TRANSLATED FROM THE BENGALI BY SARBAN BANDYOPADHYAY
Only a single tree stands in this enormous field. It’s a banyan. Wherever else you look, you’ll only see the expanse of the field. At a great distance, villages lay far-flung from each other. Across both sides of the border, it is now an unbroken paddy field. The tree is massive. Its shade, its shelter, encloses an area of considerable size. This is the place where we stop to rest with the bulls after walking for five miles under the sun or post-monsoon rains. The bulls cannot run away because they are tied in pairs. Neither can they walk fast. They stay tied like this for many days. This is what God seems to have decreed for their fate. Ever since they are brought to the market of the Shiva temple, or perhaps even before that, when they are brought there from Katihar on trucks, or who knows, perhaps even before that, when they end up in the hands of the contractor via brokers and wholesalers from the rural corners of Haryana, Uttar Pradesh or Bihar, perhaps that is when they are paired, with ropes around their two necks tied in common knots. Hanip had taught me that even if you untie them now, they would not step away from each other.
I hadn’t believed him. I had protested, “How is that possible! They stay in such pain for so long like that!”
Then Hanip had shared how last year he had been driving a pair of bulls from Chouddo Mile to Parghata. One of the two beasts was in such a sorry state that Hanip had to summon all the energy he had to make it walk. He would have carried it on his back if he could, as calves are sometimes carried. But one could not carry a full-grown, large bull like that. Therefore, he was in deep trouble. The bull kept sitting down on the ground. As a result, the other one fell sick as well.
“Now, see here. At one point the first bull grew so weak that it lay down. It began to vomit blood from its throat with a coughing sound. Seeing it like that I removed its tying rope. Otherwise it would have died with that rope around its neck.”
Then the bull had died. Hanip was in a mess. What was he to do with the dead one, and what with the living one! Then he decided that he would leave the dead one by the roadside and take the living one to some safe place and make arrangements.
That was when it had happened. Hanip exclaimed, “Oh Allah, it wouldn’t move! The living one wouldn’t leave the dead one by any means!” It was a complete mess.
Escorting the bulls to the banyan tree in the field was one job. Then at the right time, when the Border Security Force would open a “line,” the beasts had to be delivered to the other side in pairs. That was another job.
We have been sitting under the tree since yesterday afternoon. Myself, Hanip, Jugal, and Bikhna. There are eight or ten other people as well. The four of us just belong to a team. However, no such thing as a team can be said to properly exist around here. The word is in fact meaningless, because everyone does the same thing. But still, Hanip, Jugal, Bikhna and I, we do form some sort of a team; and within it, me and Hanip on the one hand and Jugal and Bikhna on the other are tied in pairs, just like those bulls.
We have been here since yesterday afternoon. The BSF has not focused their torches on us even once through the night. Focusing their torches means opening a “line.” When they open a “line,” we cross the border with the paired bulls and reach a different location one and a half miles away. That is where the bulls change hands. And then we return.
But yesterday the BSF didn’t open a “line.” Neither did they focus a torch nor did anyone come with an update. As a result, we could not close our eyes for a moment. We and the cattle were hungry and tired. We were on the edge and annoyed. On top of that it had rained once in the meantime. A slow drizzle prolonged in the warm, humid post-monsoon night. It’s an event so annoying that it can goad your mind to do evil things.
Therefore, we sat through the night driving away mosquitoes and leeches, and snakes and mice. Nobody could guess when the BSF might open the line. Nobody came to us explaining why they weren’t opening it.
Hanip was the cleverest among us. He was very sharp. He said there could be a few possible reasons for this to happen. The worst reason was that the Eighty-Four might have come. Among all their battalions, the Eighty-Four had the worst scoundrels. When the Eighty-Four comes, the “line” is closed. Closing the “line” means stopping the crossing of borders, closing business, and closing all transactions among all the neighborhoods, villages, and towns around here. It even puts a stop to you sleeping with your wife. Even food stops, so sleep is a far cry. The Eighty-Four had come to this sector five years ago. They stay on good terms with no one. They don’t collect weekly extortion money from anyone. They make no arrangements with anyone. They do not wait at the post office at Mohini from early morning to send money to their families.
No personnel of theirs stands at the four-point crossing with a pen and notebook in his hands and his sten gun lying by his side, keeping track of which goods were brought by whom and who took what away. Who came hither and who went thither. They don’t do these things. Hanip doesn’t know why. Don’t they need money? When their peers make thousands upon thousands and send it home to expand their properties, don’t they feel like doing it too? Who knows? Hanip doesn’t understand such complicated things. And I am only a beginner.
Hanip also said that one or two people get shot when the Eighty-Four reigns. Hanip’s elder brother Iqbal had been shot and killed by the Eighty-Four five years ago. That was also a messy event, the likes of which you want to forget but cannot.
