She
was walking back and forth the East Car Street searching the AVT [Anand
Vinayaka Temple]. The Street was not dormant as it did decades back. The
somnolent street had now metamorphosed into a main thorough-fare… a hub of
trading activities. Falling into a maze of grand structures and skyscrapers, it
had changed itself beyond recognition.
‘May
I help you Thaye [mother]? You seem searching for something here,’ she heard a
beggar’s voice from the entrance to a mall.
‘Anand
Vinayaka Temple’, she replied, looked up morosely at the beggar; her eyes were
still scanning the street for the temple.
‘Anand
Vinayaka Temple’! The beggar exclaimed, his voice drawled, eyes became somber.
After a long pause, he said: ‘Thaye, you can’t see the temple. It was
demolished years back, razed down to widen the road. They are keeping the
Vinayaka idol in another temple.’ He paused again and asked her: ‘Where’re you
staying, Thaye?’
‘Minerva
Hotel,’ her voice trailed off, she stood frozen with shock and bewilderment.
‘OMG!
That was the hotel built on the debris of the AVT.’ The beggar now looked
deeply into her eyes. ‘Aren’t you then staying over the erstwhile abode of a
god?’ the beggar now laughed impishly and moved away from her in quick steps.
She
stood flabbergasted, felt a sense of guiltiness squeezing her heart. A quick
flurry of thoughts numbed her body, and a broken mind told her that she had
committed a sin by staying a place which was once her Vinayaka temple. She
wasted no time, retreated to the hotel, checked out hurriedly and deposited
herself in a cheap lodging house.
A
crimson ball, the sun was calling it quits and slipping into the sea when she
reached the seashore. Earlier, she didn’t choose the straight road to the
coastal area, but preferred to walk down to the seashore through narrow lanes
and alleys, which were very familiar to her and they still had the print of her
feet in tact. While walking, she could discern that the whole town was
breathing a new air of change and development. Even its lanes and alleys did
not reflect even the vestiges of the glorious past. A becoming, and
high-profile town, it had the waves of development lashing at it constantly,
making bonfires of all the cherished old monuments like the AVT.
The
seashore too was not at its old splendor. She saw the sea had rebounded a few
yards from the shore and the reason was the recent Tsunami. The sea with its
foam crusted waves was no longer the old green canvas, it had turned grey,
having got itself bedraggled by the effluents that were being pumped into it by
those industries mushroomed all over the town.
She
retreated to the town piecing together a breaking mind; betook herself to the
places which, she faintly hoped, would retain its old ambiance and charm- where
she could happily hug her past. People she saw and met on the roads looked
strange with no homely airs. They seemed to have no belongingness to the town
where they were eking out their livelihood. The ongoing industrial development,
she realized with a tinge of regret, must have brought people to the town from
far and near. She heard a medley of dialects spoken around her and found the
local culture unabashedly sleeping with the alien one.
She
went to the area where her house was once located, but couldn’t meet a single
known soul over there. When she asked an old man about the whereabouts of those
who were residing there once, he curtly told her to look out for them in the
cemetery. When she got onto the side of her old school, it wasn’t there having
had the fate meted out to the AVT. A grand multiplex stood elegantly over the
place which was once her school. For the first time she felt like a stranger in
her home town.
Mid-night.
Dark-hewn Universe fell into an abyss of silence. She looked out through the
window from her suit. The town was dazzling and glittering, invaded by floods
of lights. She was crestfallen. Her disoriented mind was in revolt not being
able to find out her roots and kiss her past. She took out her laptop from its
sleeve, sent a mail to her husband:
‘hi,
dear,
am
today winding up my trip here. i do it with reluctance and regret. the town is
not mine. it had long back stumbled into a sort of anarchy after swallowing up
all the old monuments, old tranquility and the social atmosphere. The erstwhile
mellowed, magnificent face of my home town is not found anywhere. it seems to
be an evolving city, fully commercialized; its contours not in place. in this
wild jungle of modernity, am like a mother lost her child in kumbh mela.
i
came here to embrace my past. but, this town, built on the debris of old
heritage, has no past; it cherishes only in its present and dreams about more
future anarchy. briefly, i feel i don’t belong here. the town can never be my
own. it had razed down my moorings and dreams. i won’t come here again. i know
that the only way i will ever see it is in my memory.
bye
darling. tc. convey my ‘hi’ to mom and kids,
with
love,
anusha.
***
The
Chennai-bound bus moved slowly out of its bay, would bounce forward only when
reaching the National High Way. It was not crowded, having a few passengers on
its board. ‘Who, the moron, would undertake a bus journey and that too for
sixteen hours on end under the scorching sun’, she thought. Reclining on her
seat comfortably and resting her head on the head-rest, she closed her eyes,
determined not take even a last glimpse of the monster town, once her paradise.
She
could only close her eyes, but, pitifully, not able to blink away her tears.
[Concluded]
Image Courtesy:
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