Bhiklu and Sheilaa's love affair was getting fairly good publicity. But, the only people who were not enjoying any of its consequences were them. The protagonists. Soon, their 'affair' became the subject of all idle gossip within the locality, rich with dirty hints and noxious suggestions from both the young and old alike. With the passage of months life for Sheilaa got more and more difficult. She faced lewd comments and jeers on the street from prospective Romeos who had an eye on her previously. It was a way of showing their disapproval for her affair with Bhiklu, and deep down Sheilaa knew she enjoyed that attention. She liked to be reminded that she was not the object of a single male's attention but many and it brought a slight smile on her lips. It made her dig deep within and come up with a sense of pride which in a queer way fuelled her zest to survive and rebel. At her home her mother would constantly admonish her in a manner which made her feel that she knew no other way to right a wrong other than nagging the daylights out of her daughter. Confrontations with her father were not such an easy exercise as he had an air of firmness that accompanies the rare hard-working moralist. Lately he had stopped talking to her dear daughter. Why she knew. He had come to know of Bhiklu and his reputation did not help their cause. This was painful to Sheilaa but, Bhiklu was dearer to her than all things she had ever experienced in her short life. She quietly made up her mind to leave everything for this one 'treasure' if the situation so demanded one day. Nothing mattered in comparison to their 'love'. She could leave everyone in her life for Bhiklu but, she had patience. She would sometimes dream of running away some day. With the romantic strains came the possibility of an uncertain future which made her shudder. "Only if it was that necessary. Only if it cannot be helped.", she would tell herself.

On the other hand Bhiklu avoided all his friends save a few who were seemingly sympathetic to his state. All other, he knew, lusted for Sheilaa in not so secret a manner,  and he hated each one of them for this. He would often loose the thread of conversation with Sheilaa during their sunset-trysts and think about all the little incidents and obscene jokes he shared with his friends not so long ago. He wondered why the advent of a girl he so dearly loved could change the attitude of his friends towards him so swiftly, so unpleasantly. He could find no answers to the array of endless questions that would flood his mind at those times and he felt an old, frozen grief melting inside him in these moments. A nameless grief which was so cold that it could almost burn. A sorrow so profound that he could not even cry, as it happened to him that day……………………. that day…..when he held the burning torch to his dead father's mouth. During these bouts of pain he almost…………… almost cried out loud, uncontrollably.

Shedding tears is a habit which abandons the proud and later mocks one by revisiting in swift flashes, too fast to capture, too heavy to hold , even within one's  eye-lids. He felt a helplessness he so despised. He felt lonely in the wilderness and that made him shudder. At these times suddenly, as if taking a cue from his train of thoughts another realization used to dawn on him………… the plight of his mother. How she never cried. How she was a picture of steely resolve in front of them. How she had always bitten the bullet and faced life in its most ugly, unfriendly, unpleasant and unforgiving form.  Bhiklu knew he had inherited his mother's grit and he thanked her in inaudible whispers for that. Sheilaa would take a look at his face and she would know. She also knew it was best to keep quiet at these moments.

Paaro seemed untouched by all that was happening around her. She had affections for the brother he had tended to from his birth but Bhilu's temper and clear indifference to his sisters had distanced them from him gradually. He hardly talked to them, other than when he could not find his trousers or he needed to convey a message to Chhutki. Although still a bond survived, the vibes had since long started withering between them.

Binni had her own life and showed scant regard for Bhiklu or his manners. She was always ready with a sharp remark that would deflate anyone's spirits but he used her unnerving abilities with caution as age had taught her. And she was past 18 now. The prized glimpse for many a lingering loafer, her air of strength made boys around her wary of her. Only once did a novice, a boy named Jatin who had come over to their basti on some casual premise, dared to bare his heart to Binni………………. and he still lives to regret that day. She had, with a smiling face rejected the offer in terse terms and made a standing joke of his proposition. Soon every girl within sight was grinning ear to ear at Jatin. Boys were making caricature of his fumbling words and elders looking with an eye full of unflattering intrigue. He was never seen within 100 yards of Binni from that day.

