A Suitable Boy

  Rasheed, of course, was not there, since it was term-time, but his wife and daughters were staying with his father rather than hers for a few days. Meher and the village urchins and the shock-headed Moazzam were all delighted at Maan’s arrival. He provided even more entertainment than the various black goats tied up to posts and trees around the village that were due to be sacrificed the next day. Moazzam, who had always been fascinated by Maan’s watch, demanded to see it again. Even Mr Biscuit paused in his eating to yell out a triumphant if variant version of the azaan before Baba, furious at his impiety, dealt with him.

  The orthodox Baba, who had told Maan to come back for Bakr-Id but had very much doubted that he would, did not actually smile—but it was very apparent that he was glad to see him. He praised him to his father.

  ‘He is a good boy,’ said Baba, nodding vigorously at Mahesh Kapoor.

  ‘Yes?’ said Mahesh Kapoor.

  ‘Yes, indeed, he is very respectful of our ways. He has won our hearts by his simplicity.’

  Simplicity? thought Mahesh Kapoor, but said nothing.

  That Mahesh Kapoor, the architect of the Zamindari Abolition Act, had come to the village was a great event in itself, and it was also a matter of great consequence that he had arrived in the Nawab Sahib’s jeep. Rasheed’s father had no strong views on politics except if something impinged on his interests: any such view was communism. But Baba, who wielded considerable influence in the surrounding villages, respected Mahesh Kapoor for his resignation from the Congress at about the time that Kidwai had resigned. He also identified, as did many people, with the Nawab Sahib.

  Now, however, he thought—and said as much to Mahesh Kapoor—that the best thing would be for all men of goodwill to rejoin the Congress. Nehru was firmly back in charge, he felt, and with Nehru, more than with anyone else, people of his community felt safe. When Maan mentioned that his father was considering the option of contesting from Salimpur-cum-Baitar, Baba was encouraging.

  ‘But try to get the Congress ticket. The Muslims will vote for Nehru—and so will the chamars. As for the others, who knows: it will depend on events—and how you run your campaign. The situation is very fluid.’

  That was a phrase that Mahesh Kapoor was to hear, read, and use a great deal in the days to come.

  The brahmins and banias of the village came separately to see him as he sat on a charpoy under the neem tree outside Rasheed’s father’s house. The Football was particularly ingratiating. He told Mahesh Kapoor of Baba’s methods of foiling the Zamindari Act by forced evictions (omitting his own attempts in the same direction), and offered to act as Mahesh Kapoor’s lieutenant in the area should he choose to run from there. Mahesh Kapoor, however, was non-committal in his response. He did not much care for the scheming Football; he realized that there were very few brahmin families in Debaria, none in the twin village of Sagal and not many in the villages around; and it was clear to him that the man who mattered most of all was the ancient and energetic Baba. He disliked what he heard about the evictions, but he tried not to dwell on the sufferings he knew they caused. It was difficult to be someone’s guest and prosecutor simultaneously, more particularly if you were hoping to seek their help in the near future.

  Baba asked him a number of questions over tea or sherbet.

  ‘How long will you be conferring on us the honour of your presence?’

  ‘I will have to leave this evening.’

  ‘What? Aren’t you going to stay for Bakr-Id?’

  ‘I can’t. I’ve promised to be in Salimpur. And if it rains, the jeep will be stuck here, perhaps for days. But Maan will be here for Bakr-Id.’ Mahesh Kapoor did not need to mention that if he was sounding out a future fief the subdivisional town of Salimpur, with its concentrated knot of population, was an essential stop, and that his participation there in the Id celebrations would pay rich dividends in the future. Maan had told him that his secular stand was popular in the town.

