MIMESIS
When the morning sun came streaming inside her room, she was
unprepared for it. Lying awake for the past couple of days, had taken
its toll both on her health and her state of mind. Burning the midnight
oil would surely reap a golden harvest, Urmila wondered despite strong
misgivings. She, like other students appearing for their respective
baccalaureate examinations, was left apprehensive regarding the final
outcome of her untiring efforts.
“The slow and the steady win the race, eventually. Just you wait and watch”.
Nitish, Urmila’s fiancé for the past four years had whispered
in her ears one day, when she had expressed her inner anguish about the
results of her examinations. They were sitting on the park benches
adjacent to Urmila’s hostel and munching dried, roasted peanuts,
seasoned with salt and chillies. These peanuts which are served on paper
cones are the staple for people – lofty thinkers-with a few pennies in
their pockets. Roasted peanuts were Urmila’s favourite, especially
when they were bought and presented to her by Nitish’s unkempt, rugged
hands.
“My parents want me to sit for the IAS exam. It is not easy to get
through the Indian Administrative Services, despite the efforts you put
into it”, Urmila said, lowering her eyelids so as to hide the tears
that were welling up inside her.
Nitish Mukherjee. A scholar extraordinaire from Calcutta’s
erstwhile Presidency College, Nitish was a gold medallist and an Ishan
scholar. The Ishan scholarship is awarded to the overall topper of
Calcutta University who scores the highest in its Arts faculty.
Nitish was staring at Urmila’s lowered eyelids. The urge to
plant a kiss on those eyelids was becoming too powerful, yet he had
refrained himself. Good boys don’t hurry in these matters. And besides,
Urmila was a very sensitive girl. Even though their relationship had
entered into its fourth year, there had hardly been a moment when they
had progressed beyond touching each other’s hands. When their
respective parents had been newly-weds, even holding hands in a public
space was considered to be a shameful deed. In the Calcutta of today,
the utterly western concept of ‘live-ins’ does hold true, given the
fact that family pressures and personal allegiances and predispositions
have inclined many females to bow to this precariously fragile of
human relationships.
But Nitish knows that to hurry matters with Urmila would be asking for the annulment of their personal bonding.
“Urmila, did you ever realize how long we have been seeing each
other? We got engaged four years ago simply because your parents wanted
that kind of arrangement. But at that time I did not at all fathom
that they had insisted on our engagement simply because they wanted to
get their hands onto a boy like myself”, Nitish confessed dreadfully. He
had just uttered the misgivings that had been at the back of his mind
for quite some time now.
Urmila slowly lowered her cone of roasted peanuts on to the lap
of her just-purchased navy blue South cotton Chettinad sari with an
embroidered border. She had realisedlong ago that their relationship
which had stood the test of time, had recently gone into troubled
waters. She had many a time felt the almost-compulsive touch on
Nitish’s part. This has aggravated with time. It was as if he was
touching her under some compulsion or under someone else’s orders.
“What do you mean, Nitish? You mean my parents had grabbed you
by the collar and had forced you to get engaged to me? You seriously
must be joking. It can be the other way round also”.
“The other way round?” Nitish was stupefied.
Of late this has always happened whenever the two of them met.
They had quarrelled but had ultimately made amends by kissing each
other. Anyway theirs was a love that had withstood many upheavals, both
temperamental as well as climactic. It seems just the other day when
Urmila had presented Nitish with a wristwatch with her stipend money.
“Wear this on your wrist and feel my presence. A-n-d”, Urmila had
caught him by his wrist while trying to put together the leather straps
of the new watch, “Don’t be late. I hate to stand by the roadside and
made fun off by onlookers”.
The Metro or the Underground services had just about commenced
in Calcutta. The city was celebrating this milestone in its history
with its people thronging the Underground with a lot of trepidation.
For some, the escalators posed serious threats and for others, the
speed of the trains proved to be a boon. Commuters no longer had to
jostle against each other in order to gain a toehold in an already
overcrowded public bus.
Urmila and Nitish were what one called ‘regulars’ at the Calcutta
International Film Festival venues as well as the Calcutta Book Fair,
the former being held during the onset of the winter and the latter
during the end of the season. Waiting for Nitish on the steps of the
Rabindra Sadan Metro Station on their way to catch the special
screenings of films from around the world at the Nandan film complex,
was a new found enjoyment for Urmila. She would buy a guava and tell
the fruit-seller to season it with pepper and rock salt. She simply
loved guavas. She strongly believed that it could well have been the
fruit from a guava tree that could have led Newton to formulate his law
of gravity. Apples are, she felt, hugely overrated.