Iqbal had been jobless for over two weeks. His whole family was on the brink of starvation. At that point Iqbal had taken a risk by taking only five kilos of cumin from Golap Saw’s shop. It was indeed a risk because the “line” was, obviously, closed. Twelve miles away, the town was desperate for a supply of hilsa. Therefore, Iqbal had taken a basketful of the fish.
The Eighty-Four had called “Halt” to him from a distance of five hundred yards. It was the Madrasi man of the battalion, whose name was Thanu.
Iqbal was not ready to be taken to the camp to be hung by his feet. Besides, images of his starving family members were imprinted in his brain. He had done a calculation of five hundred yards. He had thought that Thanu would not shoot for a mere basketful of hilsa. The safety of the walls of Jiten Sarkar and Shibu Sarkar’s house was a mere twenty feet away. If he could manage that distance, Thanu would not be able to reach him.
But they did not know Thanu back then. In fact, nobody knew him before that event. It was shortly afterwards that Thanu had chased a running bus on a jeep and shot and overturned the bus. The bus was carrying stuff. The culprit was the same, Eighty-Four.
Or there could have been a problem in the system of opening the “line.” Golap Saw, Bhuban Sarkar et al. had failed to properly set the “line.” Or they might have sent more stuff to the BSF than required by the contract, and thus by fooling them had jeopardized the system of opening the “line.” As long as the talks are settled and the prices are set, the “line” would not open.
Or again if there were problems in Dhaka, Calcutta, Kanpur, Lahore or Karachi, it could affect the “line.” It would then require special measures of precaution.
Therefore, we could not close our eyes through the night. Our bodies became soaked and mushy after the long drizzle and humid drafts. There was a pit of bitter jute nearby. There were lots of caterpillars there. Hundreds of thousands of them. They were venturing out in every direction, climbing along one’s limbs and to one’s head. No matter how alert you were, you couldn’t help squeezing a caterpillar that had gotten onto your skin with your fingers. You won’t be able to remember that the thing crawling over your skin was a caterpillar.
This is how the night ended; the sky changed its pattern three or four times and ultimately cleared up in the morning. Then we discussed with the others and decided that two or four people would stay back here, while the rest would go ahead, collect news and have some food before returning. In two or three turns everyone would have their stomachs full. So, we asked Bikhna to stay back while we took our trip.
The thing was that Bikhna was a tribesman; bluffing him was easy.
Twenty or twenty-five pairs of bulls had already descended into the field. They were sonorously munching on the freshly verdant, post-monsoon crop of paddy. We could do nothing about it. The beasts had not even had a drink of water through yesterday. So, we told Bikhna, “Let them be. There’s nothing to be done. Just make sure none of them goes too far out.”
Then we went to the market at Mohini. The market was already down. Even this early in the morning. Everyone knew that the “line” was closed yesterday. Only we, the marooned idiots, didn’t know. Most of the shops hadn’t yet opened. But on other days they opened right at daybreak. The scoundrels had already set up their gambling table of cards under the sheds at the back of the open market. They made a racket when they saw us.
“Today’s the day we test your luck, Hanipa. Didn’t show up after you won the hundred rupees the other day. Don’t go overboard like Iqbal now; or it’d fall on us to sleep with Syeda. You won’t have no more brothers left, will you?”
Hanip snapped, “Sons of bitches, if you got nothing to do, why don’t you go grind your father’s balls? Leave us alone in the bloody morning!”
The scoundrels cackled in a synchronous wave of laughter. The thing was that it was a soft spot for Hanip. He didn’t want to hear about these things at any cost. Thinking about them meant inevitably getting sad. Iqbal hadn’t died at once when he was shot. He had died after suffering for five months. The bullet had lodged in a bone in his waist. The doctor at the health centre at Mohini had failed to take it out. Iqbal had died rotting and festering. Hanip and Syeda had tended to him for five months. At last in winter Iqbal’s wound began to give off such a horrible stench that Syeda found it increasingly difficult to sleep beside him. She often used to slip under Hanip’s blanket and burlap to avoid the stench.
Those were the last days of Iqbal. The doctor at the hospital had prescribed a few tablets which he took and lay down in a sort of partial oblivion. His eyes used to stay open. But it didn’t seem like his thoughts and senses were intact. In the dark and under the cover of Hanip’s blanket, Syeda first saved herself from the cold, and then from herself. This was because a giant millipede had made its home inside her abdomen. This is how she used to feel at the time. Hanip had told me all of it. Syeda used to weep in the dark. The two of them together used to pray to Allah for Iqbal’s death. But it was for no other reason but to relieve him from the terrible pain he was going through. It was because neither Hanip, nor Syeda, nor Iqbal had a way out of this.
