The Witch (Part 3): The Witch Hunt

A month passed. The meteorological department finally revoked their earlier announcement that the rains were due to a cyclonic disturbance in the Bay of Bengal and reluctantly accepted that the monsoon season was already half way through without them having realized it. The rain and thunderstorms continued. The ponds brimmed up to their banks and overflowed onto the streets. Street children went about collecting trapped fish from potholes when the waters receded. New life emerged through the cracks of the old building walls. Little plants penetrated through the layers of soil and surfaced out in search for air and sunlight. The trees were all lush green, the groves verdant. Tender grass shafts started to grow once again on tracks that had almost become barren under human footsteps. And all this while the sun and the clouds carried on their age old feud for dominance over the skies. On the turfs dragonflies hopped and their translucent wings shined with either the glitter of sun rays or the vibrant hues of the rainbow that appeared against the gray sky after a shower like an arched gateway to heaven. The dark monsoon clouds formed different shapes and on the roads one could often see parents of a petulant child trying to distract its attention from the roadside vendor’s ice-cream cones to the sky where bloated resemblances of rabbits, cows, dogs, cats and other imaginary beings of bedtime stories floated past silently. Raindrops drummed rhythmically and rolled down the slanted sides of fresh green leaves like shimmering, transparent pearl beads, and then coalesced to form rivulets that ran down the length of the veins and trickled off the tips, drop by drop, into small water puddles on the ground below as they reverberated with concentric ripples.

Mother earth was fertile again at this time of the year, governed by her regular cycles of seasons that got her the rains, the droughts, and her yearly fertility. And while life was blooming everywhere, Mala got the operation done to rid herself of the curse of fertility. A ‘small and happy family’, like the one on the red and white batch, is all she dreamed of. She knew that although the NGO lady would have supported her action, the slum-dwellers would despise her. Boorimashi had taken her to Doctor Munshi for the operation. The operation wasn’t a big worry for her but its consequences were. She wished that the NGO lady was there to help her out in explaining it to Nitai.

Lying on the hospital bed, she imagined how furious Nitai might get upon hearing it, how the vile and foul-mouthed women of her slum would scoff at her, and how the bigoted priest of the local Shiva temple would project the act as a sacrilege against nature and god and possibly recommend others to ostracizing her. She had prepared herself for all these slanders that she believed were to engulf her life, but it had not dawned on her that Boorimashi, her accomplice in this act, also stood in danger. Never in her dream had she thought that the slum-dwellers would turn against Boorimashi for encouraging the act.

After the operation, Mala returned from the hospital accompanied by Boorimashi on a day that started out as surprisingly sunny. On their way back from Doctor Munshi's hospital they passed by the sweet shop on Station Road which kindled in Boorimashi a slight desire for the sweets that she loved. Boorimashi decided to prepare a fresh batch of cow dung cakes that would afford her this little luxury. But later in the day when Boorimashi returned after pasting her cow dung cakes on the eastern wall, she found a mob surrounding her hut. Nitai was leading them. He had returned the day before and upon learning about the incident from neighbors, he felt cheated and humiliated. The tinge of sarcasm that he deciphered in his neighbors' voices made him feel as if his manhood had been mocked at by two women. His rage was so profound that he would have beaten Mala to death had her mother not arrived in time just as planned. Unable to teach Mala a lesson, Nitai's hatred turned towards Boorimashi. The local priest who had for long eyed the small plot of land on which Boorimashi's hut sat, instigated Nitai to defend his honor. 'Be prepared fully to wipe out an evil from the society if need be', advised the priest cunningly.

Nitai bellowed out loud with rage, ‘She is a witch. Today she took my wife for an operation without my knowledge, tomorrow she lure others into doing the same. Now my wife won’t be able to give birth anymore! This old hag wants every female to turn barren like herself!’ Blood throbbed in his temple and his eyes burned with anger.

An agitated female voice shouted out hoarsely, ‘Yes, she herself is barren and that’s why she is forcing others to do the operation. It must be her black-magic with which she convinced Mala to commit such a sin’. The priest agreed with a few nods and wisely added, 'Shameful! heinious act against the will of the Lord'.

Others cried, ‘She will kill all our children with her black-magic. Last week Shibu’s little child died suddenly after two days of illness….it also must be because of her black-magic. Old witch!’

‘Yes I had seen Shibu’s son playing near this old hag’s hut a few days before he died. I had seen her giving him biscuits. She must have poisoned him,’ concocted another bystander, surprised at the fecundity of his own imagination. ‘She is a danger to us all. She can’t be allowed to live in our slum!’ cried out the mob in unison.

They dragged Boorimashi out of her cottage and hit her with their sticks. Blood squirted out from her forehead. Her weak body wriggled on the ground, pleading for mercy. But nobody listened to her claims of innocence, nobody cared to believe that the operation was not her black-magic. Nobody heard Mala when she cried from her bed and yelled that what Boorimashi did was only on her request for help. The sight of blood had turned the men into wild beasts feasting on a weak prey. It became a macabre display of machoism for some, thrill for others. The children of the slum, naked and hungry, watched it all from a safe distance and took refuge behind their excited mothers who angrily shouted epithets at the old witch. The incessant blows on Boorimashi lasted till the revenge had been taken. The sinner had been punished. As the heads cooled down slowly, a sudden dismal feeling of shock, shame and worry overcame everyone. They began convincing themselves that it was not their fault, the rules of the society had been broken and the sinner had to be punished, the evil had to be wiped out from the slum.

