Didi (Sister)

This novel is dedicated to the two persons, who made me believe in the basic goodness of mankind by their personal examples. So it is only proper that I dedicate my second essay at writing a novel to my late parents, Mr. J.C.Bhattacharyya & Mrs. Bind Devi.

Didi

By R.N. Bhattacharjee

Prologue Inside the jam-packed bus meant for route 45, I start feeling suffocated. I try to keep myself from leaning too much on the passenger sitting in front of me by trying to hold on to the support rod over me with all my might.

“Dada, can’t you stand straight? You’re putting all your body weight on me..”

“Sorry, Brother. Actually, it’s the man standing behind me pushing…” then turning to the man behind me I request him not to lean on me like the way he is doing it.

“Dada. If you think I’m doing it for fun, intentionally, you’d better travel by taxi…” Some other passengers break into a laugh. But today I do not want to reply back. I am, sorry, we are on our way to “Nilachal”, a place for the mentally imbalanced people and my Didi, whom I call Di lovingly, has been residing there for the last 7 months or so. Didi, who, taught me right from wrong, who was a living example of the best that Bengalee ladies the world over are known for, has been brought to this unimaginable situation by a series of cruel strokes of Fate. The woman, who at one point, was the envy of others; who had everything - success, wealth and respect, has been brought down to earth like very few have been ever before and not many are likely to be in the distant future.

As Nilu, my wife, and I finally get off the bus, we heave a sigh of relief. I received a call from my youngest sister a few days earlier informing me about ‘the scene’ that our elder sister, Mrs. Sevike Guha, a former Professor of some of the most renowned colleges in Kolkata, made last time her Bouma (daughter-in-law) decided to call on her at the mental asylum.

She was visiting Di for her signature on the cheque. Di’s mere signature would allow her to withdraw an amount totalling nearly 50,000 rupees from Di’s account at the Dhakuria Branch of SBI. Di gets it as pension for her dedicated service to the Government of India.

Di was informed by one of the staff right after the arrival of Apsara, Di’s bouma. She heard the attendant out quietly without really looking displaying the least bit of excitement. But all of them were in for a surprise, when Di raised hell the moment her bouma was ushered into the room. She went completely berserk, shouting at the top of her voice, refusing to have anything to do with her or recognise her, heaving, crying all along. Finding things going out of control, the attendant and Suchitadi, the In-charge of “Nilachal”, politely asked Ms. Apsara to leave the room. She was still wild after her departure and asked them not to let such frauds step inside her room again (By the way, I forgot to tell you that Di considered “Nilachal” to be one of the 120 houses she owned in Kolkata!). A graceful person by nature, Di was so hysterical that day, so much so that the house physician had to be sent for. She only fell asleep once the sedative had been administered. Di hasn’t been keeping well since then enquiring about one of her brothers from time to time and so on.

I find a pan shop on the way, decide to do something about my dishevelled hair from the small hand-mirror hanging out from a corner and ask the owner in the process about this place called Nilachal. He does not seem to be in any hurry to answer my query.

“Bhai, is there a place called Nilachal somewhere nearby?” I repeat the question for the second time. This time he prefers not to ignore my question and vaguely points to somewhere in the distance. Still unsure of the place, I decide not to trouble him anymore and keep on walking along the road. Finding a Chemist’s nearby, I decide to get in and ask the man at the counter. I wait for the customer to clear off the bill before venturing to ask him about the direction to Nilachal.

The man gets up and comes out of the Chemist’s. Pointing a finger outward, he then tells me: “You go straight. There is this three-storied building at the turning. You turn left there and walk along for some five minutes or so, and there you have this yellowish building, right behind the meadow. That’s Nilachal for you, Uncle.”

I thank him profusely (another quality I picked up from my Di!) and fall back into steps beside my wife. Once we get to the three-storied building at the end of the turning, we turn left, when we realize that there is no yellowish building anywhere in the vicinity.

Luckily for us, we find a young man coming from the opposite end. I tell him about our dilemma and entreat him for a proper direction of Nilachal as we have been on the move, since getting off the bus, for close to half an hour or so. He assures us by informing that we are on the right track. He asks us to keep on walking for another 5 minutes or so in order to get to Nilachal.

Relieved, I express my gratitude and keep on walking. There is a small market on the left, inbetween two rows of poorly maintained houses. I have started sweating and so has Nilu. I can see the beads of sweat on her forehead. She tries to dab at the sweats with her hanky. I ask the vendor in a corner of the market about the price of mangoes. Nilu tells me from the side not to buy too much as there is no knowing if Di will be allowed to have all this in the first place. I heed her words and just buy two pieces. We get back to the main road again as it is getting late.

