La Tulsi (in Spanish)

Uno de mis primeros recuerdos es el de mi madre rezando en el árbol de la familia tulsi. Yo crecícon el aroma de la planta de exuberantes perenne tarde supe era también conocido como el'albahaca santa'. Yo tenía doce años de edad cuando mi madre sentía que era seguro que medeje en la cocina para preparar té para la familia. Ella todavía recuerda con placer mi primerapreparación del té con una pizca de hojas de tulsi liberal y terrones de azúcar.

Vive sola en mi piso en Delhi he decidido comprar un tulsi planta de la empresa. Yosimplemente no podía conseguir su delicioso aroma de mi cabeza. Entonces mi tía venía y donóotras macetas con variedad - ésta tuvo un rojo púrpura y hojas y olía como el cielo. Mi sierva,analizando tanto exclamó: " ¿Por qué didi, eso es radha y Krishna! ¿No sabes la pareja nuncasobrevive juntos?" De hecho, no ha de Radha ( ¿o Krishna?) murió poco después.

Las ardillas y gorriones atacado sistemáticamente ortografía su desaparición temprana. La otraplanta se va a prosperar y crecer, por otro lado. Yo todavía era echar agua en la olla del muertoesperando que nos devolvería algún día. Pero no fue así. Quiero seguir a llenar la olla derechohasta el borde más desesperadamente, tengo que confesar. Hasta que he notado un par degorriones agua potable fuera de ella. Pronto se les unieron tres palomas…

