A Matter of Geography Page 3

  Amche Mumbai, indeed! These name changers… Throwing out the name Bombay in the need to supposedly throw out all that is British. It was in essence throwing out the very basis on which this city was built—tolerance. These activists, perhaps not even born in this city, want to lay claim like every acquisitive man in history, finding new and modern ways to do it! Take that repulsive Ms. Raikar… she was born in Ratnagiri.

  Every now and again are born men who must leave their mark on the world, conquer it. Alexandrian, but rendered impotent by the democratic regimes they find themselves in, they set about raising enemies and bogeys among men of religious and ethnic differences, spurring hatred. History is rife with them, and it is on the histories of their own minds that they lean for validation as they change names and lay claims on land and building.

  Damn you, Anna.

  Stepping out of the train is as involuntary as boarding was—out of one’s hands, so to say. Pushed out by the crowds alighting at the station, I find myself inadvertently at Dockyard station and with a robotic mindlessness walking down the slope to the road, taking the left turn towards Mazagaon and St Mary’s Road where we lived, Anna’s family and mine, for many years of our younger days.

  Proportions are relative to one’s own size: big, small, tall, short, nothing definitive. Walking down these streets at this moment as an adult, what had seemed like a huge avenue when we were still sucking lollipops had now miraculously diminished to a one-lane road. Since those days, I’d shot up to just an inch or two above six feet. Everything has dwarfed around me, everything but the events of our youth, which had, like the fluttering wings of a butterfly that creates tidal waves across oceans, loomed large in our life, engulfing who we were and designing our histories.

  I looked at the small lane, Gangabowdi, which had fired the imagination of our young minds during the endless summers we spent listening to the stories Joe, our neighbour, told us: the street where ghosts and spirits abided and lost souls wandered in search of whatever lost souls search for. Walking past the road that led up to Mazagaon Hill, Bombay’s reservoir, and the gardens on it, I passed the old tram terminus and turned down St. Mary’s Road—walking down history…our history, like the history of the world, written in blood.

  Somewhere down this road, Billimoria Building, the home I could never leave behind, stood innocent-like, common, dilapidated, its paint worn out, its shadow filling the small, now overcrowded street. Within its crevices still lingered the best memories of my life, making the worst memories in its folds take an unforgettable place in my experience. Cheap wooden barriers now replaced the formerly wrought-iron, intricately designed balustrade that had framed the verandah that wrapped the tenements and linked them together in a designed embrace, joining lives like one giant, affectionate arm.

  I headed to the second floor, tracing my way up the wooden stairs, each worn in the center, outlining our footsteps, sometimes light, sometimes heavy, but always overlapping as we trampled up and down, occupied with daily living.

  The building was unchanged otherwise, as though time had stood still, except it was more worn out, more silent, no children’s laughter. The same Shahabad stone that paved Bombay’s footpaths—wherever there was space for a footpath—still paved the floor of the first-storey passage. It was still the same wood, over a hundred years old, the same wooden banister, polished, not with any artificial lamination, but with the many hands that clutched it to walk up and down, the seats of children sliding down in playful excitement.

  I stepped onto the second floor, where we’d lived for more than twenty years of my life. The second floor was the superior floor—not just in height, but also in flooring, the size of apartments, and the people. We lived there—or I should say we had lived there, because most of us who lived there once were now scattered. The second floor was now predominantly Muslim. Our little Catholic universe swallowed by a black hole, disappearing only to surface in splinters in places unknown, separate, reborn, recreated.

  I walked through the door of the passage on the right that led to the verandah and the apartment where I’d lived with Mum and Dad, the side of the building where Anna and her family had lived. The wall at the head of the stairs separated the passage from the common toilets. To keep the accountability and maintenance manageable we had divided the families between the toilets. Three families shared a toilet, locked it and held a key, to prevent those who did not maintain it from using it. Ironically, the doors to our apartments were kept wide open most of the day and latched from the inside only at night when we slept. A narrow passage, enough for one person to stand in, insulated the toilets from the main passage wall. Its design seemed indifferent. Why would anyone design three families to one toilet? The building’s alleys and passages must have been a designer’s nightmare after a bilious night of hot food and opium. Yet, in its forgotten folds you could find memories of love, sacrifice, and blood.

  To our little childish minds the main passage at the head of the stairs had seemed large; sometimes it doubled as a basketball court, cricket field, handball field, soccer field, and everything in between. It was our dance floor, our party room, our conference room, our life. Now, as I stood surveying it, it could be not more than 15 feet in length and 8 feet in breadth.

  The verandah faced out to St. Mary’s Road and the building opposite. All that happened out there happened in full view of the residents of the building in front and those on the street who, perhaps taking leisurely strolls to the church, glanced upwards in our direction. However, what happened in the passage between the toilet and the wall, and in the main passage, was private as private could be in a neighbourhood where everyone knew everything about everyone else.

  I walked along the verandah and stopped outside no.18; I looked out at the road, recalling those ominous events of December 1992 when our lives changed. I watched the children in the building across play badminton in the yard and felt a lump climb in my throat and stick in my Adam’s apple. The three coconut trees in the dirt-packed ground of Billimoria Building swayed in the breeze of that quiet evening, the events they had witnessed all those years ago seemingly forgotten.

