UMRAO JAAN OF POCKET B-2! PART 1

                                                  UMRAO JAAN OF POCKET B-1

                                                                PART -I

                                             {BASED ON TRUE LIFE EVENTS}

“If you want war, I will bring it to your home, bitch!”

“We live in same home.”

“Ah! You think you are very clever. Fine, I will bring it to your door mat.”

“Fair point made, Ma, fair point!”

Well, this is the civilized extract of the conversation that I am regularly, frequently and recurrently having with my birth mother for past six months or so. {The reason to elucidate the word ‘birth mother’ would be clear to you subsequently.}

The raison d'être behind all our fights is this one guy, Shubhendu Malik. He happens to be my boyfriend and now the cause to be a tug of war for both mature ladies of Maheshwari family, me, Sarika Maheshwari and ma, Mrs Leelawati Maheshwari.

The uncommon, striking, peculiar thing about our duel is not that my mother disapproves of my relationship with Shubhendu but on contrary she overly approves his presence into our shared lodging that is our sweet home but explicitly in her life.

My mother is neither a divorcee or a widow but a proud owner of full grown sixty years old Deva- Anand kind of romantic adult male. A man who has entire life taken care of her pre menopausal libidinous desire and created me twenty four years back and also her post menopausal hot flushes and volcanic tantrums. This man has always stood beside her like a rock and she too has loved him as her one and only her entire life, until recently when she had a fall from grace and in an overnight turned nymphomaniac, looking for her vent in other men, especially my man.

It all started six months back when we shifted to our new home, B-2/157. How on earth would I have known that time that this accomplishment of shifting ourselves to a bigger place and posh locality would turn tables on us? It would transform my goddess like mother into a harlot.

The mother I knew since I peeped into this world was an absolute headstrong sedate, a walking talking orthodox book of morals, code of conduct and decorum. ‘Hundred pins woman’ as the world would know her was very particular about her dressing ways. With that army of safety pins tucked all over her sari, not a single thread of fabric dared to move astray from her reign. An idealistic woman, who preferred being called by her husband’s name rather than her first name ‘Leela’ because she found it to be amative to be pronounced by the tongue of other men, a decorous housewife, whose entire shopping destination revolved around vegetable vendors, departmental store and weekly Friday markets and a dignified lady, who has always laughed with pursed lips and had condemn out blown laughter as sign of promiscuous character. She was nothing more than an exemplified epitome of perfect avatar of housewife walking straight out of the pious Hindu calendar, all dressed up in godly authenticity.

But today she is not even a speck of what she used to be once upon a time. It started mildly like a little experimentation with her looks, hairdo and wardrobe. I took it as post menopausal passing wind which would sooner or later breeze away, maybe every lady experience it at that cult period. I welcomed it and choose to ignore it. Now, that is what the wise would call it a big bang blunder from my side. I just missed the tipping point. Lo and behold since those months forth her promiscuousness ran full swing like a delayed spring.

The ‘hundred pin lady’ became pin less and would in many occasion let the drapes deliberately fall off revealing her pushed up bosom. Her subtle makeup started to paint in darker shades of sluttish red and her shopping preferences were upgraded to online facilities.

The lady who was once a die hard bargain queen, the one who took immense pleasure as a hard earned victory even saving a penny, plundered all her saving accounts on push up brassieres, body hugging lingerie that made her appear thinner, slimmer and sexier. Fifty thousand bucks are sky fall for a middle class family of ours, where even the good daughter of the family, that happens to be me, savours her desires only with the local brands. Whereas my mother still has the branded life style wish list, yet to be fulfilled, which she keeps tugged under her pillow every night when she sleeps.

In no time my mother earned the reputation and designation of being ‘Umrao Jaan’ of B-2 pocket. It was embarrassing as well as humiliating at the same time. Every road side Romeo had her name on his lips and sometimes tattooed it on his arm, forearm, chest or butt. The whistling and the vulgar comments, the love letters and the indecent proposals from boys half her age started to weed up at the alarming pace. Worst, my mother liked all this limelight and fan following and took the sick pride in her name being chanted by every Tom, Dick and Harry of B-2 pocket.