An approaching police jeep’s siren was heard at a distance and everybody ran away. The men who had just bravely meted out justice turned into fugitives. The 'witch' lay dead in a pool of blood. Gentle rain drops that descended from the black monsoon clouds fell on Boorimashi’s body, but she didn’t grumble at them any longer. Her body lay on the street, still and cold. The clouds thundered overhead and flashed their swords. The black cat purred and leaped across the soggy alley. Mala wept in her bed, she lay weak and helpless as her mother sat by her, holfing her arm in an iron grip. The police made some cursory arrests, ransacked a few houses for goodies, nabbed a few innocent drunks from the local liquor shop and left the scene. Reporters scribbled furiously the mumblings of Pagla Khokon, a known madman in the slum, who having proclaimed himself as an eyewitness went on to provide them with a fictitious account of the event. The photographers clicked away at all angles to get the perfect shot of the dead. Their heads were busy searching for catchy titles for the news report. The municipal ambulance that collected the body made its way behind the police jeep, its siren rising feebly above the general din of the streets and the rumblings of the clouds overhead. And in the meantime the raindrops worked their way at softening the last batch of cow-dung cakes that carried the imprint of Boorimashi’s hand, erasing all signs of them from the old factory wall, steadily and stealthily.

THE END

The Witch (Part 2): Mala's Problem

Boorimashi came back from the old factory wall and went inside her hut, grumbling and complaining to herself about the monsoons, loudly enough to draw Mala’s attention. Mala stayed in a dingy hut only a few steps away from Boorimashi’s. Mala smirked on realizing that the curses were meant for the monsoon clouds and thought of chatting with poor Boorimashi.

Boorimashi managed to light a lamp after fumbling in the darkness for a while. She looked up on hearing Mala’s approaching steps. Mala came and stood near the door. Her weary eyes, seated deep in their sockets, found Boorimashi sitting at one corner of the room. Mala was in her early twenties, fairly tall, dark, and lean with worries. She was already was a mother of two. Her eldest son, Poltu, was born four years back and then three years later she was again blessed with a daughter whom she had named Minoti.

‘I heard you shouting….what’s the matter Boorimashi?’ asked Mala, carefully suppressing her smile.

Boorimashi took up her torn straw-mattress that was resting in one dark corner, folded in a cylindrical form and propped at an angle against the walls. She unrolled it, holding one side with both her hands, and waved it twice to shake off the dust before spreading it out on the floor. Then her wrinkled hand reached out for her torn palm-leaf fan and started cooling herself. Mala sat down on the mattress with her legs splayed and hands resting on the floor behind.

‘Why was I shouting?’ retorted Boorimashi at Mala’s question as if the answer was evident. 'The monsoon is here. It’s the most wretched season of the year. Today the entire lot of my cow dung cakes has been washed away'. ‘You are always complaining about something or the other!’ replied Mala teasingly. Boorimashi ignored her comment and went on fanning herself.

Mala hesitated for a while and then moved on to discuss something that was more important to her; something that had been gnawing at her heart for quite sometime then. She moved close to Boorimashi and said softly, ‘You know, he has been asking for a third one.’*

Boorimashi seemed to be happy on hearing it. She smiled, her eyes squinted, and her shriveled lips parted to form a wide joyful grin, exposing her red gum and the few unevenly spaced teeth that stood on them. But Mala didn’t seem to be very excited that her husband, Nitai, was in favor of having yet another child for she was quite happy with the two she had and didn’t want a third one. She was worried about it and had come to ask for Boorimashi’s advice. Boorimashi had served as the midwife during her previous two deliveries and Mala trusted her and valued this old lady’s opinion. One NGO lady who once came to visit their slum a year back had told Mala about the need to maintain a ‘small and happy family’ and had handed her a red and white batch to her that carried a symbol of a couple and two kids- one boy and a girl. The NGO lady had explained that only a small family like the one shown can bring prosperity to the nation. At the time Mala was happy to find that the symbol matched exactly with that of her own family; she felt as if the symbol had been solely inspired by her own family. She had enjoyed watching the envy in the eyes of her women neighbors when the NGO lady praised her family and mentioned it as an ideal example.

However, Mala had not fully understood the things that the NGO lady said, she had mentioned some kind of surgery and all. Mala had stared with awe in her eyes, amazed at the lady’s smartness and confidence. But she had only realized that the words of the NGO lady had truth in them and that she would need to follow her words if she wanted her children to grow up well. She had seen how two of her elder sister’s five children died of some disease which the doctor had said were caused due to malnutrition. She didn’t want the same to happen to her kids. She wanted both Poltu and Minoti to be healthy, she wanted them to go to the nearby Government school, and she dreamt that one day Minoti will get a good groom and Poltu will be working in some office instead of becoming a rogue like his father. She told it all to Boorimashi, the details of her immense worries and her little hopes. Boorimashi listened to her carefully, nodding her head in approval from time to time, and finally she said, ‘Don’t worry. I will take you to Doctor Munshi if you want; he will be able to tell what actually needs to be done. I have also heard about this surgery. Last month, Chatterjee’s daughter got it done. The in-laws were at first upset, but they didn’t stop her. Chaterjee ginni was telling me about all that some days back. She said that it is a small operation and is safe too. I will ask her for details about it. You go to sleep now, don’t worry so much, things will be fine’. ‘But I am only worried about Nitai and other people here….do you think they won’t mind if I get the operation done? I think they will curse me and talk bad about me,’ said Mala despondently.

The old caring voice once again responded with the usual consolation- ‘Don’t worry.’ Mala hesitated a bit as if she had more things to tell but got up slowly. She complained that Nitai hadn’t come home for the previous two weeks. Her brows knitted together with disgust at the thought of her husband’s frivolity but she controlled her anger. Boorimashi stood near her cottage door with her soot stained lamp that threw a suffused yellow light on the alley and watched Mala as she walked back to her hut. The gloomy night sky, still covered with clouds, hang low with a sense of foreboding. A black cat mewed and emerged stealthy from the backyard; its green eyes glowed fiercely in the darkness of the surroundings. It gave a momentary pause, alarmed by Boorimashi’s peering eyes, and it swiftly leaped across the soggy passage before disappearing in the night’s cloak. Boorimashi grumbled at the inauspicious creature with disgust and scuffed back to her room.

