The Book

He trouble with Dibakar Deka was that he was a .1 sentimental fool. At least that was what his wife Jaya told him. Of course Dibakar had suspected it all along and his wife's pronouncement put the final seal to it. peIiod. He was a sentimental fool. He was caught in a time warp. He loved everything that was old-his old slippers. old pyjamas, old books, old friends, old houses, and most of all, his old way oflife at Ratanpur. Jaya noted with asperity that the only good thing about the past was that it was behind you. Dibakar didn't think so. But, then, it never really mattered what he thought. That was what Jaya often said.

Dibakar Deka had uprooted himself from Ratanpur twenty years ago with great reluctance. He was now an uneasy urbanite in the big bad city of Guwahati. As the area sales manager of a baby food company he wore Peter England shirts to work, discussed marketing strategies over business lunches, zipped about in his Zen and learned not to bat an eyelid when his daughter traipsed off to tuition classes in a leather miniskirt. But his initiation into city life, opined Jaya, was not yet over. For Dibakar still wanted to gag when he sipped his Bloody Mary, he pronounced pizza the way it was wrttten, oiled his head with Jabakusum, preferred to use his hands when wolfmg down food at parties and still touched his forehead when passing a temple. All this caused Jaya and the children endless embarrassment and they often expressed their feelings quite forcefully before him ..

Then Dibakar was beset with the mid-life crisis.

Nothing seemed to matter any more, not his work, not his family life, the down payment on the duplex flat, the fat salary, the perks. He grew listless, irritable, withdrawn. He didn't care to win friends and influence people any more. He didn't care two hoots as to why the country was going to the dogs or if Clinton would really be impeached. He seriously cousidered whether life was worth living or not. Come to think of it, Jaya would make a sophisticated widow.

It so happened that one day he was mulling over these dark thoughts and spinning a glass paper-weight on his office desk when a head poked in through the door. The head had a huge grin attached to it. It was such a frank, joyful grin that it made Dibakar feel better at once.

"Hey you old rogue!" growled the head with mock anger. "Forgotten your old friend, have you."

"Praneswar!" Dibakar warmly extended his hand.

"Where did you come from, you old bandicoot!"

Mter an effusive reunion, Praneswar flopped down on the visitor's chair, lifted his leg and rubbed the soles of his feet. There was a contented look on his sunburnt weather beaten face. Praneswar was an old school mate. He worked at FCI but commuted to his home at Dodora every day. Dibakar had spent many happy days at Praneswar's home during college vacations and now he quizzed Praneswar with strange urgency. Was the old pond still there, with the dragonflies alighting on the reeds? Did his mother still pound rice on the dhe1a? Did the pigeons still murmer under the thatched eaves? Did the cows still return home at godhuli? Did they still make jaggery by boiling sugarcane juice on a flat trough above a roaring fire? Did his mother still make poa pitha, soonga pitha? Did they still drink tea in brass bowls? Did the women sit at the loom?

Praneswar looked around the room, at the wall to wall carpet, the AC fitted on the wall, the modern furniture, the tinted windows, the Parker pens on the holder, the thick brocade curtains, then threw back his head and chortled with laughter.

"You don't belong here Dibu, old chap. You'd be happier ploughing the fields, wouldn't you?

A lump rose in Dibakar's throat and impeded his speech. How well his friend understood him! Praneswar finished massaging his corns and began to pick his teeth. The sight warmed the cockles of Dibakar's heart. Good ­old Praneswar, so natural and unaffected, rough in speech, dress and mannerisms, the quintessential country bumpkin ....

"I say," began Praneswar. "Why don't you come down to Dodora for lunch on Sunday. Bring your family along."

Dibakar suddenly had a disquieting image of Jaya's stilettoes sinking into cowdung.

"No no!" he said hastily. Praneswar looked hurt. "What I mean", improvised Dibakar. ''I'll go alone."

So on the following Sunday, a balmy May morning, Dibakar set off in his Zen. As the ugly buildings, the crowds, the petrol fumes fell behind him, hope surged in Dibakar's heart. He switched off the airconditioning, rolled down the windows and let the wind tease his thinning air. He took off his Rayban glasses ·and squinted happily at the bright sunshine. He switched on the tape and . listened to Bihu songs his children wouldn't be caught dead listening to. At Saraighat Bridge he parked his car to one side and stood leaning over the railings, breathing in great big mouthfuls of air. On one side was the teeming chaotic city. On the other were the blue hills and emerald fields of the wide countryside. That was where he belonged. \Vhistling tunelessely he climbed back into the car and drove off at a daringly fast pace. He could not wait to get to Dodora.