  Epimetheus, forgetting the warning of Prometheus to accept no gifts from Zeus, married Pandora. Would that the world been different—would the history of man have been different? Would mine have stayed in some forgotten abyss never to surface? I cannot answer, for the deed was done. Mother’s announcement had moved me to open Anna’s notebook, which, akin to Pandora’s box, had let loose these butterflies in my heart and the groundswell in my head, leaving it throbbing and painful.

  Do grown men cry?

  Chapter Four

  “The price of apathy toward public affairs is to be ruled by evil men.”

  -Plato

  Nothing disgusts me more than the utter naivety of the sort that cost us our world all those years ago.

  “This Catholic apathy will be the death of you all,” Dr. Apte said, shaking his bony head when he realized I’d been ignorant of the Hindu Nationalist movement sweeping the country in 1990. How would I know, I defended myself, when I lived in a strongly Catholic neighbourhood, attended a Catholic school and college? I’d been eighteen at the time—girls, parties, and study were more a part of my world than religious politics.

  Still, looking back, why did we not know? Were we indifferent, impervious, or plain stupid? Was our bubble made of latex?

  “Don’t you understand that this was not about religion?” Dr. Apte said. “It was about giving the people a common enemy to unify them, putting fear in their hearts and getting into power. If you are apathetic and do not keep on top of things, you will find the Catholics are the next target. Who will they turn to next after the Muslims are done in, or when people tire of seeing them as the enemy?”

  We sat in silence for a very long while as my mind turned back to the announcement of the Rath Yatra, the graffiti covering the walls of Bombay.

  Sangh Pariwar, Dr. Apte explained, the organisation at the forefr
ont of the movement calling for Hindutva—Hinduness—and India for Hindus, gave a call for Ram Shilas, consecrated bricks, to lay the foundation of the Ram Temple in Ayodhya, the site, they claimed, where Lord Ram was born.

  We’d been steeped, as I mentioned, in the in the Mahabharata and Ramayan, so knew that Ayodhya was Lord Ram’s birthplace. “But is it the same Ayodhya?”

  “Reportedly so.” Dr. Apte shrugged. “History that depends on word of mouth will as such continue to validate all later-day records.”

  Hindu Nationalist organizations like the VHP and the RSS delivered several hundred thousand Ram Shilas, consecrated bricks made of ‘local earth,’ to villages and towns all over. The bricks, wrapped in saffron cloth and consecrated by the pujaris, priests, and village elders, set in motion processions of the faithful all over the country carrying this offering and converging in Ayodhya. The organizations also distributed earth dug from Ayodhya to the villages and towns in the country to unite all Hindus as one nation.

  Almost 200,000 villages sent bricks. Around the country, about 300,000 pujas of the Ram Shilas were performed and almost 100 million people joined the various processions that carried the bricks to and from Ayodhya. Mahayagnas and meetings were held, spurring the frenzy—“though, needless to point out, you slept through it all,” Dr. Apte began his story.

  “In my village in Jaigad I led the prayers and the consecration of the brick. On the designated day, I carried the brick wrapped in saffron cloth and with my friend Joshi, we took the bus to Mumbai, and from there, a train to Ayodhya to build the the Ram temple, on the spot where Lord Ram was born. This, you know, was not as simple as it sounds. A mosque stood on that very ground. I suppose you know about the Babri Mosque, at least?”

  “It changed our lives…”

  “Well then we won’t get into that,” he said, flicking his hand dismissively.

  At this point he opened a small cloth pouch, pulled out a paan leaf and spread slaked lime over it as though the lime were butter. Then he began to fill it with various little goodies—tobacco, arecnut, little this and that, every other thing that makes up a paan. Tilting his head he pushed the whole bundle into his wide open mouth in one move and, keeping it at that angle, continued. “On October 30th in 1990, I went with my Ram Shilas to the Babri Masjid as planned. We did not have a place to stay nor did we pay for the train journey. We expected that it would be provided for; that is how little we were really prepared for this day. We believed that all Hindus would be part of this and there would be ashrams open for us.”

  He seemed agitated now. He began to chew more forcefully, and I was thankful for the distance between us, expecting at any moment some red fluid to fly from his mouth.

  “We went to the site directly. The crowds had converged outside. Tens of thousands had arrived on the spot and I could not get to the front. I stood at the edge of the crowd, which was just as well, because when it got ugly I was able to run from the scene faster than others, with little physical damage to myself. The crowds chanted:

  “Jai Shri Ram, bolo Jai Shri Ram—Hail Shri Ram, chant Shri Ram

  Jinnah bolo Jai Shri Ram—Jinnah chant Shri Ram

  Gandhi bolo Jai Shri Ram—Gandhi chant Shri Ram

  Mullah bolo Jai Shri Ram—Mullah chant Shri Ram.”

  Dr. Apte got lost in the nasal-toned chanting, quite unaware of his surroundings, for we were sitting in the Chembur gardens not very far from where I lived. Embarrassed, I looked around to see whether I knew anyone from those who, now disturbed or curious, looked in our direction. Some seemed even ready to join in. Dr. Apte, however, owned the world he lived in.

