Nirvana

Avtar Krishan Rahber

The man who perhaps was called Gotam, set out on a long road which had been covered with tar, the pitch dark coal tar. The tar has melted in the sweltering heat. His molten silver is seething, and his mouth is foaming. He begins to tread swiftly here in this Bharatvarsha, turning his eyes back forth again and again. His silvery frame is seething and his mercurial self is all the more ill at ease.

His father, Sudarshan or perhaps Sadhudana, whatever his name, is quite well off, being an owner of a couple of big mills, which give off tremendous clouds of smoke daily, and along with its smoke, turn goods worth lacks and crores of rupees day in day out. Sadhidana thinks that Gotam will take over the management of the mills and become its proprietor and install Gautam Nagar by the side of Jamshid Nagar, or alternatively fight an election in the Harijan settlement and become the minister. But both the plans ran aground halfway; the mills getting closed due to lock out and the Harijans opting for a candidate from their own fraternity. Sadhudan did it with undiminished zeal and Gotam is witnessing all this wide-eyed. He is leaving the palace to wander about Yashu, lying on the bed, is staring at the door for Gotam to return. But Gotam is proceeding apace. The fever in the sun is on the increase and the congealed mercury in Gotam makes rise. He moves on, turning his eyes all around again and again.

Chhak ... chhak... chhak... This is the railway station. Chokeful trains are moving to and fro. Innumerable shadows move bark and forth, and some of them look transfixed as if frozen. Oh this noise! All this deafens Gotam’s ears. A couple of shadows moves out of a first class compartment, lunches at the platform, throwing crumbs of bread, banana peals and bones into the nearby drain. Forty to fifty shadows, without a head-dress and tattered fall at the crumbs, in a bid to worst one another to dredge the soiled and defiled crumbs and peels to fill their bellies. The couple from the first class compartment is amused at this. Gotam's mercury registers a fall and congeals. Heaving a sigh, he says: "This samsaar is an abode of miseries". Then he plods on.

The couple in the first class compartment is still laughing in their mind, perhaps they are newlywed. Yashu rose in his memory, Yashu who could not bear parting from his even for a moment. "Yashu might be waiting for me", he falls thinking, but all of a sudden he catches sight of a middle aged man attired in a "Bangladeshi" coat, worn out canvas shoe and shabby creaseless pants. "Why is he so overwrought"? The question raises its head in Gotam. "Hey, brother. what has happened to him"' Gotam asks a man standing nearby.

"He wanted to take his own life", he replied.

"What then"?

"He did not die".

"Why not"?

"He took poison three times until now".

"Do you speak in truth"?

"Strange! Do I lie then"? he says in a raising anger. Gotam's wits fall him, making out nothing. "What else then", he asks him again, he replies "the non availability of an unadulterated poison". Gotam heaves a sigh. Getting somewhat shocked, he says, "This Samsar is an abode of miseries". He starts plodding again.

He is approaching the Employment Exchange. A multitude of limbs, numberless tired out and exhausted ones with unpolished boots on, holding out their degree certificates, with an uncroped jungle of hair on their heads; their hearts grown heavy as huge lumps of stone, their eyes like flickering out oil lamps, paled out pictures. He sighs and involuntarily says, "This Samsaar is an abode of miseries". He plods on with wearied out legs. The iron in him wears thin. He has forgotten his place, but Yashu's big kohled eyes keep exercising their magnetic pull on his inner self. Not being able to decide which way to go, his eyes come to a sudden halt. Yashu, he feels, is constantly calling him to herself that loving comely, that cool shade-giving tree. Yashu, who could never swallow a morsel without him.

He turns his face towards his palace so that he could get a glimpse of her silken hair, only to forget himself for a while by getting absorbed in the fragrance of her hair . .... Gotam plods onwards reaches a dispensary. A child is bitterly weeping for hunger. What has all happened to him? Maybe his mother is dead. But no, his mother is taking him in her lap. What else then?

"Well, mother, if he is asking for milk, why don't you give him a suck”?

"He has sucked me dry, dear", she replied in return, "there is nothing more left".

Gotam cast his eyes from mother to the child and then back to the mother. The doctor examining a patient looks towards him, and Gotam stares at the doctor. "You seem to be simple", the doctor says taking pity on Gotam and takes a journal from a shelf behind. "Take a look at it", the doctor says to Gotam, opening the journal, "See this mother".

"Yes, she looks hale and hearty"? Gotam says feeling happy. “But do you see the child also"?

"Yes, I do. It is weeping. Why does not its mother suckle it"?

Gotam asks him, touched to his quick "Her breasts are full of milk".

"Ha...ha...ha". The doctor is seized with an uncontrollable laughter.

"I was not far wrong in regarding you a simpleton".

"Come now, you do not tell me why does not the mother give him a suck". Gotam asked him still more baffled.

"Her milk is poisoned, how can it be served"?

"Poisoned?"

"Yes, without doubt".

"How can this be? A mother's milk turning into poison! No, never. "Gotam remonstrated.

The doctor's eyes move to D.D.T and starts examining the patient again. Gotam heaves a sigh, still making out nothing and lets out without a restraint, "This Samsar is an abode of miseries."

He plods on, but not towards the palace now but in the opposite direction. He paces taking nimble steps on and on, thinking whether Yashu, too, will not suckle their dear one. Overtaken with despair, he walks on and on, with a face distraught, trod ding deep in the tarry mud, and corroding the silver within him. Far away, a big and broad tree, but one that was hollowed out, comes to his sight. He feels like sitting under its shade to meditate. He is inclined to meditate for many a day. But Yashu's enchanting big eyes do not let his mercurial self to concentrate on any one thing. Meanwhile a tingle from a cycle bell wakes him . ... A man with a telegram. He gets happy. A telegram from Yashumati!

He opens the telegram in a hurry and reads it out impatiently. "Dear Gotam, may you live long! May your mission be crowned with success! I pray for you. Do not worry at all for me. I am married to the mill manager".

The telegram falls down Gotam's hand. He tries to close his eyes to lose himself in meditation.

The telegram man paddled his cycle on and its revolving wheels leave two serpentine imprints extending far out on the long tarred road.