Urmila’s all-time favourite films were La Dolce Vita and All The President’s Men.
Her favourite authors included Ernest Hemingway and Harper Lee. So
when one day Nitish had presented her a book all wrapped up in blue
cellophane on her twentieth birthday, she was jubilant at first. But on
unwrapping, she couldn’t stifle her sobs. The book was a biography of
Che Guevara.
At the very beginning of their relationship, she had felt that Nitish
was far too idealistic whereas she was an incorrigible romantic at
heart. But Urmila like all the girls of her age was too happy at having
found a beau who doted on her. She had asked Nitish one day, “What had
attracted you towards me?”
“It was your hair”.
Bengali maidens usually are born with good hair, albeit with a
few exceptions here and there. The Bengali poet, Jibanananda Das, had
penned immortal lines of verse in his poem Banalata Sen. Nitish had gifted her once with the collection of poems by Das where the first poem was Banalata Sen.
“She had hair as dark as the long-forgotten night spent at Bidisha,
And a face which mirrored the sculpted craft of Sravasti; from distant oceanic shores
Where sailors, having lost all direction and hope
The land of green grass they see in their mind’s eye through cinnamon islands,
In the same way, I have seen her as she had asked me, “Where’ve you been for so long?”
Much like a bird’s nest, she had raised her eyelids. She was Banalata Sen of Natore.”
On the second of January, the year being nineteen hundred and eighty
nine, Urmila and Nitish tied the knot and were bound together in holy
matrimony. Amid the sounds of conch shells and gala merriment, friends
and family had gathered at Urmila’s father’s place on the northern
fringes of Calcutta to celebrate the auspicious occasion. There had
been few members on Nitish’s side because he had been orphaned at the
tender age of thirteen. His friends had performed the needful required
from the bridegroom’s side and had embraced Urmila, whom they had known
to be their friend’s better-half since long, with much love, affection
and warmth.
A new-found home where there were never the background
cacophonic orchestra of in-laws, proved to be a novel experience for
Urmila. She had the personal space to purse her own studies as well as
provide an emotional foil for her husband, who, she had noticed from
the past, suffered from desolation and a sense of spiritual angst.
Nitish was reading THE STATESMAN, when Urmila called out from the kitchen.
“We didn’t have mutton since we had been to Baba’s place last month. Could you buy a kilo while returning from your college?”
“Urmi, you know very well that we can’t afford mutton at this stage.
Prices have rocketed so steeply that for men like me, culinary
delicacies would have relegated to the absolute no-no. And besides, I
would have to take an extra class for my batch of students who are
appearing for their finals this month”.
Nitish came forward and planted a peck on his beloved wife’s
cheek and having cupped her with both his hands (he was well aware that
is wife’s waist was the envy of many onlookers), he said, “Can’t this
be scheduled for the next month? We are trying to make both ends meet,
Urmila. My meagre salary hardly caters to all your whims, I am well
aware. I also know that by marrying me you have opted out of family
opulence and have embraced a life of hardship just for my sake. I knew
from the very first day when I had met you that you’d be able to combat
all odds that would come in our mutual paths”.
What Nitish didn’t know by now was the fact that Urmila had
been sending her stories to a reputed Bangla magazine and after a long
hiatus they had responded by their letter of acceptance. Bishwalok, meaning The Cosmos, is going all the way out, in publishing her story, the first in a series.
The editor of the magazine had smiled at Urmila, when she had
visited their offices during the late afternoon hours, when Nitish was
away.
“You have promises to keep and miles to go before you sleep”.
“Would I be paid for the publication of my short story?” Urmila
couldn’t stop herself from asking. After all it had come down to a
hands-to-mouth existence for the two of them lately. If she becomes a
published writer with Bishwalok, an esteemed journal by any given standards, she won’t have to look back, Urmila thought.
“Of course. Your cheque would reach you within a month of the
publication. And I as the editor would like to take this opportunity to
request you not to stop writing at any cost. Our doors would remain
forever open for talented writers like you”.
