A Friend in Need…

I have not written blog for more than six months. Last time I had written in June last year. Many things have happened during these six months, both in national and international scenes, and in personal lives also. The reason for which I could not write is I had troubles with my eyes and I had to go for operation. After my second operation of the left eye I had a deep abrasion on the cornea after the wound of the operation is almost healed. That gave me excruciating pain and it took much time to be normal. I was unable to read and write. The prolonged illness had completely disorganized me. I am yet to reorganize myself, though I have fully recovered. However, I am reorganizing myself and have written a story, the first one after my recovery, which Katha is publishing in its special February issue.

****

During recuperating period after operation and healing of the abrasion I had to be confined to my room. I could not read or write. I am in the habit of reading and I read even when I commute to office sitting in the bus. Not being able to read is really a great punishment for me. In the novel The Outsider, Albert Camus has defined punishment as when someone wants something to do but he is prevented from doing. The main character of the novel has committed a murder and has been jailed and in the jail, he wants to smoke, but is not permitted. He considers this as punishment. Later he is used to non-smoking and then considers the punishment ceases to be punishment, as he no longer wants to smoke. But I cannot think of a life without books.

During illness, when one is confined to his room and not allowed to move, read or write, he is in need of the company of friends, at least, for gossiping and passing time. My friends are busy with their work and in their own ways. Pradeep and Gopa visited me once after my first operation and so also Dipankar and Sadasiv. Dipankar loaded in my computer good and my favourite songs, both of films and classical, which was helpful in passing time. Swayamprava had visited me after the second operation and spent a few hours with me and my family. But most of the time I had to listen music or sleep  to kill the oppressive loneliness. If I slept during the day, sleep eluded me in the night. The days were long, and the nights became longer.

****

Two writers I like met unnatural and untimely death recently. Jagdish Mohanty’s story, Album was published when I was doing my graduation. Since then, during my college and university days, I used to purchase the magazine if it had published Jagdish’s story. Incidentally I was reading a story from his book, Prema Aprema published by Timepass when my friend Subash Sadangi telephoned me to inform his death. He was at 61.The other writer, Suresh Balbantray died at 59. He was to retire from service after 8-9 months. Suresh had been a great friend. One day I had been to his office on an official work. I found paintings drawn by him displayed in his office room. In course of discussion I casually asked him why he had stopped writing stories or poems. He replied, I cannot write a story better than you nor I can write poems better than Senapati Pradyumna Keshari. Why should I write? A person with a large heart and a broad mind could speak like this to a younger writer like me. Whenever in the evening I went to the old bus stand, the writers' corner I looked for him and he was there to greet with a smile. I know, henceforth I shall not find him, his warmth and smile in the old bus stand though I shall look for him whenever I shall go, and the vacuum will remain forever. 

****

The old students of Alaka Mahavidyalay where I was a lecturer before I joined Finance Service had organized a get together on 12^th January and invited me to attend. Last year and the year before they had also invited me, but I had not attended. I was there a lecturer exactly for two years one month and six days. But Manisha says, her friends and my old students always ask and enquire about me. Among my students, she is only  one who has been in touch with me till today. This time I had also declined, but Prasanna, once a lecturer there and now a senior officer of Cooperative Service insisted me on accompanying him.

I could recognize two, Imam and Kalam, and faintly remember the third, Bhattacharya of more than a hundred old students gathered there. After all, twenty five years have passed since I left the college.  I told them about a chance meeting of an old student twenty years back when I was working in Satyabadi and while going to my village. I met him in a canteen at the Cuttack bus stand. I failed to recognize him, but he recognized and treated me with a hearty breakfast, a pack of cigarettes of my brand which he had remembered (then I was smoking) and a free ticket in his bus up to the bus stop nearest my village. I had written a story on the incident which was published in the Sunday literary page of Sambad under the caption Chhatra (student). This story is in my collection of short stories, aampakha lokamane(the people around us).