  “The chanting stirred a frenzy in us karsevaks, volunteers. It is a strange thing, this mob energy, almost magic, compelling. The chanting reached a crescendo and some of the karsevaks, growing emotional, beyond the limits of civility, defaced tiles on the mosque. One enthusiastic karsevak who had come well prepared, or maybe belonged to a group that had pre-planned their course of action, actually went as far as flinging a can of orange paint on the wall.” At this point he matched the visual with action; unashamedly, he spat the red fluid the paan had generated from his mouth into the bushes near by.

  In need of fresh sustenance after such a long spell of speech, he took out the small pouch from his pocket once again. The pouch matched the underpants that peeped slightly above the belt of his trousers—striped, perhaps stitched from the same material. He opened the pouch slowly, as if it provided rhythm for his contemplation and helped his recollection of the details. He stuffed the paan leaf once again and popped it into his mouth. As the paan began to turn red, he kept chewing, then needing to talk, he tilted his head backward at a 45 degree angle to contain the red spittle that threatened to drip onto his shirt front.

  “The Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh, the state which housed the epicentre of all this action, and where the Babri Masjid stood, gave a shoot on sight’ order to the police and paramilitary force who were called out at that time. The police who came to the spot went up to the Mosque first, prayed, and then opened tear gas and fire. We scattered in all directions. I and some of my friends, and a whole devout bunch of Hindus who had made the trip to vanquish the enemy—the present-day Muslim—found ourselves in dire danger of being shot down by the paramilitary. We ran into a small side alley, frightened for our lives.

  Out of nowhere, as if by magic, the doors on the street opened for us, and we were taken by the residents into their homes, protected and fed till all quieted down.”

  Dr. Apte paused and gave a small shudder. Deciding that the supari had reached a point of optimum utility, he turned around and spat it once again into the nearest bush, possibly reducing the life span of said bush by several years.

  “This is not all, Peter. I am ashamed to say that all those living on that street were Muslims. You can imagine my anger and shame when I realized this. We’d been raised from the time we were little children to believe that these were our enemies. We spent years hating them. Really, when you stop to think of it, with hindsight I can say that these Muslims who we hated so much had no hand in the history of the Moghuls who destroyed our temples. They were perhaps victims too, converted by the sword, or by some other chance shared their religion. I lost all trust in the VHP and the RSS. They cheated us.”

  “So what did you do?”

  “After we got back home, I realized what a fool I had been; I, who thought I was educated and well read, smart and all knowing, had been tricked. Never, I decided, never would I ever believe them again, nor any other who teaches hatred and divisiveness.”

  He sighed. “And yet I at times forget their disingenuity, and get swayed when the call is given to protect our religion.” It was a dilemma even I as a Catholic could understand—one’s upbringing shapes one’s whole identity. How can you ever truly escape who you are?

  Chapter Five

  The one calculation I don’t care if they got wrong is the days of the week. One more day to the week and our year would be an eternity. And even if it is a cliché, I say thank God it’s Friday, I’m happy for the weekend. Thirty-seven, single, living alone in my two bedroom apartment in Chembur is not the right recipe for reminiscing about the past.

  I have worked for the last ten years in St. Xavier’s College at Dhobi Talao, teaching mathematics: numbers occupy a large part of my day. I like certainty, calculated risks, clear concepts, and exactitude. Turning down a job in a bank that offered more money, I’d stuck with my academic view on life; not having to test my concepts with practice was more comfortable. Money occupies the mind, leaving no place for sensibilities and reasoning. It also occupies time. It makes you forget that there are other things to do, people to love, life to be lived. Teaching has not made it any better though. Zombie-like, I acquired all the trappings of a successful man: the car, the apartment, a club membership—which I hardly ever use—designer clothes. The much sought after bachelor. Have I attained the “life to be lived, people to love”? Something stops me
every time I look too closely at life outside my work.

  I watched the spider rappel down my ceiling and made mental notes to admonish Premibai tomorrow. Surely there is way to stop them proliferating, like sweeping cobwebs and killing the life in the middle of it. I am attacked by spiders. They multiply indiscriminately, weaving their webs around our normal lives, not sticking to the shadows and corners they are supposed to lurk in. I shake my head—clearly Isabel’s obsession with cleanliness is rubbing off on me. Or maybe it’s Anna’s visit making me aware of the cobwebs that have obscured the past.

  Anyway, I have to read on. Read Anna, so to say. I could never admit to my callousness should she ask me—that I’d put the book away when she first gave it to me, too distressed to read it, too pained, too angry with her for making us miss her. Abandonment is a strong feeling. How used one gets to people, and how forsaken we feel—most irrationally.

  I flip the pages through the years. Not much ever happened in the apartment building, not even in leap years, but we met, talked, fought and loved each other in an almost inevitable way. We residents had meetings for everything—Christmas, New Year—everything was a meeting. We had story meetings, play meetings, meetings to discuss the landlord… I flip the pages, wondering where to begin. I spot the year 1990 on top of a page and linger there. It was the start of events that changed our lives.