I had been giving tits and bits of the LAST NINE YARDS I am thankful to all my friends who prodded me to give the story a decent conclusion. Please overlook any typological errors as the final script is yet to be edited. Guess this the story in toto. The Last Nine Yards. 13th May 2009 I reached Dharmatala at eight in the morning. Bishnupur was about 160 odd km away and I had to be back in Kolkata by the evening. My work in Bishnupur should not take me more than a couple of hours but the village was only accessible by cycle vans from the nearest bus stop, a distance of 9 km or so. It was mid summer and the sun was already hot at that hour. I boarded a bus to Tamluk from where I had to take a cycle van. I reached Tamluk at ten thirty or so and hailed a cycle van and offered to reserve it.Time was not by my side and hence the haste. This was my first visit to Bishnupur and I did not expect much.The van puller was not in a chatty mood and that suited me fine. I lit a cigarette and took a swig from my already warm water bottle. As I gazed around all that I could see were dust filled solitary lanes, miles of emptiness dotted by date palms,and red dust. I was dying for a cup of tea and told the van puller to stop at a tea stall if he found one. He gave a grunt, which I thought was an affirmation. After a while we came to a thatched house bang in the middle of nowhere. It was a tea stall which also sold cheap biscuits and strange brands of cigarettes. The owner was a jolly chap and I managed to get some details of the village of Bishnupur. He said that the village was a kind of village like any other village and the main occupation was pottery. Most of the male members were labourers working in distant places.The South was the main destination. Those who stayed back were potters. The land, I noticed was not arable and was very infertile. After I paid for the tea, I asked him casually if he knew a person named Haripada. He gave me a strange Look and said that Haripada used to stop for tea at times on his way to Kolkata or while coming back. Beyond which he was just a stranger. I looked at my watch and discovered that it was already eleven. I requested the van puller to make haste and after about twenty minutes reached the village. The village wore a deserted look. The rustic smell of dung cakes and coal smoke coming from forlorn houses was heavy. I felt a bit nostalgic as I used to visit my uncle, who was a village school master, during my vacations mostly during the winter season. The topography was different but if you have visited an Indian village you have visited them all. In the distance I saw a grocery shop . The heat was already taking its toll on me and I felt thirsty like never before. I walked up to the shop and asked for a brand of my cigarettes and a glass of water.From somewhere beyond my view he brought out a pack. I tried to make conversation with him but he pretended to be busy. I, somehow, felt that the village was better off without strangers. But he helped me by giving the direction of Haripadas house . As I was about to leave he casually asked me what my intentions were. I told him that it was a social visit and hit the dusty lanes. After about five minutes or so, I was standing in front of Haripadas house. The house was in shambles. Broken fences, overgrown weed and the decrepit structure told me volumes of abject poverty and apparent neglect. From somewhere within I heard a wail of a baby followed by a desperate high pitched repudiation of a lady. Since I found no place to knock, I walked right in and gave a gentle cough. From somewhere a lady appeared. I was as shocked to see her as she was of me. My reasons were different. What greeted my eyes was hard to swallow. A skeletal form, dressed in rags with sunken eyes and unkempt hair stood before me. The lady was shocked by my appearance as she immediately knew I was from the city. She started to tremble and had to take support of a bamboo pole in order to stand. The baby from ii to wail but this time it fell on deaf ears . Stark fear was apparent in the ladys visage. I am sorry if I have dropped in all of a sudden, I hastily said. May I sit down for a moment? I asked. I tried to be as gentle as possible and requested for a glass of water. With trembling hands she pointed at a tube well. I placed my bag on the earthen floor and went to the tube well. After a couple of plunges , a reddish brown liquid trickled out. My thirst was gone. I have come from Kolkata, I told her. I have some questions about Haripada. Her eyes became bleary and she collapsed on the floor. In a weak voice she asked, what is there to tell? The babus have murdered him . I coughed gently and asked, You had gone to the prison the day before his execution, am I right? With a great deal of effort she nodded, and her sunken eyes filled up with tears. She was quick to rub the tears from her eyes with her aanchal and looked at me with eyes red. I knew that I was in a very delicate situation. One wrong question and I would lose everything. I asked her in a gentle voice, Did Haripada give you a diary? She looked at me strangely for a while and went indoors. After a while she emerged with a tattered exercise copy and handed it to me. I have no use for it as I cannot read. The babus from the jail sent it,along with some clothes. I noticed that she was much more composed. I took out my purse and handed her a five hundred rupee note saying that the babys had made a terrible mistake and the money was given to her by them. I