Revolution 2020 (4 page)

I pretended not to
hear and opened my maths notebook.

‘Who is GM?’
the teacher asked. She had read my initials. I had scraped them with
a compass on my ruler. Damn!

We had two GMs in
the class. One, Girish Mathur, sat in the first row. He stood up
without provocation.

‘I didn’t
do it, ma’am,’ he said and pinched his neck. ‘God
promise, ma’am.’

The teacher squinted
at him, still suspicious.

‘I swear upon
Ganga, ma’am,’ Girish said as he broke down.

The Ganga reference
worked. Everyone believed him.

‘Who’s
the other GM? Gopal Mishra!’ the teacher shouted my name. All
eyes turned to me. The teacher walked up to my desk. I stood up.

I didn’t say a
word. Neither did the teacher. Slap, Slap! Both my cheeks were
stinging.

‘Stealing
food? Are you a thief?’ the teacher said. She looked at me as
if I had stolen the Kohinoor diamond from the British queen’s
museum, something the social studies teacher had told us about two
days ago.

I hung my head low.
She smacked the back of my neck. ‘Get out of my class!’

I dragged my feet
out of the class, even as the entire 5 C stared at

me.

‘Aarti, go
clean up in the bathroom,’ Gill madam said.

♦

I leaned against the
wall outside the class. Aarti wiped her eyes and walked past me
towards the toilet.

‘Drama queen!
It was only half a slice of chocolate cake!’ I thought. Anyway,
that’s how I, Gopal Mishra, met the great Aarti Pratap Pradhan.
I must tell you, even though this is my story, you won’t like
me very much. After all, a ten-year-old thief isn’t exactly a
likeable person to begin with.

Dubey uncle, our
lawyer, pushed a small box of four laddoos towards us.

‘Sweets? What
for?’ my father said.

Dubey uncle had come
home. Baba and I faced him across our ancient dining table.

‘You’ve
got a hearing date,’ Dubey uncle said. ‘Ibis itself took
so long, I thought we should celebrate.’

I wondered if I
could give some laddoos to drama queen Aarti as compensation for the
cake. I wanted to buy a chocolate cake and slam it on her desk.
However, I didn’t have money for that. My father didn’t
give me any pocket money, and he didn’t have much money in his
own pocket.

My mother’s
illness had wiped out all his savings. She died two weeks after I
turned four. 1 don’t remember much of her or her death. Baba
did say he had to wear her dupatta and sleep next to me for a month.
After her death the land dispute started. Dubey uncle had become a
frequent visitor to our house for this reason.

‘You brought
sweets only because we have a hearing?’ Baba coughed. The case
had not given his land back to him, but it did
worsen
his
respiratory ailment.

‘Well,
Ghanshyam wants to settle the case out of court,’ Dubey uncle

said.

Ghanshyam taya-ji,
my father’s respected elder brother, had screwed us. My
grandfather had left his two sons thirty acres of agricultural land
on the Lucknow Highway, to be divided equally. Soon after my
grandfather’s death, Ghanshyam uncle took a loan from the bank
and mortgaged Baba’s

The teacher walked
back to the front of the class. She took out a tissue from her purse
and wiped the ruler clean. ‘Admit it, else the punishment will
be worse,’ she warned.

I pretended not to
hear and opened my maths notebook.

‘Who is GM?’
the teacher asked. She had read my initials. I had scraped them with
a compass on my ruler. Damn!

We had two GMs in
the class. One, Girish Mathur, sat in the first row. He stood up
without provocation.

‘I didn’t
do it, ma’am,’ he said and pinched his neck. ‘God
promise, ma’am.’

The teacher squinted
at him, still suspicious.

‘I swear upon
Ganga, ma’am,’ Girish said as he broke down.

The Ganga reference
worked. Everyone believed him.

‘Who’s
the other GM? Gopal Mishra!’ the teacher shouted my name. All
eyes turned to me. The teacher walked up to my desk. I stood up.

I didn’t say a
word. Neither did the teacher. Slap, Slap! Both my cheeks were
stinging.

‘Stealing
food? Are you a thief?’ the teacher said. She looked at me as
if I had stolen the Kohinoor diamond from the British queen’s
museum, something the social studies teacher had told us about two
days ago.

I hung my head low.
She smacked the back of my neck. ‘Get out of my class!’