Master Ji

“God knows who he thinks he is,” Runu mausi jerked her nose towards Mr. Goswami, whom everybody called Master Ji. There was nothing in the art teacher’s demeanor to justify the epithet, though. Not to me that is. The term held the suggestion of a bony male frame, sartorially inelegant. Yet there was nothing inelegant about Mr. Goswami, as he resembled an Italian Lorenzo pipe, dark, brooding and sophisticated in a 3-piece tailored suit.
Customarily, he had cornered the conversation at Mr. Bhattacharya’s post-Durga Puja party. And customarily, he had listeners giving ear with partial enthusiasm.
“This was soon after I had finished my art course from Sorbonne.” Some of us stifled our yawns. The preface too was customary. Prudence, the district magistrate’s English wife, had stretched her eyes till her artificial eyelashes touched the edge of her eyebrows. Seeing me regard her thus she winked. Her husband, Sandeep, had turned his back towards the company. He was collecting his drink – ostensibly? – at the bar set up rather ostentatiously in one corner of the sprawling terrace. I looked up. The clear, spangled sky distended before my eyes, a billowing sari in zari-work.
Although we were in the midst of April, there was a nip in the air. Leaning out from the terraced roof of the Bhattacharyas both Runu mausi and I pulled our sari pallus closer. . The low-peaked bejeweled Mussoorie hills winked back at me.
“She said she was in love with me… she was lovely…” Now everybody craned their necks to look at the speaker. Including the disinterested congregation of listeners. Self-aggrandizement was another of Master Ji’s forte. Maybe not too much out of place in this instance, though, as he did cut a wide swathe amongst the ladies.
“Who did?” the voice was that of Shankar Menon’s, the Shantiniketan artist who headed the art department at The Doon School.
“The girl… my student I was referring to, Chameli.”
“Chameli? Sounds more like a housemaid than a painter.”
“Oh no, she looked rather hip, wore jeans with exotic tops and smoked heavily.” The sarcasm went unnoticed (I suppose) and the crowd pressed closer. “She was also taking classes in water colors.”
“Not Madhubani?” The voice was Runu mausi’s.
Everybody was familiar with Master Ji’s bold Madhubani-style paintings on Durga executed on hand-made paper treated with cow dung. He’d told us that he imported the paper from a remote region in the interiors of Bihar. Several artists, even students at art colleges, had approached him but Master Ji had, so far, guarded his knowledge like a child guards a much-loved toy. Many of his masterpieces adorned Runu mausi’s café-cum-art gallery, a unique diner concept catering to the town’s well-heeled.
“No, not Madhubani,” Master Ji replied staring at a point above Runu mausi’s head.
By now, several late-comers to the party had joined us. Everybody begged him to tell the story from the beginning. Master Ji, tipping his pipe on an ashtray in a well-recognized gesture of self-importance, cleared his throat.
“There was this girl I was teaching when I was a junior assistant professor at the Government Art College.” He began leaning forward in his chair.
“Was she young and pretty?” All heads turned towards Udayan Gautama, son of the poet Vanshaj Gautama and a dabbler in poetry. Udayan’s glad eye was a byword in the upper echelons of our small town society.
“You bet, she was. There were lots of boys after her, but she said she was in love with me.” Udayan’s eyes had narrowed in disbelief. So had, I suspect, everybody else’s. Master Ji was dapper enough but no Adonis, surely.
“I had taken this batch of students to view the cave paintings in Ajanta.” His eyes shone at the recollection.
“Those caves are something, aren’t they?” Sandeep’s voice cut in from the bar. “And did you take a stroll around the garden?”
“Oh yes, that’s when the entire incident took place.”
Now everybody leaned forward, including the arthritic Professor Shivraj Tarafdar who’d retired from Cambridge and built a cottage next to the Bhattacharyas.
“I hadn’t been expecting it. Her slipper having cracked she was hobbling behind the others who had gone far ahead of us.” Then, after a pause, “I had had to stay behind to help her along.”
“And that’s when she sprung it at you, is that right?” Shankar Menon’s voice was tinged with amusement and incredulity.
“Well, not really. First we talked of this and that. She told me about her parents who lived in Nasik. I learnt she had a brother and twin sister.”
Master Ji wasn’t a man for ironies.
“I told her not to be silly and concentrate on her studies. I also let her know that I was a much married man with two children whom I had no intention of leaving. We walked on for a bit and talked of this and that. By the time we returned to college the stupid affair was forgotten,” he beamed at his audience.
“Of course,” he continued, “there was some awkwardness which both of us tried very hard to ignore and nearly succeeded.” Looking at him it was easy to see that he wasn’t uncomfortable in the least; rather, he seemed to be enjoying himself.
“What happened then?” Professor Tarafdar asked.
“She finished college and went back to Nasik. I heard she was teaching art at a local college there. And then…” He paused, scratching his beard. “And then she died. Of pneumonia.” The silence hung heavy, an unwanted pendant suspended in air.
“But, there’s more.”The crowd dispersing at the periphery began to re-congregate.
“Ten years later I ran into her twin, Shiuli. Actually it was she who ran into me.””Shiuli? Another flower?” Professor Tarafdar’s cynicism was urgently shouted down.
“Do you mean Shiuli Chatterji, the artist?” the diminutive professor carried on, unperturbed. “I think she has an opening in Triveni in Delhi sometime next week. Did she also become your student, or what?”
“Oh no. The thing is… heck; I’ll begin from the beginning. You see, I suddenly received a letter out of the blue saying that Chameli wanted to meet me.”
“But I thought you said Chameli was dead?” Professor Tarafdar was beginning to sound uncharacteristically impatient.
“I wish you’d allow me to tell the story my way.” Master Ji’s voice had spiked just a microtone higher. ”Oh, okay.”
“As I was saying, I received this letter, couriered to me as it were. It was my wife who’d received it. Opening it on my instruction she it handed over to me.”
“And what did the letter say?” Shankar Menon sounded half-amused and half-curious.
“That Chameli was coming down to Baroda and that she wanted to meet me.”
Our narrator crossed and re-crossed his legs. “I met her at the station.” He took a deep breath. “The twin, I mean.”
“And I bet she was a spitting image of Chameli,” Shankar Menon sounded a little less amused this time.
“You bet she was. Well, anyway, I took her to see my art department. By then I had also won my second national award.” Many of us stifled yawns for the second time that evening.
“And when did you discover she was the twin?” Professor Menon asked.
“She told me so herself. I wouldn’t have guessed otherwise. They were so similar. Toutes pareils. And like her twin, she wanted me to give her some tips on my Madhubani style.”“And of course, you declined.” Both Mr. Bhattacharya and Shankar Menon chorused like schoolboys.
“Yes, I did,” continued our narrator, ignoring their pooled sarcasm
“Well, anyway,” he resumed, “I took her to see the Baroda Museum and Picture Gallery and the Pratap Vilas Palace. It was on the day she was leaving that she told me about Chameli’s death. She told me she was her twin. I never heard from her again.”
A tame end to a rather tepid story, said Runu mausi to me in private, later. I couldn’t agree more, I replied. Being tired I was loath to pursue the subject.
A week later I accompanied Runu mausi to Delhi. She had to buy ‘raw material’, as she put it, for her café-cum-art gallery. Our first stop was to be the Triveni Art Gallery not far from the Bengali Market. The suggestion had been mine actually; I loved its little café with its steaming parathas and fresh yoghurt.
It was Runu mausi who spotted the announcement. It said, “Shiuli Nathan’s Madhubani paintings on display.”
The painting at the entrance looked vaguely familiar. As always, it was Runu mausi who hit the bull’s eye. “Doesn’t it look like one of Master Ji’s works?” It did, certainly. The large paintings featuring the goddess Durga, especially. I turned over the brochure. There was a brief biography, neatly calligraphed. It listed her exhibitions in India and abroad. There was only one sentence about her teacher; it read: The artist had learnt from her deceased twin sister.