quickly added,You will be looked after. I asked her if she had a family to go back to and she shook her head and turned away. I put the tattered exercise copy in my bag and prepared to leave when all of a sudden she muttered, He was with me babu and not in on the third of Phalgun. I nodded and gave her a wry smile. I will be back. All of a sudden I felt sick and a nauseating sense overwhelmed me. Back on the dusty lane I lit a cigarette and as I walked away, I could hear a muffled cry from somewhere within the descripit house. I reached Kolkata at about six in the evening and took a taxi straight to my apartment in Ballygunj Circular Road. I had a studio apartment and it was in a mess. I did not bother to clean up the mess and neither did I have the time. I took a hasty bath and went straight to the press club. I took a chair in the corner, ordered for a cup of tea and lit a cigarette. By the time I had had the last puff Samarda, my one time colleague and a few years senior to me, looked around the room and came and sat opposite to me. So how did it go, he asked. I told him bluntly that Haripada was innocent. Listen Samarda, I know when a person is not telling the truth and when he or she is. There was a tone of finality. He nodded in agreement and said,I am getting at those bastsrds. Did you get the diary, he asked with enthusiasm. I nodded and I told him that after I had gone over the tattered exercise copy I would know what really happened. A person on the death row does not lie, especially when all options have been exhausted, psychologically speaking. Samarda asked me casually, What does the lady do for a living? I heard that she works at a brick kiln. I shrugged. It had escaped mind to ask her, but she is definitely a part of the mendicancy squad. I owe the readers a brief introduction of Samarda and myself. I was teaching in a college quite a few years back. I did not see eyeball to eyeball with a couple of my colleagues regarding matters related to the administration of the. college. Moreover, I realised that teaching was not exactly my cup of tea. I quit and became a freelance investigative journalist. Samarda was in the same college and our vibes matched. After retirement he became a part and parcel of West Bengal Human Rights Commission. Samarda was a good friend of the Alipure jail warden and visits to the jail is a weekly habit. On once such visit, he visited Haripada in his isolation cell, a eight foot by ten foot damp and sodden concrete box. Haripada was used to Samarda and coinfided in him . Three days prior to his execution, Samarda had visited him . Haripada told Samarda that he was, of late, maintaining a diary, which after his demise, should be handed over to somebody who cared to know the final feelings of a man already slaughtered. As per the prison rules, no one could have access to the personal belongings of the convict other than the immediate family member. The contents of the diary would give a fillip do away with the death sentence, for which the WBHRC had been fighting for decades. This disclosure, I hope, makes the readers comprehend my activities of the day. To me it would be a gold mine and to Samarda, the right kind of ammo. If things go as was expected, we had it all bundled up. Before returning to my apartment, I grabbed a bit of dinner . I went up to my room and sat by my study table. Switched on the table lamp and opened the exercise copy. The language used was rustic Bengali, spoken in rural Medinapur. I will give my readers what was written, word for word, without adding any details. Exactly what was written in the diary. The Diary Baishak the 16th Today is the 16th of Baishak. Yesterday was the 15th. On the occasion of the Bengali new year we were given good food. I tasted chicken after a very very long time. To be honest, I had forgotten the taste. We were also given rashogollas. It tasted so sweet. My heart went out for my wife and my son. My son will be twelve come the 13th of Sravan. How I miss them. My wife cannot come to visit me often as the bus fare is very expensive. The last time she came to visit me was on the 2nd of Magh. Poor soul. The shawl was too thin to protect her from the biting cold . She had brought with her some khir. It had tasted like Gods prasadam. She is a strong lady. I have not seen my son for a long time. I yearn for him so much . Alas I dont think i will ever set my eyes on him again. The Rastrapati has not very kind.I am told that nothing can be done anymore. My ukilbabu wanted to appeal but i asked him not too. What is the use? I have suddenly become a topic. I have befriended a few inmates. They keep harping that i should appeal. No never. I am already a dead man . Years of waiting for leniency had no effect. As far as the law is concerned, the case stands closed. Baishak 17th I got up early. I guess I am running a fever. Death never scared me. When I was a little, my father used to take me on his hunting trips. Just beyond my village a reserve forest was located. My father, armed with a piece of rope, used to trap the boks.How he did it , initially did not occur to me. Over the passage of time I became adept. Every evening we somehow had flesh. Rotis were a costly affair. Just roasted bok and pantha bhat. We relished it . It was our fodder. On during his hunting trips, we had to stay overnight. We could not catch or trap anything. We could not go home. My father and I had muri with gur and went to sleep. I stayed awake . My mind was engrossed with Anima. I loved