Delhi: A Soliloquy

Author: Mukundan, M.

• Sahadevan would live in Delhi, the Indian capital, for a long time, growing old there. He would accomplish many things during this time, and would fail at a lot more. One of the important things he would continue to do was to keep talking to himself. It was a dialogue that would go on for four decades.

• One of the important things he would continue to do was

• Shreedharanunni often glanced at the photo of S.A. Dange that hung on the wall of his room, which remained dark even during the daytime.

• There was another photo beside that of Dange—of the Chinese Premier, Zhou Enlai. A hundred red flowers adorned its borders. He had bought the picture outside Parassinikadavu Temple during one of his visits to Kerala. The official deity of Parassinikadavu was Muthappan, but photographs of Zhou Enlai and AKG* outnumbered Muthappan’s in sales.

• It was close to dawn when Shreedharanunni finally fell asleep. Almost immediately, he woke up to the rumble of Delhi Milk Scheme vans filled with milk bottles driving past the house.

• ‘Are we going to burn father?’ ‘Umm.’ ‘Why don’t we bury him?’ ‘Hindus usually cremate their dead.’ ‘Father isn’t a Hindu. He is a Communist.’

• Everyone back home smoked beedis. Only the gentry and the rich, like doctors, smoked cigarettes.

• Nanumama’s cataract-dulled eyes gleamed. All the young men went to Bombay and Madras to seek their fortunes. Why was this boy going to Delhi? The mention of Delhi made everyone’s eyes sparkle like Nanumama’s. Wasn’t it the domain of Nehru? Only a few like Sahadevan recalled that it was also the city where Gandhiji was killed.

• When young men headed out to Madras and Bombay in search of a livelihood, they usually wore trousers. But Sahadevan started his journey in a dhoti—he had no money to buy trousers.

• In the beginning, you were under the impression that all of Gulshan Wadhwa’s children were sons. But soon you realised that he had no sons. All his three children were daughters. You began to wonder why his company was called ‘Wadhwa & Sons’ instead of ‘Wadhwa & Daughters’.

• The parents were ashamed to acknowledge their daughters and call them ‘beti’, so they used the masculine ‘beta’ instead.

• In Delhi, only those who lived in government quarters managed to stay in one place for any length of time. Most migrants kept moving homes.

• Those who had lamps would blow them out. The glass panes of windows had newspaper sheets stuck on them.

• Patriotism needs wars every now and then, Sahadevan reminded himself. Humanism is against all wars. Which one is paramount then? Love for the country or love for our fellow human beings?

• During war, everything else ceases to be of consequence. War unites people through thoughts of death.

• If Shreedharanunni were alive, who would he be with today? With the Communist Party of India or the Communist Party of India (Marxist)?

• Sahadevan knew that cheap watches were available in Chandni Chowk in Old Delhi. Sometimes they were duplicates, but it was believed that the duplicates of Chandni Chowk were better than the originals.

• While his earnings were not great, he could afford to send thirty rupees home by money order every month. That was sufficient for buying rations and kashayam for his father’s asthma, and liniment for his backache.

• Wadhwa knew that this was impossible to achieve in his current state. Yet, that was what he dreamt of. You don’t need anyone’s permission to dream.

• The disease that consumed him now was different. It was nostalgia—much worse and more terrifying than whooping cough and measles. And there was no Kunjappoo vaidyar to treat him.

• Toddy sellers bearing earthen pots of palmyra toddy had got into the bogie at different stations in Andhra Pradesh. Soldiers returning from Kashmir on furlough, now squeezed together in the compartment, drank deep from these pots.

• In November and December, sea fish arrived in Delhi from Gujarat and Orissa—pomfret, seer fish, sardines and mackerel. The pleasure of eating fish curry helped them forget the inconveniences of the cold season.

• She clutched the bag close as if she expected someone to snatch it away. It was moist from the melting ice on the fish. The bag was from Shankunni & Sons at Thalassery bus stand, he saw. While they were packing a saree and blouse-piece into this bag, did any member of the family, the elder Shankunni or his sons or anyone else, ever imagine that one day, it would reach Delhi and travel in a DTC bus bearing fish?

• She clutched the bag close as if she expected someone to snatch it away. It was moist from the melting ice on the fish. The bag was from Shankunni & Sons at Thalassery bus stand, he saw. While they were packing a saree and blouse-piece into this bag, did any member of the family, the elder Shankunni or his sons or anyone else, ever imagine that one day, it would reach Delhi and travel in a DTC bus bearing fish? Predestination is not just limited to humans; bags too have their destinies.

