It was obvious in a stagnant remote corner of the world ,which was under colonial yoke for centuries and abandoned before they could even start thinking of their own, just like abandoning toddler to live its own life, to consider that much superior. He knew the pervasive importance of it since in some of the mushrooming towns of houses roofed with corrugated sheets people displayed it by holding a copy of the Bible in English even though they could hardly comprehend and there were also times when the preacher was asked to do the sermons in English because the folks wanted everyone to use the civilized language.
Years after when he realized that his face was rustic and the softness of it had disappeared, then it occurred to him that he was already in his thirties and he found it difficult to recall the pictures from the past, they appeared blurred and he couldn’t re-enact those nostalgic pictures unless he had run into someone who belonged to those days. Then the news of people getting married around him also made me him realise that they were in there late twenty, and in few years he would turn forty.
He sometimes fantasized what it would have been like to be with a partner. In the past there were women who were interested in him and few whom he liked but never got the chance to express his feelings and besides he was not sure whether his condition of moving from one place to another would be easily accepted.
His siblings all had kids and they were up for big things of connection with Marwari from Thangal bazaar. Each one had claimed his or her share of land and started building brick house that they might have seen somewhere.
Despite the houses and the flamboyant wealth something was wrong with them. When they came home they would holler at their kids, but they would be very generous with good and caring words with those whom they considered useful in their business. When asked what they had been doing, they wouldn’t give anything precise; theirs answers came in scattered bits which confused others, leaving them think they were either not doing anything at all or had been engaged in some clandestine business.
To the contractors he was an uncompromising foreman who always stuck to datelines and often time, it was the contractors who couldn’t keep up with him since they couldn’t supply raw materials and most of the times lost in their labyrinthine of pulling strings through someone known in this and that department.
His hardened hands, the rusted face with metallic radiance, the well-built framed body, the sympathetic eyes which hardly blinked made the people around him feel there was no need for fine clothes or for connections, those connection people would come to him only when they couldn’t do things with money, just like an old tree giving comfort to eyes, and useful when it drizzles or is hot.
Every week couple of armoured white vehicles pulled up in front of the huge gate, a police inspector in armoured uniform would be seen grinning at them, then after a bundle a more changed hands then they would leave the gate with utmost respect and unnatural laughter.
If the armoured men and armoured vehicles claimed their days, then the sunless parts belonged to the hooded men smelling of Parisian perfumes, who crept in right after the sun's exit and managed to disappear before the mighty disc could even wink.
The siblings knew the merry-go-round network of the armoured men and the nocturnal ones; the nocturnal men would make phone calls and "hooked up" with the politicians ,who had been doing everything to outdo their peers in North India in term of appearance, to slice off construction contracts. When these contracts were finalised easily over the phones the armoured always knew and it made them burn with jealousy. Out of desperation they roll out with their best lines to claim theirs shares.
If the siblings were the conduits, while the other parties were the benefactors, then individuals like Tondon were valued less than speck of dust. But in a place where guns don't function, malicious networks fail, where only human's authentic nature works, people like them would crawl like dying earthworms. If they looked at a bricklayer-turned-foreman like him with deep indignation, then to him they were a class to be pitied, whose punches and gross hypocrisy were to be tolerated like a compassionate father would put up with his delinquent son.
One Sunday evening when he was headed to his father's house of thick earthen walls, roofed with fresh thatch he was stopped by some of those armoured people. Since they were already wasted they couldn't tell he was also drunk. When detained and asked who he was and what he was doing, he replied in Thangkul dialect, and when the interrogation was intensified he switched to Paite dialect. They kept on asking if he really was from that place, he said he wasn't and he had been sent by his heavenly ancestors to watch them.
The composure during the interrogation, the flit between the dialects and the heavenly talks gave them a shudder and they got rid of him like a person would do after he had picked up a viper in the dark and then flinging it with violent repulsion and shock.