A New Road

The wedding had been splendid, truly royal. So the Times of India had written. Nobody had expected Tilottama’s wedding to be anything less, in any case. Her grandfather had been a zamindar during the British Raj and her father, the only son, a high-ranking civil servant. To be sure, Tilottama hardly knew her father who always kept getting transferred out to new places. Her mother had died during childbirth and she had been brought up by her grandparents. Thamma doted on her and so did Dadu. The same couldn’t be said of her two sisters-in-law and mother-in-law, though. As a matter of fact she had hardly recognized her mother-in-law from the cheery fireball who’d lifted her chin with such love that it seemed to fill the entire courtyard where the family – even her extended one – habitually gathered for tea. Only that day had been special because Rathin’s family was coming to see her. The lone voice of protest had been that of Choto mashi’s who wanted her eighteen-year-old eldest niece to complete her B.A. in English and sit for the civil services’ exams. Tilottama, who had topped her 12th Board exams, wanted to study Spanish at the Jawaharlal Nehru University on the other hand. “Why Spanish, of all things pray?” Baba had thundered during one of his rare visits home. She had been too shy to let him know she adored the Tango songs and wanted to unravel their meaning. Between her youngest aunt’s ambition and her father’s need to dominate her existence her own dreams had wilted like a plant unwatered and uncared for.
She had met the groom – Rathin – only once. He’d appeared distant and indifferent and had even yawned while speaking to her. She’d caught a glimpse of his Colgate white teeth and wondered if they were false, they looked so unreal.
Rathin had been indifferent even on the night of the wedding. For one thing, he’d landed up drunk after everyone went off to sleep. He had barely looked at his new bride but switched off the lights and gone off to sleep snoring heavily.
That entire night she had lain awake thinking of Sohail. Sohail used to study at the boys’ school neighboring hers. A low wall separated these segregated institutions of hallowed learning, its slender altitude serving as a conduit for the sexes to mingle freely. Tilottama’s best friend Shalini had a boyfriend in the school next door. Arun was a family friend and the two exchanged letters and flowers almost everyday. The families were aware of the blossoming romance and had given it their blessings. Shalini was among the lucky few to have her parents’ blessings (as well as her future in-laws’) with regard to her future partner. Tilottama hadn’t been so lucky. Sohail had been Arun’s best friend and frequently accompanied them on their numerous dates and rendezvous. Dates to which Tilottama sometimes tagged along. That’s how she met Sohail and the two began exchanging notes and cards. Sohail could be so creative when it came to words. She came to understand later that he was the best essay writer in his class.
It was one of his well-crafted, superbly creative notes that got her in trouble.
She usually secreted the notes underneath the cover of her moral science book. One day the cover tore and the notes fell out. Before she was able to retrieve any Thamma picked them up. That evening nobody spoke at the dining table. The house had been this silent – Neetu, her ayah told her – the day her mother had died giving birth to her. Dadu and Thamma, so open in their affection, clenched their facial muscles tight in anger, grief and betrayal. If only they would shout at her. But then, who said breaking rules was easy?
Tilottama was promptly withdrawn from school despite Reverend Mother’s protests. The school allowed her to appear for her final Board exams privately, though. She never saw Sohail again.
Shalini told her during the wedding that it had rained fireworks at Sohail’s house post discovery of the beautifully-crafted love notes. Dadu had gone over personally to speak – actually, ‘warn’ would be a more appropriate term – to Sohail’s family. Sohail lived with his mother and maternal grandparents and an unmarried uncle, his father having died when he was a baby. In contrast to the iceberg that had formed in her household, it had rained fireworks in his. His maternal uncle whom Shalini described as a ‘brute’ had smitten his face with a rose bush cane, bruising it badly. Tilottama had imagined the red-blue gashes across Sohail’s handsome features and winced. “Please keep still,” one of her distantly-related aunts priest warned as she applied alta to her feet.

