A short story inspired by some real life events
Rains were below expectations and farmers were losing hope to earn modest returns on their harvests this year. They would be happy even if the money they invested comes back to them. They can always earn ‘more’ the next time. Ehsaan was different from the lot. He dropped out from the village school after class 8th, but over the years he mastered the art of making money. Being from a pious Muslim family, the pedagogy he received from his parents made him an ardent servant of the God, and he never dared to break any precepts which were endowed on him by his elders. In spite of the fact that his day to day activities left hardly any time for him, he made sure to offer prayers five times a day and spent some happy moments with his family.
He used to do farming on his small piece of ancestral land and the output from which was hardly enough to support the family of five which included his parents, his wife and his sixteen years old daughter ‘Alia’.
From his savings and contribution of his wife’s maternal belongings he purchased two buffaloes. He took proper care of them and they obliged him by giving around 25 liters of milk each per day. As he was known for his honesty, most of the villagers including some of the upper caste Hindus took milk from him. He never adulterated the milk and so the customers kept on increasing. Wisely he reinvested the profits in buying more buffaloes and stopped only when he had 15 buffaloes and it became too difficult for him to manage them.
The village did not have any banks at those times. People use to hide their belongings in their houses or put them in the lockers of their relatives or friends on whom they have trust. And such was the level of integrity and uprightness that in the last 10 years there was not even a single case of betrayal of trust by the trustee of their valuables.
Ehsaan saw the gruesome side of poverty all through his childhood up to his marriage. There were days when they have to sell the utensils and his mother’s silver jewelry to douse the fire of their hunger. Rather than allowing his present to hurl him off into a state of oblivion, he decided to use his unbridled enthusiasm and energy to create a future for him as well his family. Alia was 22 now and both her parents were concerned to find a good match for her. Ehsaan was quite relieved as now he can arrange a modest dowry in order to find a right match for his daughter. He had much expectation like the groom should be good looking, God fearing, caring, sensitive, faithful and most importantly unswerving from his goals. So many qualities in one person? Does not look like an easy task to find such a person. But Ehsaan will not settle with anything lesser than this. After all Alia was the real inspiration behind all the years of hard work he has done. When he used to come home after working for almost all of the day in fields, one word ‘Abbu’ mixed with the cute smile from little Alia used to refresh and rejuvenate him. She helps him to forget the unbearable pain his body was experiencing because of pushing its limits way too often.
He had earned enough to marry her daughter and the surplus was just enough to allow him to start a seed agency. He has done the calculations and with the support from the Government ‘Kisan Empowerment Yojna’ he was hopeful that this business will be a great success.
Life is not that fair. Ehsaan was soon going to realize this fact. Things can become fatalistic very quickly. There is a time when all the unbridled enthusiasm, those quixotic dreams, and path of propriety will bring you back to the origin of the journey. Something unpleasant was going to happen very soon.
Let us go back in time. If anyone has read about the class system in India, he will find Rampur Village as the model of the very detestable class system. The upper echelons of the masses will not allow people from lower one’s to do certain jobs. The one in power want to hold on to that power and the oppressed class is always bullied, harassed and persecuted for wrongs. And these wrongs are never actually wrong. To make things worse the village was not open for trade with other villages or cities. There was an underlying fear among the ruling classes that with free trade the oppressed people will also make them skilled and will demand equal rights to work in what they are good at and what will bring them more benefits.
Pandit Shankar Upadhyay was the main moral force in implementing these immoral practices. He even colluded and conspired with the Village Panchayat head Raghubeer Shashtri, to decimate and mutilate the economy and thus the lives of majority of villagers.
Surprisingly Shankar was still revered by all the villagers, irrespective of the school of thought he believed in. There were many examples when Shankar eroded his personal reserves to help the needy. One such instance was the floods of July when most of the mud houses were destroyed and villagers were left to die. Shankar opened up his grain and coal Go-downs for the villagers. This move was a blessing for the villagers as the got a roof for themselves for nearly 5 months. He also made sure that no person sleeps without food and thus he obliged with ample quantities of rice, wheat and pulses to feed the hungry souls. This startling contrast showed the better side of a person who wanted to do good for the poor people but at the same time cannot risk his position and power by abolishing class system and trade restrictions imposed on its villagers.
The confidence and the good-will he generated in the minds of villagers was overwhelming. Shankar became a bank. All the villagers use to deposit their hard earned money with him. He ensured that the money is safe. People also borrowed money from him and he use to charge only a modest interest. Such was his uprightness and integrity; he never used the villager’s money for his business ventures. Being an economic scholar himself, he knew the consequences of playing with the money of villagers whose lives were actually hung by the proverbial thread of their money deposited with him. If that thread was broken they will die.
Taking the family tradition of business and power forward, his son Dhaniram, inherited all his qualities in stupendous amounts. Someone has told him that there is serious money in liquor business. So he wanted to start a spirits manufacturing plant Hashimabad, a nearby city which was witnessing immense industrial growth because of it being a logistics hub and easy availability of skilled but cheap labor. He has done his calculations well and to set up a project of this proportion he needed huge funds. Even loan from a bank will require large investments from his side. Shankar simply did not have that much money. The only option was to sell the Go-downs, but Dhaniram knew Shankar will never agree to this. Still he tried to persuade his father but he got the reply, “I will allow you to sell the Go-Downs only over my dead body”. Dhaniram was sad to hear this but he didn’t lose hope. He has plan B in place. He knew that the villager’s money in his father’s locker was just enough for him to kick off his plant. He also knew that once he is able to get on to the gray side of his father’s character, he might get the money. From then onwards he tried to brainwash his father. He brought many successful businessmen from the city who would speak at length to prove the profitability of the Liquor plant to Shankar. Shankar was indeed impressed and starting taking and even suggesting improvements in the plan. But deep inside knew that risking the money of villagers will be a complete betrayal with the innocent souls. The battle between family and society started in his mind. After struggling for some weeks he gave away to his family’s interest. He allowed his son to exploit the villager’s deposits.