I dragged my feet
out of the class, even as the entire 5 C stared at

me.

‘Aarti, go
clean up in the bathroom,’ Gill madam said.

♦

I leaned against the
wall outside the class. Aarti wiped her eyes and walked past me
towards the toilet.

‘Drama queen!
It was only half a slice of chocolate cake!’ I thought. Anyway,
that’s how I, Gopal Mishra, met the great Aarti Pratap Pradhan.
I must tell you, even though this is my story, you won’t like
me very much. After all, a ten-year-old thief isn’t exactly a
likeable person to begin with.

I come from
Varanasi, which my social studies teacher says is one of the oldest
cities on earth. People came to live here in 1200 BC. The city gets
its name from two rivers, Varuna and Asi , which pass through the
city and meet the Ganga. People call my city several names - Kashi,
Benares or banaras - depending on where they come from. some call it
the city of Temples, for we have thousands of them, and some the city
of learning, as  Varanasi apparently  has great places to
study. I simply call Varanasi my home. I stay near Gadholia, a place
so noisy, you need to put cotton balls in your ears if you want
sleep. Gadholia is near the ghats, along the river Ganga. So the
crowds of  Gadholia becomes too much to take, you can always run
to the ghats and sit by the Ganga and watch the temples. Some call my
city beautiful,holy and spiritual - especially when we have to
introduce it to foregin tourists. Many call it filthy and a dump. I
don't think my city is dirty. It is the people who make it dirty.

Anyway, they say you
must come to Varanasi once in a lifetime. Well, some of us spend a
lifetime here.

 I had pencil
in my pocket. I used it to scribble '5 c' on the wall It had helped
me pass the time, and would make our class easier to find too.

She came out of the
toilet - face wet, drama-queen expression intact and gaze firmly
fixed on me - and walked back to the class.

    She
continued to stare at me as she came closer. 'You are scribbling on
the walls!' she said.

     'Go
complain,' I said. 'Go'

      'How
can you steal my tiffin?' she said.

      'I
didn't steal your tiffin,' I said 'I had three bites of your
chocolate cake. You wouldn't even have noticed.'

      'You
are a really bad boy.' Aarti said.     

Dubey uncle, our
lawyer, pushed a small box of four laddoos towards us.

‘Sweets? What
for?’ my father said.

Dubey uncle had come
home. Baba and I faced him across our ancient dining table.

‘You’ve
got a hearing date,’ Dubey uncle said. ‘This itself took
so long, I thought we should celebrate.’

I wondered if I
could give some laddoos to drama queen Aarti as compensation for the
cake. I wanted to buy a chocolate cake and slam it on her desk.
However, I didn’t have money for that. My father didn’t
give me any pocket money, and he didn’t have much money in his
own pocket.

My mother’s
illness had wiped out all his savings. She died two weeks after I
turned four. 1 don’t remember much of her or her death. Baba
did say he had to wear her dupatta and sleep next to me for a month.
After her death the land dispute started. Dubey uncle had become a
frequent visitor to our house for this reason.

‘You brought
sweets only because we have a hearing?’ Baba coughed. The case
had not given his land back to him, but it did
worsen
his
respiratory ailment.

‘Well,
Ghanshyam wants to settle the case out of court,’ Dubey uncle

said.

Ghanshyam taya-ji,
my father’s respected elder brother, had screwed us. My
grandfather had left his two sons thirty acres of agricultural land
on the Lucknow Highway, to be divided equally. Soon after my
grandfather’s death, Ghanshyam uncle took a loan from the bank
and mortgaged Baba’s

1 come from
Varanasi, which my social studies teacher says is one of the oldest
cities on earth. People came to live here in 1200 BC. The city gets
its name from two rivers, Varuna and Asi, which pass through the city
and meet the Ganga. People call my city several names - Kashi,
Benares or Banaras - depending on where they come from. Some call it
the City of Temples, for we have thousands of them, and some the City
of Learning, as Varanasi apparently has great places to study. I
simply call Varanasi my home. I stay near Gadhoiia, a place so noisy,
you need to put cotton balls in your ears if you want to sleep.
Gadhoiia is near the ghats, along the river Ganga. So if the crowds
of Gadhoiia become too much to take, you can always run to the ghats
and sit by the Ganga and watch the temples. Some call my city
beautiful, holy and spiritual - especially when we have to introduce
it to foreign tourists. Many call it filthy and a dump. I don't think
my city is dirty. It is the people who make it dirty.

