NOTE : This story is dedicated to all the self-dependant blind people.
....Any revenue generated from this story shall be, and is, being forwarded to the Blind Relief Association of India, in toto.
Baba woke up at daybreak. He always did. All round the year. Whether the sun was visible to the others or not, he could feel the sunrise. He sat up, did his small prayers, picked up his angochha and crawled out of the little shack. Outside, he stretched himself, turned east and once again mumbled his prayers. He picked up the small plastic bucket and walked to the hand pump.
Each time he washed his face in a day he felt his eyes and each time he felt his eyes, he remembered - he had no sight. He was born with this handicap. He did not remember anything about his parents. Perhaps he was abandoned soon after his birth because of his handicap. He did not remember much about his childhood either. The only thing he remembered was his mentor, another Baba, another sightless man, who taught him to sing, to live by himself. The other thing his Baba taught him, something he never could forget, was his daily prayer.
Baba lived down the railway tracks at Allahabad station. Everyday he lugged his shoulder bag to the station and shuttling between Allahabad and Kanpur by trains, he sold pens, notebooks, pocket diaries, needles, keychains and other titbits like that to passengers. Generally it took him the whole day to go to Kanpur and return. Depending upon occasional upsets in train schedules, he returned midway. Somehow he liked to be home for the night.
Home was an abandoned tin shack. Once used by rail workers, perhaps as a store for cement bags, it had concrete floor. Some of the bags that had stiffened due to moisture, now served him as little 'table' for his kitchen. He had few utensils since he mostly ate at the station café. Couple of glasses, couple of plates, couple of spoons, an aluminium vessel with broken handle for making tea, a pan and a kerosene stove along with its plastic bottle completed his kitchen which fitted within the two square foot tin board placed on top of the 'table'. Opposite the kitchen he had an old rusted trunk, locked and chained to the wooden mast. This mostly contained his shop goods. He did not like to have too many clothes for he knew he could always get them donated by someone or the other at the station. A little over forty years of survival had taught him not to get offended by references made to his handicap. He had come to terms with his destiny as a blind orphan.
That was not to be. His status as an orphan changed with the arrival of Munna. This ten-year-old was arrested on board some train and brought to Allahabad by the Railway Police to be sent to the Children's Remand Home. At the station he managed to escape and took shelter in Baba's shack. Later Baba got him a job as a cleaner at one of the tea stalls at the station. Thus began a relationship between the two orphans and over the last six years they became a family. With this the shack did become a little cramped but for Baba his home was complete.
Walking back into the shack Baba called out Munna, waking him up to get ready for work, himself beginning to work on the stove. There hardly was a day that Munna woke up before Baba. It was a cold December day and the sun had not even appeared yet. Poor Munna was still cuddled in the quilt but hearing Baba he shook off his sleep and crawled out of the bed. He neatly folded up the bedding and went out. Having set the vessel for tea on the stove Baba started packing his things for the day. He always had the first tea at home. Like most of the travellers, he too did not like the tea at the station stalls. By the time Munna returned tea would be ready. Then together they would walk down to the station. While Baba looked for customers for his toothbrushes or datuns, Munna, by now promoted from a dishwasher to a cook, would start his work at the stall, preparing alu-puri. Baba always had this for breakfast. The stall owner somehow believed that Baba was his lucky mascot - whenever he served Baba the first, he had a good sale during the day. In a way it was his prayer, he believed. It was nearly twenty years ago, when this particular platform was being constructed, the stall owner had started a small teashop for the workers. About the same time Baba came to Allahabad after the senior Baba's death. He was carrying with him the senior Baba's harmonium. He would sit at the teashop and sing for the workers. In return he got his two meals for the day. By the time the platform started functioning he began his little mobile shop.