* Women in these parts don’t take their husband’s name while talking; rather they refer to them with pronouns like ‘he’, ‘him’, and ‘his’; a tacit convention that everyone follows well.

The Witch (Part 1): The Arrival of Monsoon

Dark and sullen nimbus clouds appeared over the horizon. They had found their way into the city earlier than what the weather forecasters had predicted. The sun which had ruled over the city sky for the last three months of a scorching summer found itself surrounded by these somber adversaries; its orange rays flickered like dying sighs before it vanished behind the black folds. The dark clouds grumbled potent threats and flashed their swords as they spread across the sky. Mischievous wild gusts of wind carried away clothes from the cloth-lines, rattled window panes in desperate attempts to free them from their iron hinges and rummaged through unattended notebooks to liberate all the loose pages tucked away between them - love poems of a shy teenager, photos of a childhood sweetheart, letters to the beloved that were never mailed.

It was the beginning of the monsoon season in Calcutta.

People scurried for their homes. Little kids pouted their lips as their mothers dragged them off the playground. Only the street urchins continued with their game of football. The black clouds, languid and overweight, swallowed up the sky bit by bit. A heavy downpour followed. People fumbled hard against the strong winds to lock all the doors and windows to keep out the torrential, yet cherished, rain. Only a few who could not resist the temptation of soothing themselves by letting the raindrops trickle down their parched skin came out and stood in the open and got soaked to their heart’s content. Taking advantage of their mother's struggle against the winds at the cloth-lines, the kids sneaked out to dance in the rain and to enjoy the freedom of the street urchins. They sailed paper boats in the puddles formed in potholes. But soon their angry mothers came out, warned them against fever and forcibly dragged them home with a few gentle slaps. The frail paper boats, deserted by their little owners, struggled to float for a few minutes, but were either toppled by heavy raindrops or got crushed under the wheels of rickshaws and bicycles. It rained and rained, heavily and incessantly. The roar of lightning and thunder was met with the monotonous sound of conch that housewives blew in unison to placate Indra, the god of storm.

It was nine-thirty, almost four hours since the rain had started. By then the rain drops were tired of following their predecessor’s way of ricocheting from the windows, tapping against the glass, running down the window sills like a perennial stream of sparkling beads, filling up the potholes, flooding the sewage drains, and had weakened down to a soft drizzle. Lightning continued to flash across the dark night sky intermittently, albeit with a limited arrogance. The thunder had reduced to an occasional rumbling among the moisture drained clouds. The city inhabitants were preparing their beds after the scrumptious dinner of plate-full khichdi and onion pakodas, specially cooked to mark the beginning of such long awaited comfortable nights. As the household lights were turned off one by one, the city started vanishing fast in an expanding grip of darkness. An unusual stillness loomed everywhere, its eeriness being occasionally shaken by the shrill cries of the drenched street dogs. At times their cries were prolonged enough to form depressing moans that sounded more inauspicious than irritating, and added a latent discomfort somewhere deep down in the sleeping souls. A few dim but brave streetlights fought against the fast-spreading darkness to faintly illuminate the city roads, casting tall shadows of Boorimashi on the nearby dank building walls as she made her way back to her hut. Mud squelched under her slippers making it difficult for her to walk. But Boorimashi trudged along carefully till she reached her destination- a tiny hut at the end of Chaulpotti Lane, one of the many slums that dot the city of Calcutta.

Chaulpotti Lane was full of makeshift huts with thatched roofs and some with orange-red baked mud tiles that were arranged adjacent to each other over sloping roofs. Their walls were mostly made of rags and bamboo. Blue and black tarpaulin tents littered with lean and hungry bodies inside occupied the footpaths. The rainwater had spoiled their rags and so they slept on piles of old newspapers and cardboard boxes. The western part of the slum, a comparatively low-lying area, was faced with even a bigger problem of stagnant water that was almost knee deep at places. The contents of the nearby garbage dump where the city municipality trucks came every day to clear off the city’s trash had been washed away in the rains. Filth lay strewn all over the streets and a stench hung heavy in the air. But this wasn’t anything new for the Chaulpotti Lane slum dwellers, they had got used to all these over the past decades. They had learned not only to endure it but also to accept it as the wish of that almighty who determines everyone’s fate, and whom they had been worshiping sheepishly and unquestioningly as an impartial and omnipotent power behind the workings of the vast universe.

Boorimashi was in her late sixties but her wrinkled skin and thin bony arms with saggy lumps of little flesh dangling below gave her the appearance of an octogenarian. She had dense white hair which fluttered in the air and almost toothless gum which made her look like an old oriental witch from the pages of some fairy tale. But in spite of her frail looks she wasn’t very weak. She lived alone and managed all her things by herself . The rain had stopped and the faint murmurs among the clouds sounded like a jostle among birds as they settled down for the night. Boorimashi reached her hut and stood outside inspecting the puddles of water and looking around to estimate the extent of damage caused by the rains. She suddenly remembered the cow-dung cakes that she had left to dry on the factory wall that morning and hurriedly went there to find out if they too had been washed away. Cow-dung cakes* were a source of a small income for her. Boorimashi had managed to coax the old Chatterjee couple who owned the Lodge at the crossing of Chaulpotti Lane and Station Road to allow her to collect the dung of their two cows. Boorimashi had been working as a maid at the Chatterjees’ Lodge for more than twenty years and so this longtime acquaintance made the Chatterjees agree to her request without much reservation. Milkman Bhola Halder’s wife, Champa, a peddler of cow dung cakes, bought the cakes that Boorimashi produced and sold them at higher price in the city suburbs. But Boorimashi was happy with whatever extra money she earned this way. The salary that she got from working at the Chatterjee Lodge along with this little extra income was sufficient to meet her basic expenses and even allowed for occasional little extravagance like a two rupee ice-cream cone or a couple of sweets from the fly infested sweet shop on Station Road. The delight from indulging in this slight profligacy that the extra income allowed was so great for her that she didn’t mind tiring herself with the additional work. Everyday she used to go out to collect cow-dung in the morning and then pasted it in the form of small, flat, circular disks on the old factory wall with her own hand and left them there to dry in the sunshine. And on drying she collected them in sacks and kept them ready for Champa to buy.

