Kahaani

      


       

     A slow slumbering Saturday was once again upon me.  The week had left me exhausted.  The difficulties that had fallen on me, I was too tired to even complain about their unfairness. The loss of trust and betrayal had left a bitter taste in my mouth. As the solitary shaft of the morning light slipped into my room through the creaks in the window, I sat up clumsily, whispering a silent prayer and trying to think of the day ahead. Instead my mind fleeted backwards (Ah! the mind! When will it ever listen to me?!) to the days when things were different, when people were different, when Saturdays were different. I tried not to feel bad about them. I tried not to feel bitter. I tried not to feel terrible. My mind, surprisingly, listened to me for once.


Feeling the menacing morning heat all over my body, I stepped out of my bed wondering whether I should pamper myself with an AC this summer. The heat and the summer reminded me of my year in Arizona! Oh how I loved complaining about its heat! I found it strange, as much as I complained about the intolerable mercury level of the Grand Canyon State of USA, it was not without a touch of fondness. 


I turned the newspaper munching on my break-fast, clearly my mind pre-occupied with a hundred things. These days my mind remains occupied with so many things! I tried to pay attention to the comments on Pranab babu’s budget by the financial pundits. But soon the mind escaped again. Ah! the mind!


I sat staring at my lap-top. I played some music, and soon my room was filled with soothing vibrations. Alone in my room, I felt liberated. I felt a strange satisfaction and a power of conviction. The dark lumbering clouds that filled my mind over the last few days, something deep inside assured me will dissolve soon.  Feeling much lighter and better, I decided for Kahani  in the evening. 


Kahani- I’ve heard enough good things about it to wean me away from my instinctive hesitation for a Bollywood movie. The setting being Calcutta, the gorgeous Vidya Balan being the protagonist, the fast-paced thriller being the theme- all of it sounded like a delicious combination. And as luck would have it I got a good corner seat right at the back when I booked my ticket online.


And what a movie it was! Watching it I soon found myself back in the all so familiar grimy streets of the City of Joy, my own Calcutta!  It is now my seventh year that I am staying away from her. Watching the movie made me realize how deeply I am still connected to her, in spite of my never ending complains and grudges. The noise, the warmth, the rain, the clouds, all felt like an extension of my ownself, which in the din of things I almost forgot. The women wrapped in saris, exactly the way I see my mother wearing it, I felt as if I have known them forever.  The crowded streets, the chai wallahs, the narrow alleys, the glistening faces- all took me back to the time when they were so familiar that  I hardly noticed them. And yes, how can I forget the Durga Puja! The annual advent of the Divine Mother fills the air of Calcutta with a festivity that only a Calcuttan can feel and connect to. The flashing lights, the splendid pandals, the wide-eyed bejeweled idols of Ma Durga, showering un-inhibitedly  her divine benedictions on all her children, the defiant spirit of exhilaration in an otherwise capricious city, all of that came rushing back to me. After all these years.


But what filled my heart, in this season of betrayal and ingratitude is that the power of love is still the strongest. It can fill the spirit with so much resilience, that even the most insurmountable hurdles fizzles away when faced with it. The strength that wells up in the heart, pure and unsullied, what can stand in its way? The inevitability of what is right and goodness to prevail over what is wrong and unjust,  I walked out of the dark theater into the bright multiplex, once again reassured of this faith. I could hear Tagore's immortal lines "Jodi tor daak shune keu na ashe tobe ekla cholo re" (If no one heeds to your call, then walk alone!) as it  floated out of the theater before getting drowned in the cheerful chattering.