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A Suitable Boy

Vikram Seth


  He greeted Mahesh Kapoor with a mere ‘Good morning, Sir,’ and Maan, whom he had not expected to see, with a hello.

  Mahesh Kapoor, who was still used to being addressed by his erstwhile title, looked a little closely at Sandeep Lahiri.

  ‘Yes?’ he asked abruptly.

  ‘Quite a pleasant day—’

  ‘Have you simply come to pay your respects?’ asked Mahesh Kapoor.

  ‘Oh, no, Sir,’ said Sandeep Lahiri, horrified by the thought.

  ‘You have not come to pay your respects?’ asked Mahesh Kapoor.

  ‘Well, not not to—but, well, I’ve come for a little help and advice, Sir. I heard you had just arrived here, and so I thought—’

  ‘Yes, yes—’ Mahesh Kapoor was walking on, and Sandeep Lahiri was following him on the narrow divider, rather unsteadily.

  Sandeep Lahiri sighed, and plunged into his question. ‘It is like this, Sir. The government has authorized us—us SDOs, that is—to collect money from the public—voluntary donations—for a small celebration on Independence Day, which is—well—just a few days away now. Does the Congress Party traditionally have any particular hold on these funds?’

  The words ‘Congress Party’ struck an angry chord in Mahesh Kapoor’s breast. ‘I have nothing to do with the Congress Party,’ he said. ‘You are well aware of the fact that I am no longer a Minister.’

  ‘Yes, Sir,’ said Sandeep Lahiri. ‘But I thought—’

  ‘You had better ask Jha, he virtually runs the District Congress Committee. He can speak for the Congress.’

  Jha was the Chairman of the Legislative Council, an old Congressman who had caused Sandeep Lahiri much trouble already, ever since the SDO had arrested his nephew for hooliganism and affray. Jha, whose ego required him to interfere in every decision of the administration, was the cause of half of Sandeep Lahiri’s problems.

  ‘But Mr Jha is—’ began Sandeep Lahiri.

  ‘Yes, yes, ask Jha. I have nothing to do with it.’

  Sandeep Lahiri sighed again, then said:

  ‘On another problem, Sir—’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘I know that you are no longer Minister of Revenue, and that this is not a direct concern of yours, but, Sir, the increase in the number of evictions of tenants after the Zamindari Act was passed—’

  ‘Who says it is not my concern?’ asked Mahesh Kapoor, turning around and nearly bumping into Sandeep Lahiri. ‘Tell me who says that?’ If there was one subject that cut Mahesh Kapoor to the quick, it was this unspeakable side effect of his pet legislation. Peasants were being evicted from their homes and lands all over the country, wherever Zamindari Abolition Bills were being or had been passed. In almost every case the intention of the zamindar was to show that the land was and always had been under his direct cultivation, and that no one other than him had any rights in it at all.

  ‘But, Sir, you just said—’

  ‘Never mind what I just said. What are you doing about the problem?’

  Maan, who had been walking behind Sandeep Lahiri, had also stopped. At first he looked at his father and his friend, and enjoyed their mutual discomfiture. Then, looking upwards at the great cloudy sky that merged with the far horizon, he thought of Baitar and Debaria, and sobered up.

  ‘Sir, the scale of the problem defeats the imagination. I cannot be everywhere at once.’

  ‘Start an agitation,’ said Mahesh Kapoor.

  Sandeep Lahiri’s weak chin dropped. That he, as a civil servant, should start any kind of agitation was unthinkable—and it was amazing that an ex-Minister had suggested it. On the other hand, his sympathy with the evicted peasants, dispossessed and destitute as they were, had forced him to speak to Mahesh Kapoor, who was popularly seen as their champion. It had been his secret hope that Mahesh Kapoor himself might stir things up once he realized the scope of their distress.

  ‘Have you talked to Jha?’ asked Mahesh Kapoor.

  ‘Yes, Sir.’

  ‘And what does he say?’