The old factory wall where Boorimashi dried her cow-dung cakes belonged to a closed factory that was once known as the Raheja Jute Mills. It was a dilapidated structure with green moss stained walls, lined with deep cracks inhabited by reptiles. The rusted iron frame of the roof jutted out menacingly against the sky with broken asbestos sheets dangling precariously from its chassis. Weeds and shrubs had grown erratically in the factory precincts. The main entrance door to the factory was tinted green with moss. A huge iron lock, red with rust, hang on it. Just above it was a ‘Suspension of Work’ notice, written hastily in black paint some twenty years ago when a labor unrest over due wages forced the management to close the factory for once and all. Since then the factory that once used to roar with the noise of thousand machines, chattering of the workers and hourly whistles fell into a dead silence. Nobody had entered its premises over the years. But its outer walls still served a variety of purposes; the eastern wall was for Boorimashi to dry her cow-dung cakes while the others displayed various graffiti- a hammer and sickle painted in red, notices of political rallies, election promises, and slogans of ‘Vote for a better Government’. These were flanked by arrays of colorful posters of political leaders pasted all over the walls without any reverence for the dead factory’s ‘Stick No Bills’ warnings.

Boorimashi heaved a sigh of despair. All her efforts had gone in vain. The walls were spotted with little remnants of the cow-dung cakes that she had left to dry. The heavy downpour had managed to soften the dung and broke them away from the wall. She cursed her luck as she headed back for her hut. More than the financial losses what pained her was the loss of the cakes themselves for she never thought of them as inanimate entities meant just for selling but had a rather strange affection for them. This conspicuously weird behavior of Boorimashi started ever since she took conscious notice that every cow-dung cakes she made carried the impression of her palm, unaltered, right from the time of their conception as she pasted them on the wall to the time when their pitiable life ended up in smoke. Each one of them had a different shape and size but all of them faithfully carried the same impression -the impression of her hand, the imprint that identified them as hers, somewhat like the faint imprint of parent's facial features that all children carry. And so she sometimes felt that instead of selling them she could as well preserve these little creations of her barren life. But then she knew that it was a crazy thought and she herself would smile at her silliness.

*a cheap fuel still in use for cooking in very few households, mostly in suburban areas.

The loop without a hole

Once upon a time there lived a writer who became famous (and perhaps even notorious) for always beginning his stories with the cliched opening sentence: "Once upon a time..."
Whether this curious literary style was a product of a pathological level of nostalgia (which may well explain the reported bouts of depression that the writer frequently suffered from) or a quirky modernist experiment (in which case the writer was way ahead of his time) has remained as a matter of great debate among critics and readers. Even to this date his admirers proclaim him as a true visionary, while his detractors reject him as a hack who lacked even the slightest imagination to come up with variations in his opening sentence. But most scholars have noted that his stories were all very original, and each of them was unique in their content and style. Therefore, it would seem more likely that the writer had deliberately chosen to use the same opening line in all his stories. While the debate on the quality of his works raged on, few took the trouble to identify the possible source or inspiration that motivated the writer to adopt this whimsical style. Only recently, a renowned critic and Fabrication Times columnist, Dr. I.M.A. Sinik, presented an idea that best elucidates the reasons for the writer's style. Dr. Sinik argues that the writer got the idea to use the same opening line in all his stories after coming across a fictional account written by some unknown writer in which the protagonist was a quirky writer who always began his stories in the exactly same way. In his last Sunday's column Dr. Sinik revealed that this fictional account, titled "The loop without a hole", was written by a relatively unknown writer (an errata issued later in Fabrication Times clarified that the unknown writer was in fact a resident of a mental asylum for the most part of his adult life), and he cited the following excerpt from the original fiction to justify his claim: Once upon a time there lived a writer who became famous (and perhaps even notorious) for always beginning his stories with the cliched opening sentence: "Once upon a time..."
Whether this curious literary style was a product of a pathological level of nostalgia (which may well explain the reported bouts of depression that the writer frequently suffered from) or a quirky modernist experiment (in which case the writer was way ahead of his time) has remained as a matter of great debate among critics and readers.

Reveal 7 random things about you

A fat friend of mine whom I know from schooldays (or at least that's how I would like to remember him even if he loses his weight) wrote an entry on his blog about "7 random things about you" at the behest of some other friend of his. My initial reaction was to ridicule him for claiming that he is tidy (or what he calls as his 'organized chaos') since I know from college days that his room was far from it. It was littered with the junk and filth he collected from his seniors. But then I refrained from calling him out on it, mainly because I had started to think whether I also have 7 random things that I could write about myself, that is, do I know myself well enough to write 7 such things? After a bit of struggle, I finally managed to write them down:

1. I like to imagine myself sitting at a window in an old English style cottage on some remote East Coast island. From there I watch the gentle waves of the ocean as they caress the pebbly beach lying beyond a vast patch of sun dried beach grass. I sit at that window all day, envying the playful gulls as they hover above fishing boats in fearless joy. But when I hear the whistle of the occasional ferries that arrive at this island's harbor, I get reminded of the mainland to which I belong, and from which I am always eager to escape, even if only for a moment, even if only on a flight of fantasy.

I did manage to escape to this island once on a cold and misty December morning. It goes by the name of Block Island.

