Vikram Seth - A Suitable Boy

‘Now I must see to things,’ he said, and disappeared for a while.

Maan had a slow and relaxed bath, and came down to find his father waiting for him impatiently. They began to discuss the candidates, the support they could expect from people of different areas or religions or castes, their strategy with regard to women and other particular groups, election expenses and how to cover them, and the faint possibility that Nehru might be induced to give a speech in the constituency during his brief tour of Purva Pradesh in mid-January. What gave Maan a real sense of warmth was the fact that his father was far less dismissive of him than usual. Unlike Maan, he had not lived in this constituency, but Maan had expected that he might simply extrapolate his experiences of the Rudhia farm to this northern subdivision. But Mahesh Kapoor, though he did not believe in caste, and thought little of religion, was more than alive to their electoral implications, and listened with care to Maan’s description of the demographic contours of this tricky terrain.

Among the Independent candidates — quite apart from Waris, who was a supporter — there was no one who presented much of a challenge to Mahesh Kapoor. And among the party candidates, because he happened to be the candidate of the Congress Party — anxious though he was about fighting from an unfamiliar constituency — he started out with an immense advantage. The Congress was the party of Independence and the party of Nehru, and it was far better funded, far more widely organized, and far more quickly recognized than the others. Its very flag — saffron, white and green, with a spinning wheel in the middle — resembled the national flag. The Congress Party had a worker or two in almost every village — workers who had been somewhat active in social service during the last few years, and would be very active indeed in electioneering in the coming couple of months.

The other five parties presented a mixed bag.

The Jan Sangh promised to ‘advocate the spread and extension of the highest traditions of Bharatiya Sanskriti’: a thinly veiled term for Hindu, rather than Indian, culture. It was more than willing to go to war with Pakistan over the issue of Kashmir. It demanded compensation from Pakistan for the property of Hindus who had been forced to migrate to India. And it stood for a United India which included the territory of Pakistan; presumably, it meant a forcibly reunited one.

The Ram Rajya Parishad appeared more peaceable if further removed from reality. It declared that its object was to bring about a state of affairs in the country similar to that of the idyllic age of Rama. Every citizen would be expected to be ‘righteous and religious-minded’; artificial foodstuffs such as vanaspati ghee — a kind of hydrogenated vegetable oil — would be banned, as would obscene and vulgar films and the slaughter of cows. The ancient Hindu system of medicine would be ‘recognized officially as the national system’. And the Hindu Code Bill would never be passed.

The three parties to the left of the Congress who were fighting from this constituency were the KMPP, the party that Mahesh Kapoor had joined and then left (and whose symbol was a hut); the Socialist Party (whose symbol was a banyan tree); and the Communist Party (whose symbol was a sickle and a few ears of corn). The Scheduled Castes Federation, the party of Dr Ambedkar (who had recently resigned from Nehru’s Cabinet on the grounds of irreconcilable differences and the collapse of the Hindu Code Bill), had forged an electoral alliance with the socialists; they had no candidate of their own for this seat. They concentrated mainly on double-member constituencies where at least one member from the scheduled castes was bound by law to be elected to the legislature.

‘It would have been good if your mother had been here,’ said Mahesh Kapoor. ‘It’s even more important in this place than in my old constituency — even more of the women here are in purdah.’

‘How about the Congress women’s groups?’ asked Maan.

Mahesh Kapoor clicked his tongue impatiently. ‘It’s not enough to have Congress women volunteers,’ he said. ‘What we need is a powerful woman speaker.’

‘Ammaji isn’t a powerful speaker,’ Maan pointed out with a smile. He tried to imagine his mother on a podium and failed. Her speciality was quiet work behind the scenes, mainly in helping people, but sometimes — as in elections — in persuasion.

‘No, but she’s from the family, and that makes all the difference.’

Maan nodded. ‘I think we should try to get Veena out to help,’ he said. ‘You’ll have to talk to old Mrs Tandon, though.’

‘The old lady doesn’t like my godless ways,’ said Mahesh Kapoor to his son. ‘We’ll have to get your mother to speak to her. You go back next week and tell her. And while you’re at it, tell Kedarnath to speak to the jatavs he knows in Ravidaspur to contact the scheduled castes in this area. Caste, caste.’ He shook his head. ‘Oh yes, and one more thing. For the first few days we should travel around together. Then we can split forces to get more coverage. The Fort has two jeeps. You can go around with Waris and I’ll go around with the munshi.’

‘When Firoz comes, you should go around with him,’ said Maan, who did not care much for the munshi and thought he might well lose his father votes. ‘That will make a Hindu-Muslim pair in each jeep.’

‘Well, what is keeping him away?’ asked Mahesh Kapoor impatiently. ‘It would have been much better if he had showed us around Baitar. I can understand why Imtiaz can’t leave Brahmpur.’

‘He’s had a lot of work recently,’ said Maan, thinking for a moment of his friend. He had been allotted Firoz’s room as usual, high up in the Fort. ‘And the Nawab Sahib?’ he countered. ‘What is his reason for deserting us?’

‘He doesn’t like elections,’ said Mahesh Kapoor shortly. ‘In fact, he doesn’t like politics at all. And after his father’s role in splitting up the country, I don’t blame him. Well, he’s put everything at our disposal. At least we are mobile. Can you imagine driving my car along these roads? Or going around on bullock-carts?’

‘We’re perfectly mobile,’ said Maan. ‘Two jeeps, a pair of bullocks, and a bicycle.’ They both laughed. A pair of bullocks was the Congress symbol, and Waris’s was a bicycle.

‘A pity about your mother,’ repeated Mahesh Kapoor.

‘There’s still a long way to go before the polls,’ said Maan optimistically, ‘and I’m sure she’ll be well enough to give us a hand in a week or two.’ He looked forward to the return to Brahmpur that his father had just suggested. It seemed to him that for almost the first time in his life his father trusted him; indeed, in some ways, depended on him.

Waris entered to announce that they were just on their way to the Socialist Party meeting in town. Did the Minister Sahib or Maan Sahib wish to come along?

Mahesh Kapoor thought that if Waris had organized some heckling it would be inappropriate for him to go. Maan was bound by no such scruples. He wanted to see everything there was to be seen.

The meeting of the Socialist Party began forty-five minutes late under a huge red-and-green canopy on the playing fields of the government school in Baitar, where most important large meetings in town were held. A few men on the podium were trying to keep the crowd entertained and patient. Several people greeted Waris, and he was delighted to be the centre of a little knot of attention. He went around introducing Maan and greeting people with an adaab or a namaste or a hearty slap on the back. ‘This is the man who saved the Nawabzada’s life,’ he announced so flamboyantly that even the robust Maan was embarrassed.