Anyway, they say you
must come to Varanasi once in a lifetime. Well, some of us spend a
lifetime here.

I had a pencil in my
pocket. I used it to scribble ‘5
C
on the wall. It
helped me pass the time, and would make our class easier to find too.

She came out of the
toilet - face wet, drama-queen expression intact and gaze firmly
fixed on me - and walked back to the class.

She continued to
stare at me as she came closer. ‘You are scribbling on the
walls!’ she said.

‘Go complain,’
I said. ‘Go.’

‘How can you
steal my tiffin?’ she said.

‘I didn’t
steal your tiffin’ I said. ‘I had three bites of your
chocolate cake. You wouldn’t even have noticed.’

‘You are a
really bad boy,’ Aarti said.

half of the
property, forging the papers with wrong plot numbers and bribing the
bank officer.

Ghanshyam taya-ji
made bad business decisions and lost the money. The bank sent a
foreclosure notice to us. Baba protested, and the bank slapped cases
on both my father and uncle. The two brothers slapped cases on each
other. All these cases moved through our legal system slower than a
bullock cart on the national highway.

‘Settle?’
My father leaned forward.

I picked up a laddoo
and put it in my pocket.

‘Ghanshyam
will give you some cash. He will take your share of the land and
handle the bank and legal cases’ Dubey uncle said.

‘How much?’
Baba asked.

‘Ten lakhs,’
Dubey uncle replied.

My father kept
quiet. I snuck away another laddoo. She should be happy with two, I
thought.

‘I admit the
offer is ridiculously low for fifteen acres,’ Dubey uncle
continued. ‘But there’s a loan of a crore on your
property.’

‘It’s
not my loan!’ Baba said in an uncharacteristically loud voice.

‘He submitted
your documents to the bank. Why did you give him your property
papers?’

‘He is my
elder brother,’ Baba said, fighting tears. The loss of a
brother hurt him more than the loss of land.

‘If you want
more money, I can ask him. Why drag this forever?’ Dubey uncle
said.

‘I am a
farmer’s son. I am not giving up my land,’ Baba said, his
eyes red. ‘Not until I die. Tell him to kill me if he wants the
land.’

Baba then stared at
me as my hand reached for the third laddoo.

‘It’s
okay, take all of them,’ Dubey uncle told me.

I looked at both of
them, picked up the box and ran out of the room.

♦

I placed the box on
her desk with a thump.

‘What is
this?’ She looked at me primly.

‘I ate your
cake. I’m sorry’ I said, my last word faint.

‘I don’t
like laddoos,’ she announced.

‘Why? You
firang or what?’ I said.

‘No, laddoos
make you fat. I don’t want to be fat,
³
she said.

‘Chocolate
cake doesn’t make you fat?’

‘I don’t
want it,’ she said. She gently pushed the box towards me.
‘Fine,’ I said and took the box.

‘Did you say
sorry?’ Aarti said.

‘Yes, I did.’
I noticed her loopy plaits, tied up with red ribbons. She looked like
a cartoon character.

‘Apology
accepted,’ she said.

‘Thank you,’
I said. ‘Sure you don’t want the laddoos?’

‘No, fat girls
cant become air hostesses,’ she said.

‘You want to
be an air hostess?’ I said.

‘Yes.’

‘Why?’

‘They fly
everywhere. I want to see different places.’

‘Okay.’

‘What do you
want to be?’ Aarti said.

I shrugged my
shoulders. ‘A rich man,’ I said.

She nodded, as if my
choice was reasonable. ‘Are you poor right now?’

‘Yes’ I
said.

She said, ‘I
am rich. We have a car.’

‘We don’t
have a car. Okay, bye.’ I turned to leave when Aarti spoke
again.

‘Why doesn’t
your mother give you a tiffin?’

‘I don’t
have a mother,’ I said.

‘Dead?’
she asked.

‘Yes,’ I
said.

‘Okay, bye.’

I came back to my
seat, I opened the box of laddoos and took one

out.

Aarti walked up to
me.

‘What?’
I asked.

‘You can eat
my tiffin sometimes. Don’t take a lot though. And don’t
take any cake or nice treats’

‘Thanks’
I said.

‘And don’t
make a mess. If you want, we can eat together during lunch-break.’