2. I like to wander through a city's streets and back alleys, like a ghost, free of all commitments, worries and squabbles of everyday life, indifferent to all feelings of pain and joy, and just content to watch other people as they go about with their miserable and mundane life. They are all performers on a stage who are blissfully unaware that I am one of their greatest admirers. And so, as a ghost I am fully free to enjoy my anonymity amidst these teeming millions of gifted playwrights and talented performers. They all can act without memorizing any script or having any rehearsals. They come and go, shouting out their lines at random, but still behaving as if their cacophony has some definite meaning. Does this play belong to the Theater of the Absurd? Am I watching Ionesco's The Bald Soprano? But no, this is not it. Gradually I have realized that although this play is meaningless, it is still an epic drama -one whose plot and scenes are totally unknown to the entire cast, and even to a ghost.

3. I like to read fiction and to watch movies. They allow me to forget the burden of existence, which according to me, like almost everything else, is completely meaningless. And any attempt by human beings to assign meanings will be quite arbitrary, and therefore, must be rejected. Some of my friends say that I am a 'nihilist', maybe so, but such labels have no meaning for either me or any true nihilists as far as I can tell.

4. I like to sit in coffee shops and bookstores, and preferably in bookstores with coffee shops. One awakens the mind, the other awakens the senses.
The Rittenhouse Square Barnes & Nobles has a cafe that is particularly interesting; you get to enjoy your coffee under the watchful eyes of Kafka, Joyce, Shaw, Wilde, Woolf, Twain, Tagore, and a host of other literary geniuses, who all share the cafe walls with many yellow hued photos of 19th century Philadelphia.

5. I have a love-hate relationship with my hobbies of painting and sculpting. I have a habit of destroying these works, and I have been like that since childhood. I am very self-destructive; it brings me great suffering and melancholy -the two basic ingredients I need to transform me into my ghost.

6. I am anti-religion to the core.

Religions are the most dangerous invention of human imagination. If mankind has to progress and survive, religions must die, along with all their delusional saints, prophets, charlatans, fanatics, gods and goddesses (yes, I refuse to use capital letters for them). All that should survive this purge are the elaborate tales about these beings that we have spun for our impromptu script, so ardently and desperately with the hope of giving some meaning to our wretched lives, or perhaps to convince ourselves that receiving justice is our birth-right, and that we all will get it someday, if not in this life then in the afterlife for sure. Till then we can only seek pity. The idea of an unfair world is so terrifying that we prefer to live in hope than to face reality. Some like me turn to fiction and fantasy instead. That way they can live in a much fairer and colorful world and carry it around within the modest enclosure of their skull, at least as long as the chemicals inside it permit them to do so.

7. I like to travel.

In my memory, Chicago is Steel Gray, New York is Blue, San Francisco is Orange, Seattle is Bluish Gray, Rome is Brick Orange, Venice is Ocean Blue, Portland (Oregon) is Green, Boston and Delhi are Red, and Calcutta is faded Yellow, like the shades of old photographs from an album that was locked up in a chest and later forgotten along with other memories of yesteryears. I have also seen many photos of the same hue lining the walls of a Philadelphia bookstore's cafe; they were pictures of busy markets, trams, and horse drawn carriages -like the ones I saw in front of the Victoria Memorial when I was a boy growing up in Calcutta.

The yellow photos of Calcutta that my mind has preserved, although somewhat damped and discolored, remind me of the city's lawless yellow taxis and policemen in yellow khakis who have to regularly teach them the law for a nominal bribe; the yellow school building where I wasted twelve years of my life; the yellow pages of the used books bought in College Street; the yellow facade of Medical College where patients and their relatives lie scattered on the front stairs like victims of a massacre; the yellow coaches of metro rail that slither in the city's underground passages and the decrepit yellow trams that once ruled the city's surface; the yellow rajbhogs and yellow kachuris that my grandma liked; the yellow saree that my mother sometimes wore; the yellow goddess with ten arms and four children who comes to Baghbazzar year after year without any slightest change in her routine; the yellow marigold garlands that adorn her neckline; the penniless yellow eyed drunks who having fallen out of the goddess' grace lie next to the drains overflowing with yellow urine; the yellow dump trucks of KMC (formerly CMC) that collect all this shit and garbage from the city, and the yellow river Ganga that dutifully washes away all the city's filth and sins into the heart of Sunderbans -the islands where yellow tigers live, and where playful gulls hover above fishing boats in fearless joy as I watch them from another continent, miles and miles away, through the imaginary window of an old English cottage on a remote island, where I travel freely in space and time, seeking refuge from the realities of my unscripted life.

The controversy surrounding M. F. Hussain's citizenship

I was constantly surprised to see how irrational most people's views are when it comes to social issues, and in this particular case, about freedom of expression. I read this entry titled, "Does India deserve M F Hussain?" on Soutik Biswas' BBC blog. There was a long list of vitriolic comments left by the angry mob, consisting mainly of patriotic Indians, proud of their new found wealth and status in the world, confident of their self-assuring rhetorics about diversity and tolerance. Most commentators identified themseleves as Hindus, some of whom, surprisingly enough, even claimed that they were liberals, only with a small yet immensely confusing clarification that they were of a special kind that respects freedom of expression in arts provided that it doesn't cross the boundaries of tolerance, that is, as long as their holy cows aren't tickled. As far as I can see, they are the moderates who mistakenly believe that they are liberals, or perhaps enjoy proclaiming themselves as liberals. Anyway, I don't intend to appear condescending based on such trivial matters of nomenclature, especially not when all their arguments can be deconstructed point-by-point to reveal their meaninglessness. The bulk of their opinions fall into one or more of the following four categories, each of which are nothing more than a reflection of the prevalent illogical and reactionary sentiments which continue to plague India's social progress.

(1) Some readers feel that M. F. Husain should have depicted some Muslim or Christian Prophets in nude so as to balance out his 'offenses' in the eyes of Hindus. Their claim is that Hindus are more tolerant and that Husain has exploited this tolerance.