  The one person who had very mixed feelings about Mahesh Kapoor’s visit was the young Netaji. When he heard that Mahesh Kapoor was in the village, he rushed back from Salimpur on his Harley Davidson. Netaji, who had recently been put up for election to the District Congress Committee, felt that this was an opportunity for contact-making that was too good to be true. Mahesh Kapoor had a name and a following, and, however thinly such silver was beaten into foil, he hoped that some of it might cover him as well. On the other hand, he was no longer the powerful Minister of Revenue but plain Shri Mahesh Kapoor, MLA, a member no longer of the Congress but of a party of uncertain prospects and unmemorable name that even now seemed riven with disagreement about whether to wind itself up. And the acrobatic Netaji, who had his ear to the ground and his finger to the wind, had concrete proof of Mahesh Kapoor’s weakening might and clout. He had heard about Jha’s power in Mahesh Kapoor’s own tehsil of Rudhia, and had imbibed with particular satisfaction the news of the swift transfer of the arrogant English-speaking SDO who had snubbed him so painfully on the platform of Salimpur Station.

  Mahesh Kapoor took a walk around the village in the company of Maan and Baba—as well as Netaji, who forced himself upon them. Mahesh Kapoor appeared to be in an excellent mood; perhaps the respite from Prem Nivas had done him good—or the open air—or Majeed Khan’s singing—or simply the fact that he could see political possibilities in this constituency. They were tailed by a motley gang of village children and a small, black, continually bleating goat that one of the children was driving along the muddy path—a glossy-headed goat, with pointed little horns, thick black eyebrows and mild, sceptical yellow eyes. Everywhere Maan was greeted with friendliness and Mahesh Kapoor with respect.

  The great monsoon sky over the twin villages—indeed, over much of the Gangetic plain—was overcast, and people were worried that it might rain the next day, on Bakr-Id itself, and spoil the festivities. Mahesh Kapoor for the most part managed to avoid any political talk. All that sort of thing could be left to electioneering time. Now he simply made sure that he was recognized. He did namaste or adaab as was appropriate, drank tea, and made small talk.

  ‘Should I go around Sagal as well?’ he asked Baba.

  Baba thought for a second. ‘No, don’t do that. Let the web of gossip do its work.’

  Finally, having made his rounds, Mahesh Kapoor drove off, but not before thanking Baba and saying to Maan:

  ‘Perhaps you and Bhaskar are right. At any rate, even if you didn’t learn much Urdu, you weren’t wasting your time.’

  Maan could not remember the last time his father had praised him. He was extremely pleased, and more than a little surprised. A couple of tears came to his eyes!

  Mahesh Kapoor pretended not to notice, nodded, looked at the sky, and waved in a general way to the gathered populace as the jeep squelched off.

  14.22

  Maan slept in the verandah because of the possibility of rain. He woke up late, but did not find Baba louring angrily over him asking him why he hadn’t been to morning prayer.

  Instead, Baba said: ‘So you’ve got up, I see. Will you be coming to the Idgah?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Maan. ‘Why not?’

  ‘Then you should get ready quickly,’ he said, and patted a fat black goat that was browsing meditatively near the neem tree.

  The others in the family had preceded them, and now Baba and Maan walked across the fields from Debaria to Sagal. The Idgah was located in Sagal; it was part of the school near the lake. The sky was still overcast, but there was also an undercast of light that added brilliance to the emerald colour of the transplanted rice. Ducks were swimming in a paddy field, scrabbling for worms and insects. Everything was fresh and refreshing.

  All around them, approaching the Idgah from different directions, were men, women and children, all dressed in festive attire—new clothes, or—for those who could not afford them—clothes that were spotlessly clean and freshly pressed. They converged on the school from all the surrounding villages, not merely from Debaria and Sa
gal. The men were for the most part dressed in white kurta-pyjamas; but some wore lungis, and some allowed themselves coloured kurtas, though of a sober colour. Maan noticed that their headgear varied from white, close-fitting filigreed caps to black, glossy ones. The women and children wore brightly coloured clothes—red, green, yellow, pink, maroon, blue, indigo, purple. Even under the black or dark-blue burqas worn by most of the women Maan could see the hems of their coloured saris or salwaars, and the attractive anklets and chappals on feet patterned with bright red henna and splashed with the inescapable mud of the monsoon.

