Sinha saheb came home for an early supper not long after Maitreyi didi and her family left. That same night, we were woken up around two by a group of men who were arguing loudly with Man Singhji at the front gate. From the window of our darkened room, I could see their well-oiled lances gleaming in the flame of torches.
Sinha saheb dressed in a flash, giving me strict instructions not to step outside the house or even to switch on the lights. My heart in my mouth, I watched through the window as he walked to the gate and stepped outside, while Man Singhji trained his rifle on the group. By then, Mauji Singh and Nandkishor had also arrived at the gate and were standing close behind Sinha saheb, both armed with equally menacing lances.
A chilling awareness of my impotence suddenly washed over me. I still had the folding knife that Amma had given me years ago, which I had never actually used. It was safely tucked away among my clothes, but now I ran over to the bureau and pulled it out. Hurrying back to the window, I tried a practice stab or two on the wooden windowsill, acutely aware that wood was not the same as living flesh, feverishly trying to think—What would Amma do? Surely she wouldn’t just stand behind a window and watch.
As I searched hopelessly for an answer, I saw Sinha saheb walking away from the gate toward the house, with the bare-chested leader of the group following a few steps behind him. I rushed into the living room but then hesitated about opening the screen door that connected onto the patio, where they had stopped. Sinha saheb sat down on one of the wicker chairs, and the other man squatted near his feet. The man was clearly agitated, but he kept his voice low. Even at this hour, I noticed, Sinha saheb had taken care to dress in his office clothing—an immaculate button-up shirt and neatly pressed trousers. The only thing out of place was a pair of sandals rather than his formal shoes.
The man seemed to be both complaining and pleading, but he spoke in a language I did not understand, and all I could catch was the name Singh. What he said was followed by a mixture of threats and commands from Sinha saheb, delivered in Bhojpuri. I could not make out precisely what he was saying, but there was something about an injured man and his family, about the need to avoid any further trouble, and about breaking the man’s arm if he failed to comply. He spoke quietly, in short, crisp sentences, but his tone was cold and stern. When he finally raised his voice, to summon Nandkishor, the squatting man quickly wiped his brow with the end of his dhoti. I could see that he was trembling.
I stood frozen behind the screen door as Sinha saheb pushed it open, instructing Nandkishor to give the man some tea. The door narrowly missed hitting my face, but it hardly mattered: I already felt as if I’d been slapped. Sinha saheb was momentarily startled by my ghostly appearance, although he assumed that I was simply scared. I stared at him in disbelief, struggling to transform him back into someone I could recognize. Then I held out my hand to show him the knife I was clutching. Puzzled, he reached out gently to touch my arm, but I involuntarily recoiled. Coming closer, he read my face with dawning comprehension. “It’s just a way of talking, you know—it isn’t anything serious.”
“So you’ve never broken the arm of one of your workers?” I gasped, nearly choking on the words.
By way of a reply, he took me by the shoulders and steered me to the sofa, where I sat stiffly while he explained the situation. A brawl between two groups of miners had gotten out of hand, nearly killing one of the workers from Sinha saheb’s mine. Both sides were eager for a final bloodletting, and the friends and family of the injured man were clamouring for revenge. But the leader of the group had ordered them to hold off temporarily. The miners from other colliery had the protection of the much-feared mafia leader S. P. Singh, and, as it was, if the workers from Sinha saheb’s mine were to retaliate, Singh would bring in his goons to punish them, violently. Sinha saheb’s workers needed level ground on which to settle the score, and the leader of the group was convinced that Sinha saheb had a direct line to Singh and could persuade him not to intervene in the dispute.
“Do you? Can you?” I sputtered.
Sinha saheb looked squarely at me. “My job is to avert bloodbaths, not to ensure that the fight is an even one. I am able to do that because I know how to talk to these people in a way that will get the message across.” He paused. “So do you still think I’m a monster, or are you ready to go back to sleep?”
With that, he led me by the hand back to our bedroom. I did not resist, but the grip of my other hand around my knife remained tight.
