GROWING
UP IN INDIA – My Diary
Prologue
Idiots, have provided me only one window and that
too is wrung up with iron bars and placed in the top most perimeter of the 12 X
12 room. I simmer with primal anger, as I look around, a filthy corner in the
soiled flooring intended for my basic toilet needs; a broken bed and a dust
laden mattress, fractured in as many places as can be, a stained sheet and a
plate of world’ most horrible food heaped on a plate in front of me. I heard
about the tax payer’s money being invested in prison welfare but somebody
please tell them that even prisoners like me don’t get the tax payer’s money’s
worth. I wonder where most of it gets drained out. I cannot get my books to
read, they feel the subject is too violent for inmates like me, bloody
monsters, having fun at my cost.
Six Months Ago
The sun streams across my window and the glass
scatters the rays all over my room. Another sunny morning, one more tiring day,
I think to myself. I don’t know why Abba had to, of all the places, have a
restaurant here, however considering that this eatery turned Dhaba turned
restaurant has been with the family for ages, I cannot blame him much. My dad
passed away two years ago and left me this Royal restaurant in a small Indian
town. It is still a mystery to me, how he survived a damaged liver for all
these years, I had mentally prepared myself long ago. The day mom died, I was
barely three years old. My father took to drinking like religion and he
religiously courted death since then. I miss Nikki, my ex-girlfriend, but she
is happily married enough to ever think about me.
My Dad left his country and his beloved legacy –
the restaurant, six decades ago and made a house in Canada; a house which was
never destined to become a home. My mother, a simple woman died during
childbirth, or so everybody believes but the real truth is that my father
killed her. My father was known for his bad temper and I carry his lineage
forward. Nikki left me because I hit her in a fit of fury, borne out of jealousy
and the fear of losing her, but I did lose her eventually; I feel like a Hulk
at times, my anger knows me better than I know my anger. It comes up silently
and possesses me and I don’t know how to turn it off. I have embittered friends,
many enemies and practically no one to call my own. At thirty, I don’t know if
I have gained anything else apart from my years and frown lines. I am not a bad
person but isn’t that what everyone says about themselves. But often I think to
myself, at least my anger is mine, and what is there to lose that I haven’t
lost already.
Royal Restaurant
The restaurant is not big; it has ten tables for
two and five tables for a family, six waiters, three chefs and two managers who
come in shifts. I never wanted this for myself though, I wanted to vent out in
carving wood into things of utility, used to adorn the homes people make.
I reach the restaurant at eleven thirty; the
manager is already operating by then. I see a couple of men taking breakfast
which their wives could have cooked for them. But all they want is to escape
from their family troubles, nagging wives and bad bosses. Me, I am a bad boss
myself; I know my staff is needy, if they had not been in dire need of a
regular income, they would have left me and my restaurant long back. They frown
at me and utter a scared little good morning, I don’t answer them back; I hate
them. I don’t interact with my customers, I cannot afford them becoming
displeased with my source of income. And moreover it is the only time that I
get to see people although I don’t like to at times, but on some occasions, it
is very pacifying.
Today it is very hot and the air conditioner seems
to be in a holiday mode. I am irritated at the Safaiwala, who is again using
the same worn out shred of cloth to clean the tables, these bloody Indians will
never learn. I shout at him and he hurries into the small store room to bring a
sponge and some surface cleaning lotion. My chef has overdone my omelette and
is sweating profusely standing in front of me. Sweaty pig, he can’t even make
an omelette properly. He is all I can afford, as this small town hasn’t made me
financially comfortable yet.
It is dusk now and things are moving in slow
motion since morning. I want to go home but today I cannot. My manager has a
freaking birthday party to throw for his daughter and I will have to shut shop
today. Yelling and screaming my hours pass somehow. I order a bottle of scotch
and gulp neat pegs down my throat.
Midnight
I don’t know when I dozed off, but suddenly I
found my chef, the weakling, in the tiniest of the voice trying to wake me up.
I felt like a lion in front of him. Red eyed and sluggish I told him to go home
and I would wait for some more time to sober up, before I am able to drive
home.