“Boudi, this is for you,” Ranu, the driver’s wife who also did the cleaning and dusting had brought in an inland letter. She turned the sky blue epistle over. The neat hand-writing seemed to be Rathin’s Dida who, unlike the rest of her husband’s family, appeared to dote on her. The words were formed like pearls.
“Boudi…” Ranu was twisting the end of her sari pallu. “Bordi would like to speak to you.” A chill caught at her throat. Whenever Bordi wanted to speak to her there was trouble. This past week Bordi had sent for her thrice. She never looked forward to these summons. A fire burst inside her forehead; she could feel her temples throbbing wildly.
“Tell her to come here instead!”
She counted till five. Her eldest sister-in-law flung open the door and shouted, “Just who do you think you are! Ranu broke the fish bowl didn’t you hear?”
“But you did my dear, why didn’t you pick up the pieces?” A male voice spoke before her mouth could file a protest. It was Arvind Maheshwari, the richest jeweler in town, also Bordi’s ex lover. Bordi’s conquests had been legendary, right from school. It was said of her that if you joined all her ex lovers from end to end they would form a chain around the globe.
What had made Bordi enter into an arranged marriage with the school teacher Mohit Bhattacharya was something Tilottama failed to understand. Some said it was because her last boyfriend, a professor of English Literature at the local college, had ditched her. People who’d been close to the professor said his mother had been extremely vocal in her protest regarding the entry of ‘an infamous coquette’ in her household.
Mohit da and Bordi fought constantly. Correction. Bordi fought with Mohit da constantly. As a result, Bordi ended up spending much of her time at her father’s house. Every time she walked out on her husband there would be a fresh wave of trouble for Tilottama or Tilo, as Chhod di had taken to calling her.
Chhod di was supposed to be the brilliant one in the family. An Oxford graduate in Botany she was the only one amongst her luminous coterie of friends to return to India. She was currently the head of the Botany department at the local college. Of her three female in-laws Chhod di appeared to be the least hostile. Or so she thought.
One Sunday afternoon, when the entire household was asleep she woke up to hear a small movement in the kitchen. She saw Chhod di reading her personal diary next to the stove. Like a wild animal she tore at her and snatched it out of her hands, her eyes live coals. Chhod di had reacted by not speaking to her.
The collective hostility of her in-laws was hanging upon her like a sword. Did Chhod di and the rest know about Sohail?
Bordi’s spectacles glinted antagonistically under the lamp light and she advanced menacingly. Arvind caught Bordi’s hand as Tilottama stepped back involuntarily. Bordi opened her mouth to hurl the choicest abuses available in her arsenal when Arvind yelled ‘STOP!’
If Tilottama had a knife in her hand she could have sliced the silence with it, she thought as blood rushed to her head. She looked up to find Arvind winking at her conspiratorially, his smile reaching the corners of his large eyes. A gurgle of laughter formed in her throat and she coughed to cover it up. Bordi’s eyes were ablaze but she said nothing. For the first time that she had stepped in as a bride Tilottama didn’t feel intimidated.
A storm broke loose when Rathin returned that evening, though. She did not know what it was that she abhorred more: the theatrical ravings or the icy silence and solitary confinement. Finally, the driver was summoned from his sleep at 11. He was given directions to her natal home. Ranu helped her with the packing.
No one saw her off as the family’s old Ford revved to a roar inside the porch.
To Tilottama it felt as though a large boulder sitting on her neck was finally being lifted off. Once the hell-spot she called her in-laws’ house was out of sight she pulled out the note Arvind had hastily thrust into her palm. She reclined comfortably, her first relaxed posture in months.
Her voice rang out loud and clear as she read out his address to the driver. The Ford was soon speeding by a new road…

