Revenge

Samir was reclining on his driving seat listening to Britney Spears with earphones. Even though he looked very relaxed, he was frequently looking at the gate of the yellow coloured bungalow, which was about 100 meters away from the corner of the road where he had parked his blue Audy Sedan. In the lazy Sunday afternoon, there was not much of people on the roads at AH block in Salt Lake.

The music was on, but Samir was not listening. His mind went back to 8 years back in a sweltering evening . The mood was of extreme celebration at his home. A lot of friends and relatives flocked his home with sweets on that evening. Congratulatory messages were pouring in. Samir was a good student, but nobody had expected that he would rank 300 in the IIT entrance examination. Strangely, the hero of the evening was himself missing from the scene. He was scurrying  anxiously on the roof with his mobile phone. Rima was not picking up the phone. After repeated attempts,  Rima eventually came on the line.

"You cannot do it Samir. You have to join." She was sobbing.

"No way, I can’t  live without you."

"Don’t be a fool Samir. You must join the IIT. Once the WBJEE results are out, you can quit it and join me, if I get selected."

Suddenly, drops of rains started to pour in. Samir was deeply engrossed in his thoughts. He did not notice that it had become cloudy outside. His sight was getting hazy. So, he switched on the wiper.

Rima didn’t make it to the WBJEE, either. But she was selected in Physics Honours in the Jadavpur University. As expected, Samir did very well in WBJEE. To stay in touch with Rima, he quit IIT and got admitted in mechanical engineering in Jadavpur University.

The friendship between Samir and Rima dated back to a period when both of them went to the same coaching centre. It was a case of love at first sight. Both of them were very good students. Within few months there came a  time when they could not live without meeting each other even for a single day. Both of them decided to join the IIT. But Rima’s failure had rudely disturbed their plan of staying together.

Samir got selected in Infosys, while Rima pursued  MSC in Physics from the same University. The same dilemma reappeared when Samir was posted in Hyderabad. On repeated pursuance, both by his parents and Rima, very reluctantly, he went to join there. Within a few days, Samir, without Rima, felt like a fish out of water. Even though, they chatted for long hours over mobile phone, Samir’s uneasiness didn’t subside. Within 3 months, Samir realized that he couldn't take it any more. He quit the job, and settled for a much less salary in RS Software in Kolkata.

There was suddenly a movement outside the gate of the yellow house. Through the watery glass, Samir noticed that a shivered old lady came out of the house. "Oh, that must be the maid servant",  Samir told  himself.

Rima Sanyal was a Brahmin, while Samir belonged to the creamy layer of the OBC community. Samir had visited her house several times. It was no secret to Rima’s parents that they were madly in love with each other. Samir always thought that getting a positive response for marriage proposal would not be a problem. In case of a difficulty, he had a backup plan in his mind, too: they would simply run away. Rima always laughed at that suggestion. She always had the confidence that her parents would listen to her.

Samir looked at his watch. It’s 4-25 PM. Within a few minutes, Rima should come out of the house. Samir hadn’t met Rima for 3 long years. 3 very long years! That Samir who couldn’t live without seeing Rima for even 3 days hadn’t met her for 3 years!

Everything went wrong when Samir’s parents went to Rima’s house for a formal marriage proposal. Rima’s father firmly said that it was not possible for him to accept an OBC boy as his prospective son-in-law. Samir’s father could not take the insult. He got a mild heart attack and became bed-ridden. It took 3 months for Samir to get over the shock. By that time, his father regained his health. Samir thought that it was the time to implement their back up plan . When he floated the proposal to Rima, she agreed to run away. But before that, she told him to settle in a different city. After completing the MSC within a year, she promised to join him.

At last, Samir’s patient wait for 1 hour came to an end. The moment has arrived. Rima has come out of her house. Samir could not believe his eyes. Rima’s demeanour has completely changed from a bubbly, chirpy girl to a serious-looking mature lady. Samir had never seen her in sari. But today she was wearing  a gorgeous purple-coloured cotton-printed sari. Her skin complexion has always been comparable with that of a Briton. In the soft evanescent sunlight, she looked like an angel from the heaven.

Samir took a job in Pune and patiently waited for a year for Rima’s course to be completed. They had been regularly in touch over phone calls. But suddenly Rima’s behaviour began to change. She stopped receiving calls on the pretext of preparing for exams. Samir could not figure out the changes in her behaviour, as she never did that before. But Samir consoled himself that everything would be fine, once the exams were over.