Jugal was anemic and pale. Healthy people of his race have a yellowish complexion, but he was woefully skinny and weak. He spread out a gamchha on a chabutra, lay down on it and said, “You guys go. I can’t walk any more.” He fell asleep immediately.
The two of us then went to Abinash-da’s tea stall and sat down. We drank hot tea and ate foul bread from Motin’s bakery. As we ate, we saw three big, olive-colored vans come from the direction of the headquarters and head east. The vans contained new faces. Two more vans followed a little later. I looked at Hanip, who looked at Abinash da, the tea seller.
“Eighty-Four?”
“Why, don’t you know? Where have you been? The market’s been down since yesterday. No income. You two are my first customers this morning. I have to move my business.”
I tried cheering him up, “Hey, people would always need tea and breakfast.”
Abinash said, “They would. But they wouldn’t pay for it. Where would they get the money?”
Hanip was just sitting quietly. A horror was unfolding before him. A shiny olive-colored Jeep whooshed by the road. It had a small flag set in its front. It drove so smoothly that the flag appeared to be made of a plate of steel. Then Hanip whispered, “Shit. I really need some money now! Syeda is big with a child. For the first time in so many years! We don’t have much time.”
Abinash said, “Hanip, remember what I said. Let me know if there’s any work. You are my customers at this shop.”
The work Abinash was talking about was brokerage in the cattle market. Hanip did that sometimes. But it requires investment. Hanip didn’t reply to Abinash, as if he hadn’t even heard him.
At that moment a red motorbike halted in front of the shop. Bhupen, son of our employer, supported himself with one foot on the ground and called to us.
“Keep the goods with you. Collect the charges for provisions from our house.”
Provisions meant cattle feed for the bulls. Bhupen didn’t wait any longer. He vroomed away on his motorbike.
Now the problem was that Hanip and I had to take two pairs of bulls each and sustain them secretly in our houses. This was because Bikhna and Jugal’s houses had never had the arrangements to host bulls.
Therefore, we had to go store the beasts in our houses. Then we set off together. We went to our employer’s house and collected the provisions for the bulls. From there we came to the open market. The scoundrels made a racket again as they saw us. They called out, “When the line’s off, pissing n’ shitting are off too. Come on, Hanip. Try your luck. You’ve been way too lucky lately.”
We went to the back end of the market space. It was not a market day, but a few people had still set up large pots of fermented pochani and distilled chowani liquor for sale. Each of us took two cups of pochani from Basumati, Bikhna’s elder sister. From the taste we understood that it was doja, or twice diluted. We protested, “Why are you cheating? Selling doja?”
She replied, “I’m not cheating. Doja is what I’m selling. Take some more, and you won’t need any lunch.”
We didn’t meddle with Basumati. There had been a big problem with her a year ago. There was this guy called Jatin, Jatin of the Poliyas. Jatin had been drinking with us. While drinking, he had said something to Basumati. We had assumed it was a joke. But none of us had actually heard what he had said. Jatin had said it and Basumati had heard. Then Basumati replied something. Something like a threat. Then she said, “Don’t you have a mother and sisters, you piece of shit! Go flaunt your manhood before them.”
Jatin was still laughing. The fact was that Bikhna’s brother-in-law Jalpa was an ascetic. He sat all day long at the newly made bus stop and smoked pot. He wore only a piece of red loincloth. His hair had matted into a solid, bizarre knot. It rose straight like a brown, conical bamboo sprout above his head. Jalpa also always carried a trident. He claimed that his hair had turned like that in a single night. His hair-knot was the grandest of its kind. Admittedly he had once cut it off his scalp and thrown it into a river. When he had gone to take a bath the next day, the knot had floated back to him.
A scared Jalpa had picked it up and put it back on his head. The knot had reattached at once.
People had another name for Jalpa: the impotent hermit, because your seeds dried up if you smoked so much pot. An impotent man is like a defanged snake. A snake which has lost its venom also loses its will to bite. Jalpa was like that. But it wasn’t the only reason. People had given him this nickname because he was Basumati’s husband. He stayed at the resting spot for passengers all through the winter and the summer— throughout the year, in fact— for most of the time.
If one reflected upon Jalpa’s condition, one’s concerns for Basumati would be justified. Because it wasn’t just anyone; it was Basumati. If you saw her just once, you would drink even the four-time washed water of rice beer, which is worse than doja. And we swear that it would still make you high. Seeing Jalpa like this and Basumati like that, Jatin had assumed that such an imbalance couldn’t exist. He had found the faith that he could set the balance right. He had crossed the line in his spree of jokes, and losing control in the end, had even pulled Basumati by the hand. It is doubtful if he would have done this if he were sober. But he had already almost emptied a large handi of rice beer.