I enjoyed the day and decided to attend next time if they organize and remember me.

xxxxx

 

 

 

 

 

Gypsy Songs

I always carry  with me a note book. Whatever interests me, a line of a poem or something interesting I have read from a book or an event I come across I note down. But I am not a well organised person. Many of my note books have been lost or misplaced. When I take note I hope I would read it later, but that  rarely happens. Recently I came across one such note book I had maintained in 1993-94 and started reading. During that period I had read two books on Gypsies and had noted down some facts about Gypsy life. One, Gypsies: Indians in Exile by D. P. Singhal and the other, Raggle-Taggle by Walter Starkie. What interest me about gypsies are their life style and their songs. One of the traits of gypsies is their love for music and love songs. It is also said that Beethoven was influenced by Gypsy music. There is a proverb that says you can make a peasant drunk on a glass of water and a Gypsy fiddler. Here are some stanzas of Gypsy songs:

(1)

“Why dost thou wander?” they ask

That I myself do not know

Let wandering birds answer that

Let roaming stars tell that

(2)

The moon soft moving over the heaven

My darling, seems like thee

And other folks are but clouds

Those hide thy face from me

(3)

In jails they could not hold me

With chains or bolted door

But now I am bound for ever

To her to whom I adore

(4)

No matter what may be our plight

We will never be apart

For fate may take you from my sight

But never from my heart

(5)

Like a ghoulish moth that flies

Towards the flame, for you I yearn

In the fire that lights your eyes

There is something I discern

It is death! The strange surprise!

Yet the fires that light your eyes

Gladly would I burn!

(6)

If only I had loved the Lord

With love as deep and pure

With love as true as I loved you

I’d go to heaven sure

(7)

Enjoy your youth, my darling

And do not play with fate

Old age is coming sometime

Then death…. It will be too late

****

Pages From A Note Book

I am not a poet.Sometimes, an event I come across or something I read from newspapers or hear from a friend agitate  or provoke me. I scribble my reactions in my note book. I have never sent those for publication. But I preserve those in my note book.

In 1994, I was working at Styabadi of district Puri in the Treasury. I had throat infection and had loss of speech. I could not speak. I had inflamation in the throat and I even could not swallow food. I had to live on liquid diet. I took medices, higher antibiotics. But it did not have any effect. After almost a month, the doctors advised me to consult a cancer specialist. For a few days I thought I had cancer. During these few days I had scribbled in my note book a few lines, which may not be treated poems. But when I read it brings back those memories. Here I produce one of the two poems(?):

Waiting for her
(1)

You are coming

I have the news

Today or in the next month

Tomorrow or in the next year

You have not fixed the date and time

But I am sure

You are coming



Today she came

To the office on official work

I had been waiting for this day

Since long ago

She had been always in my mind



She is today as she was

When I first met her years ago

She wore a smile on her face

Her eyes gave off a feeling

of many untold stories

I found her the way

I expected to find her



I have many things to tell

Things inside me competed with each other

To come out

But words failed

I could not tell

Felt pain in my chest



How could I tell in the office?

Amidst the known and unknown faces

My voice would have been drowned

In the jungle of the words

like ‘yes sir’, ‘thank you’


She looked at me

Her look pierced into my eyes

And from my eyes into my heart



She told at the time of parting

She would come again

This time

Not to the office on official work



I am afraid

You may visit me

Before she comes again

NAMESAKE

It was the day of Kumarpurnima and an office holiday also. I was doing what I enjoy most: lying on the bed I was reading a book, Salman Rushdie’s autobiography, Joseph Anton. I heard a bike stopped at my gate. I went out of my room and saw a person sitting on the bike was looking at my nameplate. I asked, “Who are you looking for?”

He replied, “Sahadev Sahoo, the writer”

“Yes, I am.” I said.

He said, “No, I am looking for writer Sahadev Sahoo, I A S, ex- Chief Secretary and former Vice Chencellor, OUAT. My friend, Umasankar Pal has published a book of poems. He said Sahadev Sahoo is staying at this address, and has given me a book to present him.”

