The Dance of Durga
THE DANCE OF DURGA
Kanika K. Dhillon
HarperCollins Publishers India
For my Father
I lost you last winter, on the eve of a new year.
I wonder if there is any way, to talk to you one more day
And get a chance to say good bye.
To you I am forever grateful. I miss you.
Love you, Papa.
‘What you seek is seeking you’
– Rumi
Contents
Rajjo
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
Durga
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
Acknowledgements
About the Book
About the Author
Copyright
RAJJO
1
August 1971, Gurdaspur, Punjab
JASWINDER, pot-bellied, balding and in his mid-thirties, cursed his luck as he frowned at the old lady sitting on the lone wooden bench in the corner of his shop and muttering to herself. She was eating jalebis from a paper cup. It was a busy day. Jaswinder was swamped with work and rushed customers filed in and out of his cramped shop. Furthermore, he had a headache, the stocks of oil and sugar were running low and he suspected his wife was sleeping with one of the boys who worked in the shop.
With all these worries hovering over him, he was in no mood to babysit the old grouch. She sat grunting in one corner with a narrow cinnamon-coloured face sheathed in wrinkles. Contours crisscrossed her skin, etched with the relentless needle of time. Watery eyes peeped out at the world wearily with a tinge of blue. She had cataract. Her lips were no more than a surly dash that moved while she muttered.
‘You rascal, don’t you dare tell them where I am hiding. I have seen you grow up naked on our streets.’
Jaswinder shook his head for the hundredth time, ignoring her ramble and went back to attend to an impatient customer. He barked at his teenage employee, ‘Gappi, pack a kilo of barfi.’
Perhaps he could ask Gappi if he knew which one of these boys was fucking his wife on the sly!
The old woman’s hair was covered with a white cotton dupatta, rumpled with time and age. A few wispy white strands fell rebelliously on the brown face. There was some white hair on her chin. Perhaps that was her licence to be senile.
‘Why don’t you go home, Mata-ji, your son must be worried about you!’ Jaswinder hoped she would scoot soon.
‘Let the rascals worry, they won’t listen to me, they won’t believe me, they won’t let me name my granddaughter! Here, give me some more!’ She stretched out her cup assertively to be refilled with the sugary sweet.
Jaswinder feared the old lady, easily ninety-plus, if not more, would die in his shop from a sugar high, but what he feared more than her dying in his shop was that she would create a scene in front of the customers. He better refill her cup. He was going to whack Gappi for allowing her to sit here in the first place.