That was enough to make Bikhna and his kin declare war. Armies of Adivasis gathered at the town of Mohini. There were at least ten thousand of them. Eight or ten people from Jatin’s neighborhood got hit by arrows. Jatin and his kin didn’t sit idle. They set fire to about a dozen houses in Bikhna’s village. Several policemen were deployed. Cars full of police arrived. There were a few rounds of firing. It was tremendously lucky for them that nobody got entirely killed that time.
Hanip and I drank the pochani and went to sit among those scoundrels. In fact, now we had nothing to do but play cards. When the line was regular, this is where we played cards. We played cards and kept track of when the line would open. As soon as it did, we made a round trip, or two, or at most three. Then we went back to going high and playing cards. This is how one carried on until one turned into a complete scoundrel or one was put down by Eighty-Four or some other similar battalion. But one round trip earned you more than a whole day’s wage for labour. And if you could use your brain, then even a little bit on top of that. This is how you could try for some savings, and stay alert for a sudden opportunity. Hanip and I have such dreams. If we do get that opportunity somehow, then we hope to own an old truck. Then the futures of Hanip and I, Jugal and Bikhna would be smooth. This was the first and last dream of con-men, which flared up when one drank Basumati’s handmade doja.
We went through rapid losses. Me as well as Hanip. It wasn’t long before our own supplies were exhausted, and we laid our hands on our employer’s funds to feed the bulls. We took a break and went back to Basumati, hoping to regain some luck. Then we saw that the man sitting reclined on the handi close to Basumati was Jatin. He was getting high there.
This was another difficult thing. Jatin was a man of many responsibilities. Sometimes he was a broker at the cattle market, sometimes a wholesaler of raw materials, sometimes a cross-border contractor of some big operation. He had gone into hiding after the problem we spoke of before. When he reemerged, he was unchanged. He would only come to Basumati to get high.
Jatin told Hanip, “The employer had called. The Eighty-Four are staying. The employer wants to sell off his goods. Twenty or twenty-two pairs of boulders. So, what do you say, Hanip, won’t you be with me?”
Boulder meant long-horned western bulls. We called them “boulders” in our line.
Hanip jumped at the opportunity. “Sure, I will. I need money pretty bad.”
*
All the arrangements were made in a day or two. The employer was not going to keep the goods at home. The Eighty-Four would surely get a hint. Therefore, he would release the goods before they could settle down at their posts. Even a loss was welcome. On the other hand, Nakul Saw, Phani Saw, Joga Agrawal were ready to offer credits. It was money lending for a night. The arrangement was this: take a loan from the lenders and buy a pair of boulders from the employer with it. Then sell the boulders at the market, pay the loan back with interest, and increase your own money. The chance wasn’t bad. Discounting the contingent expenses, you could end up with even three or four hundred rupees if you were lucky.
Hanip asked me, “You’re in, aren’t you?”
I said, “Of course I am. I need money too, and badly. There’s a problem at my sister’s house. The brother-in-law was supposed to get a bicycle. We couldn’t arrange for it yet. That son of a bitch is making an issue of it. You start here. I’ll visit my sister tomorrow and be back in two more days. Then I’ll join you.”
*
I returned from my sister’s after two days. I reasoned with her husband. I said I would give him his bicycle within a month. It wouldn’t be a problem if the boulder business with Hanip went well. Dreams beckon to you at every turn of a con-business. Dreams would call you like the Devil and lure you away.
But when I got down from the bus at Mohini, everything was silent and still. The atmosphere was ominous. Abinash’s tea stall was open but there were no customers.
Abinash offered me a glass of tea and asked, “So haven’t you heard anything?”
“No, I haven’t. What happened?”
“Hanip is gone.”
I dropped the glass.
“How?”
“He was on his way to the market with his boulders. The BSF challenged him on the road. Hanip showed them papers with the Panchayat’s seal. He was going to sell his bulls at the market.
The Eighty-Four didn’t listen to him. It happened right on the road. Eight miles away from the border; the BSF had no right to restrict passage in that area. A crowd gathered. On top of that it was market day. The BSF would take Hanip to camp. The public won’t let them. Moreover, the line was closed. What do people do but smuggle and steal like this? Everyone was already on edge. The BSF got scared and fired random shots. Hanip fell first. He was right in the front, you see. Two more people fell after him.
I heard everything and sat like a statue. Then the first thing that rose before my mind was the expectant belly of Syeda. The scoundrels at the open market did say something like that. One should watch one’s words. What, indeed, would Syeda do now?
Also, read Cold Store by Abhijit Sen Translated from The Bengali by Rituparna Majumder and published in The Antonym:
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