• Kunhikrishnan’s house had a telephone, the only one on the entire street. Since he was a journalist, the connection had come through very quickly. Everyone else had to curry favours with an MP or a minister.

• Kunhikrishnan’s house had a telephone, the only one on the entire street. Since he was a journalist, the connection had come through very quickly. Everyone else had to curry favours with an MP or a minister. Even then, the waiting time was three or four years.

• All of a sudden, the night was split by the piercing wail of sirens. The power went off. The city was enveloped in darkness. Lalitha sat there, feeling numb. Memories of the wars of 1962 and 1965 came surging back. One war ends and another starts.

• When she heard from her mother that Kunhikrishnan was employed in Delhi, she was so happy that she pranced around like a goat kid. Now, she hated Delhi.

• Bus journeys strengthened human relationships. Passengers sat side by side, brushing against one another and catching the odour of the other person.

• He had seen Om Prakash Jain, his landlord, cleaning his teeth with a neem stick. The old-timers in Delhi used these to clean their teeth, and neem was as effective as charcoal dentifrice. But even then, when passengers in DTC buses opened their mouths, Sahadevan had to turn his face away.

• After the war, there was a shortage of everything. Kerosene had vanished from the market. Sugar was not available. Lentils and onion prices were on fire. For the poor, all these were essentials. What did the rich need kerosene for? They had gas stoves in their kitchens. What did they need lentils and onions for? They ate their chapatis with chicken and paneer tikka. That must be why the prices did not rise for these.

• In Punjab, there was no dearth of food. There were gurdwaras everywhere, even in the villages. Anyone could go in as long as they covered their head. Sardarnis from wealthy families served everyone chapati and dal made with their own hands. During his travels through Punjab, his body had started filling out from eating the wholesome food at the gurdwaras. His sunken cheeks had filled out. His neck became thicker. He smoked weed all the time. There was no shortage of that either in Punjab.

• No one had any objection to making the girls strip on the holy night of Lord Jesus’s birth. It was because Lord Jesus was a Christian. If he was Hindu, the glass panes of the restaurant would have been shattered, Sahadevan assured himself.

• One day, fed up with their life of hardship and grinding poverty, Rosakutty’s mother had leapt into the river from the boat. Because she was a strong swimmer, she did not die. She reached the shore by employing the crawl and the backstroke.

• One day, fed up with their life of hardship and grinding poverty, Rosakutty’s mother had leapt into the river from the boat. Because she was a strong swimmer, she did not die. She reached the shore by employing the crawl and the backstroke. That was the day she realised that the poor and the hungry ought not to learn swimming.

• The neighbourhood had one municipal school. Only the children of poor people studied there. Looking at the faded, wrinkled and shrunken uniforms, the dishevelled, unwashed hair, and sandals worn down to only a suggestion, one could gauge their state of poverty.

• Photographs of Comrade Krishnapillai and Comrade AKG hung on the wall. Beside them, a framed photograph of Vyjayanthimala in a swimsuit, cut out from a calendar. Raj Kapoor’s movie, Sangam, had run for months on end at Eros Cinema in Jangpura. There were huge posters of Vyjayanthimala emerging from a swimming pool. Dasappan had been desperate to watch Sangam.

• ‘No one is coming to cut their hair. All the boys are walking around with long hair. I’m half-starved already; if everyone decides to grow their hair, what will we barbers do? We’ll starve, that’s what we’ll do. Why are the youngsters growing their hair like this, sir? It’s not like they don’t have the money for a haircut, right? Even those travelling by cars and scooters are growing their hair. What is all this?’ ‘Those who are growing their hair are rebels. They want to live as they please, not according to the diktats of others.’

• ‘Dasappa, why are you suffering like this, just in order to live here? Why don’t you go home? Since the Communists have come to power, the life of workers has improved. Barbers like you go to work wearing a watch around their wrist and sandals on their feet.’

• ‘Dasappa, why are you suffering like this, just in order to live here? Why don’t you go home? Since the Communists have come to power, the life of workers has improved. Barbers like you go to work wearing a watch around their wrist and sandals on their feet.’ Dasappan remained silent. Sahadevan realised that he should not have asked the question. Dasappan could well ask him the same thing. Why was he struggling in Delhi? Everyone had their reasons for leaving behind their land of birth. Vasu had his reason. Rosily had hers.