This is by far the most ignorant and illogical argument. It seems that our standard of tolerance has gone down to such a level where Hindus think that they are being more tolerant as long as they don't end up killing an artist for his artworks. Extremism is not the benchmark against which tolerance is to be judged because in that way any fundamentalist action, no matter how damaging and disreputable, can be passed off as a mark of tolerance. Such incidents have happened even in the past with Deepa Mehta and Taslima Nasreen's works, and their recurrences only prove how intolerant the Indian society is, no matter how fervently one claims otherwise. Indians should not even approve, encourage or justify such behaviors, irrespective of what other countries and their religions do. Husain should be free to paint anything he wants, and in similar way, all bans on Rushdie's 'Satanic Verses', Taslima Nasreen's books should be lifted. Those who don't like an artist's work can write a rebuttal or review, but have no right to stop him or her from creating their art or prevent others from enjoying it. Only a psychologically repressed society advocates violent retribution, and unfortunately, India is one, as amply demonstrated by most of the commentators. How did it all come to this is a question that one often wonders when they look at the creativity of our predecessors. For India to truly develop, advances in technology must be accompanied with much needed social reforms.

(2) Some comments argue that Husain's art goes against Indian 'morality'

This too is entirely meaningless, since morality is not an absolute concept; it is subjective, and above all, it continuously evolves over time, and rightly so. In fact, it is the duty of an artist to challenge the prevalent notions of morality and to make people question them so that we don't get stuck with false, yet well-accepted, notions about morals. In any case it is not some abstract notion of morality that Husain's art poses a threat to, if at all, it just exposes the fact that the idea of morality, at least among a large portion of the Indian population, is too closely associated with religious beliefs or simplistic sentimentality as opposed to conscientiousness.

(3) A few commentators suggest that Husain should have been more 'sensitive' about general public opinion.

Artists are perhaps the most sensitive and conscious beings in the first place. Over the course of mankind's progress, it has been the artists, scientists, and philosophers who have mostly held ideas that were extremely unpopular, if not downright unacceptable, to the general public at the time. And so they made many enemies. But that didn't stop them from provoking the public again and again, not out of malice but out of the sheer need to seek truth and to enlighten the masses. If the argument that one should not express oneself out of sensitivity towards the general public opinion was justified, then we would have lost most of the great writers, painters, playwrights, and in fact, we would still be believing that the earth is the center of the solar system. Therefore, it is not only appropriate but also necessary that thinkers continue to offend the general public by forcing them to face realities and questioning their holy cows. Public opinion cannot be a consideration while expressing oneself through painting or writing; if the public doesn't like it then they can simply turn their back. An art form that is unaesthetic it will die out naturally.

In conclusion, it is important to accept that Indians need to show true tolerance instead of simply speaking about it, and that overlooking or denying our society's flaws is not an act of patriotism, but correcting them is. What India desperately needs is a wave of social reforms -an Indian renaissance that will enlighten both its thriving middle income class and its oppressed lower income class. While the technological progress is already happening, the cultural and social reforms are yet to be seen. It is the artists who can show the way. But time is of essence; the nuovo rich society is being numbed by the comforts of the cozy multiplexes and shopping malls and are simply turning apathetic to the need to fight against all kinds of bigotry, religious dogmatism, superstition, and ignorance. It will not be possible to sustain the country's progress in the absence of that consciousness.

Femme Fatale, Part 3: The Sermon

The Master, Mary's father, began his sermon with a gentle smile.
Dear friends, as you know, we are all the children of God, the omniscient, omnipresent, omnipotent God; a God so potent and virile in His imagination that He managed to imagine the creation of billions of earthlings, each with the same potency and imagination to imagine their real creator in all His glory.
He took a deep breath, peered at the congregation, as if to judge whether they were following him or not, and then calmly continued:
Yet, we have lost our way. False prophets have misled us and established religions in His praise. But a few of us have found the right way, and we have assembled here today to understand and interpret His message in the way He had originally intended us to. The question that we will discuss today is "What is the real meaning of life?" But to answer that we must first understand 'reality' itself. Dear friends, come here one by one and take this from my hand. This is the only substance that can help you to understand reality.

He stood up with a chalice in his hand and the devotees lined up before him. Josh also joined the queue. The Master took out what seemed to be strips of some kind of blotter paper and dipped them in the alcohol of the chalice before putting one in each devotee's mouth. Josh also received one, and moments later he had an experience which is similar, although much more disillusioning, than the one you, the reader, might have on closely watching this video:

The congregation hobbled back to their seats as the Master began to speak again.
Dear friends, our eyes and senses deceive us, what we believe to be reality is probably a mere illusion. God has thrown a challenge for us, it is to see whether we can overcome our immediate notion of reality and use our imagination to find what He really intended. Unfortunately, established religions have failed to guide us. They ask humans to repent and to be afraid of His wrath. They tell us that it is He who will judge us in the end. But dear friends, they are all wrong. God has given us all His potency and imagination, and yet we fail to see that the real meaning of life is to live it. And to live it is to enjoy it. The joy of life, my dear friends, is in the act of union between two bodies. It is the most spiritual experience that one can have, and yet our corrupt society would prefer not to talk about it, and religions make them believe that the purification of soul is possible by renouncing sexual desires. Friends, it is against this false notion of puritanism that we must fight.

Josh could not understand most of the sermon, but images like the one above flashed in his mind. They did seem to be telling him something vaguely similar. The teary eyed congregation was in praise of the Master's sermon. Josh was too confused to understand what they were saying, and he mechanically chanted along with them, 'Master! O, Master, help us to taste the joy of life!'