  It was while they were walking along the narrow paths that a man, old, thin and hungry-looking, and dressed in nothing but a dirty dhoti, intercepted Baba and, with his hands folded, said in a desperate voice:

  ‘Khan Sahib, what have I done that you should do this to me and to my family? How can we manage now?’

  Baba looked at him, thought for a second, and said: ‘Do you want your legs broken? I don’t care what you say now. Did you think about this when you went to the kanungo to complain?’

  He then kept walking towards Sagal. Maan, however, was so troubled by the man’s look—half of hatred born of betrayal, half of supplication—that he stared at his deeply wrinkled face and tried to recall—as he had with the sarangi player—where he had seen him before.

  ‘What’s the story behind this, Baba?’ he asked.

  ‘Nothing,’ said Baba. ‘He wanted to get his grasping fingers on my land, that’s all.’ It was clear from his voice that he wished to dismiss the subject from his mind.

  As they approached the school, the sounds of a loudspeaker could be heard repeating the praises of God or else telling the people to get ready for the Id prayers, and not to delay too long at the fair. ‘And, ladies, please make yourselves proper; we are about to start; please hurry up, everyone.’

  But it was difficult to get the holiday-making crowd to hurry up. Some people, certainly, were performing their ritual ablutions by the edge of the tank; but most of them were milling around the stalls and the improvised market that had formed just outside the school gates along the length of the earthen embankment. Trinkets, bangles, mirrors, balloons—and, best of all, food of all kinds from alu tikkis to chholé to jalebis extruded spluttering into hot tawas, barfis, laddus, flossy pink candy, paan, fruit—everything that Mr Biscuit could have dreamed of in his least constrained imaginings. Indeed, Mr Biscuit was loitering near a stand with half a barfi in his hand. Meher, who had been given some sweets by her grandfather, was sharing them with other children. Moazzam, on the other hand, was busy befriending various vulnerable children—‘for their money’, as the shaven but mustachioed Netaji pointed out to Maan.

  The women and girls disappeared into the school building, from where they would watch and participate in the proceedings, while the men and boys arranged themselves in rows on long rolls of cloth in the compound outside. There were more than a thousand men present. Maan saw among them several of the elders of Sagal who had given Rasheed so much trouble outside the mosque, but he did not see the sick old man whom Rasheed and he had gone to visit—not that in such a large gathering it was possible to be certain about who was not there. He was asked to sit on the edge of the verandah next to two bored policemen of the P.P. Police Constabulary, who lounged about in greenish khaki and surveyed the scene. They were there to see that order was maintained and to act as witnesses in case the Imam’s sermon contained anything inflammatory, but their presence was resented, and their manner betrayed that they knew it.

  The Imam began the prayers, and the people stood up and knelt down as required with the awesome unanimity of the Islamic service. In the middle of the two snatches of prayers, however, there was a sound of distant thunder. By the time the Imam had begun his sermon, the congregation appeared to be paying more attention to the sky than to his words.

  It began to drizzle, and the people started getting restless. Eventually they settled down, but only after the Imam had interrupted his sermon to upbraid them:

  ‘You! Don’t you have any patience in the sight of God—on the day we have met to remember the sacrifice of Ibrahim and Ismail? You put up with rain in the fields, and yet on this day you act as if a few drops of water will dissolve you away. Don’t you know how those who are doing the pilgrimage this year are suffering on the scorching sands in Arabia? Some of them have even died of heatstroke—and you are in terror of a few drops from the sky. Here I am talking about Ibrahim’s willingness to sacrifice his son, and all you are thinking of is keeping dry—you will not even sacrifice a few minutes of your time. You are like the impatient ones who would not come to prayer because the merchants had arrived. In the Surah al-Baqarah, the very surah after which this festival is named, it says:

  Who therefore shrinks from the religion

  of Abraham, except he be foolish-minded?

  And later it says:

  We will serve thy God and the God of thy fathers

  Abraham, Ishmael and Isaac, One God;

  to him we surrender.

  Is this the quality of your surrender? Stop it, stop it, good people; be still, and do not fidget!