After walking for some ten minutes more, we get a glimpse of the yellow building, behind the dumping ground in the distance. As we get closer, we find “Nilachal’ written on a faded board atop. I get very apprehensive thinking if anyone can be living in a ramshackle building like the one facing us in all its glory! Behind the closed gate, all I can see is the dingy room at the end of the corridor. There is also a staircase leading up to some place somewhere! I press the bell with vengeance. After what seems like eternity, a middle aged lady comes down.

“Are you Suchitadi? The one I talked to in the morning?” I ask her hastily.

“Yes.” She responded. I’ve been waiting for you.”

“How is Di?’ I cannot control my excitement anymore as I find her trying to unlock the gate.

“She’s much better these days. Not talking incoherently anymore. In fact, she has behaved herself rather well of late.”

“Good. Can we meet her right now?” I find myself acting like a teen, full of curiosity and questions.

We are taken to a room across a narrow passage with pots containing withering flower plants on either side on the first floor. Suchitadi offers us seats. She presses a bell and the next moment a lady in her mid twenties hurries in.

“She’ll take you up to her room. Please be careful and try not to excite her. She is okay now, but with these patients, you never know…” Nilu and I exchange a glance.

“Please follow her and don’t you forget what I’ve just told you.” Both Nilu and I nod our heads as we get out of the room. We start climbing the steps leading to the second floor.

The steps end on a dead corridor. On the right there is a curtained room. The young lady draws the curtain aside and asks us to get in.

I am scared, looking at the dimly-lit room in front. All the floodgates of memories come crashing in…

CHAPTER-1 On a tantalizingly torturous afternoon, we found ourselves on the way to the mental asylum in Beleighata. Sachitadi was waiting for us. Without any further ado, she had us ushered into a medium-sized room on the second floor of the ramshackle building. There were four beds, one empty, the rest occupied. The heavily curtained windows created a mysterious, surreal environment inside the room. My eyes took some time getting used to the far-away atmosphere in the room. Then I chanced to see Di. She after all these years of sheer hell, was reduced to a skeleton of the vibrant woman she had been once.

I bent down to touch her feet. In a daze, she opened her eyes and blinked under the florescent light of the room.

“Didi”.

‘Who is it? Do I know you?”She wailed out in a piteous voice, trying to figure me out by moving her hand up mine and back.

“You tell me”.

“I can’t. Why don’t you tell me yourself?”

I kept silent. I had a great deal of admiration and respect for this sanatani Indian woman.

She was staring at me, looking lost and ill at ease.

“Didi, I’ve finally figured out the reasons for your coming here. Smart as you have always been, you did a lot of thinking before taking this decision. And once you made up your mind, like Ma used to tell us, there was no stopping you. You decided on the asylum as the last resort to be saved from the guiles and clutches of those cunning daily-paid nurses working for you in shifts.”

My mind flashed back to what could otherwise have been a glorious afternoon as I, her youngest brother, accompanied her to the apartment in Dhakuria. The nurse kept quiet all the way through. She had not uttered a word at our ancestral home at 41. Nor did she speak anything on the way in the taxi. But there was animosity in her voice the moment we entered into Didi’s apartment. While Didi was popped up in her bed, tired, I was sitting on the stool nearby, chatting with her. Didi hinted at her helplessness and the way both the nurses were taking advantage of her.

“You know, Sayak. Normally, I lunch at around 12.30 and she (pointing to the nurse), takes hers at around the same time. Then from 1.00 till 4.00, she has nothing else to do other than sleep. I’m paying her for coming to sleep in my room!”

Sutopadi, for that was what her name was, started purring like a wounded cat. Then hell broke loose as she burst out, shouting at the top of her lungs.

“Ma is always talking like that. We don’t do anything for her and she is getting better without us doing anything for her. Baudi is right in saying that she (Didi) is …she is insane!”

Didi, in her own apartment, in the presence of her own brother, decided not to react. I felt sorry for her. I felt ashamed of myself for not trying to stop the nurse from rambling and shouting at Didi.

Even that day, I could’t do anything to mitigate the pain in Di’s heart, just like the day she had asked me to spend the night at her residence at Salt Lake. Being a family man, I offered some lame excuses to be with my family. She must have realized by then how utterly alone she was in this God’s universe.

