‘Then it is better you write a letter saying you are withdrawing your complaint so that we can close the file.’

‘But you have not even opened a case file till now because no case has been filed. Where is the question of closing an un-opened file?’

‘These are technical matters; better you just say in a letter you are withdrawing your complaint.’

The complaint is withdrawn, a letter to this effect delivered to the police station who accept it as the proper authority to do so; as proof they even stamp a copy of the letter as ‘received’.

The receiving clerk firmly presses the rectangular wooden block into the padded ink box, he lifts it, he brings it down on the copy of the letter; he stamps it with finality.

Thup!

Otto Sir is now free to teach the male children of India anything, anywhere in the country.

There is another African saying, a proverb this time: to raise a child it takes a village.

An entire village was ready this time to support a child called Siddharth.

But the centre of a child’s life is its parents.

And the centre of a parent’s life has to be the natural laws, and the laws of the land.

Siddharth’s centre could not hold because the laws of the land did not hold; the legal process would not truly assist his distraught parents.

And when no centre holds, things begin to fall apart: villages too.

Innocent Siddharth. Alternating between bewilderment and dread.

Frightened Siddharth. Future perpetrator, perpetuator?

That little boy in Pune, playing cricket, going to school, is he okay? Can he, ever, be okay?

So many little boys like Siddharth in India. Are they identifying with their aggressor to the extent that they think all teachers are ‘like that’, will they grow and be a teacher ‘like that’ themselves? Will they grow with sexual identity confusion and become homosexual; or will they grow, marry and do it to their children? Are they getting nightmares right now; do they need counselling? Will they—as they grow—do things to the little boys in their school? Their neighbouring children who visit their home to play with them? Will they lie in wait to also do things to their little girl cousins when they meet them at weddings and other family functions? Or will they go to their homes and do it?

Is that why Razia’s cousin sexually abused her in her own home, because he too had once been in Siddharth’s place?

Or did he just do it to Razia, and her sister, because no parent stopped him?

Razia

She insists she is being continuously sexually molested by her male cousin when he visits their home.

Her ammee says, ‘He is my very own sister’s son. You should be ashamed of yourself for saying this.’

Razia comes to her ammee again and insists.

‘Keep quiet or I shall tell your abba who will beat you up for talking such rubbish, then he will stop you from going to your painting classes on Sundays.’