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| Boy-Oil on Canvas by Riyas Komu- 2007 |
The Lottery Man
The government started selling lottery tickets. Huge ads were given in dailies with the picture of an Ambassador car. The first prize also carried a cash component of Rs.50,000 which was quite a big amount in those days for many to imagine. Gopi, the mike operator, while testing the sound system from the shop at the market-place, tried to make things simpler to his countrymen.
“You’ll get enough notes and if you’re placing them side by side, you would probably be reaching Mavelikkara”, he said. The place under mention was twenty kilometers away. Thambi Annan, the lottery agent was having a windfall. Women who sold their produce in the evening market started buying lottery tickets. However, Lady Luck always looked the other way. She favored a man who made a living by climbing coconut trees. The fellow won the first prize. Overnight he switched over to polyester dhotis with golden embroidery and wore a gold chain round his neck. He was promptly rechristened as “half a lakh”. Whenever he watched cinema at the local theatre sitting first class, heads turned back. He would then smoke cigarettes to keep nervousness at bay. Slowly people and even political parties started vying with each other to befriend him. One day,the house of a party leader was attacked by the rival opposition party which had included the lottery man to their fold. Spears and iron rods were freely used. And there was a country bomb which failed to explode. The aggressors wanted to kill the man of the house but luckily he was sleeping elsewhere. His henchmen clashed with the assailants with the same kind of weapons. For the attackers, it was quite unexpected and they fled, leaving one -the lottery man -behind. Obviously he was a novice as he was too naïve to see through the scheming of political parties. He was badly bruised in the fight.
I dashed to the scene immediately after reaching school. Afterall, the house which was attacked belonged to my class-teacher. Her husband didn’t have a proper job and was engaging himself in politics. They were living in an unassuming house with thatched roof. I saw the whole place ransacked and it looked more like a battlefield. The sobs of my teacher filled the air. Just outside the house, the lottery man was lying on the ground. His expensive dhoti was drenched in blood. A diffused country bomb gave him company. I thought he was dead. Meanwhile, Chakklan my senior schoolmate brought tea and slowly poured it into his mouth. Chakklan was one of the henchmen who fought against the intruders and now he was feeding his enemy. Probably Chakkalan knew that he would also meet with a similar fate one day.
The Fish Hunt
The rains were very heavy during monsoon. The village women didn’t have anything to do except cursing the incessant rains for their joblessness. They sat on the cow dung plastered floor of their huts and managed with tapioca and baked jackfruit seeds. The men were sitting idle too. The roar of the angry sea was audible even at a distance of three kilometers. The ponds and rivulets started overflowing but the rains showed no signs of a lull. A sheet of water engulfed everything- ponds, thoroughfares and courtyards. The borders literally withered away. Small boats were brought to the doorsteps for transportation and the water level was still on the rise.
God, let the pozhi be broke open now
A collective prayer wet up the air. If only Pozhi, the sand bank accumulated between the sea and the river face was busted, the water level would recede. The district magistrate alone had the authority and if he was busy with some other work, the only option left for the villagers was to move to the school verandah. A make-shift refugee camp, full of squabbles and mayhem. Free ration was unheard of. During nights when the rain had a recess, people armed with knives and choottu (torch made out of dried coconut leaves) moved out en mass for fish-hunting. Young and old joined the hunt. Two crestfallen boys watched the entire bustle standing at the entrance of their small house. They were not allowed to dare.
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| Emmanuel - Oil on Canvas by Riyas Komu-2007 |
Paper Cigarettes
Mother’s younger cousin Satyadevan used to drop in during the evenings. He was in his late teens and was loitering around doing nothing. Uncle Satyan always kept beedis on his girdle. Taking out a beedi, he would order,
Get the fire from the kitchen
We obliged. Uncle Satyan would clutch the lean end of the beedi between his teeth and press the other end against the burning log. He was sucking fire into the beedi. Making smoke rings was his forte and he would showcase his talent for us. In case he forgot, we would plead,
Uncle Satyan, the smoke rings, please
We were sufficiently delighted . One day we decided to make smoke rings ourselves. Rolling paper we made two cigarettes, one for me and the other for my brother. We went into the kitchen, lit the kerosene lamp and squatted on the floor facing each other. The paper cigarette was lighted and we took it between our lips. Even before the first drag, both of us had plunged into a terrible bout of cough. The mouth, throat and eyes were all burning. Suddenly the back door was opened. It was our unsuspecting mother.