her very much. I remember that I had smiled. We had had a rendezvous. It was quite late into the night and we were sleeping under the open sky.All of a sudden I noticed a pair of gleaming eyes I was petrified. I slowly shook my father. He woke up with a start and saw what I saw. Very slowly he reached under his head and his hands groped for the dagger. In the semi moonlight we were eyeball to eyeball with a fully grown leopard, which was advancing stealthily. Then it jumped. The next ten seconds or so was terrifying. My father rolled away some distance and jumped on the leopard from the hind.As the leopard was groping for my neck, my father plunged the dagger into the back of the leopard. The leopard growled in pain and before it could turn around for my father, he had planted the dagger into the chest of the beast. Profusely bleeding, the leopard took a few steps and collapsed. I had suffered from a few deep scratches which were deep. But the fact I was alive made a lot of difference. My father was very agile in spite of his age. I had a mixed feeling about death. Sometimes it used to scare me, at times I used to console myself by talking to me, telling me that it was inevitable. It was nothing but the loss of consciousness and that one would be entering a stage of eternal bliss. Did it hurt? I had asked the dakterbabu once . He said that according to science it was instantaneous and no one felt the pain. It somewhat consoled me.But dead men do not talk. Death, by itself, was an enigma. Of late I have been ruminating about afterlife. Was there a heaven. Was there a hell. Some philosopher had once said that heaven and hell are here on Earth. You will be punished, not after death, but when you are alive. I have never harmed anyone. But I have been separated from my family and living in this hell hole since eternity. I have lost track of time. It is of no essence. But second by second, minute by minute I am been drawn towards the scaffold. Just nine Yards away. I shiver from fear because I am a mortal. At times I am not scared. The confusion persists . Someone once told me that ignorance is bliss . Nothing could be nearer to truth. The lights have been dimmed.I had my dinner at six thirty. My fever is going up.I need to tell dakterbabu tomorrow. Its probably the damp floor. THE LAST NINE YARDS 18th Baishak My fever increased with the passage of time. After midnight I guess I was delirious. Dont remember much as to what transpired. I tossed and turned. There was this banging inside my head . It throbbed . I remember getting up and asking Gopal, the guard who used to watch me at night, for a glass of water from the earthen pot in the corner of the corridor. It had a pinch of camphor and had an effect of mint. My throat was parched. Gopal obliged and assured me that the daktarbabu would be in early. I drank from the glass and felt a bit better. By five thirty in the morning my fever had somehow come down marginally. I felt weak though . As promised by Gopal, the daktarbabu was in pretty early. He dropped in at about eight in the morning. He checked my pulse then he put his round disk on my chest. After which he sat on the floor as if in deep thought. He gave me a wry smile but his face was sombre. I looked at him and asked him if I was suffering from kalajor. He shook his head and told me that I would be fine after I had had my medicine. There was something in his gesture that told me something was bothering him. As he left, the guard gave me a sullen look and bolted the gate . The guard who watched over me during the day somehow despised me for reasons unknown or so I thought.I somehow felt sorry for him as he never used to leave his place. He maintained silence all throughout his shift until Gopal took over. After a while the darogababu along with the doctor arrived. The guard chained my feet and my hands and pushed me out of the cell . I stumbled along the corridor till I reached the jail clinic. The guard unshackled me and I was put on a weighing platform. My weight was measured and recorded. I was made to swallow some tablets of various colours, shackled and pushed along the corridor till I reached my cell . I was perspiring a lot and my shirt was soaked by my perspiration. I collapsed on the cot. A couple of rotis and some vegetables were given to me at nine as was the routine. After that I slept till one in the afternoon. I had skipped my lunch as the guard did not call me and neither did he push my plate into my cell . I had no regrets as the very thought of food was nauseating. I never bothered to ask the guard his name as he never bothered to communicate. We were absolute strangers. At about five in the evening I noticed a few new faces that i had never seen before. All were in khakis excepting one person who was wearing a kurta and a pyjama. He was short in height and was chewing pan.His eyes were red and appeared intoxicated. There was something in him that brought out chills in me. He stood for a while outside my cell and watched me . I was sitting on the cot . He asked me in a gruff voice to stand up. I stood up but it had to take the support of the wall as I was feeling very weak. He looked at me from head to foot, spat on the floor and left. Before leaving I thought that he gave me a sinister look with a smile that can chill the heart of even the hardiest of men. I had this odd feeling that my rendezvous with death was just a matter of time. I guess that I have to make haste as I have so much to tell. I want to shout . I want to