Around midnight, I woke up with a start. Was it a
noise I had heard or my mind was playing tricks on me? The neighborhood was a
constant prey to thieves and burglars and I felt angry, angry like never
before. Some stupid thief had dared to rob my money, I will teach him a lesson
that he will never forget. Stealthily, I stepped inside my kitchen, ah yes! I
could hear the rustling of some vessels. I yelled, and someone jumped out of
the window. The stupid chef had forgotten to latch the big window. I will kill
him tomorrow, but now it is this thief’s turn and I ran outside, determined to
catch him, before he could disappear into the darkness.
I saw him running on the gravel outside and chased
him. When he did not stop, I picked up a brick lying on the manhole cover and
flung it at him with all my fury and the pent up rage. I intended to kill him,
and I targeted his skull. Before I knew it, the man was huddled on the ground,
clutching his head with his hands; I picked up another brick and threw at him. The
man let out a groan and then it was silence all around, no movement; I walked
over to him, my hands still shaking with pure anger. Had he not been dead, I would have hit him
again. But he was not breathing, I searched him, his pockets, and the rag he
wore and there in all honesty lay crumpled on the ground, what he had dared,
steal from my restaurant. They were two pieces of stale buns which the chef had
forgotten to put out for the dogs. Then everything happened very quickly, and
before long I found myself in the police station.
Prison
The man had died on the spot, media and the police
looked at me with contempt. Yes they would dare do that to me, seeing me
chained. I don’t know what all words media has called me, what all names have I
been given. I don’t know, I don’t care about these idiots and what they know or
what they think of me. I was sentenced 10 years in prison and there goes my
life, I thought. Prison was hell, and everyday served as a reminder. I was kept
in an isolated cell, as I was dangerous. Inmates tried talking to me but I
would glare them away. I did not want small talk; I did not want any talk, or
those stupid religious books they gave me to read. I spent my days looking at
the single window in my cell (as if looks could snap those iron bars) or
looking at the sneaky smelly rats in my cell which scampered around unaware and
unafraid. Each time the constable came to push the nasty pile of food in my cell,
I contemplated wringing his neck and escaping from the prison. I don’t know why
I never tried it though; I had become a quiet monster as they called me. The restaurant had been shut down and anyway
I had nobody who would visit me in the prison, so I was on my own.
A Visitor
I had an unexpected visitor one day, a small girl
dressed in greasy torn clothes. The visiting hours were on, so the constable
brought her to meet me, across the glass. Luckily there were a few other visitors
and I was able to hear what that girl said to me. On other days, even if you
would be screaming your throat hoarse, your visitors would not be able to hear
you, amidst the din of everyone shouting to their imprisoned relatives
respectively. Even prisons, in India are overcrowded you see, everywhere you
see, there are all kinds of people. In Canada though, I had been locked up for
two nights, when Nikki had filed a complaint against me. But then she had come
to see me (the last time I would ever see her) and she had spoken quietly on
the phone, one on the each end of the glass wall that separated us. Prisons
were also well equipped in Canada, but in our country, well, who would spend
time, money and effort on us prisoners when the government did not have the
sprit to do so for normal citizens.
Anyway back to the little girl. This little girl, had
a streaked, unwashed face and unkempt dirty hair tied into a pony tail with a
filthy red ribbon. She looked barely ten years old though her eyes looked as
vacant and as pained as someone who had lived their entire life.
And this is what she said to me:- “You have killed my Rehman Chacha, he was the
only one who watched out for me, I am an orphan and I found him in the night
shelter. Since then, he was the only one who would place a hand on my head and
tell me that one day everything will be okay. The night he did not come back,
was the night, when the other boys in my shelter raped me in turn, hit me and
threw me in the old tunnel. I spent days and nights, hiding in the dark tunnel,
wondering why Rehman Chacha had not come in the shelter that night, to protect
me from those boys, like always. He was the only family I had and he deserted
me and I despised him for doing this to me. But then, I got to know from
someone, that you had killed him and there had been two pieces of bread lying
next to him, when his dead body was found. That bread, you see, he was bringing
it for me. I was running high fever since some days and had not eaten anything.