Samir would never forget the day, when Rima completely stopped receiving his calls. Her phone number  became switched off for ever. Within a week, Samir was in Salt Lake. When he went to Rima’s house, her father rudely told him that Rima had gone to the UK for pursuing higher studies. He refused to divulge the details of the university and the  contact number of Rima. Samir could not stay in Salt Lake for long due to work pressure. But he told his younger sister to enquire about Rima, and inform him as soon as her whereabouts were known.

Within two months,  Samir got the news that Rima’s marriage with a Brahmin boy had been fixed. The story of her foreign trip was a hoax to fool Samir. Immediately, Samir got back  in Salt Lake. As expected,  he was denied any chance to enter her house. Rima’s ex-Colonel father even threatened to lodge an FIR of molestation if he continued to disturb them. The way Samir waited today, he waited for 15 days for Rima to come out. She didn’t come out. Samir didn’t know that she was not staying in this house. But in the mean time, an ultimatum was sent to him from his company for long absence without notice. Samir didn’t care, as Rima was more important than his job.

But his patience was running out. One day, he barged into Rima’s house to see whether the Colonel had locked her inside the house. The wily Colonel was probably waiting for this mistake. Immediately, he pressed a lot of bogus charges against Samir. He was detained by the police. The Colonel had some good connections in the government machinery. Samir was denied bail for 7 days. During that period,  the Colonel had married off Rima, and the newly wed couple went to Europe tour for honeymoon. When Samir got out of the jail, he was a broken man. On instructions of the Colonel,  the police had given him the beating of his life. Adding insult to his injury, he was sacked from his company.

Since then a lot water has passed through the Ganges, Samir tried hard to forget Rima. He remained unemployed for quite a long period before setting his own software business. He always had the talent. Within a few years, he made it a great success. The question of marrying never occurred in Samir’s mind, because he could not even think of any one else other than Rima as his life partner. Rima had gone to Australia, where her husband was on deputation for 3 years. They came back to India just a month ago. Rima’s husband got a posting in Sector 5 in Salt Lake. Samir’s company is also situated there. By the quirk of fate, one day, Samir saw Rima from the window of his chamber, when she came to meet her husband.

Since then Samir couldn’t sleep peacefully even for a moment, as the questions that had bugged him for several years came back to haunt him: What was in Rima’s mind? Was she coerced by her father? Why didn’t she ever want to explain the situation to him? Did she betray him? Why? He pondered over these questions night after night losing his sleep. He couldn’t come to any conclusion. He couldn’t believe that Rima on her own volition rejected him. So, he decided to seek answer from Rima, when he would meet her.

Samir found out that Rima was staying at her home with her husband and father. Around 4-30 PM on Sunday, Rima goes to marketing in Big Bazar alone. Samir decided to meet her when no one else would be around. He would seek answers to his questions.

The moment has arrived. Rima is within 50 meters away from him and coming towards his direction. Samir could not wait any longer to meet her. Suddenly,  his heart started to beat like a drum. He felt his ears have suddenly become very hot. His nostrils have expanded. His head was spinning like a teetotum. Samir threw off the ear phone, and started the car. He gave a firm push on the gas pedal; changed the gear from 1st to 5th. In no time the car picked up 120 kmph speed. Rima got scared watching a speeding car approaching towards her. She quickly tried to move towards the foot path. But in no time Samir’s car thrashed Rima’s body so hard that she crashed on the wall of the nearby house.

She didn’t die immediately, but became unconscious. Blood was gushing out of her body copiously. The impact made such a noise that people from the nearby houses came out. Samir reversed his car, and came back to Rima. Before Rima’s father and husband could come to the spot, he came out of the car with a bottle of water. He threw cold water on her face. Rima was severely injured, but cold water regained her consciousness. She was writhing in extreme pain due to multiple fractures. But Samir was in a no mood to show sympathy to her.

He asked, "Why Rima, why?"

Picture taken from net

Pulse Polio Nightmare

Fear of imminent death caused a constriction in my throat and a spasm in my chest. 20 to 25 very angry, red-eyed, bearded people with open swords and shiny daggers had surrounded me and Sabina. "Kill him, kill him", they were shouting. Crying copiously, Sabina was begging mercy for my life. But her efforts were going in vain, as the mob seemed to be in no mood to heed.