  ‘Sir, it is no secret that Mr Jha and I do not see eye to eye. What distresses me is likely for that very reason to delight him. And since he gets a large part of his funds from the landlords—’

  ‘All right, all right,’ said Mahesh Kapoor. ‘I’ll think about it. I have just arrived here. I have had hardly any time to ascertain things—to talk to my constituents—’

  ‘Your constituents, Sir?’ Sandeep Lahiri looked delighted that Mahesh Kapoor should be thinking of fighting from the Rudhia subdivision seat instead of from his regular urban constituency.

  ‘Who can tell, who can tell?’ said Mahesh Kapoor in sudden good humour. ‘All this is very premature. Now that we are at the house, have some tea.’

  Over tea, Sandeep and Maan got a chance to talk. Maan was disappointed to learn that there were no immediate prospects of a hunt. Sandeep had a distaste for hunting, and organized a hunt only when his duties demanded it.

  Luckily, from his point of view, they no longer did. With the rains, poor though they were proving to be this year, the natural food chain had revived and the wolf menace had subsided. Some villagers, however, attributed their greater security to the personal intercession of the SDO with the wolves. This, together with his clear goodwill towards the people under his care, his effective on-the-site methods of determining the facts of a case in the course of his judicial duties (even if it meant holding court under a village tree), his fairness in revenue matters, his refusal to countenance those illegal evictions that came to his notice, and his firm hold on law and order in his subdivision, had made Sandeep Lahiri a popular figure in the area. His sola topi was, however, still an object of mockery for some of the younger people.

  After a while Sandeep took permission to leave. ‘I have an appointment with Mr Jha, Sir, and he is not someone who cares to be kept waiting.’

  ‘About the evictions,’ continued the ex-Minister of Revenue, ‘I would like to see a list for this area.’

  ‘But, Sir—’ began Sandeep Lahiri. He was thinking that he had no such list, and wondering whether he should, ethically speaking, part with it even if he had.

  ‘However inadequate, however incomplete,’ said Mahesh Kapoor, and got up to escort the young man to the door before he could mention some new scruple that had occurred to him.

  14.3

  Sandeep Lahiri’s visit to Jha’s office was a fiasco.

  Jha, as an important political figure, a friend of the Chief Minister, and the Chairman of the Upper House of the state legislature, was used to being consulted by the SDO on all important matters. Lahiri on the other hand saw no need to consult a party leader on matters of routine administration. He had not very long ago been at university, where he had drunk deeply of the general principles of constitutional law, the separation of the party and the state, and liberalism a la Laski. He tried to keep local politicians at arm’s length.

  A year in his post at Rudhia, however, had convinced him that there was no getting around direct summonses by senior political leaders. When Jha was foaming, he would have to go. He treated such visits as he would the outbreak of local pestilence: as something unforeseeable and unwelcome, but which necessitated his presence. If it was a drain on his time and his nerves, it was part of the penumbra of his job.

  It would have been too much to expect the fifty-five-year-old Jha to come to the young man’s office, though strictly speaking that was what the proprieties required. But out of a sense of what was due to age rather than to the Congress Party, the SDO went to visit him instead. Sandeep Lahiri was used to Jha’s rudeness, so he had come prepared with a sort of silly-ass look that hid what he was really thinking. On one occasion, when Jha had not offered him a seat—apparently because of absent-mindedness, but more probably to impress his underlings of his superiority over the local representative of the state—Lahiri had, equally absent-mindedly, helped himself to one after a few minutes, smiling weakly and benevolently at Jha.

  Jha, however, was in a genial mood to
day. He was smiling broadly, his white Congress cap askew on his huge head.

  ‘You also sit, you also sit,’ he told Sandeep. They were alone, and there was no one who needed to be impressed.

  ‘Thank you, Sir,’ said Sandeep, relieved.

  ‘Have some tea.’

  ‘Thank you, Sir, I normally would, but I have just had some.’

  The conversation circled, then alit.

  ‘I have seen the circular that has been distributed,’ said Jha.

  ‘Circular?’

  ‘About the fundraising for Independence Day.’

  ‘Ah, yes,’ said Sandeep Lahiri. ‘I was wondering if I might ask for your help with that. If you, Sir, respected as you are, were to encourage people to contribute, it would have a considerable effect. We could collect a substantial amount, and put on a good show—distribute sweets, feed the poor and so on. In fact, Sir, I am counting on your help.’

  ‘And I am counting on your help,’ said Jha, with a broad smile. ‘That is why I have called you.’