I could sense things going out of control. I knew she needed help. It wasn’t menopause, it was something else. The first door I knocked seeing her drowning ship of morality was of my beloved daddy. My mother’s behaviour shook me to the core but what my daddy had to say about it, took away the bare minimum earth left beneath my feet.

According to him, my mother’s preoccupation into other worldly things, what so ever they are, gave him ample independence to again enjoy his, once lost bachelor-hood. He was having the fabulous La Vegas time in the murky B-2 pocket of the city. He could watch television twenty four into seven, drink tea with three spoons of sugar; ‘n’ number of times in a day, eat whatever he wants to, freely scratch his nose and debug it for as long he wants to, most importantly could have the luxury to call his friends home to play cards and could wear same underwear week long without being guilt trip under the long lectures on hygiene and etcetera and etcetera. Like my mother his list was also endless.

For first time in my lifetime, after seeing the true colours of my parents, I felt like the only hyper mature person in the family. For the first time in the life time, I doubted them to be my parents, I felt adopted.

When daddy turned indifferent and my mother continued with her unbridled frivolity, the best defence mechanism that I could garner was to adapt to the adulterated adult ways of my family. That was my second mistake. I realised it too late, when her clowning around started to involve love of my life, my one and only, Shubhendu.

Her overly cuddling him, pampering him and inappropriately touching him very often, was brought to my notice by Shubhendu but because of an altruistic love for my mother I turned blind eye to it. I thought them to be nothing more than the fragments of my tainted imagination. She can go around picking the men all over the city but she won’t do that to my man, after all he is her futuristic son-in-law. My blind faith in my mother kept Shubhendu’s revolt under check though it bubbled occasionally.

The last straw to my this faith-based love towards my mother shattered, when she took an quantum leap by boldly, openly as well as authoritatively proclaiming her proprietorship over my boyfriend by mapping his face by her signature red lipstick kisses including his lips. She candidly declared war against me.

That day Shubhendu came to me like a fallen autumn leaf, which has been ripped out of its grace and dignity. My tears diluted away his pain of victim-hood as he could see my real misery. My entire world was falling apart and all I could manage was tanking my eyes.

That was enough. That night I took the handkerchief and wiped off every lasting strain of salted water from my eyes and took a decision. If she wants a war, I will give it one to her. I am not going to let go Shubhendu without a decent fight. Now the only goal in my life would be to find reasons behind my middle class family fairytale going somersaulting. I will definitely crack this case open, find answers to it and fix it, even if it meant that I have to dig few graves all alone at middle of night, I will do that too.

Next day I was ranger ready. I had Google, Shubhendu and my grey cells, only left to trust in this world. The first clue to the enigma was that it all started when we shifted in this fateful house, so therefore, maybe, answers lies in its bricks. Maybe some dark history is buried deep in its chest that has returned to haunt us all.

Google had nothing much to speak about it neither the books in the local library. But that sixty plus librarian turned out to be a great help. Seeing our keen interest in digging the past or being irritated by our frequent pry to answer our useless piling up questionnaire for past three days, he pointed us to the grand old man of the locality who was capable to answer our queries. It was our stumbled epiphany.

In no time my ultra-tech boyfriend GPS us to the old man’s front yard. I was in a fix, what am I suppose to ask him, how am I going to break the ice to start that atypical kind of conversation? While I was busy finding my way out of these nebulous thoughts clouding my brain box, my super tactile boyfriend gained us an amicable entry into the household by striking acquaintance with the five year old kid of the family. The very next moment as I clearly remember, we were sitting in the chairs in front of the bed that lodged the frail body of that super-old man.

The thing that got me in awe was that how can anyone grow that old? It seemed as if he had a very translucent layer of skin painted over his degenerating skeleton. There was not a pin point space on his phizog that was left untouched by wrinkles. I don’t know whether he could see us or not but it was of sure that even at this ripe age his hearing was acute. He perceptibly reacted to the changes in the barometer that we brought with our entry in his room.