When I ventured to Dhosa gram panchayat, about 15 km from my block head quarters in the morning, I knew that the mission was going to be fraught with danger. But even in my wildest nightmare, I couldn’t  imagine that they would be hell-bent on taking my life.

When I was posted as the Joint BDO in Joynagar 2 development block, my primary responsibilities were to look after the NREGS programme and the health matters. While NREGS was cool, heath became an unhealthy matter for my liking. There used to be a monthly meeting at the district headquarter, where various heath matters were discussed. Eradication of pulse polio had been a matter of grave concern for not only the country, but also the entire world. So, every state took the matter very seriously,  and rigorous mechanism was introduced to achieve the objective. In this story, I shall not deal with the technicalities of the matter. But it would be sufficient to say that every district authority  had identified some hamlets termed as red spots in the area under its jurisdiction where there had been no administration of pulse polio vaccine. Unfortunately, my block had 3 such hamlets. In the first meeting, the DM had asked me what did I do to cover those 3 spots. I was vague, as I had no concrete idea about the matter.

When I went back to my block next day, I enquired about the issue. They told me that those spots were like mini-Pakistan: no body could go there without risking his life. A couple of efforts were made by sending some Muslim officers and Muslim nurses to persuade them. But every time they got back  beaten black and blue by an angry mob. Since last 2 years nobody dared to visit those spots. I was young, energetic and enthusiastic. Besides, I had an ex-Muslim girlfriend with whom I spent time for about 5 years. That gave me some confidence to deal with Muslims. So, I decided to take the bull by the horns. From my experience, I knew I could not venture there alone; I had to take a female companion.

I asked the ANM, but she reacted as if I asked her to walk barefoot on fire. On her refusal, I tried to persuade the ASHA of the region. She, too, tried to shrug off the responsibility. But I could not let that Muslim lady go. So I had to threat her that I would sack her in case she did not comply with my order. Thus, very reluctantly Sabina Shiekh, a young, good-looking, unmarried,  poor Muslim lady, agreed to accompany me.

Taking Sabina with me was a really good decision. We had to get down from the car at a distance of 2 km from our destination. From there onwards, we had no other option but to walk on a 4 ft narrow dirt road. Sabina, being an ASHA, often came to this areas to administer tablets to pregnant women. She knew ins and outs of this place. When I was very carefully passing a 2ft path very close to a pond -- I was really scared as I didn’t know swimming -- Sabina told me that our red spot would start after this place.

I was pleased to note that as predicted by Sabina, the entire menfolk were on the field, busy in reaping paddy -- which took a delightful golden yellow colour --  with sickles. Only a few elderly men were gossiping together in front of a mud house, while the children were busy in playing. We tried to move as surreptitiously as possible. However, an old man sitting idly and smoking bidi  on the veranda of a tin-shed house noticed us.

 He asked, "Hey, where are you going?"

 We were prepared for this question. Sabina said, "Jt BDO Sir will enquire about the proper implementation of the Janani Suraksha Yojana." The grumpy old man didn’t know me. However, he knew Sabina. So, he didn’t put any more questions.

Almost all the houses were mud houses in this hamlet, mostly thatched, a few with tiles and  a few with tin sheds.

In front of one such house, Sabina said, "This house has 4 children below the age of 5. Let’s begin with this house, Sir."

With a constriction in throat, I said,” Okay! Let’s begin."

On thrice calling her name by Sabina, a mid-thirty, burqa-clad lady opened the door. Watching me, an unknown guy, she got scared. Sabina assured her not to panic and asked her to call her children, as she would give them chocolates. But before that they had to take 2 drops of a medicine. The lady angrily said that her children would not take polio vaccine, as her husband had told her that intake of polio vaccine would make them impotent.

With a plastic smile on my face, I lied through my teeth, "This is vitamin drop, very good for health. This is a special initiative from our block development office. It has nothing to do with polio. "

Perhaps, my suited-booted demeanour made her rethink. She stammered a bit and very reluctantly called her 4 children, all aged between 0 to 5. Sabina administered all of them 2 drops of polio. After that as promised, she gave them a chocolate each. I heaved a sigh of relief: for the first time any child from this village had taken a polio drop.

Then we moved to the second house. By applying the same method, we administered polio drops to the two tiny little children of that house. Within one and half hour, we managed to cover 80% children below 5 years. I began to feel relieved. Sabina said, "4 more houses, Sir. Then we would be done."