run . I want to meet my wife . I want to meet my son. Bhagwan give me solace. My son is so special to me . He is innocent. Never had the chance to grow up. He still cries like a baby though he is ten summers old . Daktarbabu had told me that he needed special treatment. I did not understand him.My son will never grow up, thats what he had said. Today I am thankful to Bhagwan that he had willed me a son who will, in days to come, never realise that his father is a convict. Convicted of a crime that he never committed. Ignorance is bliss. People will taunt him after I am gone, but thankfully he will never understand what a taunt is. Bhagwan has his own way to make amends. Ha ha ha..... My back is aching. Let me stand for a while dear diary. Please wait. Dont leave me. You are the only object that understands me . What an irony. The humanity of the inanimate surpasses the animate. Forgive me . I will attend to you tomorrow. Dinner has just been pushed into my cell and the lights will be dimmed. I never felt so important in my whole sordid life.Ha ha ha.. They keep the lights on for me . They just dim it. I shall get up early tomorrow. So much to tell. Anima has just entered my cell. I need to give her some time before I sleep. I spent about three hours conversing with Anima, my wife. I was very excited as I saw her after a gap of six months or so . That too from behind a grilled barricade. That she was right there in the cell with me was definitely delightful. The night guard, for reasons best known to him, kept looking at me from time to time in utter surprise. God bless his evil soul ! 19th Baishak. I did not know when Anima left the cell, but when I woke up in the morning , the fragrance of the coconut oil, which she applies on her hair was still there. Since the very morning there was a great deal of activity in the corridor. I could hear hammers hitting nails, curses, explicits of intoxicated men. Gopal wore a grim look. He somehow reminded me of people of Kolkata. Always grim and in perpetual hurry. When I first put my feet on the Sealdah platform about nine summers ago, I was affronted by men speaking gibberish. The language was incoherent. I remember asking one gentleman with a runny nose, the way to Behala. I has a friend working there as a help, who had asked me to come down to Kolkata where he would help me get a job of a help.God knows, people in Kolkata were really in need of help . This friend of mine had left Bishnupur a couple of years back to avoid starvation. I followed suit, as my wife was in advanced stage of pregnancy and I was broke. Back in my village, I was a handyman without a regular source of income. After I had discussed the situation with my wife, she ultimately had agreed and bid me a tearful farewell. Little did I know what lay in store for me. After reaching Kolkata with fifty rupees on me, I located my friend sometime in the evening. He invited me to stay with him for the night but told me, in uncertain terms, that I would have to make my own arrangement the next day. He promised me that I would be inducted as a liftman the next day. That term was very new to me and I thought that my job would be to lift things. At the crack of dawn , my friend woke me and told me that the manager of the society was waiting. I got up from A deep slumber and put on my best dhoti. It was cleaned by Anima. Spotless. I took a hasty bath and followed my friend to meet the manager. The manager was a nice person and he explained to me what my duties were. Al I had to do was press buttons of a cage. My salary was fixed and I was to be paid two thousand rupees for the trouble. I had felt like kissing him. The manager also told me that I could use the small room in the compound, quite like the cell I am in now, to stay. My friend convinced the manager to part with five hundred rupees, that would go to meet my immediate expenses. My duty started the next day. I remember waking up the next day, taking a bath and getting into a brand new uniform with a black pair of new shoes. It took me a good fifteen minutes to put them on . I wished Anima could see me. After having a cup of tea, I took my position in front of the cage. Days ambled on. I had written to the village daktarbabu a letter which was to be narrated to my wife. The poor thing could not read . The daktarbabu had given me his phone number. I had, on couple of occasions, called him to relay news to Anima. In the meantime, I started liking a small girl of six odd summers . Every mornings, at dot eight thirty, this angel used to get inside the cage with a huge bag, probably weighing more than her frail disposition, give me a bright smile . I used to help her with the bag and used to escort her to the bus stoppage, just opposite to the apartment. On certain days, I used to greet Rupa with a bar of chocolate. Whenever I did that, her innocent eyes would fill with tears . I used to take out my hanky and wipe away the unknown tears . She never told me the reason why she silently cried. But my bar of chocolates became a matter of a daily practice and her tears became more and more infrequent. I guess she liked me . Our closeness grew and her order was that I play with her after school. Her parents were both working and used to come back home late at night, never together but always intoxicated. Shaab was sometimes with unknown mem shaabs. On some occations the mem shaab would come to the apartment with unknown shaabs. I could never understand the ways of these people. I slowly, over time, got