Unconsciously his hand felt the harmonium and he unhooked it off the peg on the mast. With his angochha he cleaned it and slowly began to play. He remembered the senior Baba, who was a pretty good singer and sang the song "man ki aankhen khol baba" with a lot of pleasure. As he played the same song, he remembered those early days. His Baba was a mere beggar. Together they sang songs and begged on the streets of Aligarh. Those were the days when they cared only for their two square meals and those were the days when people did look after such talented beggars. Together they were pretty happy with whatever they had. As times changed so did the attitudes of people. The number of beggars too increased. Soon their fraternity became a "nuisance" for the materialistic society. Little difference did people make out between a habitual beggar and a blind orphan with singing talents. This perhaps hurt his Baba so much that he took to bed, never to recover again. Young Baba took care of his elder doing all he could do. He even went all the way to cremate the senior Baba in Allahabad, with whatever meagre resources he could generate. Tears began to roll down his eyes. He cleared his throat and to hide his pain, he began singing "man ki aankhen khol" aloud, putting his heart into the song.
He did not realise how long he sang but as he finished he heard Munna asking him to have his tea. He had forgotten all about the tea. He gently smiled at Munna and took his glass of tea. Munna told him that he sang a lot better than many of the singers he heard on the radio at the stall. Baba just smiled and recalled what a great singer the senior Baba was. Quietly they sipped tea for some time then Baba broke the silence expressing his wish to take the harmonium some day and try singing like the good old days, - just as a tribute to his Baba, if nothing. Munna rarely questioned Baba's decisions. He knew that Baba did all this to keep himself busy and happy. With his job secure at the stall, he could well take care of Baba. This fact was never discussed, but was well understood. On his part Baba was worried about Munna's future. He did not want Munna to be another orphan like him. He wanted Munna to get married when time came, move out of the cramped tin shack, have a stall of his own - if not in Allahabad, then some other station, be a master of himself, raise a family, send his children to school, many things, all good things for him. Yet, he found it difficult to voice them, like any parent, always wishing well for the children but never discussing about it. Perhaps the fear of intruding into Munna's own dreams prevented him. There still was some time for taking any decision, he thought. Munna was hardly seventeen.
As he boarded the train he was pleasantly surprised to hear some familiar voices. Among a group of twenty-odd passengers on a pilgrimage to Haridwar, there were some whom he occasionally met at Allahabad. To them he was known to be a salesman, of sorts. Seeing him with his harmonium, they pleaded him to sing. There could not have been a better opportunity for him to pay his tribute to the senior Baba, he thought. Gladly he accepted.
The atmosphere was religiously festive, the audience was faithfully attentive and the artiste was devoutly dedicated. Soon the whole compartment got involved in their celebration. One bhajan after the other Baba went on singing. There was no stopping him. His voice began to open out. Others joined him in chorus. Thaalis, chimtas, manjiras, dholaks, or just any other thing that could work as an instrument of accompaniment, were brought out one by one. In no time a whole orchestra was set up with Baba as the lead singer. As one song finished, someone would start another and everyone joined in. Song by song time went by.
It was Baba himself who reminded others of time. Somehow he always felt the rising and setting sun. Perhaps the smell in the air, the fading warmth or some extra-sensory-perception warned his system about dawn and dusk. He was in trouble, he realised, as they were well past Kanpur. He bid farewell to group of his devotees, whose warm send off had made him richer by about three to four hundred rupees, and got down at the next station. Though he did not like it, but occasionally it did happen that he missed the train back home, delays in schedules of trains being the reason. In such situations Baba travelled back the next evening. Munna was aware of this therefore Baba did not panic, but at the same time he hated the thought of having to sleep over the unforgettable experience that he had, without sharing it with Munna. At the station he found out that the next train to Allahabad could only get him there in the morning. He decided to travel the next day.
Baba could not get back for the next four days. All trains on the route were cancelled the next day when news spread by the afternoon that Babri Masjid in Ayodhya was demolished. He had money to see him through those four days, besides the security of his handicap, but his heart kept silently crying all the time as he sat at the lonely unfamiliar station and thought of Munna. Every few hours he would walk up to the stationmaster's room to check about any train going to Allahabad, and return disappointed.
Seeing him walk through the huge crowd towards the stall, Munna jumped with joy. Calling out for him Munna raced up to him pushing aside everyone and everything, Holding each other in a tight embrace both broke down, crying uncontrollably. The crowd watched them in amazement but little did the crowd know that bond of father and son between the two orphans was cemented with those tears they shed on each other's shoulders.
© S. Ravikiran Shastry