Oozing in confidence, I said, "Yes Sabina, we are going to make the impossible possible."

Sabina said, "Sir, your idea of showing the chocolates first is working very well. The mothers are not showing much skepticism."

In the next house, we got ourselves in a very precarious situation. We did not know that the young mother of 2 were an educated lady. Within a minute, she understood our stratagem.

 She said, "Hey, this ain’t any vitamin. This is polio drop."

I felt very nervous. Would  she scream? Would she call the men from the field? But proving my apprehension wrong, she said she appreciated our effort  and wanted to know how we could enter here on a polio vaccine day!

I said, "This ain’t a polio vaccine day. This is my special effort to save the poor children from your locality. I spent 1000 rupees from my pocket to purchase the chocolates."

She seemed to have been very impressed by  me. We covered the next two houses in the next 20 minutes.

In front of a very dilapidated pucca house, Sabina said, "This is our last house, Sir."

"How many children are in the house, Sabina?" I enquired.

"Only one, Sir." The answer sounded so sweet to my ear that I could not believe it.

"Did you say one?" I wanted a reconfirmation.

"Yes Sir, this a rather progressive family. The husband of the house works in a tailor shop in Kolkata and the wife had passed the higher secondary examination."

Cheerfully, we knocked the door. Here, too, not much of a fuss happened. Just when we were preparing to leave the house, there was suddenly a bolt from the blue. 20 to 25 very angry looking, bearded Mullahs barged in to the house.

"Where is the bastard who is making our children impotent?" - A short-statured, middle-aged, leader type of guy with a very long beard, which he dyed with red colour, asked.

"Kill him, kill him" was the chorus call from others.

While we were busy in giving OPV to the children of this hamlet, a boy went to field to show his prized possession, which happened to be the chocolate given by me, to his father. The father was a medieval-minded muajjam of a local mosque. He became suspicious, and on enquiry he found out the truth. Within a few minutes, he called the men to avenge what he thought  was an attack on Islam. The people of this area had been known to be hot-headed. Immediately, they took out their weapons, ranging from swords, daggers, sickles to sticks.

Within a second, I understood that there was no point in denying that we administered polio drops to the children below 5 years age of this hamlet. I tried hard to make them understand that how important it was for their children to take polio vaccine. I had taken a few pictures of polio victims in my pocket. I showed them the pictures and told them that without the vaccine, their children, too, could be afflicted with polio. I thought that watching the pictures, they would calm down.

But the local Imam of the mosque, Jan Mahammad, shouted from the top of his voice, "Stop your bull shit! You think that we don’t understand your propaganda! You are a rabid anti-Islam fellow. You want our children to be ruined. We won’t spare you."

The public supported him with the blood-thirsty call of, "Slit his throat. Kill him."

By then Sabina began to cry copiously. She begged for mercy of my life. She told them that I was a good guy, and I had no evil intention. Jan Muhammad didn’t like her coming in defence of a kafir. He slapped Sabina forcefully,  and in a stentorian voice, told her to remain silent, lest she should also be killed along with me.

Before I could come up with another set of argument in my defence, a boorish young man targeted my neck with his sword. Had it hit the target, I wouldn’t have been here to tell you the story. Fortunately and thanks to my reflex, I swayed away quickly from the brandishing weapon. It missed my neck, but took a slice of flesh from my shoulder. Blood gushed out. Immediately, my shirt became soaked with blood. Watching so much of blood, Sabina fainted. I was in severe pain, but it was such a time that I could not pay any attention to it. Also, in front of an imminent death, my fear had also vanished.

Somehow, I garnered courage, and shouted as hard as possible,

 "Enough! Stop hitting me. If the polio drops are harmful to your children, so will they be to me. I am unmarried. I am drinking it in front of you."

I drank half portion of potion in a bottle in front of them. Surprised by that move, there was pin drop silence in the room for a while.

But within a minute Jan Muhammad said, " You son of Devil, you think we shall be puzzled by your drama? Kill him folks."

Encouraged by his demagoguery, again the people surrounding me became agitated. A middle-aged robust man, who looked like a butcher to me, shoved me so forcefully that I fell down on the floor. The butcher raised his chopper to cut my throat. I thought that was it. I closed my eyes.

One second passed, two second passed, but nothing happened. When I opened my eyes, I was extremely surprised to see Tarannum Bibi, the lady who praised my effort, crouching in front of me protecting my body from the bloodthirsty weapon. Within seconds two more Muslim ladies came forward encircling me. Extremely aghast by the action of these ladies, Jan Muhammad rebuked them, "What are doing here, you idiots?"