The editor, Projjwal Chatterjee, knew what a talent Urmila
was. Her stories, especially “The Fisher Woman” where she has portrayed
the hapless condition of a lonely and destitute woman, waiting for her
haul, have that uncanny perception of the effervescent human condition
that would throb within the pulse of every reader. Quite contrary to
his usual stance with contributors to his journal, he had summoned
Urmila to his office quarters and had handed over a cheque of two
thousand rupees, in advance, for regularly contributing to his journal.
Urmila had returned home that day, a kilo of mutton wrapped in
a black plastic bag clasped in one arm, while in the other she had a
brand new shirt for Nitish which she had purchased from New Market,
previously called Hogg’s Market, an area which lay adjacent to the
magazine’s head offices.
Urmila would never be able to forget that day for as long she
lives. Nitish had returned home a little before nine at night, totally
drunk. In a bout of drunken stupor, he had slapped Urmila when she had
dared to question him about the delay.
“You are drunk, Nitish”.
“Yes I am. Who are you to mother me? It seems you think I am
answerable to you, but I am not”. A drunken Nitish had slouched himself
on their bed.
Urmila had spent that unforgettable night lying cramped on a
couch on their living-cum-dining area. At the break of dawn, she had
taken the course which she had been mapping out for the past couple of
days. Theirs had been a marriage of convenience. Urmila knew it from the
very first day of their wedded lives. She had always thanked God
inwardly that they had no children. It must have been because of this
(her inability to conceive) that had ultimately snapped the slick
thread by which their marriage was bound together. Lovemaking had
become more a routine affair. Urmila had wanted more out of her
marriage to Nitish.
She had come out of her home –the one which she had built with every
drop from her slowly-drained-out bloodstream – never to return. The
city was waking up to a warm summer morning. Newspaper hawkers had
started dropping the papers onto their destined houses by throwing
rolled up balls of newspapers in a manner which could have landed them
in the Olympics Games’ discus-throw event. Having grown up in North
Calcutta, Urmila sorely missed the raucous cries of the maid servants
of respective houses when they ushered in the morning sun with their
banter across terraces.
South Calcutta’s difference from the ambience prevailing in
its Northern sector, is marked and a matter of pronounced critical
debate. Much like the tug-of-war between East Bengal and Mohun Bagan
football fanatics. East Bengal fans are basically the ‘Bangals’ who
themselves or their ancestors had left East Pakistan (now Bangladesh)
whereas the Mohun Bagan supporters are the ones who had been residing
in Calcutta since the time of their forefathers. The latter are called
endearingly as the ‘Ghontis’. ‘Promoter-raj’ has so far been successful
in altering the skyline of the city. Calcutta has sacrificed many of
its architectural splendours, dating back to its colonial ancestry, to
the megalomania of certain moneyed classes. These people, in an
unprecedented drive to amass more wealth, are bringing entire edifices
to the grounds and quite contrary to popular belief, it is always the
wealthy who win over the poor and the needy however conscientious the
latter might be.
North Calcutta had yet to welcome skyscrapers and South
Calcutta was on the verge of being engulfed in the money that was being
thrown around to poison the middle classes.
Urmila came out of her house where she and Nitish had shared
many a full-moon night. She was heading for the main road where she’d
be able to alight onto a public transport. The Calcutta Tramways is a
heritage institution. Urmila quickly alighted on a tram that was coming
down its tracks in no hurry at all and quite oblivious to the urgency
of its probable passengers.
“Ticket please”, the tram conductor tried to ignore the look
of anguish on the part of Urmila as she rummaged the knotted ends of
her sari and handed out few coins as payment for the fare.
The tram began its crawling journey towards various
destinations. Urmila had her seat adjacent to that of the driver
himself, who was a dark and soiled personage to whom carrying passengers
in his two-bogeyed vehicle was more a duty than a personal preference.
Given a chance, he would well love to enjoy a plateful of rice and
mutton curry with family. Yet to satiate his as well as those bellies
in his family which are always craving for food, he had taken up a
driver’s job.
“Trams would soon become a relic of the past. Given the fast pace of
our lives today, they are an unnecessary baggage”, Urmila’s father had
told his daughter one day. But inwardly he also believed that trams
offered one the airy comfort of a laid-back attitude to life, which is
fast vanishing.
But Urmila strongly believed, contrary to her father’s
visionary assumption that trams were like family heirlooms. They would
be hard to cast off, yet would have to be relegated to the background
and treasured for posterity. They offered one the airy luxury of a
slow, sure and serene ride.