  ‘My help?’ said Sandeep, smiling helplessly and warily.

  ‘Yes, yes. You see, Congress also has plans for Independence Day, and we will take half the funds you collect, and use them for a separate display—a very good display to help the people and so on, you see. So that is what I expect. The other half you use as you like,’ he added generously. ‘Naturally, I will encourage people to contribute.’

  This was precisely what Sandeep had feared. Though neither the older nor the younger man referred to it now, a couple of Jha’s henchmen had made overtures of the kind to Sandeep a few days earlier; the proposal had gone entirely against his grain, and he had told them so. Now he continued to smile in a silly way. But his silence distressed the politician.

  ‘So, then, I will expect half the funds. Good?’ he said, a little anxiously. ‘We will need the money soon, we will need a couple of days to organize things, and you have not yet begun your collection.’

  ‘Well—’ said Sandeep, and threw up his hands in a gesture that implied that if matters were at his discretion, he would have been delighted to give the entire sum he collected to Jha to do with as he pleased, but that, alas, the universe had been cruelly disposed to prevent him from receiving that pleasure.

  Jha’s face darkened.

  ‘You see, Sir,’ said Sandeep, moving his hands around freely in curves of helplessness, ‘my hands are tied.’

  Jha continued to stare, then exploded.

  ‘What do you mean?’ he almost shouted. ‘No hands are tied. Congress says that no hands are tied. Congress will untie your hands.’

  ‘Sir, it is like this—’ began Sandeep Lahiri.

  But Jha did not let him continue. ‘You are a servant of the government,’ said Jha fiercely, ‘and the Congress Party runs the government. You will do as we tell you.’ He adjusted the white cap on his head and hitched up his dhoti under the table.

  ‘Mmm,’ said Sandeep Lahiri in a non-committal voice, donning a frown as perplexed and silly as his smile.

  Realizing that he was making no headway, Jha decided on a conciliatory and persuasive tack. ‘Congress Party is the party of Independence,’ he said. ‘Without Congress there would be no Independence Day.’

  ‘True, true, very true,’ said the Sub-Divisional Officer, nodding his head in gratified agreement. ‘The party of Gandhi,’ he added.

  This comment caused geniality to flood back into Jha’s ample frame.

  ‘So we understand each other?’ he said, eagerly.

  ‘I hope, Sir, that we always will—that no misunderstanding can ever make its way into our relations,’ replied Sandeep Lahiri.

  ‘We are two bullocks of one yoke,’ said Jha dreamily, thinking of the Congress election symbol. ‘Party and Government pulling together.’

  ‘Mmm,’ said Sandeep Lahiri, the dangerously silly smile appearing again on his face in order to mask his Laskian doubts.

  Jha frowned. ‘How much do you think you will collect?’ he asked the young man.

  ‘I don’t know, Sir, I haven’t done this sort of collecting before.’

  ‘Let us say, five hundred rupees. So we will get two hundred and fifty, you will get two hundred and fifty—and everyone will be satisfied.’

  ‘Sir, you see, I am in a difficult position,’ said Sandeep Lahiri, biting the bullet.

  This time Jha said nothing, simply staring at the presumptuous young fool.

  ‘If I give you some of the money,’ continued Sandeep Lahiri, ‘the Socialist Party will want some, the KMPP—’

  ‘Yes, yes, I know you have visited Mahesh Kapoor. Did he ask for money?’

  ‘No, Sir—’

  ‘Then what is the problem?’

  ‘But, Sir, to be fair—’

  ‘Fair!’ Jha could not mask his contempt for the word.

  ‘To be fair, Sir, we would have to give an equal amount to all these parties—to the Communist Party, to the Bharatiya Jan Sangh, to the Ram Rajya Parishad, to the Hindu Mahasabha, to the Revolutionary Socialist Party—’

  ‘What!’ burst out Jha. ‘What?’ He swallowed. ‘What? You are comparing us to the Socialist Party?’ He hitched up his dhoti once again.

  ‘Well, Sir—’

  ‘To the Muslim League?’

  ‘Certainly, Sir, why not? The Congress is just one of many parties. In this respect they are all the same.’