Two Incidents

Two incidents
One of my earliest memories is that of my mother praying to the family tulsi tree. I grew up with the aroma of the lush perennial plant I later learnt was also known as the ‘holy basil’. I was twelve years’ old when my mother felt it was safe to let me into the kitchen to prepare tea for the family. She still recounts with delight my first tea preparation with a liberal sprinkling of tulsi leaves and sugar cubes.
Living alone in my flat in Delhi I decided to buy a tulsi plant for company. I simply couldn’t get its delicious aroma out of my head. Then my aunt came over and donated another potted variety – this one had red and purple leaves and smelt like heaven. My maid, looking at both exclaimed, “Why didi, that’s Radha and Krishna! Don’t you know the pair never survives together?” Indeed they didn’t for Radha (or was it Krishna?) died soon after. Squirrels and sparrows attacked it systematically spelling its early demise. The other plant continues to thrive and grow, on the other hand. I was still pouring water into the dead one’s pot hoping it would revive some day. It didn’t. I would continue to fill the pot right up to the brim rather hopelessly, I have to confess. Till I noticed a pair of sparrows drinking water out of it. Soon they were joined by three pigeons… The tulsi plant died a long time ago but it left a watering hole even as it breathed its last.
Significantly, another incident took place just then. Being slightly late to work I was surprised by the overwhelming silence at the office. A peon, who was busy dusting the furniture, jerked his head towards the north of where I was standing. I saw that he was indicating the theatre where films or slide shows related to the company’s line of business were sometimes displayed. I smote my head. Of course! The Product Development Manager had announced a film on real estate marketing in Europe earlier that week. I missed most of it since I was late. The lights came on and the Product Development Manager announced that the film-makers had a short 20-minute film they wanted to show us and that we could stay back if we wanted to.
The film had me enthralled. Entitled “Plastic: The Synthetic Menace” it revealed how toxic gases released in the air aren’t the only threat to the environment. Non-biodegradable substances like plastic pose a threat right from its inception as some of its constituents are benzene and vinyl chloride which are known to cause cancer. The devil in the pack even during production, plastic releases noxious substances like ethylene oxide, benzene and xylenes which can cause cancer, birth defects, damage the nervous and immune systems, as well as the blood and kidneys. That plastic waste around the region of 500 billion to 1 trillion is added to the earth every year is a deeply alarming reality. Environmental groups in the United States estimate that nothing short of 84 billion bags is produced in that country on an annual basis. The film showed disturbing sights of mounds of plastic choking rivers and canals.
The film being over, an eerie silence cloaked the hall. Speaking for myself, I was truly devastated by what I had seen. Coming out of the theatre I cringed at the sight of foam cups next to the coffee vending machine, as I am sure quite a few of my colleagues did too.
From the following week I started taking my own coffee mug to work. To my surprise, I discovered that everybody else was doing the same. Some of us liked to have tea instead of coffee, for which a tea-seller would be called in from outside. We told the tea-seller that henceforth we would be drinking tea out of earthen pots which were biodegradable. Money was collected to buy the biodegradable pots.
I also noticed that some of my colleagues, especially females who would do their shopping after work, were now carrying shopping bags to shopping centers and refusing plastic. I, on my part, have been doing the same since. Plastic bags in the office were also replaced with paper envelopes – perhaps not the best solution but at least a more moderate one.
One earthen pot and one film. Two seemingly unrelated incidents changed my life, not dramatically but significantly…