She hated men and she knew why. She had this firm belief that men used women to meet their ends and later disposed them off. She had a burning desire to make amends to this ritual in her own small way. Either she would never marry and still live a happy life, almost as an exhibition of her unflinching belief in self-sufficiency (of which she thought her mother was a model) or she would marry a strong individual who would prize her free-will as much as he would do his own. She decided that in any case she would vindicate herself. Victory would be sweet and she would savor every moment of it, she thought. The very thought of it brought a radiance to her face. She felt assured with every passing hour of her goal. The goal to be different than the mundane rest.

 Meanwhile, Chhutki's life seemed like it had stagnated with the exception of an increment in the numbergray hairs that sprouted every month. Other women her age would blame it on her worries; the brave ones would blame Bhiklu. On the other hand Paaro's marriage was an issue of immediate concern to Chhutki now. She knew the community to which they belonged crossing the threshold of 20 years made a girl nubile enough. Beyond that age an unmarried girl raised suspicions of an affair gone sour or just plain ugliness. Chhutki labored under the thought that Paaro fitted none of these cases and yet she had to be married off. At last a rishtaa arrived where demands were nominal and hazards manageable. A willy Saas and a visibly frustrated Nanad. The boy was a peon in an office. Age 25, monthly income three thousand rupees, occasional drinker with a reputation of being helpful to his neighbors. The credentials were quite satisfactory to Chhutki but the niggling worry of an unmarried sister-in-law within the household multiplied her apprehensions. Considering Paaro's quiet demeanor she knew she would never fight back and reply. She would, like a part of her mother, take things lying down and resign to her fate if anything went wrong. Time was in shortage and decisions had to be taken. Chhutki took the plunge and after a customary chat with Paaro fixed the date for the marriage. Relatives, there were few, were invited. Neighbors shared some huffing and puffing in putting the scaffolding together. Binni's visible excitement made the uninitiated onlooker guess who actually the bride was. She felt a fervid joy at her beloved Didi's wedding and she did her best to make it special. She did all the song and dance and teased the groom till he looked red in his cheeks.

Bhiklu was nowhere in sight though. People felt he was missing from the action still no one enquired. Chhutki got more restless with the hour and atlast sent few people on a man-hunt mid-way into the wedding rites.

Bhiklu took the train to nowhere that evening. As he looked blankly out of the window with tired eyes which was still too unsure of what was happening and whatever was to happen next, he took solace in the only fact that Sheilaa was in the seat next to him. …….. away from the wedding din, away from family and familairity.

To  Be  Continued…………But after a break. No ideas coming to me right now. Back to full-blooded blogging for a while. Will come back to write more of the novel later.

Bhiklu never made his complaints and anxieties apparent to the family. He kept to himself and abhorred it the moment his elder sisters would point out something to him. He would deliberately clutter his clothes and muddy his trousers at play………..just because he was told not to do so. He would loose things and pick up fights with bullies. He would irritate neighbors and steal mealy amounts from inconspicuous tin-cans Chhutki would use to hide her money in. All within his sight were frustrated with his annoying antics. Some even took it upon themselves to deliver punishment………which was swift and painful. But, every bruise on his torso, every pain in his back contributed in making him a hardened delinquent. Slowly he began to withdraw into a deep tunnel of darkness that he felt would encompass his entire life, his every waking hour. Gradually, it became obvious that no amount of admonition could make Bhiklu behave. His sisters kept mum. Chhutki decided to use her privilege of commanding occasional obedience as scarcely and as rarely as possible. She could sense with that inexplicable sense of female precognition called 'sixth-sense' that pushing Bhiklu might spell the rot quickly. The fact that the ominous decay had already set in was a present reality which was well known to her. She just averted the inevitable for an indefinite period. She knew something had to yield. And the more she thought of it she wished she wouldn't live to see that day. "There is no God………there can't be one.", she thought at these moments.

Years rolled on as rain on the leaves of a steep evergreen descends down to the ground. Leaf by leaf, branch by branch. Slow but sure. Interminable and undeterred.

Chhutki's hair was now combed with visible streaks of silver-gray and Paaro- a girl just in time to get married. Binni was her effervescent self. She always had a chirping presence which provided the bare minimal succor to her mother ………….without which her life would have been  a damp, dark hole of resonant sobs.
Neighbors, with the permission from Chhutki went on a groom-hunt overdrive for Paaro. Everyday some news would come in and hushed discussions on money or the lack of it would put an end to them. Paaro stood in silent testimony to all these proceedings with a heavy heart. She never resented that she was robbed off a child-hood for no fault of hers. She held no grudges against anyone but her own luck. She would only pray to lessen some burden off her mother's already sagging shoulders and make her smile.

