Dear D,

I know that the last few months, in fact the last few years have been hard for you. You’ve left behind the old familiar ways, and sometimes you wonder if you’ll ever find that comfortable place again. You’ve often asked – why can’t I have that. You probably feel that life has knocked you around and not been fair to you. Maybe you are right – perhaps life hasn’t been entirely fair to you. But look around you – you are the chosen few – the blessed and the fortunate – for you are loved and taken care of. Remember that day, almost 3 years ago, when you were alone and desperate and you thought that you wouldn’t survive another week. But it worked out, didn’t it. It happened again last year, and yet again it worked out. So trust me. It will work out.

And seriously, you know that it is futile and stupid to worry about things that you have no control over – so why bother. I know, I know – you are only human and at times you cannot help but worry. But don’t sink into that quite feeling of fear and pain. Don’t let it hold you down; don’t let it keep you awake at night. You need to close your eyes, let go and dream. After all, you’ve always been a dreamer. As a little girl, you would drift away in the middle of the class – your teacher thought you were too absentminded and hit you on your palms with a wooden ruler. You cried but you didn’t stop dreaming. You graduated from school with the nickname Alice in Wonderland. Some people laughed but you didn’t care. So why are you now so afraid to dream?

I know that you have this irrational fear that if you dream something, it will not happen. While part of growing up is the realization that life is not what we cracked it up to be and all our dreams don’t necessarily come true, that shouldn’t stop you from being who you are and living the life you want to live. You’ve come this far – you’ve done some stupid things, some amazing things – but you’ve been there and done that. And that’s what counts. And who knows, you dreams might come true. There is an infinite wisdom in this world. At times, it may not be apparent to you, but it is there. So keep the faith.

Love always,
O

The unfolding of our lives (4)

The past becomes our present, our present our future. But we can never quite tell the seamlessness of it all, because we cannot let go the regrets of what was or the fears of what will be.

As I look at my mother now, I feel like I never really knew her. When I was a child she was always very busy, and when I grew up and started my own family, I could never really forgive her for what I thought was her betrayal.

I was born in a tumultuous year when India’s destiny was being shaped. But I was too young to remember what happened. What I do remember is that growing up, I longed to spend time with my mother. For Ma, the Quit India movement was her real baby. She became actively involved in the struggle. She would mobilize people and support underground resistance groups. She was working with many of the women leaders in Congress like Sucheta Kriplani and Aruna Asaf Ali. Ma felt especially drawn to Aruna Asaf Ali. She admired Aruna for breaking the boundaries to go to college, work, marry outside her community. Later that year my mother led the formation of a women’s wing in Lucknow and they had decided to join their comrades in Bombay for a large scale protest. And just as they were boarding the train, the police swooped down on them and all of them were thrown into Jail. My father also believed in the cause, which is why perhaps, he let my mother go on protests around the country and get arrested, but he was more of an intellectual, who liked to ruminate on his ideas on paper, and not get his hands dirty with the nitty-gritty the way my mother did.

Two younger brothers and a younger sister followed, and we woke up one morning in a free country, though it was hard to tell in Lucknow because people were being slaughtered and houses were being burnt. In 1948, when Aruna Asaf Ali and others left the congress to form their own socialist party my mother joined them as well, and later on she helped Aruna to establish the National Federation of Indian Women, the women's wing of the Communist Party of India. My mother would also occasionally sing for All India Radio and my brothers and sisters would gather around to listen to her – we got to spend such little time with our mother that sometimes hearing her voice on the radio was the closest we got to her. The only people that my mother really took time out for was our eldest half-sister Rakhi because Ma did not want to be labeled as the bad step mother, and my youngest brother Rudra (his nickname was Babla) who was pampered by everyone in the family. But we were all tremendously proud of our mother. In 1958, she won a seat in the legislative assembly, and everyone in Lucknow knew us as Kaaveri Ganguly’s children. And strangely enough, I saw her as Kaaveri Ganguli as well - and not really as Ma.

It was my father who I had a special bond with. He was a professor of mathematics, but he enjoyed writing. He would often write political essays and at times poetry. Whenever he wrote a new poem, he would read it to me and ask me what I thought. Sometimes on weekends, he would pack all six children in his Morris Minor and take us to the cinema. On rainy days we would all drink milky tea and Mukundalal , our servant, would make us hot pakoras. We would each take turns telling Baba what we would do when we’d grow up. I think looking back now on my childhood, it’s those rainy days that I miss the most.

The day before I was supposed to get married, Baba came into my room. He looked at all the silk saris laid out on the bed and said, “Bubai, you will make a beautiful bride."
I know it was silly but I immediately burst into tears.
That night Baba also told me about my real father -Asad Shaukat.