The End-Point
My father took me to Gurukula during one of his annual pilgrimages to Sivagiri. Sreenarayana Guru, the saint who was also at the helm of the renaissance movement, had his samadhi atop a serene hill. The adjoining hill had the Gurukula where the late Guru’s desciple, Nataraja was available for darshan for the entire pilgrimage season. My father and I walked up the hill with difficulty. The ambience of the ashram was tranquil and meditative. A pleasant looking Swami whom we met among the trees called me near. He wanted to make friendship with me but I was too nervous to answer his questions. Just to regain composure, I started reading a poster on the wall many times over.
“Oh… you know English too! Smart boy”.
I swayed my head in agreement. I was already on a pedestal. Swami’s honeyed words had a magical effect on me but I had to move on. We were running behind time. Once the darshan time was over, Nataraja Guru would retreat to the interiors. The guru was staying in a naturally lighted hut. He was lying on a couch with his feet resting on leopard skin. People had thronged around him in a wide circle. The guru was talking to a dignified woman about the importance of thoughts. I stood next to the lady fancying myself worthy of the Guru’s immediate attention. However, he didn’t take any notice of me. I was sad and angry. A young man prostrated before him, then he stood up slowly and raised his dhoti, to reveal a dreaded skin disease.
Swamiji, have mercy on me…please..
The Guru was unruffled. He said in an impassionate tone,
Don’t worry. Everything is happening for the good.
I was puzzled by those words. It took me decades, to figure out the meaning. Obviously, I was a slow learner.
Fright of Rabbits
My mother had a bad temper. Anger had its spell on her too often. Her nose used to swell and the rattling sound made by her teeth when she pressed them against each other was audible to people around. Curses flew across. On the contrary, my father was a man of tolerance. On the rare occasions when he blew up, he was careful enough not to raise the volume.
Theirs was a love marriage. My father had dumped his studies in school as he thought he was cut out for social work. The peer pressure also contributed since it was considered progressive if one chucked one’s studies for the sake of a mainstream movement for change. It was the pre-independence days. As a matter of fact, neither my father nor his peers were very good at studies. Clean-shaven and hair well kempt, they donned khadi clothes. Long juba and dhoti were ubiquitous and the more educated among them wore a shawl over their shoulders. Interestingly, all of these volunteers were married, had big families including parents to look after. Domestic worries and financial troubles haunted them like shadows. That didn’t stop them from contributing their bit anyway. In fact wives and children were relegated to innocuous corner of their lives. The children’s education and growth were severely affected but people had ceased to care. The women of the village never complained. The wives dutifully gave birth to brand new children every year.
My parents had to move out shortly after marriage to a makeshift shed which they later developed into a tiny house. The going was certainly not smooth. My mother hoped to get her husband’s attention exclusively for the household but that did not happen. He was the secretary of the local SNDP branch, office-bearer of the farmers’ co-operative society and more importantly, a fund-raiser for public causes. Father was a handsome man, tall and fair-skinned. He was plain and hardworking with clean habits. In fact nobody in khadi smoked or touched alcohol in those days.
“Your father is a spoiler”, my mother said to me when I was no more a child. As usual, I failed to get the meaning. She was hinting at his two-timing habit. Mother cursed him. Listening to the flak for long would put my father on the defensive. He would accuse her for making his life dull. The battle was scaling new heights. We, my brother and I, watched the scene scared and speechless. The parental fights fell into our lives like mountain slides. Fear. Anxiety. And Disquiet.
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| Untitled - mixed media on paper by Riyas Komu |