'Smile' ' What an elusive object it had proved to be in their lives. Yet, she clung onto a thin thread of hope that someday……………someday she would be well off. Someday she would be able to help her mother, push in crumbling notes into her mother's ashamed, unsure hands and bask in the pride of being of some help.
Someday………………..someday she would be happy. Though she had trained her mind from a very tender age not to dream. Yet, like all girls she imagined…….. An understanding groom, loving, caring………..a small household bereft of tentacles of unending need that she was so accustomed to.

She dreamed of a better tomorrow. Someday it would be a reality.

Bhiklu was the 'Prince amongst the ruffians' and he prided himself for that. That much he knew he had inherited from his father. While beedi was not at all a mentionable offence and desi liquor an occasional way of merry-making…………………a few puffs of gaanja were his latest fascination. He thought it made him 'manly', a greater 'Mard' amongst the other boys his age. After all sixteen years was high time one got to know of the variety of colourful pleasures that life offered. Stealing money to get into shabby little halls infested with rats and mosquitoes to watch provocative gyrations of semi-clad heroines were one thing and……………………………falling in love something else.

So Bhiklu discovered. Love was something else. Completely calming, almost putting the soul to rest while the heart kept pounding , harder and harder, running a wild , blinding sprint to attain some goal invisible to his squinting eyes. Sheilaa came to his life in a flurry and he knew he would never let go of her. Never.

It was last summer when he had started stealing glances at her. She was barely fifteen yet her figure was a canvas replete with shades of imminent womanhood. Her slender arms would struggle with the mischief of the stale breeze in afternoons, when she would grapple to keep her fluttering pallu in its rightful place, while she walked back to home. The by- lanes were safe considering  the lonely summer streets while she returned after carrying daal-chawal-sabji for her father who worked as a daily-hand at an adjoining construction site. Bhiklu would follow her on his bicycle, pedaling away ever so slowly, only to draw her anxious glances which over the months turned to approving smiles. Then to inviting stares and then finally to complete surrender. Bhiklu took pride in his quarry as he knew it was a victory of his patience and unwavering perseverance. He took extra care while dressing now, took extra time in combing back his luscious black hair from his fore-head into patterns he thought stylish. The heady veneer of generous amounts of Jasmine ether in Bhiklu's vests told tales to Chhutki. Yet, she thought it wise to be a spectator. A mute one at that.

They would meet in the afternoons under the distant Deodar and the air would resonate with their silly grins and giggles. As the sun took its leave in the west-sky they would occasionally hold hands and walk into the sunset, making a perfect silhouette of guileless lovers. At these times, Shielaa would be thankful to the dissipating darkness which hid her scarlet face and watery eyes. She would steal moments of reverie during her chores when she would envision a home, an earthen stove, a loving husband and a life of her own. Sometimes she would burn a finger or two, lost in her thoughts while baking chapattis. " Idle reveries cause some burning, its only my fingers…….that's the least I deserve.", she would smile to herself.

  Sheilaa was teeming with life and laughter. She knew all about scandals and gossips, adultery and elopements……and knew how  people, even in the lower-rung of society, deprived of all outward pomp that wealth accompanies, had reservations against such disobedience. But, she found something irresistible in Bhiklu which she never found a word for. It was more of a longing, a burning passion that made her ear-lobes red-hot whenever she confronted him. She could sense a childish restlessness hiding inside Bhiklu and sometimes a patient ear, sympathetic to all her worries and labour. But, at times she could feel Bhiklu's eyes wandering, before they moved and shifted till they settled onto her flawless treasure of a bosom. And at these times she knew she saw a mad thirst in his eyes. Eyes that devoured her every inch with a primitive, ferocious craving and undid her chunni mentally. She always managed to change the topic before the lull of silence could mean consent to his lust. During these moments, almost by instinct, Sheilaa would always feel her Chunni and slip a hand to check her choli, as if making sure all was not lost. That her pride was intact. That stares couldn't rape……….and she thanked God for it.

Bhiklu would have her, she knew. But he would have to wait. Wait till he made something out his life, something worthwhile, something meaningful. And most importantly something which would ensure enough money for them to start a family.