Sinha saheb’s parents, Gupteshwar chacha, and chachiji arrived at the same time for a visit. I was very grateful for the effort that everyone was making, especially my mother-in-law, Ma, to shield me from the discontentment and disdain of my father-in-law, Babuji. Sinha saheb thought he was a man impossible to please, but I did everything I could think of. I dared not cook on my own, for fear that the result would be less than perfect, but I spent a lot of time in the kitchen planning, supervising, and tasting. Sinha saheb chided me gently for spending too much time in the hot kitchen, and the heat did seem to be getting to me, making me feel sick and dizzy, Chachiji laughed that I was trying too hard, but Ma took a long look at me and asked me to go to the doctor with her.
It was confirmed: I was pregnant. But it was not supposed to happen. How much did I know this man or this place? I was supposed to travel the country and the world. I was supposed to finish my doctorate and be a professional woman first. A truly independent woman who could choose her own path and who went wherever it took her. Not a woman old before her age, who joylessly bore the double burden of family and professional responsibilities. I was inconsolable. Sinha saheb looked miserable.
Amma’s voice was not very clear on the scratchy trunk call. She still sounded amused. “Why are you so surprised?” she asked. I tried to tell her what this meant for my dreams, but I could barely speak. Amma tried to listen to my silence and then announced that she would be taking the first train available to make the three-day journey to Dhanbad.
Professor Deodhar had not replied to any of my letters of enquiry. When we finally connected on the phone, all he could tell me was that he was busier in retirement than he ever had been. His priority was the research of doctoral candidates whose future employment or chances of promotion hinged on their degree. In his opinion, my situation was not urgent. I was married, and I was not employed. I just had to be patient. Had I known that it would be six years before I would be able to return to my dissertation and complete my doctorate, I might have pointed out that even patience has its limits.
Sinha saheb pulled out all the stops to make me happy—picnics by the rivers and lakes, long drives to nowhere through emerald greenery, the latest Hindi movies, records of music from everywhere, even a pair of shoes that cost as much as what I suspected was half of Amma’s salary. He tried to make pragmatic future plans to help me finish my degree, promising me that everything would work out the way I wanted. I was not sure what I wanted, except that I did not want to be nauseated all the time, or battle with debilitating headaches or achy swollen feet.
Mrs. Rai from the neighbourhood took it upon herself to bring a cup of spinach juice tempered with lemon and rock salt every morning. Another neighbour argued that spinach would make the baby dark-skinned, and insisted that I eat lots of coconut and drink lots of milk with saffron to ensure a fair-skinned baby boy. Ma and Chachiji regularly sent homemade sweet and savoury laddus so that the baby would be born satiated and not drool. It was also suggested that I take special care during the pregnancy, given that my sister had borne no children, as though it may be a family trait that I needed to or could avoid. All this attention surrounded me like a sugary web. I struggled to feel grateful for it or find any comfort in it.
When Amma arrived after her long train journey with three connections, I rested my throbbing head in her lap and sobbed. I wasn’t sure if she understood the cause of my misery; I could hardly put it in words within my own head. I felt partially erased—the only part that seemed to matter was my body as the vessel of a birth. Amma nourished my soul by holding my hand quietly, allowing me to not explain anything. Her visit made me feel more settled than I had ever been in Dhanbad.
Near the end of Amma’s two-week-long sojourn, Sinha saheb encouraged me to accept Didi and Jijaji’s invitation to spend part of the summer in mild Dhar rather than hot and humid Dhanbad. He promised to drive up to bring me back in two weeks. Amma and I travelled two days by train to cover the eight hundred miles to Indore. I was ashamed of my misery in front of Didi, her enthusiasm at the news of my pregnancy only making me feel worse.
Didi organized a musical evening to announce and celebrate the pregnancy. She dragged me and Amma along to all the shrines and temples in Dhar to pray for a safe delivery. Her kitchen staff worked long hours preparing special foods for me to eat and take back with me to Dhanbad, while Jijaji treated us to day-trips to all my favourite sites—the palatial ruins of Mandu, the impressive ghats and palaces of Maheshwar, the island temple of Omkareshwar, dedicated to Shiva. As Thakur saheb and Amma discussed the American incursions in Cambodia and the ongoing secessionist movement in East Pakistan, I realized with embarrassment how quickly my own world was shrinking.
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