Sumita Vaid Dixit
Click here to read my biography
The doctor discharged Mrs Sharma, and the relatives disbanded, preparing to return home. The sisters-in-law promised to visit Mrs Sharma on the naming ceremony. Only the grandmother stayed back at the hospital.
Mr Sharma booked a taxi. While Mrs Sharma, Soumil, wrapped up in a soft blue blanket, and the grandmother came in the taxi, Mr Sharma followed them on his Lambretta.
The taxi entered their society, Nav Yug Vihar – the white bold letters painted on a black metal that arched over the main gate. The guard, an old man with a white handlebar moustache, congratulated Mr Sharma, ‘bedhai ho!’
They drove past the four-storied pink flats that sat grumpily on either side of the lane. Theirs was on the ground-floor, overlooking a small park, which made Mrs Sharma very proud. Only just a few other flats in the society enjoyed the view of the Eucalyptus trees. The others sat face-to-face, peeping into each others’ lives.
Vinod, the neighbourhood dhobi, abandoned his ironing when he saw Mrs Sharma step out of the taxi.
‘Congratulations, sahib, bibiji,’ Vinod said, looking at Soumil, who was fast asleep. And then, noticing a strict elderly presence he hadn’t paid attention to, Vinod lunged forward with folded hands and greeted the grandmother.
‘It’s a boy,’ the grandmother said, assuming airs of her yesteryears, when she was called Kasturi Devi.
‘Oh, baba looks like bibiji. I must put a black dot on his face; it will ward off evil spirits,’ Vinod said. His gaze accidentally fell on the grandmother, and she retaliated with her lethal stare. Vinod ran to his shed, a makeshift tin roof supported by four wobbly wooden pillars, and kept cool by the Eucalyptus trees. He pulled out a sack of coals from under his ironing board, dug his hand into it, rubbed his index finger on a piece, and ran back. He put a tiny dot behind Soumil’s right earlobe.
‘Our son is safe,’ Mrs Sharma said, thinking harm was locked now in a bottle. But as soon as Vinod returned to his bundles of clothes, Mr Sharma asked Mrs Sharma to wipe off the black smudge. The grandmother wasn’t pleased at all.
* * *
The door bell rang; Gitanjali ran to open it, her hand barely reaching the knob. Mr Sharma came to the door but he didn’t open it.
A group of eunuchs, draped in colourful saris – purple, blue, red, yellow – and bright red lipsticks, laden in artificial jewelry, had gathered outside the house. They were clapping with their masculine hands, dancing, and singing in hoarse voices:
‘Hai hai! hai hai! hai hai!’ The eunuchs sang and twirled in their sari like Helen, outside the Sharmas’ house.
A boy is born, hai hai
He will ride a silver horse, hai hai
Bathe his parents in coins of gold, hai hai
Marry Zeenat, hai hai
And have seven sons, hai hai!
‘Arre big sahib, we are here to bless your child. Our blessings will protect your son from harm,’ the leader of the gang said, catching her breath.