An hour later Dodora came into view. There were phutuka shrubs lining the roadside. The wind soughed among the bamboo copses. Half naked children splashed happily in pools of water. Sinewy weather beaten men walked along with ploughs perched jauntily on their shoulders. Gourds and pumpkins nestled on the straw roofs of houses. Cows and goats ambled along the road. Stripling youths sat fishing on the banks of ponds. Women balanced babies or brass pots of water on their undulating hips. Flocks of geese squawked and waddled by. Thin columns of blue smoke rose from thatched kitchens. It was so perfect, so rustic. And yet ... What was this? There were light posts along the roads at regular intervals. There was a canary yellow signboard exhorting people to trust Vinay Cement. At the cross road there was a PCO booth. Packets of Maggi noodles hung in a string bag at the grocer's shop. A group of young women simpered past the car wearing salwar kameezes. Dibakar suddenly felt apprehensive.

Praneswar was waiting for Dibakar in front of his house. Beside him was a 407 truck.

"What's this doing here?" Dibakar asked without preamble.

"Oh this?" Praneswar said proudly. 'This has been hired by Khagen, my brother. We bring straw from Be~uchi."

"But didn't you use bullock carts for that?" asked Dibakar, getting out of the car.

"Oh!" laughed Praneswar. "Who has time for those.

This is much quicker."

Praneswar's house. Dibakar remembered. Cool earthen floors, stout wooden pirhas, cane handfans, smoky oil lamps, a brass tray of betel nuts, lime and paWl .... Praneswar's house today. An RCC monstrosity with pink walls, bright lights and electric fans, foam cushions on sofa sets, calendars on the walls. A 'IV set and filmi magazines.

Dibakar was aghast. He wiped his face with his hand kerchief and glumly accepted the chilled orange squash that Praneswar proudly offered him.

Praneswar's wife. Dibakar thought of a shy young woman, face obscured by her chaddar, vermilion streak in the parting of her hair, content to listen rather than speak.

Praneswar's wife, in reality. Abrash young woman in a sleeveless blouse and synthetic sari, stick-on bindi and lipstick talking glibly of her experience in working at a beauty parlour in Guwahati.

"You still have the pond, don't you?" Dibakar asked Praneswar hopefully.

'We filled it up when we built this house", explained Praneswar. "Couldn't risk a pond with my two kids running around."

"And the cows?"

"Sold them off," grinned Praneswar. "My wife here complained all day about cowdung smell. And who would milk them any way?"

"When the children grow up a little, we'll shift to Guwahati", said Pronoti. "r want them to go to an English medium school"

"Dodora is really backward", shrugged Praneswar. "Do you know, only five families use gas cylinders here?"

"You cook on the gas?" Dibakar's eyebrows shot up. "Of course," assured Pronoti. "I don't want to ruin my eyes with all that wood smoke."

Pronoti went indoors and returned after sometime. "Lunch is ready," she called out gaily. Dibakar and Praneswar went to the other room. Lunch was laid out on a brand new dining table complete with napkins and cutlery. Instead of pigeon meat there was chicken. Instead of plain rice there was pulao. Instead of roasted tomatoes there was salad. No matikaduri saag, no thekera tenga. Dibakar chewed glumly and wondered why he had come in the first place.

An hour later Dibakar drove back to the city. The rustic idyll he had dreamed of encountering did not exist. He felt immeasurably saddened and also a little angry.

"Hi Pops!" called out his daughter as she opened the door. "You look pooped. Anything wrong?"

"No", he said shortly. "Where's your mother? Off to her club?"

"No", she grinned. "Mum has a surprise for you actually."

Dibakar groaned and flopped down on the sofa.

Surprises were often nasty.

But were they? Jaya was smiling as she put down a tray on the table near him. On a plate there reposed five perfectly round, black, crunchy, warm ti1laddoos.

"Help youself," said Jaya, rumpling his hair. ''You love them, don't you, my dear country bumpkin?"