Life was an unending questionnaire of impossible problems for Chhutki now. She did the chores in three houses and managed a meager thousand rupees at the end of every month. Still, she kept telling herself that tough times were the tests that GOD conducted to verify the deserved. Only she would sometimes wonder if there was a GOD at all.

Chhutki understood clearly that the money was not even enough to feed three mouths and she had one mouth too many with her. She decided that it was going to be her hunger on which the others would cyclically sustain. But she would never make it obvious in front of her children. They were the last thread of hope for her.
From then on every bite she took made her feel guilty of one of her offspring's appetite.

The death of her father made Paaro withdraw into some untouchable shell of reticence. She hardly talked to anyone outside the family and whatever little that she uttered within the four-walls was solely concentrated on her mother. Paaro felt a helpless guilt eating into her as she occasionally saw her mother taking refuge in the smoke of the choking chulha to shed tears of a frail surrender to fate. She would come out smiling sheepishly and say, "It is the black fumes which make my eyes watery. We must arrange for some dry wood tomorrow. I will see if I can bring some from the bushes."  Paaro would give her a hint of a knowing smile and both of them would know.

Paaro knew education would be an expensive commodity from now on and she restricted her trysts with books to occasional visits to night-schools. She knew she had to be strong. She had to look after her younger siblings and mitigate her mother's worries, even if it be by a miniscule margin.

Binni on the other hand was her ever-ebullient self. She let the gloom of her father's death pass by her like a night storm and she came out of it unfazed though a little 'different'. She would sometimes wrap herself around her mother's shoulders and feel a morbid lack of emotion creeping into her ever so slowly. She felt that her mother was strong and they were all required to follow in her footsteps if they were to survive the excesses of their fate. Binni came back from school and sometimes narrated amusing incidents to elicit a few half 'laughs from her mother. Whenever she succeeded she felt overjoyed and a fulfilling sense of achievement sprouted in her young mind. How she loved to see her mother smile. But, she knew it would be many years till her mother would get a chance to don that soothing, gleeful arc on her again. Binni only shuddered at the possibility that her mother might completely loose her gift of laughter before that day. She made a silent resolve in her mind that she would work towards making that day in her mother's life a vague possibility rather than the distant dream which it presently was. An unacheivable fancy.

Bhiklu was unaware of all the machinations that occupied the more mature brains of his sisters. He felt the absence of his father the most and felt it queer that the family had so easily accepted his death. Bhiklu nurtured a strong conviction which he nourished every day through an unending array of wishful assumptions that it was he who ever really loved their father. All others were opportunists who fed on the toil of the poor man. Bhiklu thought of being great one day. How, he never knew but a burning desire to fulfill the ultimate dream of his father slept with him even in his dreams.
Unknowingly he was building formidable walls around him to ward off his sisters. Though his love towards their mother remained unwavering, Chhutki knew she was nursing a bundle of conflict in Bhiklu. And she wanted it all to end.

The sooner the better. She knew.

It was a Sunday evening and as that year brought an unusual chill in the air in the middle of the otherwise innocuous November everyone was busy keeping themselves warm inside the comfort of their blankets. Suddenly, out of nowhere a din of suppressed angst filled the air.

The outer Baraunda slum spanned a good two kilometers in length but as is custom bad news spread like rapid-fire even in these vast expanses of human settlement and it was almost midnight when Chhutki heard muted whispers of the accident. A terrible sense of foreboding sprang inside her and her feminine instinct told her that her anxious wait for Lallan's return was to end now. And it ended. Tearfully.

She drowned herself in her own tears and the world around her swung in a crazy blur at the news. She could not register anything in her mind for grief had already numbed her, nor could her eyes see anything as they were sore. She could only hold onto the thin assurance of her daughters' hugging her and the pale face of her son watching her weep in honest disbelief.

Later they told her that Lallan had committed the fatal mistake of drinking too close to a pond. Out of his senses after gulping to his throat he waded his way into the middle of the pond and before anyone in the group could stop him it was too late. People had made frantic searches into the pond but after hours of painstaking dives they could only salvage his lifeless body from the water-bed. It was wet, limp and a tranquil pall seemed to have descended on Lallan's face.