• The refugee influx from Bangladesh which had started before the 1971 war continued after the war too. Hungry, sick and exhausted, they moved to various parts of the country through multiple entry points in the north-east. It was like the overflow of sludge and rocks that follows a landslide.

• Little children with misshapen torsos, pale yellow skin and sunken eyes thrust their arms out at pedestrians and passing cars. Most of them were naked, and the boys were circumcised. As he watched, a middle-aged man in a pristine white kurta-pyjama, probably on his way back from the Shiva temple on Humayun Road, with no provocation whatsoever from anyone, got down from his cycle, picked up some stones from the pavement and threw them at the children. One of the stones found its mark. It hit the thing he had aimed at—a circumcised penis. For a moment, the child stood with his mouth agape, numb like a statue. Then, convulsing in pain, he screamed and ran. The women who were cooking on makeshift stoves under

• Little children with misshapen torsos, pale yellow skin and sunken eyes thrust their arms out at pedestrians and passing cars. Most of them were naked, and the boys were circumcised. As he watched, a middle-aged man in a pristine white kurta-pyjama, probably on his way back from the Shiva temple on Humayun Road, with no provocation whatsoever from anyone, got down from his cycle, picked up some stones from the pavement and threw them at the children. One of the stones found its mark. It hit the thing he had aimed

• Little children with misshapen torsos, pale yellow skin and sunken eyes thrust their arms out at pedestrians and passing cars. Most of them were naked, and the boys were circumcised. As he watched, a middle-aged man in a pristine white kurta-pyjama, probably on his way back from the Shiva temple on Humayun Road, with no provocation whatsoever from anyone, got down from his cycle, picked up some stones from the pavement and threw them at the children. One of the stones found its mark. It hit the thing he had aimed at—a circumcised penis. For a moment, the child stood with his mouth agape, numb like a statue. Then, convulsing in pain, he screamed and ran.

• Like in Nizamuddin, termite hills of refugee camps began to spring up all over the city.

• But Sahadevan was not the argumentative type. He would never seek answers to his problems from others. He believed that one should find them all by oneself. A notion that was reinforced by some of the books on Western philosophy that he had read recently.

• After this, his primary priority became money. He had changed jobs. He had started his own business. But nothing seemed to bring an end to his state of poverty. Gradually, he calmed down. He bought a second-hand copy of Simone de Beauvoir’s The Second Sex from a used-books seller in the Sunday market at Daryaganj for five rupees.

• Sahadevan was exhausted from carrying the burden of so many people. Yet, the doors of his mind would not slam shut. They remained open, always, and anyone was free to enter.

• Sahadevan was exhausted from carrying the burden of so many people. Yet, the doors of his mind would not slam shut. They remained open, always, and anyone was free to enter. Devi and her children had been parked there for a long time. Vasu had also found a spot. And now, Rosily.

• These days, she didn’t go to INA Market. The place was full of Malayali men. They came in the evening from the air force bases at Palam and Race Course Road, to ogle at the nurses from Safdarjung Hospital.

• As a rule, Rosily avoided Malayali customers. They usually had a litany of complaints. And they asked her about her family. Some would sing the songs of Yesudas. Some asked for credit. She didn’t like any of that. North Indian men didn’t trouble her. They didn’t say a word, they paid, did their bit, and went away quietly. That was professionalism.

• ‘Nothing is impossible, Sahadevetta. Do you know, her name is not Rosily. Her real name is Rosakutty. She claims that Rosakutty is dead. She is from a family of settlers in the high ranges.’ ‘I’ve read Vishakanyaka by S.K. Pottekkat.’

• ‘I’ve read Vishakanyaka by S.K. Pottekkat.’

• ‘We should keep a goat, amma.’ ‘A goat? Whatever for?’ ‘Haven’t you read Pathummayude Aadu by Basheer? We can give the salary to the goat as its feed. Then we don’t have to break our heads over these calculations.’

• Sahadevan rummaged through his memory bank from twenty years before he had arrived in Delhi. It felt like a huge haystack. He wormed his way into it, his eyes closed, punching through with his head, but all he saw was darkness. If he opened his eyes, the stiff ends of the straw poked them painfully. Sometimes they tickled his nostrils, making him sneeze repeatedly. When he crawled out from the darkness after much sneezing and with his eyes burning, he had a bundle of memories with him.