To come back to my conversation with Didi at the asylum, I continued to speak uninterrupted to Di. “You knew you didn’t have many options. You couldn’t go stay at any of your siblings’. You had tried earlier but that didn’t help you much. You couldn’t go back to your residence at Salt Lake as solitude like a noose was beginning to loom large around you neck. Staying at Dhakuria was proving to be menacing. Your Bouma (daughter-in-law) was busy in her own world. Still mad at you for her failed marriage. She hardly spoke to you. Gone were all your dreams of making it up to her. The nurses were getting into your nerves. Raised in a middle-

class family, you have always been very particular about money matters. You have spent so much on people who you thought were financially in a spot of bother. You never even thought for a second time about helping them. But these nurses, who were simply jabbing money out of you, were your eyesore. Naturally, paying the nurses 275/- per shift was something you couldn’t come to terms with. By then, one of them, Sutopa, had started shouting at you in front of your Bouma. Her audacity was turning out to be too much. It was then that you decided to act crazy.

Next morning while the other nurse was changing at the stroke of 8 ready to depart and Sutopa was making her way in, you decided to play your first card. First, by scolding her for coming late and leaving early, and then for stealing your money from your wallet. The scene brought your Bouma into the room. She never bothered to look at you; Straight away she looked at the nurse questioningly.

“Baudi, Ma’s accusing me of stealing her money. How could I steal her money? I came just 10 minutes back. We may be poor; Baudi, but we have our self-respect.” She was on the brink of tears.

“Don’t you worry, there was no money. The 100 rupees she had there was given to Bapi for buying her medicine.”

This is where you decided to barge in uncharacteristically. “It’s not given to Bapi (your driver). It was stolen from my wallet by this glutton” You left it at that. It was on the same day that you decided to play your next card by telling the nurse who came for the night shift that your Bouma had left you at their mercy and then…

“I’d my Sona Baba (your grandson), but he died a few years back …”

You knew very well that your Bouma was sitting at an earshot. As you had assumed, your remark about your grandson brought her to your room again, fuming. She was dying to have a go at you, unable to hear you talk like that about her only son. This is when you put on an act that would have put even Suchitra Sen (Bengal’s most popular actress till date) to shame.

You started rolling your eyes, shaking your head up and down, and went on talking as if you were hallucinating. Bouma, who had come out of her room in frenzy, stood at the door and then for the first time without saying anything, she left you. That is how you put the idea of the asylum into her head.

Chapter-2 THE DAUGHTER OF BENGAL

Di cared a lot for her family long before her marriage. I will have that picture engraved in my mind for eternity – the picture of Di coming down to Kolkata during the vacations and

helping us in innumerable ways. Sometimes scrubbing us as she was very particular about personal hygiene and cleanliness, soaping us to make us appear presentable, even bathing us at times to help us not to suffer from any filthy feelings. She always seemed so fresh, neat and tidy that I was perpetually in respectful awe of her presence. Always dressed in white saris, her hair parted in the middle, with the high-powered glasses (a product of her hard work during the student life), she always stood for the best of everything in life.

Never the one to keep grudges, particularly if it concerned her siblings and their families, she was always outspoken and forthright. Once, so the story goes, she paid a visit to one of her relatives holding a high post in the Bengali society. Least bothered about his status and all, Di criticized him for meting out a rough deal to her father. At his own residence, when only two of us were present in his room! If this is not daring, I do not know what it is then.

Di always taught me some of the best lessons of life. “Sayak, if someone criticizes someone else infront of you, don’t go spreading the criticism around. Try to tell the good things, the good qualities the man might have spoken of the other person, if you have the opportunity.

Even if you hear Mr. A cursing Mr. B for a lot of genuine reasons, the best thing to do would be not to utter a word about it in the presence of Mr. B. ….. And finally, after having done something for someone, never try to keep that favour in mind. Very few people in this world are lucky enough to have the opportunity to do anything, anything at all, for others.”

Di was the pride of her family. Every single member of her family respected her a lot. She had the final say in most of the family matters. She seldom spoke ill of her parents. That does not make her a coward. She would be the first one to criticize them if she found them sitting on the fence or trying to cover their own wrong-doings. She was the tower of strength for her father when her father was in a financial doldrum.

Born in the year of India’s partition, she was admitted in a reputed school in Calcutta at the right time. Her father, far advanced than most of the contemporaries, wanted nothing but the best of western education for his daughters. English and History were her best subjects and all along she secured the highest marks in these subjects. She detested Mathematics and till the end held the belief that she would not have qualified for IA had her mathematics teacher not manipulated her marks to give her a pass in the concerned subject. She was convinced that Banidi, her Mathematics teacher generously awarded her the pass marks, when she did not even deserve a zero! She was always grateful to this teacher and spoke in glowing terms about her.