The Master began to speak again.
Dear friends, now we shall seek God by fulfilling His wish. My dear daughter, Mary, will help you in seeking His grace.
The Master then turned to Mary, who was looking more beautiful than ever. Through the haze of smoke, she came forward like an angel and stood beside her father. The Master invited the eldest member of the congregation, a yellow eyed, hairy, old drunk, who took Mary with him to the next room. Josh sat perplexed, he could not understand it at first. The old drunk came out after a long time, buttoning his shirt, and he handed over a few bank notes to the Master, bowed respectfully, and left. One after the other, the members went in to that room, came out after sometime, either tucking their shirt or zipping up their trouser, and they paid to the Master, bowed and then left. Josh was the last member left in the house. By then he had regained some of his senses. It was his turn to go in. The Master accompanied him to the next room where Mary lay naked on the bed.
- Come here darling, I was waiting for you, she said coquettishly.
- You whore!, exclaimed Josh, gripped in a fit of rage.
At this the Master suddenly thrust at him and pinned him down on the bed next to Mary. Josh had never imagined that the old man was capable of showing such strength and violence. He shouted at Josh, 'You filthy apostate! How dare you insult her?' Josh realized that the Master was searching his pockets and as soon as he had found the wad of cash, Josh's monthly salary, he left the room with it. 'Learn to show respect to the Lady, she will be your savior and your salvation,' barked the Master on his way out.
- Come dear, don't get upset. I am here for you, said Mary.
Josh looked at her with disgust for sometime.
- Come my baby, she said, extending her arms towards Josh.
Josh slowly embraced her and began to sob like a child. Behind his closed eyelids he saw an image which seemed to narrate back to him this story of his life:

Femme Fatale, Part 2: The Invitation

Mary's desk at the workplace was right outside Mr. Sweeney's office and opposite to Josh's. At lunch, Josh and Mary often had little chats during which she told him that she lived with her father, who was some sort of theologian. Being the only daughter, she had to take care of the home as well. These little disclosures only raised her stature in Josh's eyes and made her seem even more divine, and therefore, increasingly unattainable. Mary's reluctance to talk too much about her life also increased that sense of aloofness about her. Josh found it very hard to find suitable topics for long conversations until he found out that, like him, Mary too enjoyed watching movies. And one day, just like in movies, a downpour came at five in the evening when Mary was about to leave from work, giving Josh the chance to escort her under his umbrella, a wish that he had secretly nurtured for long.

When they reached her home she invited him to come in for a drink. The home was on the second floor of an old, shabby apartment. It had a small hall and two rooms, one belonging to Mary and the other to her father. Her father came out to welcome Josh. He was an old man with wise eyes and shaky hands. He was wearing some kind of a white robe that gave him an air of authority. He informed Josh that he was waiting for his congregation to arrive and invited Josh to join them. Josh did not like the idea, but he was curious to hear that the old man held his sermons in that dingy hall. Moreover, the idea to stay close to Mary, and to get to know her life better, seemed quite appealing to Josh. The old man was pleased with his decision.

- Son, our congregation is held in secret for we believe in ideals that are different and perhaps quite unacceptable to the corrupt society that surrounds us today, the old man informed Josh.
- And what exactly do you preach? Josh inquired.
- You will see soon, they will be here any moment now, we will be glad to have your company.

The bell rang and Mary attended it. Five members of the congregation arrived. They all looked like ordinary men who had just come from their workplace for some evening fun. They referred to Mary's father as the Master. Having renounced all religions many years back, Josh wasn't quite sure whether weekday evening sermons were that common. In any case, all these were irrational he thought. After an initial round of introductions, the congregation took their seats and Mary's father got up to light a bunch of incense sticks. Copious quantities of drinks were passed around, which the members had brought with them. To Josh, all this looked increasingly bizarre, nevertheless he sat down with them and removed his necktie to get a bit comfortable. Mary stood demurely next to her father. The little hall was soon filled with smoke coiling out of the incense sticks. The fumes mixed with the intoxicating smell of alcohol that hung in the air, creating a stifling environment. Josh felt uneasy and excited at the same time, only the beautiful face of Mary calmed him.

Femme Fatale, Part 1: The Arrival

In the beginning of fall, Josh, a self-declared atheist and confirmed bachelor of forty, ran into the beautiful and pious Mary while ascending the stairs at his workplace. Their eyes met, and they greeted each other. He moved aside to let her pass and watched after her as she made her way down the staircase before disappearing behind the main door leading to the street, leaving only a faint trail of her perfume behind. It was the first time Josh had seen her; in fact it was the first time that he was seeing a lady at his workplace. When he turned his head around, he saw the watchman on the landing of the first floor with his usual coffee mug in hand.
- Met our new secretary?, asked the watchman as his lips twitched to form a suggestive smile.
- I see, so did she join today?
- Yes, apparently the boss is very pleased with her already, the watchman replied, smacking his lips to clear the froth left from his last sip.
- So he arrived early today? Well, that's good, I need to talk to him, said Josh contemplatively.
- No, I don't think you can. He said he is tired today and needs to leave soon. He has to be at the station in an hour, informed the watchman.
- Oh yes, I remember now, he had told me that his wife is going to her mother's today.
- Yes, that must be it.
Nevertheless, Josh went to his boss' office and knocked on the door. He had to talk to him about his salary; he had been promoted three months back, but hadn't seen any raise since. His boss, Mr. Sweeney, was a fat, short swindler, who after having made a fortune in the real estate business had aligned himself with a political party of similar dubious ideology and started the consultancy office where Josh had been employed for the last three years. When Josh entered Mr. Sweeney's office he found the old swine panting as usual, perhaps a little more than usual. He excitedly informed Josh about his new secretary, Mary. While he went on with his monologue, Josh absentmindedly imagined how it would look if one were to hang Mr. Sweeney upside down and slash him from his chest to lower abdomen with a sharp blade so that his entrails fell out like those of the pigs in the abattoirs. While Josh was still engrossed in his grotesque reverie, Mr. Sweeney suddenly looked at his watch, jumped up from his chair and left the room. Josh followed him, but Mr. Sweeney hurried down the stairs with loud grunts and pants. By the time Josh reached the main door, Mr. Sweeney was driving off in his car. When Josh came out on the street, the sun blinded him for a moment and a dark silhouette appeared before him. The familiar smell of perfume told him that it was Mary.
- Are you all right?, asked a mellifluous voice.
- Yes, I am fine.
Mary helped him back to the office. He thanked her and took her around the office, introducing her to all the other employees, just the way Mr. Sweeney had asked him to. It was only then that Josh noticed the innocence on her face, but there was something seductive in her. He observed her moist red lips, her dark brown eyes, the brown locks of hair that caressed her nape, and judged their beauty like an expert jeweler carefully weighing old gold trinkets before buying them. Mary seemed to be more beautiful than he had previously thought. She was twenty something, but there was a charm and poise in her that he had never noticed in any other girl before. Moreover, she had attended college, a rarity among girls in that town. Overall, he was very impressed with his new colleague. Josh had never been very close to his colleagues before, perhaps because he had a certain disdain towards them for their vulgarity and ignorance. Their crudeness and insincerity appalled him. But Mary was entirely different from them. She was beautiful and intelligent. In his heart he felt that her arrival at the office, and therefore in his life, held a promise that was yet to be explored. That day on his way back from work, Josh felt some inexplicable happiness rising in his heart which made him feel strong and young. In his happiness, or perhaps in an effort to preserve it, he even paid off a drunk beggar, which was not only uncharacteristic of him but also went against his principles. He sat down on a park bench. The change in nature had begun, the leaves had taken a yellow hue. He sat there for long trying to recreate Mary's face in his mind.