Before I could use the power of my tongue to register the purpose of our visit, the old man stole away the thunder from me and striked the ball out of the boundary at very first opportunity he got to display his mystique.

“I know you will come. You are here to know about her, about ‘Leela’.”

The last word got us real bouncy at our seats. It couldn’t get more creeper than it was already. The dead man speaking from his grave did have important piece of information about my beloved mother Leela.

The plethora on my face vanished and I turned gravely pale. I held Shubhendu’s hand tightly.

“What took you so long; I have been waiting for you for you for a while now.” He continued increasing the mercury.

“I guess traffic is bad at this hour.” My genius boyfriend answered the question.

I pated his hand displaying my disapproval to his zeal to excel in Q and A buzzer round. He needs to understand that there are few questions that should be deliberately left unanswered. How can we be so heartless, to devoid a man, whose age could only be determined by carbon dating, his lasting fame as a mystique story teller? If he wanted to build a TRP around his story, let him do that. We are here just to get a mystery solved.

“Foolish boy, I have been waiting for you for the past century.” Now, he was angry old man.

See, that what I want to convey it to Shubhendu through my staring glaring eyes. But men can never decipher a worthy woman’s gaze, it’s been a problem with men since stone age.

“I apologize on his behalf, Baba. Please continue what you were about to tell about Leela.” I begged him.

The old man took five deep breaths and every time I thought it was his last one. My heart skipped every second beat to his lost breath. But it turned out to be his ways to garner ultimate footage. Even in the death bed he cared about his reputation and finally he took my penny for his thoughts.

“She is back and now no one in this world can stop her.”

“Who is back Baba?” I was getting impatient.

After three deep breaths came out the lingering answer, “Madhur Leela is back!”

That’s not about my mother and I am least concerned about this Madhur Leela lady, who so ever she is. The old man just got confused. Well, it’s common symptom with his age but uncommon sign for our generation to believe in such disbeliefs. To prove my thought, Shubhendu was almost on his feet to leave. I was about to follow him that suddenly the frail framework of anatomy held my hand. With all the lasting strength he forced me to maintain my sitting stance.

“Her soul is back to take the revenge. She needed a vessel and I think she have found one. Madhur Leela is back to finish her unfinished business, to complete her left over ‘Leela’!”

Though Shubhendu want me to move but my gut told me to listen to him. Thereafter what he revealed brought my entire world to standstill. My mother was bewitched by a soul of a courtesan who has been dead for past one hundred and fifty years.

 As the legend goes, Madhur Leela was the most beautiful woman that walked the earth that time. Her beauty intoxicated the sanity of every man who got an opportunity to see her once. Irrespective of their age, they were crazy for her, plundering their wealth over her and abandoning their wives and kids. These women who have been so ruthlessly been left by their men, tried talking to Madhur Leela to leave the town, so that they could have a decent family life. They all pleaded, cried and begged at her feet. But Madhur Leela so drowned in her arrogance and pride that she couldn’t see their pain. Instead she asked her servants to throw them out of her home premise.

Humiliated and abandoned, these women united over the one common goal, to take vendetta. They plotted to kill her and they were successful too. They first cleverly poisoned her and then burned down her house to ashes. Through the blazing flames and counting on those desperate smothered breaths, Madhur Leela screamed, “I will never forgive you all. I will be back to take away your husband’s forever.” And then that most beautiful courtesan died the most painful death.

The place where our house B-2/157 stands today was once upon the time the abode of Madhur Leela.

Listening to what that old man said and the way he vouched it with authenticity, my heart went into V-fib and the gush of unstoppable flood poured down from my eyes. My mother is not my mother anymore, she has become Madhur Leela and now, she only seeks revenge. And she has chosen her first prey and he is Shubhendu.

“It’s all rubbish! Mere superstition. Are you going to believe all this, Sarika?” Shubhendu held my free hand. He could feel my failing pulse.

But suddenly something unexpected happened. They rickety hand that held my hand during the entire story telling session fell down lifeless. There was blood oozing out of his nostrils. Blood was a real deal, he was not faking it, it didn’t seem as his yet another TRP trick.

I was alarmed and I shouted, “Shubhendu, look at him..... I think he is dead.”