The magic thief

Suddenly the number of thefts seemed to have gone up in the town where Suman lived. Dadi told him one day on his return from school, “Did you know that Lala Karorimal’s shop was looted today? No one knows who did it.”
The grocer Gajanan Lal’s jewelry shop had been looted the previous day. The thief had disappeared without leaving a trace. The policemen of the town were shocked by the cleverness of the thief who simply left no clues behind.
Lala Karorimal’s precious diamond pieces had disappeared before his very eyes as had Gajanan Lal’s jewels and Seth Mithailal’s sweetmeats.
“The thief must be supernatural,” Suman told himself and then sat up straight. What if the thief was gifted with supernatural or magical powers? Then he had a sudden brainwave.
Having finished his lunch and homework, he proceeded to meet with Billoo and Blackie. He’d heard dadi say that animals were gifted with keener senses than humans.
Walking along the main road he heard an announcement:
“Hear! Hear! The mayor wants the townspeople to look after their own belongings. The invisible thief is too difficult to catch.”
Suman came upon Blackie and Billoo beneath the mango tree in the market place. To avoid being overheard by passersby, he led them both towards the bushes behind Shyam Lala’s shop.
Billoo told him that he’d been able to smell out the invisible thief at Karorimal’s shop.
“Are you able to smell him now?” Suman asked. Blackie the Bull replied, “Billoo has a stronger sense of smell than I do!” Then Billoo added, “Why don’t you speak to Lalu the Dog? His nose is even sharper than mine!”
The three set out in search of Lalu.
They came upon Lalu at Seth Mithailal’s shop where he was eating samosas with relish. Seth Mithailal’s servants loved the dog and often sneaked him snacks and other eats.

Suman and his two friends held a quick conference with Lalu who agreed to smell out the invisible thief.
The next evening after Suman was returning from the market place having sold his toys he saw Lalu speeding towards him.
“The thief is in Sameeran Bi’s house!” Lalu was panting with his tongue rolling out.
Sameeran Bi happened to be the richest lady in town. And just as generous. She’d opened a school for girls from poor families. She was also known to feed the poor and beggars once every week.
The thought of the thief entering the house of such a respected and big-hearted lady upset Suman greatly. He proceeded towards Sameeran Bi’s house determinedly. Lalu, Blackie and Billoo did the same.
Lalu stopped and sniffed the air. Sameeran Bi’s house was in view. “The thief’s here!” he barked and bounded towards the godown. The other followed suit without a further thought.
The godown was choc-a-bloc with sacks filled with crops. Lalu ran towards a particularly fat sack and growled, “He’s in there!”
“What are you doing here?” Sameeran Bi’s watchman had suddenly appeared in the godown.
“We are looking for the thief,” said Suman. Furious, the watchman exclaimed, “What! Are you mad? That thief has managed to remain unseen so far and you say you can actually spot him. I never heard such nonsense in my life!”
“What’s happening here?” A melodious voice made itself heard. Now its possessor had also made herself visible. Suman wheeled around: it was none other than the gracious Sameeran Bi!
“Sameeran Bi!” Suman cried excitedly, “the thief is here, hiding in that sack. I’ll just get him out, you’ll see!” He began rubbing the ring vigorously. The sack began to wobble rapidly. “Stop! Please stop! hee! hee! hee…”
Sameeran Bi and watchman held their breaths in amazement when Suman, who was still rubbing his ring announced, “I’ll only stop when you make yourself visible to us!”
“Alright! Alright! Hee, hee, hee…. I’ll do so…hee, hee, hee…”

The thief was still laughing when he emerged from the sack in person. Everyone gasped in shock. Why, this was Bhiru, Seth Maithailal’s trusted servant!
Bhiru was now sobbing helplessly. Sobbing, he told Sameeran Bi that his master Lala Maithailal had never given him enough money for a living, nor enough to eat. He was even thrown out of his job without being given a reason. That day he was passing through the forests when he rescued a dwarf who was drowning in the river. The dwarf gave him the gift of disappearing at will. But he also warned Bhiru against misusing his gift. “But I did!” wailed Bhiru. He begged forgiveness of Sameeran Bi and of all those present and vowed never to steal again.
Once he left, Sameeran Bi turned towards Suman and asked, “How did you know where he was hiding?”
“It wasn’t me who discovered him,” Suman laughed, “it was Lalu the dog who found him!”