Ranga had taken from me, whatever I earned from begging at the signal and I
could not go to work for the next few days. But I am not going to waste my time
over you; today I will lie on the railway tracks till the moment some train passes
over me. I will go to my Rehman Chacha, wherever he is, heaven or hell. I just
wanted to tell you that my Rehman Chacha was not a thief.”
And as quietly she had come, she was gone but she
had left something, that feeling of dread inside me, choking me, clasping my
breath. It was as if my face was frozen and I could not react, frown or cry. I
could not sleep that night, nothing had tormented me this badly in the past,
not when I cremated my father, nor when Nikki had left me and got married or
when the world had ganged up against me and had called me a ruthless brute.
Ten Days Later
That girl has emptied me of whatever good I ever
thought of myself, I hate myself. I killed a poor old man who was stealing
bread for an orphan ailing girl. And because of me those vultures of men, scraped
away the girl and maybe today she is lying somewhere on the tracks, and the
stray dogs feeding off whatever remains of her.
For days now, I haven’t been able to eat, the
thought of eating a piece of bread is heart wrenching, like someone has stabbed
my heart and is now slowly turning the knife inside. Crying my heart out has
not helped, nor have those religious books.
I just stare emptily at the wall in front of me, sleep evades me and
each moment is a blur. I feel as if the world is moving at light speed and I am
the only one who is still and watching them from a another universe. The pain
is unrelenting and I am all alone. Oh God, what have I done? Will you ever be
able to forgive me, I am lying in prison but how do I repent for my ghastly
deeds. Should I kill myself, no that would be too easy, what do I do? Should I
appeal for a death sentence to the high court? What should I do, what will
relieve me of my pain? Am I really the Quiet Monster?
Epilogue
Today I stand a free man, looking at those walls
which captured me, imprisoned me, secured me and changed me. I have been let
off for good behaviour and freed in eight years instead of the complete term of
ten years that I was sentenced to.
I turn around at the world outside the prison and
it tempts me and yet manages to scare me. Will I be able to do justice to my
goal, will I be able to survive on my own and sustain the human being in me. I
unlearnt and learnt the value of life and I spent days, months and years honing
up my carpentry skills.
I have made money in the prison, my first income
that I am proud of, the one which has been reaped out of repentance, tears and
goodwill. I have trained other prisoners too, in the art of making furniture.
An NGO has tied up with a furniture dealer to sell to the people, what we make.
And I hear the brand PRISON MADE is
bringing good returns to the dealer. I have about thirty thousand that I have
earned, handed over to me in a white envelope by the prison superintendant
along with my clothes and other valuables.
I have already written to my restaurant manager,
he has come forward to support me in my mission. I will turn my restaurant into
an orphanage and make one workshop for carpentry; I will train the children to
make good sturdy furniture. The dealer from the prison has already offered me a
50% deal, only because he is a good man and he thinks I am too.
I was unable to save that girl or undo what I did
to her Rehman Chacha but I will try not to allow this to happen to any child
again. I still am haunted by her face at times and I wake up drenched in sweat
and with the heartbreaking feeling that I killed her childhood, her protector
and in the end her too. I still feel angry, angry with myself and those boys
but now my anger does not come out on people, it comes out on the wood. I have
mellowed down and I know that I will never allow the monster to surface again.
My orphanage is my hope, my redemption. And I do fervently wish that someday, I
will be able to gain that little girl’s forgiveness, wherever she is and then I
shall forgive myself too.
Nikki is also helping me in running this orphanage;
she has already registered it under the Societies Registration Act. Her husband
has shifted to India for business and she has decided to help me, realize my
dream. After all I did to her, she has forgiven me. I have been brandished as a
prisoner, but she will be the face of NANHI AASHA. Yes, that is the name for
the orphanage. I have also applied for a government grant to run this
orphanage.
No orphan will become a beggar at the signal or
the road from now on to earn a meal and spend the night in namesake of the shelter,
scared every moment that something, someone vile, will attack them. Oscar Wilde
says that, experience is the name everyone gives to their mistakes, I have
committed gravest of the sin and yet this experience has given birth to a whole
new me with a whole new purpose.
Who says I was born and brought up in Canada and
came to India as an adult, I know, I have been born in the small town prison and
have grown up in India. Grown up into a human being…..
