C3 Olden days

On a dense morning on Friday, 13th of September 2012, Aastha shares her happiness with her mother, Rita, who often held ‘untying knots of everyday life is better than an idle one’.

Rita hailed from a poor Sindhi family of Prayag. Like all mothers, she has been living her life for her children. She has been the only pillar of strength due to which the family could cross the tides of bad times. Problems are never too big. Sheer patience can overcome it. She had a belief that when the storm blows, one must not stand and face the storm but lie low for the storm to pass.

Recollecting the olden times, Aastha continues–"Do you remember your old times, mother? How badly we have suffered?"

“How can anybody forget those times? Rita continued. “It pains me to relate such incidents where a soul cries for justice, liberation, peace, and a right to life. One cannot tolerate injustice, unnecessary harassment, domination, slavery, and mental torture, especially in a joint family”.

You are speaking the truth, mother. I remember how much I have hated my grandmother,” cried Aastha.

“Why did you hate her?”

Don’t look at me like this, Mother.

Rita smiled and continued –“The only irritant in your grandmother’s eye was my poor social background. They never treated me as a newly wedded bride upon my marriage, but as a free maid, a slave for life. I was a slave to everyone, including your father, who was amongst those who substituted love for dominance.”

Why did Dad ill-treat you? It is such an irony. I often wonder how the outsiders looked upon you with respect while the family took you for granted. Everyone in the family used you - emotionally, physically, mentally,” cried Aastha.

“Sometimes, I wonder where you would vent up all your anger. Many times, I was a victim of your wrath. It disturbed my emotional and mental frame of mind immensely. I was bereft of your love and affection. You always held my uncle in a good light despite his evil endeavors and always maintained that he was not evil enough to take such a strong measure of creating havoc in our lives. His aides - my aunt and his close friend, Mr. Amit Gupta, who was an accountant in the partnership firm aired his evil intentions.

With his aides, he cheated his brothers, for he wanted us to be his slaves, with no wishes and rights of our own. He could never tolerate our opposition and, hence, the big change.

Your teachings of Simple living and high thinking gradually became a part of our life.

In the long run, the shortage of money and the resultant showdown seemed frustrating to us but made us realize many things. We realized that the world is a temporary union of the haves and have nots and one cannot remove the man-made differences overnight. These differences are harsh lessons that have to be lived with every time. The greed of money or ego or vanity of my uncle, whatever is the reason, affected our lives. It made us think about the finances in a certain way.”

“It was not only about money,” added Rita.

“Then what was it all about?” queried Aastha

“Cheating, torture, slavery, and above all, humiliation,” cried Rita

“I clearly remember how your uncle conspired against your father and filled the office space with all unnecessary suit material to be supplied at fake costs, creating trouble for your father. He compelled his brothers to leave the office so that he would exploit all the assets. Formally, the partners (the three brothers) prepared minutes of the meeting for the retirement of the partners, wherein they stated they would give a share to the retiring partners as per the tentative division of share done for all the partners in the meeting. The partners would get the amount of share as provided in the first balance sheet to be prepared by the firm after retirement. This made up the germ of the dispute in the future, as your uncle cheated us by siphoning our funds and not showing a correct amount in the balance sheet, fabricating the balance sheet.

They did not give us complete papers of separation. We were not even made aware of what was going on. We were very naïve. You became a lawyer and apprised us of the situation.

Your father couldn’t do much except take his share. We enjoyed the interest receivable out of the share kept as a loan with the firm”.

“But mother, don’t you think it all starts from our wealth? Very few can make their food. Only the rich get the cream of life”, cried Aastha. “I remember how I completed my school and college education partly because of the interest we received from the share and partly from the loan taken from banks and some of my relatives on the maternal side. My education was thus expensive and truly hard-earned. We separated from the joint family in 2000 and were partially independent to lead our lives. It was the biggest change for all of us. However, every month we had to beg and call up my uncle several times before he would send us the money, our money, to us. The money was also not sufficient for the whole family. There being many mouths to feed, but no hands to work”.

“You are right in your thinking,” replied Rita. “Our relatives who favored your uncle never wanted to see my family grow. It was out of such jealousy that once your father’s sister pointed out to me, “My daughter could never clear the entrance exam of law, then how could your daughter clear the exam”. To this, I did not reply but merely gave a smile. You were madly in love with LAW and pursued it with firm determination. It was the only savior and hope for us, which we realized very late. The process has been long. But you became a lawyer.

We had many apprehensions about you undergoing legal education. Some of which had something to do with fees. We also had some fear about your living alone in a distant place and staying away from the family”.

“I remember, for the first time, I had to stay away from my family. It was even more difficult for me to leave my family as I would live alone in a distant city, whereas my family had the togetherness of each other. I knew I had to be tough and keep going. It was that day, and it is now when the seeds sown in my past bore the fruits today. I passed the law course with flying colors. That flight took five years to complete, though...”

“You have proved your mettle once again and secured a good job for yourself. Congratulations”.

“Thank You, mother”.

Aastha puts down the receiver. She receives a call from the Learner Coaching Institute -

“Mam, we have arranged three lectures for you tomorrow. We will provide the details in the institute.” Saying so, they ended the conversation.

As for Aastha, she expressed her gratitude to the entire universe, gods, goddesses, humans, even demons. Thanking the almighty for all good and bad things, she goes off to sleep. However, fixing her mind to a point in meditation for a long time was difficult for her. She did not even try.

She wakes up after an hour. It was 3 am. “Devil’s hour,” she thought. It is not a good thing to wake up now. Why do I get up around this time only? I don’t feel nice. Oh! My Gosh, what is happening? I can feel somebody is there. Somebody is watching me.