• He chatted about films and music. Boney M. was his favourite pop band. He owned a Philips LP record player, which he kept in his bedroom. The drumbeats of Osibisa reverberated in his room even after midnight.

• His uncle, the head priest of the Mathura temple, had drilled it into Rahul from his childhood that, before breaking bread with strangers, he should find out their caste.

• Watching the scenes of poverty, the piled-up garbage and bare male bodies, Sahadevan had wondered how long he would be able to stay in this city. And yet, he had survived. He had seen no major improvements in his life. But he had no

• Watching the scenes of poverty, the piled-up garbage and bare male bodies, Sahadevan had wondered how long he would be able to stay in this city. And yet, he had survived. He had seen no major improvements in his life. But he had no desire to return home either.

• If material comforts had been the purpose of life, by now Sahadevan would have gone back to Kerala. The only two problems there were unemployment and poverty. And even if there was poverty, there was cleanliness and hygiene. Even if there was hunger, people were socially conscious. He saw nothing of that in Delhi.

• Instead of M.F. Husain’s paintings, he picked out two prints of a tantric painting by Sayed Haider Raza. The salesman probably didn’t know that Raza was Muslim. And thus, the Muslim Abdunnissar stepped out of the gallery with a rolled-up painting of Hindu tantric emblems made by a Muslim artist. It was his response to Shivshankarji of Arya Samaj Road, owner of two buildings and seven buffaloes.

• Harilal Shukla used to say that one of the drawbacks of Malayali painters was their obsession with colours.

• ‘Doesn’t matter. Whatever it is, you have found a job. Your father, sitting in the heavens, must be happy.’ She looked up instinctively. The old fan continued to whirr above, making a racket.

• Though he was more than twenty years old, Rahul Sharma didn’t know that when a brahmin boy elopes with a thiyya girl, be it to any corner of the world, those who have to find them will find them. Vidya picked up her bag and together, they left Khan Market and walked to Lodhi Gardens. Trees grew thickly around the grave of Sikandar Lodhi. From the thickets, the fluttering of all kinds of birds could be heard. A hare ran across the foot trail and disappeared into the tangled vines. Though it was frying hot outside, the shadows of the trees lay dense within. They sat close to each other, hidden behind the trees and vines, where no prying eyes could reach.

• Sathyanathan always looked at her challengingly: one day he was going to bring her back onto the straight and narrow path. The worst was the pity in Sahadevan’s eyes. She didn’t need anyone’s sympathy. She had chosen her own path after due deliberation. She was ready to face the consequences. Vasu was the only one who looked at her normally. Which was why she had a soft spot for him. ‘I’ll

• Sathyanathan always looked at her challengingly: one day he was going to bring her back onto the straight and narrow path. The worst was the pity in Sahadevan’s eyes. She didn’t need anyone’s sympathy. She had chosen her own path after due deliberation. She was ready to face the consequences. Vasu was the only one who looked at her normally. Which was why she had a soft spot for him.

• Litchi trees, heavy with the fruit, grew on either side of the road between Ranchi and Haridwar.

• Dasappan alone cursed the rain as he gathered up the chair and cloth he used for his customers, the Himalaya Bouquet powder, Afghan Snow cream and Vi-John shaving stick, and sought refuge in the nearby footwear shop. No one had come for a shave or a haircut all morning. Now that the rain had started, it was unlikely anyone would. Today, he would starve for sure. The summer rains made everyone else happy. To Dasappan, it signalled hunger.

• Sahadevan himself was not particularly in favour of mashu’s ideology. But that didn’t bother him. He believed that one type of treatment alone cannot cure the ills of society.

• Though darkness was yet to fall, adults and children were squatting by the side of the road, defecating. In the dim light, they chatted about the latest news in their homes and locality. They would be visible from the houses in Defence Colony, full of rich and famous people. Most Delhiites didn’t seem to mind the stink and refuse. It was a problem for Sahadevan because he still had the civic sense of a Malayali.