  Surely, Abraham was a nation

  obedient unto God, a man of pure faith

  and no idolater,

  showing thankfulness for His blessings;

  He chose him, and He guided him

  to a straight path.

  And We gave him in this world good,

  and in the world to come he shall be

  among the righteous.

  Then We revealed to thee: “Follow thou

  the creed of Abraham, a man of pure faith

  and no idolater.”’

  The Imam got quite carried away with his quotations in Arabic, but after a while he returned to his quieter discourse in Urdu. He talked about the greatness of God and his Prophet, and how everyone should be good and devout in the spirit of Abraham and the other prophets of God.

  When it was over, everyone joined in asking for God’s blessings, and, after a few minutes, dispersed to their villages, making sure they returned by a different route from the one they had taken to arrive.

  ‘And tomorrow, being Friday, we’ll get another sermon,’ some of them grumbled. But others thought that the Imam had been at his best.

  14.23

  As he walked back into the village, Maan bumped into the Football, who drew him aside.

  ‘Where have you been?’ asked the Football.

  ‘To the Idgah.’

  The Football looked unhappy. ‘That is not a place for us,’ he said.

  ‘I suppose not,’ said Maan indifferently. ‘Still, no one made me feel unwelcome.’

  ‘And now, you will watch all this cruel goat business?’

  ‘If I see it, I’ll see it,’ said Maan, who thought that hunting, after all, was as bloody a business as sacrificing a goat. Besides, he didn’t want to get into a false compact of solidarity with the Football, whom he did not greatly care for.

  But when he saw the sacrifice, he did not enjoy it.

  In some of the houses of Debaria, the master of the house himself performed the sacrifice of the goat or, occasionally, the sheep. (Cow sacrifice had been forbidden in P.P. since British times because of the danger of religious rioting.) But in other houses, a man specially trained as a butcher came around to sacrifice the animal that symbolized God’s merciful replacement for Abraham’s son. According to popular tradition this was Ishmael, not Isaac, though the Islamic authorities were divided on this matter. The goats of the village seemed to sense that their final hour was at hand, for they set up a fearful and pitiful bleating.

  The children, who enjoyed the spectacle, followed the butcher as he made his rounds. Eventually he got to Rasheed’s father’s house. The plump black goat was made to face west. Baba said a prayer over it while Netaji and the butcher held it down. The butcher then put his foot on its chest, held its mouth, and slit its throat. The goat gurgled, and from the slash in its thro
at bright red blood and green, half-digested grass poured out.

  Maan turned away, and noticed that Mr Biscuit, wearing a garland of marigolds that he must have somehow procured at the fair, was looking at the slaughter with a phlegmatic air.

  But everything was proceeding briskly. The head was chopped off. The skin on the legs and underbelly was slit and the entire skin peeled off the fat. The hind legs were broken at the knee, then bound, and the goat was hung from a branch. The stomach was slit, and the entrails, with their blood and filth, were pulled out. The liver and lungs and kidneys were removed, the front legs cut off. Now the goat, which only a few minutes ago had been bleating in alarm and gazing at Maan with its yellow eyes, was just a carcass, to be divided in thirds among the owners, their families, and the poor.

  The children looked on, thrilled and enthralled. They especially enjoyed the sacrifice itself and later the spilling out of the grey-pink guts. Now they stared as the front quarters were set aside for the family, and the rest of the body chopped into sections across the ribs and placed on the scales on the verandah to be balanced. Rasheed’s father was in charge of the distribution.

  The poor children—who got to eat meat very rarely—crowded forward to get their share. Some clustered around the scales and grabbed at the chunks of meat, others tried to but were pushed back; most of the girls sat quietly in one place, and eventually got served. Some of the women, including the wives of the chamars, appeared to be very shy and could hardly bring themselves to come forward to accept the meat. Eventually they carried it off in their hands, or on bits of cloth or paper, praising and thanking the Khan Sahib for his generosity or complaining about their share as they walked to the next house to receive their portion of its sacrifice.