By Vijayshree
It ran in our family I guess: always being cash strapped just around Dasara time. Bapu being a civil works contractor, used to have bills which were pending for clearance and so our Dasara festivities would always have a tinge of sadness to it, before they began. But Bapu made sure we never knew of his financial troubles and so, Amma headed towards General bazaar in Secunderabad where she knew of a clothing shop which sold on credit.
Back in the late 1970’s and the 1980’s, when we were children, buying on credit, stank of poverty unlike now, where flashing the credit card is the norm. So, knowing at that time, that we were buying on credit, filled me with shame and guilt. I’d have much better, done away with buying clothes, altogether. But, when Amma came back with bags overflowing with new clothes, she was met with four eager and happy kids, reaching out quickly, into those bags. That said something for my temporary feelings of guilt and shame.
We had two distinctive rituals maintained by Bapu for the occasion of Dasara: one was firing his gun into the air, on the evening of Dasara and then, scanning for the sight of eagles, soaring in the sky. Eagles or Garuda, we were told, were Lord Vishnu’s mount and sighting them on the Dasara evening, was a sign of good luck.
On the Ayudha Pooja day, Bapu would get his single barrelled gun out and dissemble it, into its parts for cleaning purpose. I would fetch him, coconut oil and a rag cloth for cleaning and polishing the parts of the gun. I watched in awe as, he carefully rubbed each part of the gun with oil and the cloth. I can still remember the woody smell of oil rubbed on the wooden parts of the gun. After cleaning it, he would re-assemble it and then, smear it with vermillion, before placing it next to the images of Gods.
When it came to the actual time of firing the gun into the air, which Bapu did on the terrace of the house, I would hide inside the house, for the fear of the booming sound made by the gun when it was fired. And I also feared all kinds of mishaps around it. That it would misfire, or back fire, or hit a bird in the air or may be a passing helicopter. Anyway, I was hidden, inside the house, with my hands tightly pressed against my ears and I came out only after someone informed me, that the gun has already been fired. More than anything else, I feared for my Bapu, that his frail form would never be able to hold the gun, when the shot was fired. But Bapu always held on, however sick and ill he was. That Gun became a part of him, I think, after keeping him company for many years of his life.
On his healthy days, we would go in the Ambassador car towards the Tank bund area and watch the procession of Goddess Durga, led by the Bengali women who sang in gay abandon in praise of the Goddess. We then went for watching, the burning of effigy of Ravana, at the maidan located, somewhere near the lower Tank Bund area and waited until the effigy went up in fire, in a burst of crackers and flame.
Dasara ended for us, thus, as we slowly began our return home in the dark night, with no street lights, whatsoever and with only stars shining in the sky and a nip of the winter in the air. What began with a tinge of sadness, ended with a longing for it to come back sooner. Bapu made sure we were happy, and Dasara being a big day for all of us, from Telangana, he knew money or no money, his children had to have a good time on that day. For me, he simply made the day unforgettable and with it the memories of Bapu too.
Circa 2014, I am headed to general bazaar again for shopping, but to our disappointment, we find a shop which had been selling clothes since many decades had permanently shut and so, as we bought kulfi in the narrow lane and discussed, where to head next, we saw with satisfaction that nothing much about general bazaar had actually changed and it seemed to be stuck in some kind of, time warp. We even spotted the sign board of the shop where Amma used to buy on credit and we were also, happy to hear Telanagana spoken everywhere. Heard a mother chiding her daughter, for her choice of clothes and laughed, remembering it sounded so, like Amma too.
Then, we decided to go to a shop on the secretariat road, which put us on the Tank bund route and made us have a glance at the Bathukamma floats, put up, everywhere. When we reached the Secretariat road, the whole place was reverberating with Bathukamma songs blaring aloud from the speakers, as all the government offices were celebrating bathukamma on a grand scale. For once, the truth of being in Telangana sunk in, with a lot of joy, as if finally, a city which forbid Telangana was now dancing to the tunes of Telangana and in that dance, was once again finding that, what was once a missing and cut off part, had become whole again.
When we were shopping in this place, an old man who came into the shop to sell Tea, to the shop keepers was telling them, with pride that, ‘Kya gana hai Saab, Hamara Telangana ka hai. Dil bahut khush hai, yeh din dekhne se. Kitna josh leke aara dil me, bathukamma ka gana sun ne sai- woh bhi, hamara Telangana mai.’ He said with pride, and that about summed up my feelings too. What he said was, ‘What a great song it is, after all it is from our Telangana. I cannot explain how happy I feel hearing the song and what joy it fills, my heart with, this song of Bathukamma.
We were treated with his tea for free. Even as I offered to pay, he declined, ‘You are our guests in the shop, you should not pay, and guests are like Gods to us.’ The tea never tasted more satisfying than it did, at that moment, I think.
When it came to the payment time, my sister paid her bill. I actually had come to only give her company but could not resist buying and I did it, on the confidence of that, all pervasive, credit card. Then, to my chagrin the shop keeper said, the card swiping machine is not working. I could not believe it; I knew this guy hated accepting credit cards. I scolded him first, asked him to try it again, then seeing that it was really not working, I gave his partner a beseeching look, which made him say, ‘You can pay it later, you know, you are our regular customers’. That really stirred my pride and I rummaged through my bag to find the amount and borrowed from my sister whatever was short. Nothing much has changed from the time when we were children I think, Dasara always finds me penniless and somehow it is tinged with sadness.
But I never forget to carry on with some of Bapu’s rituals, like giving sweet boxes to non Hindu friends. Bapu’s Gun has gone silent, but I scan the skies in the evening for the eagles. Every year their sighting becomes rarer but still in any given year, I never went to sleep, until I spotted at least one of them. But last year, strangely, I was standing until it was really dark and my legs and neck ached from straining to catch their sight, looking far up into the skies. The eagles never came and Amma had a brain stroke that very night. It was the beginning of only unending darkness for me, I think.
Now, as I stand on the threshold of another Dasara, I can only look in hope and wish for the eagles to come back in the skies.
This Dasara is special, remembering how we would end each year with a wish to celebrate our next Dasara in Telangana and now, that wish has come true. So here is wishing everyone a ‘Happy Dasara and May it drive away any evil spirits that might be lurking around us and let this be a special one’. Our children will never know the torments that we had been through, in a place which we could never call our own, even if it always was.
Like the wise tea-seller summed it up, this is a moment of pride for us: who could have imagined Bathukamma songs echoing from every office, in the very seat of power, in the city of Hyderabad. Now it is, as true as the sun rising in the sky and this Dasara is surely the Biggest one, in our lives.