• We have, I fear, confused power with greatness. —Stewart Udall

• The Emergency was a time of disappearances. But the buses ran to schedule. Not just that—the conductor patiently ensured that everyone got on board before blowing the whistle. Other passengers helped the blind and the lame onto the buses. The Lotharios who used to stand close to the women passengers and rub against their bodies now kept a respectful distance. People didn’t have to repeatedly pat their pockets to make sure their wallets and cash were safe. The pickpockets disappeared. There were orderly queues at post offices, milk booths and ration shops. And no power cuts. If the power failed, a phone call was enough; the lineman came running. When girls walked about in short skirts, there were no wolf whistles. The usual eve teasers disappeared from parks and theatres and colleges. The Jayanti Janata Express and the Grand Trunk Express, which typically ran five or six hours late, started arriving on the dot. There was one hundred per cent attendance at the Secretariat. Quacks closed their clinics and vanished. The eateries in Daryaganj and Pandara Road stopped adding artificial colouring to their kadhai chicken. Smuggled goods disappeared from Chandni Chowk.

• At the theatre, Sahadevan would observe his fellow Malayalis. Women, children and elderly folk. The fragrance of coconut oil mixed with the smell of wet hair, Chandrika soap and Pond’s talcum powder. Nurses from Safdarjung Hospital, All India Institute of Medical Sciences and Moolchand Hospital, wearing salwar-kameez bought from Sarojini Nagar Market and with Lacto-Calamine on their faces. Young soldiers with close-cropped hair from Race Course and Cantonment, hovering around them. These soldiers and nurses were the stars of the early romantic history of the Delhi Malayalis. Sahadevan remained a spectator in their midst.

• Sahadevan knew that there were many Malayalis like Dasappan in Delhi. Malayalis of every type lived here. He had seen the Malayali roadside vegetable seller in Munirka; the fish seller in Bengali Market, who spoke Bengali as fluently as his customers did; the balloon seller at India Gate; the keychain seller at the zoo, who pestered visitors who came to see the tigers, gorillas and lions; and the pimp who worked in the red-light district. There were Malayalis among the pickpockets who came from Trilokpuri to pick pockets on DTC buses. There were Malayali goondas. There were Malayali policemen who collected a monthly hafta from them. There were Malayali adulteresses who stole money from the pockets of their khaki uniforms. They, like Dasappan, got to go home only once in five or six years to meet their families. There were some who couldn’t even do that.

• As it is, the veins of sardars, even those with low blood pressure, throb with blood that’s volatile, Sahadevan mused.

• ‘It has only been two weeks. Already we are unable to tolerate it. I feel suffocated. There’s been an Emergency in the Soviet Union from the time of Stalin, hasn’t there? How are they able to tolerate it?’ ‘Be careful, Sathyanatha. Comparison is an art too, and you know nothing of it. How can you compare Stalin and Indira Gandhi? Stalin is a great revolutionary who changed the course of history. Has Indira Gandhi done anything like that? What is her status in history?’ ‘Stalin or Indira Gandhi, it’s all the same. I’m against anyone who silences the voice of a people.’

• It had been years since he started living in this city. Unbeknownst to him, his roots were growing into its soil. It had become a habit to say ‘our Delhi’ when he spoke of it.

• She prayed that Kunhikrishnan wouldn’t return from the post office in a hurry. If that happened … She shuddered. The policemen went away, leaving the mess in their wake. Before they left, one of them asked, ‘What’s your name?’ ‘Indira.’

• Kuldeep Singh, the headmaster, was despondent. His school had been given a quota of twenty-two vasectomies that month. He had received warnings that if the quota was not fulfilled by 31 December, action would be initiated against him and the school.

• He had requested his relatives and friends; fallen at their feet. Among them were men who had four or five children. No one budged. They didn’t even condescend to listen to him. ‘Sardarji, first you get it done. Then come to us. What idiocy!’

• ‘I’m scared, masterji.’ ‘You’re a girl, why should you be afraid? It’s men like me who have reason to fear.’

• Huge banners had been strung up in front of the camp. They proclaimed that the water shortages in the country were due to a population explosion, and therefore, there should be no more births, and for that, everyone should volunteer to be operated upon.

• ‘Saab, what do the V and P stand for in V.P. Agencies?’ she asked softly, hesitantly. It was a question that no one had asked him so far. ‘It stands for Vidya and Pinky Agencies. V for Vidya and P for Pinky.’

• Vegetable vendors, cobblers and sweepers moved around in Eastmancolor clothes.

• He realised that neither Sathyanathan nor he could win any battles on their own. Only a mob could do it. He wished to be part of such a mob. But where was the mob? The problem with a mob is that it cannot lead itself. It needs a leader to carry it forward.

• One day, two policemen came to his place looking for Kunhikrishnan. They stood in front of Jayaprakash Narayan’s photo and asked him, ‘Yeh kaun hai?’ ‘Shekharan Nambiar, my father.’ ‘Tumhara baap?’ ‘Haan ji.’