(This work has been copyrighted)

Blackie The Bull

The town was buzzing with excitement. A cycle race – a major annual event in which all the best schools of the town participated – was about to take place. Suman’s school too was to take part in the race.
Next to the school was a huge field which was also the venue for practice. Those who came to practice were usually sons from well-to-do families who would be driven to the field in style. And in such beautiful cars too! Suman marveled at the colors – red, green, blue, yellow… even silver and mauve. Just like chariots out of a fairy tale. Suman would look at his old bicycle and feel a twinge of envy. When he grew up, he resolved, he would earn a lot of money and… “Can’t you see where you are going, idiot? Looks like you have buttons for eyes!” The voice belonged to a rich man’s son who, while speeding towards him on his brand new bicycle, landed on the ground with a thud. The rich man’s son named Sunil was now shouting at the top of his voice, “Aren’t you the one who comes to practice at the field? Very well, I’ll set you right there!”
Suman gingerly touched the third finger of his right hand; the ring was still there. He’d lost his fear of being struck by bullies thanks to the ring. The bullies, on the other hand, ran for their lives on seeing him. In his heart he blessed the dwarf whose life he’d once saved.
Feeling a presence behind him, Suman turned. Directly behind him was standing a large bull. It was Blackie the Bull who was also known as the ‘madcap bull’ because of his antics. He would chase people and sometimes drive his horns into them. His favorite haunt was the Shiva temple in the heart of the city.
The madcap bull never harmed Suman though. The reasons were not far to seek: Where the townspeople would call him ‘madcap’ to his face or throw stones at him Suman would always show him respect, bring him biscuits and shower affection on him.

Blackie asked Suman, “Is there anything I can do for you?”
“No!” whispered Suman who did not wish anyone to overhear and wonder. But Sunil did overhear for he growled, “What are you mumbling, idiot? Too afraid eh?” His beautifully cut new navy blue trousers were caked in dust thanks to the fall. Blackie, who was beginning to lose his temper, advanced towards Sunil.
“No Blackie, no!” Suman yelled. Blackie stopped at once. A sudden hush fell among the onlookers. No one had been able to stop madcap Blackie before like this.
Dadi, who got to hear of the incident, asked, “I believe you pulled off a miracle today with the madcap bull?”
“Isn’t he a living being dadi, just like us?”
“Wow!” exclaimed dadi happily, “you’ve become so wise!”

Dadi had prepared a delicious meal of mango pickle and chapattis which Suman ate with relish. He then proceeded towards the field to practice. The race was to be held on the following day.
The cycle bought through dadi’s meager savings was very old yet Suman rode it like a champion. He would have won the race hands down if it were today. If only…
On his return he was surprised to see Blackie at his doorstep. Dadi was feeding him chapattis. What was Blackie doing there?
“Wait dadi,” he said, “I’ll feed him. Why don’t you go inside?”
No sooner had dadi left than Suman turned and asked, “Tell me Blackie, is everything alright?”
“It isn’t. Why else do you think I’m here?”
Blackie the bull then went on to tell Suman about the conversation he’d overheard at the bazaar. Sunil and his friends had held a meeting under the peepul tree at the heart of the bazaar. No one had paid heed to Blackie’s presence there. One of the boys was saying, “Lets go and give him a beating. He thinks too much of himself!”
“No!” said Sunil. “Lets not get into fist-fight. Don’t forget, the race takes place tomorrow. I have another idea: How about exchanging one of the tyres of his ramshackle old bicycle with a punctured one? He thinks he can win the race, hah!”

Suman left his bicycle outside. At night Sunil and his friends silently made their way to the hut to carry out their wicked plan.
At the crack of dawn the next day Suman was wheeling his bicycle outside the hut when he spotted Blackie. The friendly bull, in a bid to protect Suman from his enemies, began walking beside him. Seeing the two together, Sunil and his cronies turned away.

Suman won the race that day. Sunil and the other boys stared in jealous amazement when Suman sailed ahead of them on his brand new bicycle! How had he learnt of their plan? Had someone informed him? But who? Sunil scratched his head in frustration.