As Chhutki was allowed to take one last look before the funeral rituals started she suddenly sensed a deep and profound sense of helplessness seething inside her. In her tearful farewell she knew that this would be the last time ever that she would be found crying. Almost like a chill that crawls up the spine in no time she felt hitherto unknown reserves of inner-strength flooding to fill her void. She braced herself for her ordeal by fire as she saw the tender fingers of Bhiklu fumble with the torch that would light his father's pyre.

Paaro was pale and serene, and Binni uncontrollable. It even amazed onlooking neighbors how absolute lack of affection to one's offsprings can also vehemently elicit tears of mounful despair at death.
‘Death was a great leveller’, they thought.

 That dawn, people walked back to their shanties talking in hushed tones of the imminent hardships that Chhutki was to face and how difficult it would be to rear her daughters now. What they forgot in their whispers of effervescent concern was the plight of the little boy who had with trembling hands held a burning torch, waiting for the Pandit to complete the last rites. He was not tearful. Neither was he sore with grief.

Bhiklu, in his young mind had a premonition that life had ended for him with his father gone forever. He winced when he was told to consign the mortal remains of his 'dear father' to the tyranny of restless flames of the torch. Yet, he did it with a silent apology to the departed soul as he was told that otherwise his father's soul would never rest in peace. Bhiklu could do anything for his father's happiness. But, he never could imagine in his naiveté that he would have to perform the 'ultimate service' that a son is asked to perform for his father so early in his life. He steadied his mind and with a courage unexpected of a ten year old lit his father's pyre with firm, resolute hands.
Bhiklu never turned back to see the dance of the flames on  rampage over the lifeless body of Bhiklu.

Chhutki could sense at that very moment that her son had ceased to be the child she had known from his birth. Careless, foolish and quiet.
Now, she saw someone completely different staring back at her from within her son’s clothes. And she shuddered just reading the look on that young child's face. For all that she saw in him ..she knew he would be never be the child he was .

Growing up in destitution never impedes primeval love amongst humans. And this trait along with many others make human beings the animal that they are.

Love was abundant among the siblings in Lallan’s household. Four years had passed and Chhutki felt every moment of her  motherhood offering bliss as her three children gathered inches off ground with routine regularity. Bhiklu could go on babbling with his elder sisters for hours. He seemed to be glad of all the attention that he got. After all he was the ‘boy’ in the household and that made him ’special’.

Paaro and Binni grew in their mother’s mould and brought to their daily chores the same amount of dedication and toil as their mother. Chhutki fed her little ones with all the love and care only a mother could gather from her dwindling resources plagued by poverty.

Lallan had mended his ways appreciably. After all, he had to set good precedents in front of his son. He seldom returned drunk to his home and his famous bouts of ill-temper were now relegated to their rightful place in gossips around idle bonfires. But pangs of poverty held up its head sometimes. And amongst all it was Chhutki who felt its brunt the most. 
Lallan wanted Bhiklu to grow up to be some one ‘big’. He could not imagine what that big physically connoted. Still, like any other proud father he harboured majestic dreams in his heart for his child and he stole his moments of fantasy imagining a bright tomorrow for his son.

The daughters, who made their presence felt to Lallan only during supper-time, lived in morbid fear of his rage. They stayed perennially intimidated by his restless postures and hostile voice. Never could the two girls remember their father talking to them few words of praise or promotion. Chhutki felt helpless at such inhuman behavior but knew it was a natural pattern going by Lallan’s male-bias. She did all she could to shield her daughters from their father’s wrath and as an act of helpless compensation showered all love and care she could on these ‘lesser beings’.

Time flew and soon it was that period in Paaro and Binni’s life when a girl realizes the pains and pleasures of approaching womanhood. Chhutki took good care of her daughters and kept constant vigil on their activities. After all life in slums for growing girls was akin to nursing a lamb amongst a herd of lurking wolves. Paaro was 13 now and Binni 12. Paaro, being the quieter one took voluntary responsibility of her siblings. Binni was a chirping bird. She was like a ray of constant hope and light to the dull surroundings and there was never a quiet moment with her around, unless of course Lallan was at home or Chhutki was seriously upset about something.