• The demolition squad and the Nehru Brigade pushed Sahadevan out of the way. The bulldozer moved forward. He escaped falling prey to it only because he spoke English and was a Madrasi.

• ‘Have you started your sermon again, Madrasi?’ ‘Goli maaroon bande ko?’ The CRPF soldier had his finger on the trigger of his rifle.

• The area around Jama Masjid was full of dilapidated buildings, it was a place of poverty and squalor. It needed cleaning up. If one looked south from Jama Masjid, one should be able to see the majesty of India Gate. The buildings in Turkman Gate blocked this view. All such obstructions had to be removed; the buildings had to be razed. It was the aesthete in Sanjayji that had persuaded him to beautify Turkman Gate.

• There was one more reason. Turkman Gate was a mini-Pakistan. Sanjayji used to tell his friends: There’s no need for a Pakistan in the capital city.

• Fajruddin’s Attar Bhandar had been looted. Smashed bottles of rouh-al-oud, majmua and abdul akheer lay on the ground. The intoxicating fragrance of the attar had turned into a piercing, migraine-causing odour. The sherwani-clad corpse of the Unani doctor lay prone in the gutter. One of his legs had been crushed under a bulldozer. The compound wall of Abdul Ameen’s bungalow had been levelled. Stray dogs were sniffing at the corpse of a small child. Inside Dargah Faiz-e-Ilahi, the naked body of Firdous, stripped of her burqa, lay frozen in rigor mortis.

• Everything has been figured out, except how to live. —Jean-Paul Sartre

• ‘JP’s Sampoorna Kranti doesn’t move me.’ ‘But it’s attracting and moving crores of people, Janakikutty.’ ‘Isn’t JP a product of Vinoba Bhave? What happened there, Sahadeva? Vinoba Bhave supported the Emergency. Mother Teresa also supported it. Sarvodaya, the Bhoodan Movement, nothing’s right. There’s God and religion in all of them. Harijans shouldn’t be given land received through begging. It should be done through a revolution …’

• From their experiences of those nineteen months, Delhiites had come to understand that freedom was as essential as food and a roof over their heads.

• Vasu did not align with any particular ideology, Congress or Communist. But if there was anything that required stoning, he was ready to cast the first stone.

• Cardamom and ginger-infused masala tea for Abdul Ameen. One normal tea for Sahadevan. He was ever the normal person.

• Vasu had narrated the story of Raksha Bandhan to her. Yamuna was the sister of Yama, the god of death. On a full moon day in August, she had tied a rakhi on Yama’s wrist and sought his protection. Yama was pleased and gave her the boon of immortality.

• Delhiites, being devotees of Rama, had a different story to tell. When Krishna suffered a cut on his arm and began to bleed, Draupadi tore off a piece from her raiment and tied it around the wound. Pleased by the gesture, Lord Krishna accepted Draupadi as his sister and offered her his protection, for all time.

• It was many days later that Lalitha had realised it was Vatsyayana. She didn’t know exactly who he was, but he appeared to exude divinity, even more than Rohtak Baba did. ‘Who’s that?’ ‘He’s a great ascetic.’ ‘If we pray to him, will we have children?’ ‘If we do as he says, yes.’

• Like doctors without patients, who spent time in their clinics swatting flies, she was roaming around without a job, even after earning a PhD.

• The Chinese who killed Shreedharanunni in 1962 were hard-hearted, but their Hero pen wasn’t. Letters dropped off its nib onto the paper like flowers gently falling in the breeze. Many were the young men and women who wrote love letters using a Hero pen.

• Delhi has people who drive bulldozers over women and girls, but it also has some who feed ants and birds,

• ‘There are people in Delhi who feed cows when humans are starving. For them, cows are more important. You know that. They don’t know the value of human beings. It’s such men who turn into fascists. I despise them.’ ‘I just cannot see Om Prakash Jain as a fascist.’ His landlord didn’t say a word about the rent. But he kept reminding Sahadevan that he should find a job soon. ‘Do you know how to type?’ he asked one day, when Sahadevan was returning after buying cigarettes. ‘Yes, I do.’ ‘How’s your speed?’ ‘Not bad.’ He knew he couldn’t match Lalitha’s speed. She had passed not only the Lower, but the Higher too. ‘Then go and meet this guy I know. I’ll give you a letter. He’s a good man. He’ll help you.’ Om Prakash Jain’s friend, a lawyer in Patiala House, needed a typist. And thus, Sahadevan, who used to go around wearing a tie and carrying a briefcase in his hand as the owner of V.P. Agencies, became a typist who wore a shirt with a worn collar and commuted in overcrowded buses, hanging on to the overhead bar, to reach his office, drenched in sweat. One of the many miseries wrought by Indiraji and Sanjayji. What else was there to say? In the mornings, after making and eating two wheat dosas, chased down by a cup of strong tea, and smoking a cigarette, he left for Patiala House.