Actually Suman had left his old bicycle outside the night before while his brand new bicycle – he and dadi had pooled in their savings – had been lying hidden underneath his bed. Sunil and his friends had meddled with the wrong bicycle!
The race being a prestigious event of the town, Suman’s prize was awarded by the town’s mayor. Dadi said on his return that day, “I knew you would win!” Suman silently thanked Blackie the Bull.

The Tree

‘Dadi’ is what Suman’s grandmother was called by everyone. Reason being that she was too old for anybody to remember her real name.
It was quite another matter that other women were extremely jealous of dadi who happened to be the best at knitting in the locality.
Suman returned from school one day to find dadi chatting with Vimla chachi who used to knit for a living too, like dadi. Vimla chachi was telling dadi about a tree which could respond to questions.
Had Vimla chachi discovered a magical dwarf too then? He decided to pay close attention to the conversation. Vimla chachi was telling dadi about a tree which moved one of its branches answering ‘yes’ in response to questions.
Suman was amazed nonetheless. Was it actually possible for a tree to respond to questions?
That evening he went across to Romu’s who had some new information up his sleeve. The magic tree was a piece of nonsense, Romu told him. It was simply a ploy on the part of the locality’s women to show poor dadi in a poor light.
“Youth hasn’t left the hands of that old bent witch, has it!” he’d heard Vimla chachi snigger. The rest of the locality’s women had sniggered too. Kamla chachi who was noted for black and yellow teeth had laughed in glee and said, “She’s quite mad as it is, after this incident no one will want to give her any business.”
The evil plan was this: Poor innocent dadi would be led to the mango tree next to Shyam Lala’s grocery and encouraged to ask questions of it. Bystanders and passerby would laugh themselves to death. What great entertainment, the women had decided. Suman could barely control his anger.
It was afternoon yet. Suman decided to have a word with the mango tree. He was worried though. Would the tree listen to him? More important: Would the ring’s magic work on it?
Suman was still pondering these questions when Vimla chachi turned up at the doorstep suddenly. “Dadi is not in,” Suman sounded surly. “Who is it, Suman?” Dadi shouted from within. “Oh Vimla it is you! Come on in, why are you standing outside?” Looking accusingly at Suman Vimla chachi said, “Your grandson was telling me such tall stories!”
“Oh don’t mind him, he’s only a child. But please tell me, does the tree really answer questions? God knows how many times I have gone past it and never known about its magical properties!”
“Hey dadi! Just come with me and you’ll know,” Vimla chachi almost dragged dadi outside the hut. “Wait!” Suman yelled from inside the little hut, “I am coming too.” He could barely contain his anger. How jealous and small-minded these women were who were trying to make fun of a poor old woman.
Vimla chachi did not lead dadi to the mango tree, after all. Rather she brought dadi and Suman to the backyard of her house where stood a thorny tree like a watchman on guard. Suman was now really worried. He’d never seen this thorny tree before.
Poor dadi, who was utterly innocent, now asked, “But Vimla , didn’t you say it was the tree next to Shyam Lala’s…”
Turncoat Vimla chachi replied, “When did I say that, dadi? It is the same tree I told you about, honest.”
Suman, who was between dadi and Vimla chachi, turned slightly. From the corner of his eye he saw the end of Kamla chachi’s sari fluttering in the wind. Sudden laughter rose from one of the rooms in the house.
“Can I ask questions of this tree then?” dadi asked.
“Of course you can,” said wicked Vimla chachi. “But you are only permitted to ask three questions.” Someone laughed once again from inside one of the rooms in the house.
Dadi had closed her eyes in the meantime. She called to the tree, “Dear tree deity! Do you know me?” The thorny tree swayed a little and then began to shed its thorns. Pretty soon the thorns had covered the entire backyard. So amazed was dadi at the tree’s feat that she forgot to ask the other questions.
Dadi’s jealous neighbors emerged from Vimla chachi’s home with their mouths open. How had this happened? Of course, no one had seen Suman pull out his ring and rub it.

(This work has been copyrighted)