Before we could pronounce the time of death, the five year old great grandson of the old man, who was present at the door entire time we were there, rushed to his bed side. He immediately took out an injection from the drawer next to the bed and in the next splitting second he thrust the injection in old man’s chest. There came the gasping sound from the dead man and he happened to be alive again. I was startled and shaken to the core.

Like the great grand papa, the kid was talented and eloquent too. Looking at Shubhendu he said, “Its adrenaline. It will purchase us few moments to do the needful.”

But Shubhendu stood there confused with no idea how to react. Reading his quizzical expression, the melodramatic thespian tapped his forehead and continued, “Do I have to tell you everything? Can’t you for once in your life behave as a mature adult? You have to take him to the hospital, since no elder in my family is home at this moment.” Then he turned towards me and said, “Are you sure you want to be married to this guy?”

Shubhendu frowned.

Under the guidelines of his new master, Shubhendu did do all the needful. I was supposed to accompany them to the hospital but Shubhendu advice me against it. Today have been too much of a shocker to take for my weak meek heart and he doesn’t want it to be burdened more by old man’s health issues. I was back at home. My life couldn’t be getting more screwed and twisted than it already was. What a mess that God has chosen for me, first a promiscuous mother to deal with and now a nefarious vindictive soul.

It was no time to dilute away in self pity. I had to mandatorily utilize every passing second before that Madhur Leela invalidates my innocent mother completely.

For next three days and two nights I did the PhD level research to zero down the people who had the expertise in dealing with such kinds of supernatural phenomenon. I made myself a personal list of Ghostbusters. Shubhendu was not in compliance with my earnest effort as he kept shrugging it as the mere superstition of the feeble mind.

“Shubhendu, it’s not always like this that we could explain every phenomenon that happens in this world. There are things that exist beyond our human understanding and we can’t question their presence. Eyes can’t see what mind doesn’t know, honey, all we need is a faith.”

“It’s your fear speaking. We are denizens of twenty first century. It sounds stupid as well as crazy of what you are unto.”

“Didn’t you see that man risked his life to tell us the brutal truth?”

“He is already one hundred and eight years old with one of his leg hanging in the grave. What do you expect from him, to glow pink.”

“Can you explain why death tried to knock him out at that particular time and moment when he was telling us about that tainted soul? How could you forget that blood oozing out of his nose, you too witnessed it. Why can’t you do the maths here, it was Madhur Leela playing tricks on him, punishing him to reveal her true identity to us.”

“Cirrhosis, the man has almost his entire liver fried up to the life time of debauchery. It was nothing more than the repercussion of the sins of his youth.....”

I was done with his logic and mind games. I was irritated for he couldn’t understand my view point. I lost the thin thread of my patience and screamed at him, “She is my mother and I would do everything under my power, till my last breath, till the last drop of blood that flowed in my veins, till the last beat of my heart, I will try to save her. So let me do it. I am walking hell here, if you can’t appreciate my pain here, you can leave.”

I was in tears. And he knew in his heart this was my dead end to indulge in any debate, how validate it be. Nothing would change my heart now.

He took my hands in his hands and then he hugged me. I could feel his warmth. My tears moistened and stained his shirt but he still kept me near to his heart. His heart beat was my only solace in those trying times.

He indeed was my ‘preux chevalier’ and I can’t afford to lose him to the curse of Madhur Leela. I have to fight for him too and these were the feeling of my heart that I could never formulate it in vocabulary to explain him.

Even though he didn’t approve of my actions but he still stood there with me being my pillar of strength.

Lo and behold started the parade of the godly brigade in my house, who vouched to posses super human powers to deal with problems, like ours. Some came with the peacock feathers, some with the holy water, some had the modern sci-fi gadgets at their disposal, some with chains and wires but no one was able to bell the cat. For one entire week these guys with quality, ability, credentials and testimony displayed in bold letters in their websites, tried every arrow in their quiver, every card in their deck and every trick off their sleeves to entice that vengeful soul out of my mother but brutally failed.

She was still on the verge of going topless publically!  

TO BE CONTINUED........