• ‘There are people in Delhi who feed cows when humans are starving. For them, cows are more important. You know that. They don’t know the value of human beings. It’s such men who turn into fascists.

• All the important art exhibitions in Delhi took place in winter. The season started in November and went on till March.

• When Ravana fell to one side, enveloped in smoke and fire, chants of ‘Ram, Ram’ rose from the crowd. Some people shouted, ‘Indira Gandhi ki jai.’ If M.F. Husain could draw Indira Gandhi as Goddess Durga, it was hardly surprising that the cobblers, peanut sellers and vegetable vendors of Ajmeri Gate looked up to her.

• There was a second attack by the Khalistani terrorists, this time during Durga Puja. They shot and killed devotees congregated in a Puja pandal in Chittaranjan Park.

• The crowd outside AIIMS didn’t know when Indiraji’s soul flew to where her father Jawaharlal Nehru and ex-husband Feroze Gandhi waited. They continued to pray for her life. But no one’s prayers could have saved her that day. Beant Singh and Satwant Singh had fired thirty-three rounds into her.

• Beant Singh and Satwant Singh had fired thirty-three rounds into her.

• The cobblers and vendors of ice-water, peanuts and bananas abandoned their carts and stood in front of AIIMS, mourning. One-legged and blind beggars dropped their bowls and prayed for Indiraji. Many of them were victims of nasbandi. But they had forgotten that.

• Tilak Nagar, Hari Nagar and Trilok Puri, where Sikhs lived in large numbers, drowned in the flashes and sounds of firecrackers bursting in abandon.

• By sundown, the city’s residents could see the lifeless body of Indira Gandhi, wrapped in the tricolour, on their black and white screens, the images telecast by Doordarshan. In the background, Kishori Amonkar sang bhajans.

• Under normal circumstances, he wouldn’t have gone to a stranger’s house to watch TV. But this was no ordinary day. Everything was extraordinary today. It was a day that established that a gun can kill its owner. A historic day.

• He gazed fondly at the artists making pots with wet clay, their hands covered with sludge. They were in touch with the earth every day. Even after they washed their hands, the marks would remain on their faces, knees, elbows and legs.

• He had remarkable insight into the world of contemporary art and the vision to predict its future. And he had very little interest in artists from Kerala. He did not care for the over-sentimentalism and lack of sophistication in their paintings. He thought they were very loud. Vasu was different. You couldn’t tell his country of origin from his work, or the cultural tradition he came from. The people in his pictures pulsated with life. He didn’t pin the labels of nation or religion to the travails and miseries of human beings.

• He said that Vasu’s art could be understood and appreciated only after reading Suzi Gablik’s essay on minimal art in Concepts of Modern Art: From Fauvism to Postmodernism, edited by Nikos Stangos, and that she should only talk to him after she had read it …

• They were forcing their way into any place they had doubts about. By evening, the gang leaders had distributed copies of census reports to their men.

• They spent three days and nights in Garhi without even a drop of water to drink. By the fourth day, she didn’t have the strength to stand up.

• All journeys end at home, where they begin, Sahadevan told himself. If not to one’s own house, a return to God’s house was inevitable.

• A suitcase placed in a corner of the room contained the sarees and salwars that she was going to wear at home. She was leaving behind all her old clothes. Her old life too. He wrapped

• A suitcase placed in a corner of the room contained the sarees and salwars that she was going to wear at home. She was leaving behind all her old clothes. Her old life too.

• Everyone was concerned only about themselves, Sahadevan mused. It was his turn now. He was going to live a self-centred life, concerned only about himself.

• Sahadevan expected Lalitha or Devi or Sathyanathan or someone else to call, to wish him a happy birthday. His own expectation surprised him.