"He is a good man. His intention is good. We cannot let him die" , said Tarannum firmly.

I thought my life had been saved by these ladies. But since when the mad mullahs listened to their womenfolk? This was no exception. Within 5 minutes, Jan Muhammad and others cleared the deck of the troublemakers. Again, I was left alone to face the ferocious hyenas.

 Jan Muhammad said, "Hard luck! You have come to the lion’s den. You have to face the consequences. Be ready for death."

Jan Muhammad himself took a large, shiny chopper. Two men forcefully made me lie standstill on the floor. Again I closed my eyes, as I thought luck would not favour me second time. But I didn’t know that when the intention is good, luck sometimes shows extra favour. Before Jan Muhammad’s chopper could bifurcate my body, a bunch of armed police men from the local police station barged into the room, and took control of the situation very quickly. The OC of the police station was known to me.

Very surprised, I asked him, " I didn’t inform you. Then how could you enter the scene in correct time and save my life?"

He smiled, "Sabina informed us. We knew this would be a very dangerous situation. From the very beginning, we had a close watch. But I must give credit to you for fulfilling the most difficult job."

I looked at Sabina. Sabina smiled at me. I took Sabina’s both hands in my hands, and said, "Thank you very much Sabina."

I couldn’t understand why at this happy juncture Sabina cried!

Picture taken from net

Film Review : Wazir

I saw the news that the Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal had watched Bejoy Nambiar’s movie “Wazir” with its cast including producer Vidhu Vinod Chopra, writer Abhijat Joshi and actors Farhan Akhtar and Aditi Rao Hydari. I have been criticizing Kejriwal  for a while on various issues. So, I decided to watch the movie to see what kind of movie he endorses.

Farhan Akhtar (Danish Ali), who played the role of an ATS officer, had lost his daughter while chasing a dreaded terrorist. His wife Aditi Rao Hydari (Ruhana) held him responsible for the loss of her child, and moved away from his life. Farhan, too, held himself guilty and tried to commit suicide. Just before he was going to shoot himself, the wheelchair-bound Pandit Omkarnath Dhar (Amitabh Bachchan) made entry and eventually got sucked into Farhan's world. The twists and turns of the story began from here,  coming to a menacing figure called Wazir, trailing blood and gore and death.

The film used an actual chess board to tell us how to make moves. There was a nice, even if a little underlined, metaphor at work too: life is like a game of chess, and we are all pawns at the mercy of the crafty `wazir’. Manav Kaul played the role of a  power-hungry politician, and Neil Nitin Mukesh made a comeback, even if sketchy and a trifle contrived.

Now, let me come to the critical analysis. Farhan Akhtar might have looked a bit different with a well-trimmed moustache, but his acting was as mediocre as ever. In the romantic scenes with Aditi, he looked awful. His voice quality was not good.

Aditi didn't have much chance to show her acting skill in this film. But whatever chance she got as a distraught mother, she did a good job by letting her silence speak. This is the first film of Aditi that I have seen. She looked beautiful in the film.

Amitabh Bachchan, the Sean Connery of Indian movies, completely fitted into the role of an old man who had lost his legs and his wife in a serious road accident, and had reason to believe that his daughter’s demise -- blamed on a fall on a staircase at the home of the welfare minister Yazaad Qureishi (Manav Kaul) -- had actually been a case of murder.

But the main fault line of the film lied in the very weak story. It had glaring flaws. The terrorists didn't attack Farhan when he lost his daughter. It was he who went to chase them carrying his daughter with him. No ATS officer, or for that matter, any sane person would do that.

How a paralysed man, who could not move without a wheelchair, could drive, tie threads and plant bombs -- then jump over the wall (because he couldn't have walked out through the door due to traps being implanted ) and go back to the hospital will remain as mystery.

If you love asking critical and embarrassing questions, this is the film you must watch, because you will have a filed day after watching the film.

I could not understand how could Vidhu Vinod Chopra, who has produced films like Parinda, 1942: A Love Story, Munna Bhai film series (Munna Bhai M.B.B.S. and Lage Raho Munna Bhai), 3 Idiots and PK, produce such a mediocre film!

Therefore, I shall give a thumbs down, and my overall rating would be 3.5 out of 10.

Pictures from internet