used to this way of the world and concentrated on my work at hand. I soon became a favourite of the manager and Rupa was an extra icing. After about six months into the job I applied for a short leave. I had accumulated about seven thousand rupees and the Pujas were just around the corner. My Life leave was readily granted and I was on my way home, feeling quite like a king. On the way I stopped at Ratandas tea stall and fed him with the updates. He was A sort of a father figure to me and his wellwishes were always with me. Whosoever reads this piece of worthless material, please note that I was just paid a visit by one of the gods, could not catch his name, who promised me bliss in a couple of days. I offered him a glass of water and he drank deep before disappearing. I feel rejuvenated and hence this lengthy ramble of a mindless mendicant. Anyway I reached my village and was welcomed by all and sundry. My Anima fell into my arms and took me indoors . On the earthen floor lay my son busy sucking his thumb. He gave me A lazy look, smiled and releaved himself on the handmade cot. Days flew and I found myself back on the basement. My joy surpassed my homesickness when I saw Rupa . She had grown. She had lost weight. She gave me a sullen look and refused the chocolate i offered her. It took upto a week before we again became friends. Once friends, she told me that Jhunjhunwala shaab, her father had smacked her a couple of times. There was this strange auntie who took to hating her on first sight. Her mother was in Mogadishu. For a person of my stature, Mogadishu could well mean the moon. She further said that this strange auntie would not give her food on time and was very harsh with her. I gulped all this down and as I did so, I sensed a teardrop, which Rupa wiped away with a hanky that she plucked out from her pocket. She made me promise that I was never to leave her again. After my duty hours, I hunted down the manager and asked him the way the Kolkatans. He just Said, Keep to yourself and you have not met me. Nearly a year into my job but I could not figure out the Way Of The World . I had this eccentric teacher who used to mutter to himself in the Cage . One day he invited me over to his apartment to hear him mutter for which he would me dinner. Since I had nothing to do,I went over. He started with a parable and ended up with Goncripe. The way of the world he said. I Apologised profusely for not getting the name straight. He then told me ,Whats there in a name. I agreed and bid him goodnight. Time flew . The winter set in . Rupa was always by my side. I had started to feel that I was not only blessed with a son but also a daughter. I was on the top of the world. Nothing was against me and the Sun shone bright. Sometime in the month of Phalgun I received a call from our village . daktarbabu that I was wanted as my son of late has not been keeping well.I boarded the next bus to Tamluk and was at home by the evening. My son was suffering from a very high fever. I consulted the daktarbabu and he told me bluntly that my son was suffering from a kind of mental disorder. He needed special treatment. My world came crashing down . What kind of special treatment? He said that a nue. ..something had to be consulted and the expenses were high. Dumbfounded I returned home. On the seventh of Phalgun a police jeep stopped in front of my ramshackle of a house and a person wearing a khaki put the handcluffs on and said I was being arrested for murder and rape of a girl named Rupa.Raped on the fifth of Phalgun, murdered and sliced into pieces. My world disappeared and the terra firma engulfed me. Its been years now and the other day Rupa had come to my cell to tell me that a family awaited my arrival. But wait! I hear the keys of my cell turn . What is this? Food like lay everywhere. My marsupial friends have had a feed. I looked up and saw the darogababu along with some other people in khakis enter the cell. Rupa and Anima are also there. A happy reunion. Give me a moment dear diary. I have to converse and listen. 19th Baishak 11.33 PL I was given a meal that befits a king. By the crack of dawn I have to make a journey. To a distant land . No more hunger for food and eternal bliss. Anima promised me that she will come very soon . But then I have Rupa. Rupa is wiping the tears from my eyes and is telling me that i just have to cross a dark tunnel. She will be on the other side Thank you dear diary . The journey is long and I got to pack. The present. I looked at my watch and gave a yawn. It was Five thirty in the morning. I closed the tattered copy and made myself a cup of coffee. After that took a bath and called Samarda. He picked up my call after a couple of rings. I told him that I had to meet him ASAP . WE agreed to meet at nine, the same place. I had a few things to do and by nine I was at the press club.Samarda was already there. I opened my bag and handed him the manuscript. He smiled at me and asked me if i wanted my job back. Teaching. All of a sudden I felt nauseated. I got up and went to the washroom and puked. I came back to the hall only to see an empty table . A tattered exercise copy was on the table along with a note. Get back to your dashed teaching. The manuscript does not have any value. Just a piece of advice son. The world out there is big and ugly. I knew everything. You wanted to screw bastards. First be a bastard yourself. Concluded.
Posted on: Sun, 13 Jul 2014 11:32:53 +0000
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