The Death of a Mantis

Joshua went out to the balcony for a smoke. He needed some time to think over the entire matter. Marie realized it too. So she quietly retired to her bedroom. "We can't go on like this, I can't take it anymore. You must choose now," she had told him earlier at dinner. She didn't want to say it, but it just happened. Actually, it had to happen someday, and she knew it all too well. During these five years of their courtship, only the fear of losing Joshua had somehow prevented her from saying it out loud. But today an innocuous joke had triggered her outburst. Her concealed anger and frustration had suddenly found a vent, and they poured out with full vengeance, hoping to hurt and shame Joshua, if not make him repent.

"Joshua, I think you never really understood me. To you I am simply an escape from the daily squabbles of your unhappy married life. You behave as if you have every right to turn to me for comfort, but that I should not expect anything from you in return, not even love. I am tired of being the healer, of being your mistress. I want you to leave behind your past, your dysfunctional family. Come and stay with me. You must choose now, or else let me talk to your wife." Marie's words seemed to have taken Joshua by surprise. But no, that can't be true. He could not have been that naive. He knew what Marie wanted. She had waited for all these years hoping that Joshua will leave his family and come over to her forever. But that hadn't happened. Yes, Joshua could gladly leave his wife, but he couldn't live without the two little kids he had with her. "How could Marie even think that I will ever leave the kids?" wondered Joshua as he lit his cigarette. Wasn't it clear to Marie that their relationship could never be anything more than what it had always been? -A relationship whose very existence depended on the complete lack of expectation of it evolving into something bigger. Joshua thought that they both knew it from the very beginning. Perhaps the woman in Marie knew it too, but had never been able to accept it.

Joshua went to the bedroom. Marie was lying under the soft white sheets and watching an Animal Planet documentary on TV about sexual cannibalism in the insect world. Joshua snuggled up to her. She seemed to have cooled down. He caressed her hand, and kissed her. He reached out for the remote control and increased the volume.

Watch how the male praying mantis slowly climbs up on the female's back and then proceeds to mate. The mating can continue for several hours in some species.

Marie's sighs were barely audible. Those were the sighs of both pleasure and pain; physical pleasure and emotional pain. The bed rocked gently with the sighs.

While the procreation is still in progress, the female attacks the partner and devours its head. A greenish fluid exudes from the opening left by the male's head. Researchers believe that since copulatory movements in the mantis are controlled by the ganglion in the abdomen, the mating continues even after the male has lost his head.

Joshua wasn't looking at Marie anymore, he paid no attention to her kisses, whispers, and her pleas. He was watching the hideous drama unfolding on the TV screen. Without a warning the female mantis lashed out to devour its partner. The headless male mantis still remained on top of its female. Caught between the raptorial legs of the female, the helpless male had little chance to escape.

When the mating is complete, the headless male mantis may try to escape but the female grasps it firmly.

"So much like humans," thought Joshua, who was feeling light in his head. Like the headless mantis he too was trying to free himself from Marie's embrace. The violence unfolding on the screen was the violence that has always existed and will continue to exist throughout the animal kingdom. This is the violence of orgasm, of conception, of birth, of domination, of death -the violence that is necessary for the very existence of life. It is the violence needed to ensure the perpetuity of species and for securing a better future for progeny. "Can a father be expected to desert his children for his mistress?" No. "Is violence justified to protect family and children?" Yes.

The male mantis is destined to be a female's meal.

With the speed of a female mantis lunging for its mate, Joshua picked up the pillow and held it tightly over Marie's face. She fought back, scratched him and wriggled under his weight. But it was all over very soon. Joshua shook off Marie's lifeless arms and legs from his back. He had been able to do what the male mantis couldn't -he had freed himself.

Post coital cannibalism is found in other insects as well. In some species one partner actually sacrifices its life. For example, the black widow spider too devours its male partner, but their courtship ritual is even more elaborate than the praying mantis'.

Joshua felt dizzy and confused; he got out of the bed and stood before the mirror. In it he saw Marie lying under the ruffled white sheet, her silver necklace with the little cross pendant lay on top of it. She appeared to be peacefully asleep. But Joshua wished that she would open her eyes and rise up, then call him near and forgive him for all his sins. Perhaps she already had. After all hadn't she always said that she would gladly sacrifice herself for him? The TV set droned on softly, a black widow was busy impaling its mate. All of a sudden time seemed to have stopped ticking, nothing could ever be the same anymore. It was as if the world had silently turned around. Joshua needed some time to think over the entire matter. He went out to the balcony for a smoke.