It was easy for them to loathe the sight of him and he was quick to comprehend that they all were mimic people, mimicking a far-fetched world which they neither could fully imagine nor could practically furnish. Like having listened to a ferocious tale and now armed to simulate, but there was no war and if they wanted they would either have to invent a war or go back to the ravaged times that represent the height of human brutality.
To be continued........
Years after when he realized that his face was rustic and the softness of it had disappeared, then it occurred to him that he was already in his thirties and he found it difficult to recall the pictures from the past, they appeared blurred and he couldn’t re-enact those nostalgic pictures unless he had run into someone who belonged to those days. Then the news of people getting married around him also made me him realise that they were in there late twenty, and in few years he would turn forty.
He sometimes fantasized what it would have been like to be with a partner. In the past there were women who were interested in him and few whom he liked but never got the chance to express his feelings and besides he was not sure whether his condition of moving from one place to another would be easily accepted.
His siblings all had kids and they were up for big things of connection with Marwari from Thangal bazaar. Each one had claimed his or her share of land and started building brick house that they might have seen somewhere.
Despite the houses and the flamboyant wealth something was wrong with them. When they came home they would holler at their kids, but they would be very generous with good and caring words with those whom they considered useful in their business. When asked what they had been doing, they wouldn’t give anything precise; theirs answers came in scattered bits which confused others, leaving them think they were either not doing anything at all or had been engaged in some clandestine business.
To the contractors he was an uncompromising foreman who always stuck to datelines and often time, it was the contractors who couldn’t keep up with him since they couldn’t supply raw materials and most of the times lost in their labyrinthine of pulling strings through someone known in this and that department.
His hardened hands, the rusted face with metallic radiance, the well-built framed body, the sympathetic eyes which hardly blinked made the people around him feel there was no need for fine clothes or for connections, those connection people would come to him only when they couldn’t do things with money, just like an old tree giving comfort to eyes, and useful when it drizzles or is hot.
Every week couple of armoured white vehicles pulled up in front of the huge gate, a police inspector in armoured uniform would be seen grinning at them, then after a bundle a more changed hands then they would leave the gate with utmost respect and unnatural laughter.
If the armoured men and armoured vehicles claimed their days, then the sunless parts belonged to the hooded men smelling of Parisian perfumes, who crept in right after the sun's exit and managed to disappear before the mighty disc could even wink.
The siblings knew the merry-go-round network of the armoured men and the nocturnal ones; the nocturnal men would make phone calls and "hooked up" with the politicians ,who had been doing everything to outdo their peers in North India in term of appearance, to slice off construction contracts. When these contracts were finalised easily over the phones the armoured always knew and it made them burn with jealousy. Out of desperation they roll out with their best lines to claim theirs shares.
If the siblings were the conduits, while the other parties were the benefactors, then individuals like Tondon were valued less than speck of dust. But in a place where guns don't function, malicious networks fail, where only human's authentic nature works, people like them would crawl like dying earthworms. If they looked at a bricklayer-turned-foreman like him with deep indignation, then to him they were a class to be pitied, whose punches and gross hypocrisy were to be tolerated like a compassionate father would put up with his delinquent son.
One Sunday evening when he was headed to his father's house of thick earthen walls, roofed with fresh thatch he was stopped by some of those armoured people. Since they were already wasted they couldn't tell he was also drunk. When detained and asked who he was and what he was doing, he replied in Thangkul dialect, and when the interrogation was intensified he switched to Paite dialect. They kept on asking if he really was from that place, he said he wasn't and he had been sent by his heavenly ancestors to watch them.
The composure during the interrogation, the flit between the dialects and the heavenly talks gave them a shudder and they got rid of him like a person would do after he had picked up a viper in the dark and then flinging it with violent repulsion and shock.
It was easy for them to loathe the sight of him and he was quick to comprehend that they all were mimic people, mimicking a far-fetched world which they neither could fully imagine nor could practically furnish. Like having listened to a ferocious tale and now armed to simulate, but there was no war and if they wanted they would either have to invent a war or go back to the ravaged times that represent the height of human brutality.
To be continued........
Comments
Post a Comment