Over the years, my mother scaled back her involvement in politics , and by the time my daughter was born , she had assumed the role of a full-time grandma. Both my kids adored her, and surprisingly, she enjoyed being a grandmother as well. My mother had never made loochis for us, but every time any of her grandkids visited, she would ply them with all sorts of home cooked delicacies. I could have forgotten the years of neglect, but I could never let go of what she had done. She had made me not just a barstard child, but an orphan. She had robbed me of my entitlement to Baba, my brothers and sisters, and even to her.

I see her now, perhaps in the final months of her life. She sits by the window reading a book. She looks up and smiles. I dab the corners of her forehead with a handkerchief infused with Eau De Cologne. She pulls my hand from her forehead and brings it to her lips. Last night we made our peace. You have his nose and chin, she says. I see the moistness in her eyes. Tears that have waited for almostn sixty years. Ma is still strong . Kaaveri Ganguly. But for the first time, I also see her vulnerability. A young girl who fell in love in the summer of 1941.

The unfolding of our lives (3)

Ma is asleep. Her body weak. Her face considerably unwrinkled, belying her real age.
And even as she lies in her bed, she has that grandeur that she has always carried with her. I have never known Ma, even in the toughest of times, to display even a hint of weakness.

But Kaaveri’s was a strength that was, in fact, born out of weakness. That summer afternoon, she sat in the midst of the dearly departed, struggling to hang on to the last dredges of hope. She had led a life of privilege, never having to struggle for anything. And here she was unwed and pregnant, with the man she loved perhaps dead. Nothing had prepared her for such a fate. She could feel her breath draining, her life slowly ebbing away from her body. She was so devoid of strength that she couldn’t even muster the tears to cry. All she could do was stare blankly into the earth, numb to all sensations, all thoughts. She sat like that for hours. The sun set and the half moon rose, yet she didn’t move. And as she looked at the tombstones around her, it suddenly occurred to her that she was still in the land of the living, and all she could do was live - let the chips fall where they may.

Kaaveri went back home and barged into the drawing room where her father was sitting with several other male friends.
“Baba, can you come with me. I need to speak to you, “she said.
Her father, Ishwarnath Diwakar, was annoyed by his daughter's impertinence. Women and children were not allowed to disturb hum when he was sitting with his friends. He replied curtly, “Not now. I am busy.”
“This is important, “she continued without the slightest trace of fear in her voice.
Her father was visibly angered by his daughter’s insolence. “Go inside Kaveri. I will speak to you later.” It was a command issued as the patriarch of the house.
“Baba, this cannot wait. I have to speak to you now. “
Her father sensed the awkward looks that his friends were exchanging, and politely excused himself.

“Kaverri, don’t you know…” But before her father could complete his furious tirade, she blurted, “Baba, I am pregnant.”
Ishwarnath Diwakar was stunned, aghast, outraged. In fact he wasn’t quite sure what he felt. After a prolonged silence, he asked, “Who is the father?”
“It doesn’t matter who the father is. He is dead.”
Kaveeri could sense all the questions and accusations stirring inside her father’s head –anger and hurt that he couldn’t find the words to express. She decided to pre-empt her father’s question and said, “I know you are hurt. I am sorry. I didn’t want this to happen either. But I loved him.”
She continued in a completely calm voice, almost sounding like the parent, “Don’t tell Ma, she will not be able to handle it, but I think I have a solution for this. “
“Solution, there is no solution to this – we are all ruined. All you can do now is throw yourself and your child into the Ganges,” her father retorted angrily.
But the moment he said those words, he regretted them. Despite everything, Ishwarnath Diwakar loved his daughter; he could not bear to lose her.
“You will have to drop the child - that is the only option,” he said in a mellower tone.
“I don’t want to lose the baby. And I think there is another way. You could get me married,” Kaveeri replied.
“Married – are you out of your mind? Who will want to marry a pregnant girl?”
“There is someone I know. Sudhanshu Ganguly. He is a professor at Lucknow university.”
“Is he the father of your baby?” Iswharnath interjected hastily.
“No, he is not. I told you the father of my baby is most likely dead. But Sudarshan Ganguly comes to listen to me sing at Akhtarabai’s house everyday. I know he likes me. Offer him my hand in marriage, and let me talk to him.”
Kaveeri spoke so forcefully that Ishwarnath couldn’t help but go along with his daughter.

Sudhanshu Ganguly was a widower with a six year old daughter. He had been entranced by Kaveri’s voice since the first time he had heard her. He kept going back to Akhtarabai’s house to listen to her, and gradually - he didn’t know exactly when - he had developed a deep attraction towards Kaaveri herself. Kaaveri had sensed that attraction. While she sang, she would make eye contact with her listeners and had an intuitive knowledge of what each of them was thinking. Often, in the middle of a ghazal, she would adjust the notes to cater to the likes of a particular listener, and both she and the listener would acknowledge this and exchange smiles. Akhtarabai often said that Ghazal singing involved flirting with your listeners, and Begum Ahktar had mastered that art. Almost anyone who had heard her sing would fall in love with her.