From Victoria, she went to the Presidency College in Calcutta, arguably the best college in India at that time. My late mother would narrate a story that speaks volumes about her character and dogged determination. As the family was financially poor, Di could not afford to have more than a decent sari. Unperturbed, she would make the optimum use of the only sari. She would go to college, wash it after her return home and fold it and keep it under the mattress for pressing!

She was beginning to make her mark in the educated circles of Calcutta as an outstanding speaker and a brilliant student. She would always make it a point to participate in the literary contests and go on to win awards and accolades. The Inter-College Debate Competition was her favourite among all those competitions. She would just note down some relevant points pertaining to the topic from her father, who was a language teacher, and deliver a brilliant speech. Her pride was palpably clear as she narrated the story of the occasion when she went on to beat her arch rival, Ashim, who was, in her opinion, a far better speaker than she was. In the final, Ashim had the goose pimples and Di flattened and floored both the judges and her opponent by her sheer oratory skills. The title of The Best Debater was just another feather in her chequered career.

She would share with me the reason for going to the Presidency College. She had just turned 17 and she had butterflies in her eyes every time Dr. Sarkar paid a visit to their house. Fair complexioned and of medium build, he was the most reputed doctor in their locality. He was in his mid thirties and a strikingly handsome man to say the least. Di fell for her Prince Charming straight away. But there was a serious problem. Dr. Sarkar was already married.

Realising her conscience would not allow her to snatch another lady’s husband; Di had to turn her attention to Presidency College for her husband hunting campaign! If her college days were full of glory and sunshine, her university days were no less. Always a favourite with the teachers, she was brought down to earth when she failed to secure the First Class marks by a whisker. Consequently, all her desires and dreams of going abroad for pursuing higher studies evaporated from her mind as she was more intent on securing a job and standing behind her struggling father.

It was a lazy, dreamy kind of afternoon at 41 when Haridas, called Di to his drawing room on the first floor of the house. “Didibhai, come near me and help me with the editing.”

“No, Dadu. I want to go to Kamludi’s. She is getting her doll, Lovely, married to Didi’s Atish tonight. I don’t want to miss the fun and the eatables.”

“You can go later, Didibhai. The wedding is not going to take place before the evening. By then you will have finished jotting down these pages for the seventeenth chapter of Kumod Kamini.‘” As Di got closer to his bed, her grandfather put forward the draft and enquired of his granddaughter jovially: “Do you like Kamludi very much?’

“Yes, they are very nice people. They always offer us a lot to ear, though we have never invited them to ours. They also talk so highly of you as if you are the most learned man in the whole universe.”

“I see, what do you think of me, Didibhai?

“You are a good man but very strict with my uncles and aunties. The only person who is in your good book is Baba…Na? Dadu, if I ever marry inter-caste, will you treat me the same?”Di changed the topic as was wont with girls of her age.

Haridas was momentarily nonplussed at the abruptness of the question. He loved this spirited granddaughter a lot. In many ways she reminded him of her father in the hay days of his life. Rebellious, daring and completely unruffled by the goings-on around him.

“If you, Didibhai, marry someone from another caste, it might be difficult for me to take anything from your hand. It is not allowed at all.”

“Why? Who doesn’t allow it? Aren’t all the religions the same? Didn’t you hail from Barisal, a predominantly Muslim-dominated place?”

“That’s true, But that is a different matter altogether. Now, will you please help me or not?”

“Fine. But only for an hour or so. Kamludi asked me to go to theirs repeatedly.”

Didi would sit down on the floor while her grandpa would go on dictating the content of his next well-researched book to her.

“Let me tell you another thing in this connection, Didibhai. If you ever go abroad for higher studies, I will not allow you to come anywhere near me when you come back ….?

“This is not at all fair, Dadu. What are you going to do if Bablu (her eldest brother) goes abroad?”

“He won’t be treated any differently. If you go abroad, you will mingle with the foreigners, be eating out with them. That is not what is expected of a decent Bengali girl.”

Didi was sure that she would never get to go abroad as Mathematics was her nemesis. When the result of her M.A. Examination was out, she could not even dream in her wildest imagination that she would get a lucrative offer from a university for a scholarship! She never gave a second thought to the offer. Her Dadu had settled the matter once and for all long before!