Chhutki sometimes felt her years of unrealized childhood flood back to her when she shared little moments and secrets with her daughters. They took their mother more as a guiding friend than a superseding authority. The girls had their little stories to tell and Chhutki had hers from her days of child hood. The exchange of love was so palpably subtle that one could not differentiate what was bartered in between silent sobs and muted giggles. It was in simple terms a bond which was beyond the scope of human expression and Chhutki was eternally glad to immerse herself in these currents of tender affection that her daughters so innocently lavished on her. Sometimes she wept tears of sheer joy in front of her choking mud-stove and prayed to God to preserve these little gifts for her home forever.
If God listened to any of her prayers or not she never knew for life continued to move at a pace that could put a snail to shame. An air of invisible languor embalmed everything in this ambience of decided poverty.


But as ant takes the confines of a rejected shoe-box as its entire world Chhutki taught her daughters that the world for them was never beyond the boundaries that she had drawn for them. And it was from their thatched hut to the school by the adjoining road-side. Chhutki wanted the world to expand for her daughters someday. Someday, when she too would share a part of their freedom and breathe freely the air of independence.

All three of them were admitted to the free-municipality school. How Chhutki cajoled and begged Lallan to let the girls get admitted to the school was an epic in itself. He declined and deferred until Chhutki decided to put her foot down for the first time in her life. Lallan was almost provoked to hit her blue and black but, he resisted that temptation as his son was growing up now and such violence would do little to make a good role-model out of him. So, Lallan’s preferential image-consciousness and his love for Bhiklu saved Chhutki the beating of her life and got the girls admitted into the school. This was the first step towards any improvement that ever touched Chhutki’s household. And she was quietly pleased about it. She knew she had taken a considerable leap towards realizing her secret dream. A dream to see her girls soar into the sky and make her proud. Some day they would, she was sure. But, if she would live to see that day she doubted.

At school, Paaro was a favourite with all teachers as she was quiet, docile and submissive. She never trespassed a line and never disobeyed orders from teachers. She was both attentive and smart. But, Binni was smarter. She played all games as boys did and sometimes bettered them with ease.
 She was a bundle of unbridled energy and this reckless trait of hers sometimes shook Chhutki and raised eyebrows on many a forehead. Her teachers always reminded Binni to watch out before she tripped over herself. She hardly paid any attention to all these words of useless wisdom. She knew what ultimately mattered at the end of the day were grades. And there she did much better than her goody-girl elder sister.

Bhiklu was a couple of classes younger to the girls and he was a source of constant shame to Binni’s aggressive ways. He was bullied around by his friends. But, a few scuffles and nasty bruises was all it took to make the class-heavy weights wary of Bhiklu’s ‘body-guard behen‘. No one dared to mess with Bhiklu from that day onwards. No one wanted to end up with a twisted wrist or a sore throat.

Bhiklu was neither as quiet and calm as his eldest sister (and Lallan was proud of that for “Boys must be rash”, he would declare.) nor was he as quick in fist-fights or mental mathematics as the younger one. Binni’s reputation of ‘un-girl like’ behaviour and manners was slowly gathering girth in the neighborhood and Chhutki kept track of her ever-incrementing record of ‘atrocities’. Chhutki did her best to keep all these news away from Lallan’s ears. She knew the day he came to know of Binni’s ‘manly-deeds’ it would be the last day for her in school.

 Lallan wanted to raise his daughters only till the time they were fit to be married off and propagate more of their kind. He knew only a boy could bring pride to the tired shoulders of a father. Girls figured nowhere in his schemes.They were born to be burdens, he thought, and ought to be handed over to their husbands in proper time.
Chhutki prayed to God with folded hands and wet eye-lashes that such a day would not be knocking at her doors for at least 6-7 years from now on. What God and His plans kept in store for her she would not know, till another 3 months passed.

Chhutki could have never imagined that time could so ruthlessly expunge all remnants of the past in such short notice.

I am pleasantly surprised to see some of my friends here egging me into posting more frequently. I owe a word of appreciation to Anuraag and company. I am sure that the fire that drives me from within is not running short of any coal. I was just researching the possibility of  renewable sources of energy to charge my spirits. That’s it.

I am presently exploring my ability to write a novel of sorts. The novel, I intend to post in the form of episodes. I am not too sure if it will be readable. But, then you all can tell me a few things about sprucing it up maybe. I will be all ears to those comments. So here goes:

*******

Bhiklu was born out of an accident. His father, Lallan had not thought of the wealth of joys he invited when charmed by the effects of the country-liquor he demanded his marital dues. His wife Chhutki could only comply. She knew resisting would see her wake up in the morning richer by a dozen bruises. Not that Lallan was gentle in bed. He was a master at giving vent to all his frustrations at night.
A small man with a terrible temper which kept all his mates on their toes, he knew how to “command respect”. Lallan believed in hard-work and made merry in his own ways whenever he thought he had enough to buy a baatli or two. Only that night it turned out to be different. He impregnated his wife in his drunken frenzy.