The following day, Kaverri and her father went to Sudhanshu Ganguly’s house, though Kaaveri did most of the talking. She told him about her unborn child and Asad. She told him that she needed a respectable home for her baby and herself, and she told him that she would be a good wife and a good mother to his daughter. In the end of her hour long monologue, she added, “I think you have kind eyes, and I think you like me.” Sudhanshu was appalled and impressed by Kaveeri’s honesty. He was offended by her brazenness and yet somehow touched by her courage. Three weeks later, Sudhanshu and Kaaveri were married. It wasn’t the grand wedding that Kaaveri’s parents had envisaged. The family gossip mill worked overtime with stories of scandal. Questions about why a beautiful, young Kaaveri was marrying a not-so-attractive Bengali widower were raised. But as is often the case with family scandals, before long there are buried, hidden and forgotten.

I was born on August 10, 1942. A day earlier, Gandhiji had made his famous 'Do or Die' speech in an open session of the All India Congress Committee at Gowalia Tank. The entire congress leadership was arrested and hundreds and thousands of people rushed to the streets to clash with the British authorities. The last big battle for India's freedom had begun.

The final instalment of this story will soon be posted...in a day or two.

The unfolding of our lives...(2)

All we need to do is participate in the unfolding of our lives...because we can never completely prepare oursleves for what happens

Perhaps it was youth - a time when we are still untouched by the jagged edge of reality, a time when we can believe without a shadow of a doubt. Perhaps it was Asad who had all the makings of a teenage heartthrob with his knight in shining armor looks and his revolutionary like intensity. Perhaps it was the fact that in all of her eighteen years, he was the first man who had spoken to her like an equal. Or perhaps it was just hormones. But through those humid summer nights and cool grey days preceding the monsoon, Kaveeri fell in love.

Asad was Akhtarabai's distant nephew. All the girls who practiced at Akhtarabai’s house would giggle nervously every time he passed by. And for Kaverri, Asad opened up a world that she never knew existed. The world outside the "lal phatak wali haveli". A world where farmers were dying, wars were being waged, and where dinner table conversations revolved not around Shakuntala mausi's woes, but around freedom , self-rule and the quest for justice. Asad's father, a member of the Shaukat family, had been a prominent member of the Khilafat movement, and so he had grown up in a house which resonated with voices of dissent. But unlike his father who had been drawn to the Khilafat movement by his desire as a Muslim to protect the Turkish Caliphate, Asad was driven by a deep sense of anger against the British. For Asad, aligning with Gandhi's non-violent struggle was also not an option. He was a rationalist and a marxist who had little regard for tradition or for Gandhi's spiritual notions of ahimsa. So when Subhash Chandra Bose left the Congress to create the Forward Block - a leftist party that would rally all radical and anti-imperialist progressive elements in the country, Asad was quick to sign up. And while technically he was supposed to be studying law in Lucknow, he spent most of his time going to meetings and discussing strategies for reversing India's exploitation by the British.

Asad and Kaveeri would spend hours talking about what was happening in the rest of India, and even about the trouble that was brewing in Europe. And in the evenings, when Kavveri sang, Asad would sit in the corner of the room and listen intently. For all his aggressiveness as a political firebrand, Asad was also deeply romantic. He would surprise her with inconsequential gifts and sometimes with Pasanda kabab from her favorite shop in Aminabad. And it never bothered him that they were of two different religions. They never talked about what they would do in the future, but somehow Asad's invincible confidence and calm was reassuring. So despite occasional misgivings, deep down Kavveri felt that everything would be ok. Besides, she was completely entranced in the moment and had little inclination to think of the future. She would bury her face in Asad's chest, and would listen intently to his heartbeat. She loved the freshly laundered smell of the Kurta and the rhythmic sound of his heart. She could lie like that for hours, in the middle of the cemetery, and it was only after Asad nudged her repeatedly and reminded her that it was getting dark, that she would reluctantly part.

She waited under the shadows of the falling sun. A second, a day, and two months had passed since she has last seen him. An urgent missive had taken him to Calcutta. There had been no time for prolonged goodbyes or melancholic conversations. There had been no time to say, "I'll write to you" ",I'll think of you.", "When will you be back.?"

Through friend's of friend's she had managed to send a letter to Asad with the desperate plea, "Come back soon." There had been rumors that he had died in Burma, but she hoped fiercely that he hadn’t. She sat on a tombstone, exhausted by her own fear. She looked at her stomach, and wondered if his child was really in there.