I could make out the confusion. I had been staying at Cuttack since last fourteen years and giving my Cuttack address. Recently I have shifted to Bubaneswar and given my present address to the magazines which have recently published my stories. Mr Pal has, perhaps, come across in one of the magazines which have published my story and collected my present address and mistaken it to be the address of the I.A.S. Sahadev Sahoo.

I replied him, “I am Sahadev Sahoo, but not the person you and your poet friend are looking for.”

*****

One introduced himself as Damodar Behera telephoned me at around 2 PM when I was in my office room on 10.12.12. He said he was speaking to me on behalf of a cultural association of Jajpur district. I asked, “What for?”

He said, “We want to felicitate you on December 23 along with some other eminent persons of the district. We want your postal address for officially intimating you. The Chief Minister has agreed to do felicitation.”

I said, “The postman does not come to the place where I presently stay in Bubaneswar. It’s a newly developed area. Better you intimate me to my office address,” and I gave him my office address.

He perhaps noted down my address and said, “You are the pride of our district, we are really honoured to felicitate you. Recently I was reading your interview published in the literary magazine Bartika.

I said, “Bartika has published my story, but not my interview. I have not given any interview to Bartika. The interview is perhaps of the other Sahadev Sahoo, the ex-Chief Secretary, and the former Vice Chancellor.”

He suddenly switched off the phone. After a few minutes he again rang me up and asked, “Don’t you belong to the village Kabirpur?”

I replied, “No.”

He said, “Sorry. You are not the person we are supposed to felicitate; someone has wrongly given your phone number.”

*****

Do they have any knowledge on Odia literature?

Do they really felicitate the persons for their contribution to literature?

*****

Curse on Ahalya

I was a lecturer teaching History in a college for a little more than two years. She was a student of plus three Arts. I caught sight of her in the annual function of the college. In the cultural programme that followed the meeting she gave an Odishi dance performance. Her performance was well acclaimed. Then I remembered she belonged to the tutorial group I was allotted. She further attracted me when I came across her poem published in the college magazine. Considering her age and experience the poem was a good one.

I learnt that she was a trained dancer. She had also won a few prizes in dance competitions when she was in the school. But she was not allowed to pursue dancing after she left the school for college. She told she wrote poems, but did not send to magazines for publication as she was not sure of the standard of her poems. The editors might rate the poems substandard and reject. I encouraged her to continue writing poems and start sending to literary magazines. One day she would definitely be noticed by the editors.

I left the college and teaching also. But we were in touch and corresponding regularly. But she stopped writing to me after a few months of her marriage. I also did not come across her poems in any magazine. In course of time I had forgotten her.

After almost ten years I was sitting in the room of an editor of a reputed literary magazine gossiping with him. I found a letter addressed to the editor. The handwriting seemed familiar and I discovered it was she. I got her address from the letter, collected her phone number and talked to her over phone. I enquired about her family and children. She evaded my questions concerning her family; and told that, in fact, she was looking for me and was almost desperate to meet me. She would tell me many things and everything when we would meet. We arranged to meet within a fortnight.

She told me that after her marriage when she went to stay with her husband who was working in a faraway city, she discovered her husband was not only a drunkard and a debauch, he was already married also. He tortured her and forced her to do immoral act. She told me her story. I was shocked, and could not believe that a person could be so cruel and inhuman, which I had only seen in Hindi films.

She asked me whether I would write a novel based on her story. She told she could not tell everything, but would write and hand over me her story. I agreed. She kept her promise and within four months, gave me a diary in which she had written forty pages her story.

She is Madhavi of the novel, prema teeniranga. Madhavi, a tender and beautiful girl still carries Ahalya’s curse in the 21st century India. Madhavi says this is true with all women of brain and beauty.