Bhiklu was born in the shabby corners of a Govt. hospital somewhere in the middle of an unforgiving May. Chhutki was happy to see his tender fingers grabbing at her pallu and the radiance on Lallan’s face relieved her. She knew there would be no more children after this son. Lallan would not run the risk of feeding a third daughter. Already the ones they had had very little to answer to their stubborn stomachs. Lallan buoyed by the arrival of his son threw a little party at his daaru- adda that night. He sketched plans to augment his daily income of a mealy 110 rupees so that he could provide for the newcomer. He was sure he could make it 200 a day with a little help from his luck. Next day he went in search of some ‘better work’. A daily hand at a construction site could never make 200 bucks in the next 10 years, he thought to himself. Instead, he tried for a vacancy at a security agency. They would pay him much better, his friend Sambhu had said. Lallan lapped up the job, courtesy his muscular physique and his threatening aura. He went back to home happy and drunk that night. Now he could feed his son without worrying much. And the very thought of it brought rosy dreams to his mind.

Chhutki had been a quiet girl from Lallan’s village, Madhopur. She dreamt of going to school, having a small ‘happy’ family and a prosperous future in many of her innocent reveries. Like always, all of them were thwarted over time. Some by circumstance, some by the men in her life. Lallan had her eyes fixed on her from the time when delightful youth started to show on her face and bosom. Her dupatta was a useless defense against his lecherous glares. Finally, one day he proposed marriage to her father, Raghu. Suffering from all the ancient anxieties that a father to a daughter is tethered to from the moment he learns of the arrival of his ‘little bundle of troubles’ Raghu decided to get rid of all of them in one decisive strike.Chhutki would be married off, he decided. Chhutki’s mother reasoned Lallan’s bitter temper and limited earnings, yet, like always, ‘male logic’ centered on viability won the debate . 
Chhutki was married to Lallan.

Lallan was an assortment of violent challenges to the childish naivete of Chhutki. He was demanding on and off their marital bed and it was left to her interminable patience to appease his needs. Lallan brought home the daily necessities only when it was pressing enough. When and how much, that he decided. After all he was the master of his household. Chhutki made meals for both of them twice every day…… rotis and some aalu sabji. Sitting in front of her mud-baked chulha she sometimes indulged in cooking up some of her old, rusted dreams…..but only till the roti ballooned.
Soon she had two more stomachs to feed and a frowning face full of unsaid threats. They had had two daughters in search of a ’son’.
The Son.

Paaro and Binni, Chhutki had named her daughters. She despised the thought of having brought them to their fate of certain misery. Yet, at times she basked in the warmth of their love and her heart soared as she watched them grow in front of her very eyes.

She smiled when each of them started to take their first steps. A smile which was incomparable to anything she had felt before. A smile which she could not suppress, like all the sobs that she had gulped down after being thrashed to pulp every other night. This smile she could not help getting audible to her ears. A smile which was the gift of motherhood. The very call of Maa emanating in two chirpy tones made her feel rich. Very rich at times.


Like any other mother she cried inconsolably when any of them ran temperatures or got hurt at play. Unknowingly, she grew along with her daughters. Having faced the rigors of poverty that seemed absolute, she now had the courage to face challenges that life in the slums hurled at them. Mature and innoculated to the pangs of hunger and need, she could only offer a hint of a relieved smile at the arrival of a boy child. She knew this one would grow up to be Lallan’s son as much as Paaro and Binni had been daughters to her from their birth.

Now holding the frail ‘flesh-loaf’ on her lap she fiddled with its fingers and her own imagination. Then, in a moment of careless baby-talk she named her “Bhiklu” . Lallan ratified the name without a struggle as a token of recognition. He rewarded Chhutki’s services in delivering his dream by letting her name the child he was to own from that day .

Bhiklu was thus named, by his mother.

All suggestions as to how this novel should or would unfold are welcome. The final course of events that materializes / unfolds, as is expected, rests with me.