  Jha, utterly outraged and nonplussed, the image of the Muslim League spinning like a Divali firework through his head, glared at Sandeep Lahiri.

  ‘You equate us with the other parties?’ he asked, his voice trembling with anger that was almost certainly unfeigned.

  Sandeep Lahiri was silent.

  ‘In that case,’ continued Jha, ‘I will show you. I will show you what the Congress means. I will make sure that you are not able to raise any funds. Not one paisa will you be able to get. You will see, you will see.’

  Sandeep did not say anything.

  ‘Now I have nothing to say,’ continued Jha, his right hand gripping a light-blue glass egg that acted as a paperweight. ‘But we will see, we will see.’

  ‘Well, yes, Sir, we will see,’ said Sandeep, getting up. Jha did not get up from his chair. Turning at the door Sandeep aimed his weak smile at the furious Congressman in a final attempt at goodwill. The Congressman did not smile back.

  14.4

  Sandeep Lahiri, deciding that there was not much time to spare, and fearing that Jha was quite likely right in his estimate of his fund-gathering abilities, went that afternoon to the marketplace in Rudhia dressed in his khaki shirt and shorts, and with his pith helmet on his head. A small crowd gathered around him because it was not obvious what he was doing there and because, in any case, the visit of the SDO was a notable event.

  When a couple of shopkeepers asked him what they could do for him, Sandeep Lahiri said, ‘I am collecting funds for the Independence Day celebration, and have been authorized to ask the public for contributions. Would you like to contribute something?’

  The shopkeepers looked at each other, and simultaneously, as if by previous consultation, each took out a five-rupee note. Lahiri was known to be an honest man and had used no pressure of any kind, but it was probably best to contribute, they thought, when he asked them to, even if it was to be spent on a government-sponsored event.

  ‘Oh, but that’s too much,’ said the SDO. ‘I think I should set a maximum of one rupee per person. I don’t want people to contribute more than they can afford.’

  Both shopkeepers, very pleased, pocketed their five-rupee notes and offered him one-rupee coins instead. The SDO looked at the coins, and then absent-mindedly put them in his pocket.

  The news spread through the marketplace that the SDO himself was asking for money for Independence Day, that it was going to feed children and the poor, that there was no duress and that he had set a maximum of one rupee for each contribution. This news, together with his personal popularity, worked like magic. As he strolled casually thr
ough the lanes of Rudhia, Sandeep—who hated making speeches in his flawed Hindi and felt awkward about the whole business of asking for money—was besieged by smiling contributors, some of whom had heard that Jha was opposed to their SDO’s fund-gathering campaign. Sandeep found himself reflecting that in these early years of Independence, local Congressmen had already—through their venality, self-importance and blatant influence-peddling—made themselves quite unpopular, and that the people’s sympathy was entirely on his side in any struggle with the politicians. If he had stood for an election against Jha, he would probably, like most young SDOs in their fiefs, have won. Meanwhile, Jha’s henchmen, who had come out quickly and in force to try to persuade people to give money for the Congress celebration and not for the government one, ran into a wave of popular resistance. Some people who had already deposited a rupee into Sandeep’s kitty decided to contribute once again, and Sandeep could do nothing to stop them.

  ‘No, Sir, this is from my wife, and this is from my son,’ said one triple contributor.

  When his pockets were full of coins, Sandeep took off his famous sola topi, emptied his pockets into it, and used it as a bowl for further contributions. From time to time he mopped his forehead. Everyone was delighted. Money rained into his hat: some people gave him two annas, some four, some eight, some a rupee. All the urchins of the marketplace formed a processional tail behind him. Some shouted, ‘SDO Sahib ki jai!’ Others stared at the treasury that was building up in his hat—more coins than they had ever seen in one place—and took bets on how much he would gather.

  It was a hot day, and Sandeep paused occasionally for breath on the ledge of a shop.

  Maan, who had driven into town, saw the crowd and waded into it to see what the matter was.

  ‘What are you up to?’ he asked Sandeep.

  Sandeep sighed. ‘Enriching myself,’ he said.

  ‘I wish I found it so easy to make money,’ said Maan. ‘You look exhausted. Here, let me help you.’ And he took the sola topi from him and started handing it around for contributions.