My first novel kasatandira swapna was published in 2004. The novel begins on the day the police are forcibly cropping short the long hair, called hippy style, a fashion with the college boys then, and tearing the bell bottomed trousers of the college girls. The police act as self-claimed moral force with a view to cleansing of anti-socials and bringing in discipline in the society. That was the period of Emergency in India and almost all the leaders of opposition parties were behind bars, fundamental rights of the citizens were suspended. Ajay, a student of the college protested, and was taken to police custody. The novel covers the period from 1975 to 1984-85. Kasatandira swapna is the story of Ajay.

Sanat was present at the scene when Ajay was taken to police custody. That was his first day in the college. Prema teeniranga is also the story of Sanat. The story begins from the day Mrs Indira Gandhi is assassinated by her own body guards. Mrs Gandhi had declared emergency in the year 1975 when she was the Prime Minister. Prema teeniranga covers the period from 1984-85 to 1995-96.

I am now writing this novel, prema teeniranga, in English.

Excerpts from the English version of the novel:

“I had a dream during the last hours of the night.


I was wandering in the college garden. The garden had only roses. I saw a rabbit. The rabbit looked innocent and beautiful. I went to catch it. It moved from that place. I ran after it. It was not going out of the rose garden, but hopping hither and thither within the garden. I was running after it, but was unable to catch it. I got bruises from the thorns of the rose plants. But I did not care. My body started bleeding, but I was feeling a thrill of joy in spite of my bleeding body. I saw Raaj standing at the gate of the garden and laughing. The rabbit disappeared.


I woke up from the dream and remembered an incident happened during my childhood.


My father was at that time at Baripada, I was in Class IV. We were staying in government quarters. Our neighbour was a doctor. He was employed in Government hospital. He loved roses. In the compound of his quarters he had developed a beautiful rose garden. One day after I returned from the school I had gone to their home to play with his daughter. They had a dog. That day they had not tethered their dog. On seeing me the dog started barking. I ran away, but the dog ran after me. I was running in their rose garden to escape from the dog, but the dog was also after me. Having listened to my cry, the doctor-uncle came out of his room and controlled the dog. But by that time my body had started bleeding with the bruises caused by the thorns of the rose plants. The doctor-uncle took me to his room and applied medicine to my wound. I came back home. That night I had fever.


Lying on the bed I was contemplating my dream with the real incident happened long time ago. The dog ran after me in the rose garden, but in my dream, I was running after a rabbit in the college garden. I wrote,


The body of the girl bleeds


Bruised by the thorns of the roses


The girl chasing after the rabbit


Does not care for her injury


Failure of catching the rabbit


And bleeding bruises


Brings tears of joy to her eyes”

**************

Where God Comes As Witness

I was elated when I was transferred to Satyabadi as Sub Treasury Officer in 1992.

Satyabadi that is Sakhigopal is a historically famous and religiously important place. It is believed that pilgrimage to Puri, the abode of Lord Jagannath is not complete without a visit to Sakhigopal. The name Sakhigopal is derived from a legend in which it is told Lord Gopal has come to be a sakhi (witness) for a poor Brahmin. The story runs like this:

Two Brahmins went on a pilgrimage. At Brundaban the old Brahmin fell seriously ill. The young Brahmin nursed him. The Brahmin recovered, and pleased with the service of the young Brahmin, promised to give his daughter in marriage with him on their return to village. After their return, the old Brahmin changed his mind as the young man was of a lower caste Brahmin. He denied to have made any promise. The young Brahmin went to Lord Gopal who obliged him and came from Brundaban to be a witness.