At the same time Ehsaan has finally find the groom for Alia with all the qualities he desired. The ‘Nai’ (middleman) was able to settle a good deal of exchanging gifts and cash or more precisely the dowry amount. Alia was happy too she was very much impressed by the mannerisms of Abdul the groom. The whole family was busy in preparations for the marriage totally unaware of the equinoctial storm they were about to witness.
Dhaniram took all the money to his confidant and business partner Ajay hoping that they will get the loan soon as now the initial deposit was been arranged. To his despair, Ajay ran away with all the money and never came back. Dhaniram was busted. He shivered by the thought of telling this news to his father. He could not gather courage to face him. He wrote an apology letter to his father and told him about the vow he has taken. Dhaniram has taken the resolve to come back only when he has enough money to pay back. But that was far from possible. It was the hard earned money of his people and this poor fellow has not even earned a single penny in his lifetime. How will he be able to arrange the money?
The letter reached Shankara and it was like someone has staggered and strangulated him at the same time. It took quite some time for him to regain composure and realize the gravity of the situation his son has forced him in. The news will spread like wildfire and people will come to him for his money. The thought of parting with his properties, bungalows and other assets terrified him.
He tried to console him by thinking that he has done nothing wrong. It was his son who has done wrong. He was a very honest person in the eyes of the people and he will remain to be the same. This logic might not seem to cut much ice, but he was confident of his innocence and believed that Panchayat will not try him for this embezzlement.
The news reached the poor families. Women started hauling and weeping in masses as they had a strong premonition that the money will not come back. No different was the atmosphere in Ehsaan’s house. Abdul’s family has send the message of breaking the engagement as now they were sure that the Ehsaan will not be able to fulfill the dowry obligations. It was heart rendering. Elders from the effected houses decided to go to Shankara house and demand back the money.
Shankar expressed his helplessness and refused to concede any blame on his part. He said, “Each one of you know that I can never be unfaithful in guarding your money and valuables. Hope all of you remember the tough days of floods and how I helped you with my personal money to get over that difficult phase.” He was indeed true. The villagers were dumbfounded. But the larger question here is that if a person whose responsibility is to see that no one misuses the public money be called innocent and honest in case he shirks his responsibility? The very fact that he allowed all this to happen under his nose and with his consent will make him culpable in the worst way possible and he should not be exonerated so easily.
Disparaged by the turn of events the villagers decided to take this matter to Panchayat head Raghubeer. Raghubeer a loyal of Shankara assured the villagers of Justice. True to his colors he went to Shankara’s house and detailed him of the situation the very same night. The situation was really serious but Shankara want to be out of it without much loss. He had a treaty with Raghubeer. The judgment was fixed in few hours. Shankara bribed him with 100 beghas of land. Both were happy. Shankara will remain in Power and Raghubeer will accumulate more wealth. Win-win situation for both of them. For the villagers it was not only a lose-lose situation but it was a question of survival and death.
After feigning investigations for a couple of weeks, the Panchayat declared its Judgment. Sarpanch Raghubeer said, “It is very sad that villagers are today accusing the best people of our village with treachery and fraud. There is no such evidence against respected Shankara. No one was forced to deposit money with him. And the money was also not personally peculated by him. It was done by a friend of his son over whom Panchayat has no Jurisdiction. However the false accusation against Shankara has led to deep harm to his character and credibility. This Panchayat thus announces a penalty of 2000 rupees on each of the villagers who complained against him. ”
It was like putting salt on the severe bruises which Shankara has given to the villagers. There was no way for them to compensate the loss and carry on. The farmers have taken loans from money lenders. They would soon start looking for their neck. Where will they go? How will they pay for processing the promising crops they have this time. There was simply no answer. Ehsaan’s daughter went into depression and committed suicide by hanging in the room. His wife could not take this setback and died because of a heart attack few months later. Ehsaan himself was not able handle this catharsis and he lost his mental balance. He can be often spotted without clothes and is being referred as gutter snipe by the people from powerful and rich families.
The story was no different in other families. 23 farmers committed suicide after police cases were filed against them for nonpayment of the loans. They were constantly harassed by the lending sharks. Yes there were some good people in Government who send money for waiving off the loans of the farmer, but that money also found its way to the coffers of the people like Shankara and Raghubeer. Some farmers have to sell all their leftover belongings including their small mud houses and small strips of land. To arrange food for their children they have to do other inhuman and difficult tasks like scavenging, digging roads, mining etc.
This is the story of whole of the country where less privileged poor and middle class people are exploited everyday till their last breadth. We should try to find answer too many questions. The most important is to set accountability. Was the fact that Shankara is honest holds any water when he allowed the public money to be ripped off knowingly and in full consciousness? Is he any less than a murderer of all these innocent souls? If we are able to disallow any sort of impunity to him, we can avoid these totally unnecessary sacrifices which the poor people are doing for the sake of these illegal, immoral and egoistic masters.
Note:This story is purely a work of fiction and has no resemblance to any place or person living or dead. Though it has been inspired by some of the sad incidents across the country