As soon as the tram had entered the crossing of Amherst Street
and Harrison Road, Urmila stepped down from the first foothold, where
she had been standing for quite some time and letting the morning air
play around and dishevel her dark hair. She closed her eyes and allowed
the coolness to seep into every pore of her being.
It’s really been a long while since I last boarded a tram for a long ride, Urmila thought.
She started walking as soon as the tram had deposited her, safe
and sound, at her desired destination. She reached her paternal home
when the neighbourhood was just about waking up to another busy day.
Their maid, Purnima Mashi, was just getting the stove ready
for the breakfasts of everybody in the house. She had already prepared
two rounds of tea which were as necessary as the early morning air that
steals into every Calcutta household.
“Who is it?”
Urmila’s mother could be heard from the other side of the door,
when her daughter rang their doorbell. Except for the milkman, no one
rings their doorbell at such an hour. By its very tinkling sound,
Urmila’s mother could fathom that here was someone known to her. Just
like certain smells are associated with certain persons, so with
doorbells. No two tinkles of doorbells are alike, so it is believed.
The way one presses a doorbell reflects the inner calm or turmoil of
the visitor.
Urmila had not informed her parents prior to this visit. Yet
her mother sensed a foreboding and with much trepidation, had opened
the door.
There stood before her eyes her daughter, dishevelled with
dark circles around her eyes. Urmila suddenly stooped and touched her
mother’s feet, a custom which is followed on auspicious occasions in
Bengali households even to this day where the younger generation seek
blessings from their elders.
“It is you? At this hour? Is everything alright in your home?”
Urmila’s mother stared into her daughter’s eyes where she found a deep
sadness and melancholy which unsettled her. She had seen the same
sadness in her daughter’s eyes, when she had been told that her daughter
won’t be able to bear them any grandchildren by the gynaecologist of a
reputed nursing home in Calcutta.
“Your daughter suffers from malnutrition. It would be
advisable for her not to conceive at this stage. I cannot guarantee the
health of the child”, the doctor had informed Urmila’s father, after
performing the tests.
So when her daughter came knocking in the early morning,
Urmila’s mother’s instinct knew that her daughter has perhaps fallen
into some trouble.
“Can I have some food, mother? And”, Urmila paused here to look
pleadingly at her mother, “a cup of your specially prepared tea?”
“Of course”, her mother went hurriedly into the kitchen. After all,
it was seldom that their daughter visited their household after her
marriage.
She had put ground ginger pieces and cardamom sticks into her
daughter’s tea. She had always been like this, her mother mused.
Urmila. Their daughter.
Whenever she had been down with any ailment like common flu, it
was always her mother’s specially prepared tea which had enlivened her
spirits.
After drinking the cup of tea, Urmila rose and all of a sudden, touched her mother’s feet.
“What was that for?” Her mother couldn’t help asking her somewhat-whimsical daughter.
“Just felt like”.
“I have some work to complete. I would be back with a couple of
hours”, Urmila quickly adjusted the folds of her crumpled sari and bid
farewell to her mother. Her father, a late riser, did not perceive an
inkling of his daughter’s sudden visit.
The plan was well chalked out within Urmila’s conscious mind.
Often, when they were still unmarried, both Urmila and Nitish
would frequent the banks of the Ganges, the lifeline of the state of
Bengal. They used to dangle their legs, sitting on the wooden planks of
the ferry service and watch the sunset. They had also, once or twice,
boarded a boat and had requested the boatman to carry them to the other
side, for a pittance.
The place was as known to her as the back of her own hands.
The water seemed inviting – as inviting as the bridal finery
with which Bengali maidens are decked on their wedding day for their
bridegrooms. She looked back towards the edges of the banks. Except a
few early morning bathers, the entire place seemed apparently
deserted....
Urmila’s body was washed ashore during the latter part of the day.
“A case of death by drowning.”
The medical practitioner had diagnosed the case when the body
of a woman found on the banks of the Ganges, had been brought to him.
The only identifying papers found were the cash memo of the purchase of
a shirt, brought from a shop where Urmila had noted down her address.
That was how Nitish could be notified about his wife’s death.
The sunset that day had a fiery glow to it and as the
onlookers watched the slow but eventual dip of the halo of orange light
into the river, they also witnessed the hapless cries of a man over the
dead body of his wife whom he had loved but understood little.