At Satyabadi, Utkalmani Gopabandhu had started his famous school in 1909. When the house of the school was burnt, the classes were run in the nearby grove of chhuriana and bakul. That is why the school was known as Satyabadi Bana Vidyalaya (Satyabadi Garden School). The school was set up with a noble intention of inculcating national spirit and humanitarianism in the students. The school was justifiably called a ‘man manufacturing factory’. The teachers of the school included Neelkanth Dash, MA in Philosophy, Krupasindhu Misra, MA in History and Godavarish Misra, M A in Economics. They had forsaken allurement of government or any kind of high salaried jobs for an ascetic life of teachers. All the teachers were dedicated and learned. Neelakanth along with Acharya Harihar, another teacher of the School had taken a vow with Gopabandhu on the bank of river Bhargavi that they would work to see a better world at the time of their death than what they had seen at the time of their birth. They were not only great teachers, but also social reformers, litterateurs and freedom fighters.

My euphoria gave way to disappointment soon after I joined.

I had a notion that the place would be nice; the people would be sophisticated and progressive in outlook. But contrary to my belief, I found the place just like any other place, nothing special or different, the people rather proud, orthodox, and caste conscious. On the first day in the office, three-four persons who came to give me curtsey call asked my caste. Disgusted, I replied to one, “How does my caste relate to my official functions?”

In the hotels of Sakhigopal you had to wash your own dishes if you took tiffin or meals. I could not find a hospitable house to take on rent to stay with my family. All of my predecessors were either commuting from Bhubaneswar or Puri or from Cuttack. (My successors till today, what I learn also do the same). But I decided to stay there. I managed to get a house; it was of mud wall and asbestos roofed. There was no piped water supply. We had to drag water from a well that was inside a small courtyard of the house I lived in. One had to be careful against mosquitoes and snakes. One day, within first week of my stay there, I found a snake, a king cobra, in the office under my table; another day my wife discovered a snake in the kitchen. The climate was humid, and added to it, there were frequent power cuts.

A Brahmin used to meet me in the office. He was normally clad in dhoti. He did not wear a shirt; he used a dhoti chadar to cover the upper part of the body. He would bless me by reciting a Sanskrit sloka, and take one rupee that I offered in return.
One day I was in the office just gossiping with my staff after our day’s work was over. The Brahmin came, blessed me and also took the one rupee I was in the habit of giving. One staff member said, “Why are you offering him money? I was about to tell …he is a retired Sanskrit teacher, taking pension.”
This information surprised me. I had mistaken him to be a poor temple priest, begging by way of reciting slokas. I said, “How could he accept? I was mistaken, but he should have declined, and told me his true identity.”
Another staff member who happened to be incidentally a Brahmin said, “Sir, if a jajaman offers something, a Brahmin cannot decline. If he declines, it would be harmful for the jajaman.”
I did not know about this sort of Brahmin-Jajaman relation. But next time when the Brahmin came and blessed me by reciting a sloka I did not offer him the one rupee. He waited for some moments, but did not ask for the rupee, which he never did, and went away. But after that day he had not come to bless me.

I wanted a transfer, but could not as I was, and still am shy of approaching anyone for anything personal. But as days passed by I got used to the conditions, the mosquitoes and snakes, the people and the place. And after some days I found I had started liking the place. I liked to sit on the veranda of the house where I lived and watched bullock carts carrying loads of coconut to the market. I waited for anla nabami, the day people thronged to have a darshan of Goddess Radha’s feet in the temple. I loved to watch the queue of the devotees snaking in front of my house for the darshan of the feet. I fell in love with the special dishes of dalema, besar or mohura, the way these dishes were prepared in the locality. The pandas (temple priests) loved me and my children. They never forgot to give us special prasad offered to the God on special occasions. I stayed in Sakhigopal for more than four years till August 1996. When I was transferred I was given a teary farewell by the pensioner-friends, and I left the place with a heavy heart.