• Sahadevan expected Lalitha or Devi or Sathyanathan or someone else to call, to wish him a happy birthday. His own expectation surprised him. Even when thinking of bigger things, in his heart of hearts, he was a person of small needs. An ordinary man. A very ordinary man, waiting for birthday greetings …

• On top of that, he had been entirely negligent when it came to moulding his own life. One day, while he was out walking and conversing with himself, he decided to put an end to this negligence. Life was like writing a novel. Corrections and revisions had to be made every now and then. A complete rewrite might be required too.

• Are you turning into Ramu, the protagonist of Aravindan’s Small Men and the Big World? Sahadevan asked himself.

• Devi had spent a good part of her life in North Block, with its hundreds of rooms and long corridors designed by Herbert Baker and made of Dholpur red sandstone.

• The abject destitution was like a communicable disease that no inoculation could prevent. Delhi placed its handsome men and beautiful women in front, as a screen, to hide its destitution from the rest of the world.

• The intellectuals or artists sitting next to him did not initiate any conversations with him either. His clothes and manners marked him out to them as an accountant in a grain mill. When they discussed a Latin American novel he had already read, he sat silently, listening to them.

• The birds in Delhi must have done something good in their previous lives, Sahadevan told himself. They had the heads of Rabindranath Tagore, Mahatma Gandhi, Alexander Pushkin and Bhim Rao Ambedkar to shit on.

• He had met Latin, Russian and European authors there, though he never interacted with any of them. Not because of any antipathy. There was a writer inside him; he kept a distance even from that writer.

• Who forgot whom? Sahadevan asked himself. As time passes, people become forgetful. Perhaps he was among those people.

• Before parting ways, she said, ‘Sahadeva, I have to tell you something. I’m adopting a child. She’ll come home next month. My darling baby. She’s two years old. Her name is Indira. We can change it if required.’ ‘No. Don’t.’

• The return journeys continued. Some left Delhi. Others left life itself.

• They shared many things, they were similar in many ways. And there were differences too. Learned people say that this is necessary. Some space should be left vacant between husband and wife, between parents and children, and between friends. When a partner tries to encroach on your space, you need a room of your own to retreat to.

• He only wished to tiptoe through life without making any noise or attracting attention.

• When, long ago, I saw the Bangladeshi refugees begging and dying of hunger, I felt sad that as a man I couldn’t do what K. Ajitha,* as a woman, could.

• ‘Sathyanatha, there are only two options for people who have a hard life. One, to work hard and get out of their difficulties. Two, to try and make sure that others don’t have to struggle like them; to fight for their cause and be prepared for anything, even death. You chose the first way, didn’t you?

• Astrologers from every caste, nampoothiri to thiyya, were available to check the compatibility of their horoscopes. But did they have their horoscopes? Where did the children of communists get horoscopes from? Their actions and their sacrifices were their horoscopes. Or at least, that’s how it was made out to be.

• Many years had passed since Sahadevan had seen the street play Kursi, Kursi, Kursi, performed by Hashmi and his Jana Natya Manch at the India Gate lawns. The spectators had clapped and cheered as the king rose from the throne to cede it to the elected people’s representative. Sahadevan, not one to clap easily, had joined in. The play had been performed every day, for eight days running. From the lawn, they could see Parliament House and the national flag fluttering over it. What could be a more appropriate venue for this play, he had thought, pleased that he had caught the performance. He was filled with that familiar sense of satisfaction that came from watching a good play or reading a good book.

• Sahadevan did not shout the slogans with them. In his booklover’s heart, some lines from a poem written by the young martyr rose up: Kitaaben karti hain baatein Beete zamane ki Duniya ki, insaano ki Aaj ki, kal ki, Ek-ek pal ki

• The creatinine level in his blood had gone up. Was it because of the rum he had consumed over three decades?

• A lot of Malayalis lived around him; ordinary people, at that. They were not like the Malayalis of Hauz Khas, who didn’t walk despite having legs. They only used their legs to control the clutch, brake and accelerator.

• fellow.’ She forgot that it was an STD call and chatted with him for a long time. She asked about everything and everyone and found out all the news. Just as she was disconnecting the call, a long sigh escaped her. It didn’t reach him where he sat, three thousand kilometres away.

• She forgot that it was an STD call and chatted with him for a long time. She asked about everything and everyone and found out all the news. Just as she was disconnecting the call, a long sigh escaped her. It didn’t reach him where he sat, three thousand kilometres away.

• Just as she was disconnecting the call, a long sigh escaped her. It didn’t reach him where he sat, three thousand kilometres away.