I lovingly treasure the memory of Sakhigopal and watch avidly even today any news concerning Sakhigopal including Silpa Shetty getting kissed by a priest in the temple precincts.
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Emptiness

My words betray me

When I translate my sentiments into expression

The changeover connotes different

Other than what I intend to



My image on the mirror

Reminds me of an emptiness

I am not what I used to be



My eyes get misty

Images look blurred

Heart becomes heavy



I am, perhaps, destined to bear

This burden of emptiness

Forever

*********

In the dream, I was discussing a story with a pretty woman journalist. She claimed to have written the story. But from the first two lines I could know that the story was just translation of a famous story of Marquez. It was nothing but plagiarised. I wanted to show her the original story and looked for Maquez’s book in my book-self. But immediately I could not find. Then I remembered my assignment would end the next day. I could not go back to my old job which was a secure government service that I had left for this assignment. I became gloomy as I had plunged myself into a future of uncertainties by leaving a secure government service.

I woke up and realised it was a dream, and was reassured that I had not the left the present job, and what to talk of leaving the government service; I had also no offer of such an assignment as I had dreamt.

Dreams of this kind often visit me. I do not know what the psychoanalysts shall interpret, but I know the reasons. The reason for this kind of dream is I do not enjoy the job I am in even after completing twenty three years. Like many I failed to translate my dreams of young days into achievement and I had to enter into government service with a kind of resolve that I would leave the job after a few years. But I could not.

During my student days, like many, I had lofty ideals. I thought that I would do something for the people. I would travel a lot, mix with the people, take up their cause and highlight it in the media. For that I had to write features/articles. But I did not get into a job to my liking and I had to enter a service in which, I was told, being a government official, I could only write the things academic in nature, and nothing critical of government policy.

I have a law degree. I thought I would leave the job after a few years and pursue my interest. But government service is such a thing that one might find it easy to get, but difficult to leave. In the government service, salary of the person is secure even for one’s inefficiency and for doing nothing. A secure job and an assured salary after the end of the month is what make one lazy, stoic, satisfied and useless. In fact, I have actually made myself useless without my noticing at it. The books I had purchased for practising law are still gathering dust.

After training I was posted to manage a check gate. The purpose of setting up check gates is to check evasion of tax. As the check gate officer, one has to deal with truck drivers, tax evaders, local goons and criminals. I wondered how my reading of political philosophy from Plato to Marx to Gandhi, understanding the social issues like communalism and dowry deaths, political events or economic policies of the Government would help me sort out a simple problem when a drunken driver parked his truck at a wrong place causing traffic problem in the check gate area or when an unscrupulous person attempted at hoodwinking the officer to carry his goods in a vehicle to evade tax.

Frustrated, one day, I was ruminating my past and the present. During those dejected moments, my past days, memories sweet and sour, many incidents and friends with whom I had spent fond moments came to my mind like scenes from a cinema. I wrote a story based on such an incident which I sent to a popular literary magazine.

The story was published and was well received. I got a good number of letters of appreciation that encouraged me to continue writing stories. I have now published ten books so far, and two books are in press. Before that day when I sat frustrated, brooding over my sorry state I had never thought of becoming a short story writer. Of course, I had an ambition of becoming a feature writer/columnist.

After more than twenty years into writing and publishing ten books now I feel a kind of emptiness. Musing over my youthful dreams and my achievement so far, I think, I got my life wasted. I could have lived differently and more meaningfully. I feel I repeat in my stories what I had written twenty years back. I want to write something new, something different. But I cannot. I want to travel a lot, mix with the people, get direct feel of the place, the people and their problems. But the nature of my job with its limitations does not allow me to do. Last year I wrote a story on naxals (Pheribaku Manaa, Not Allowed to Return). Of course, the story was appreciated. But it could have been better had I gone to the place of the problem, met the people and get direct feel of the situation. That was not possible.

Initially I thought of giving up the job for advocating. I could not. In Odisha, one cannot live on his writing. Later, I thought I would quit the job after twenty years as I would be eligible for pension. But I did not dare. I have a daughter and a son. They have not settled and I have parental duty and responsibility to see they are established. By leaving the job, I do not have the confidence of earning enough to match the salary I receive at the end of the month by doing something else. I do not enjoy the job, and at the same time, I cannot quit it also. And it is painful to go to the office every day, tolerate the whims of my boss and the harangues of my Mr Know All Seniors.

*********