Uday Prakash: The Walls of Delhi

Ramnivas’ relatives, who’d always steered clear of him, suddenly started showing up at his place with whole families in tow. Ramnivas, once decrepit and spiteful, now personified all the virtue and beauty the world had to offer, and Babiya wasn’t afraid to sing his praise, all the time, and right to his face. His stock within his own caste community was on the rise, and he was often approached for advice about matrimonial alliances between families. He got all sorts of letters and wedding invitations. If he felt like it, he’d go. If he didn’t, he wouldn’t. But when he did — what a welcome he got!

‘Take it — it’s all yours. Don’t worry about paying it back,’ he’d be heard saying as he helped someone out. To paraphrase a popular saying, even a Ramnivas can get lucky.

Meanwhile, Ramnivas had begun drinking every day, and his liaisons with Sushma also became a daily occurrence. By then, Babiya knew all about the affair, but had decided to keep her mouth shut. She knew enough about the kind of man Ramnivas was to feel confident he’d never leave her or the kids. And so she didn’t worry.

Sometimes Ramnivas wouldn’t come home until well after midnight. Sometimes he’d disappear for a few days — sometimes with Sushma. But it didn’t make any difference to Babiya: the neighbourhood now held Ramnivas in high esteem. He’d go straight to Sushma’s house and had no qualms about talking to Sushma about going out to see a movie. Right in front of her mother, Bilaribai, who also washed other people’s dishes and cleaned other people’s houses.

Sushma now owned several salwar outfits, complete with matching sandals and jewellery sets. She used to go head-to-head with Ramnivas no matter how small the squabble, but now, fearing he might get angry, Sushma silently put up with more and more. On several occasions her mother cautioned, ‘How long will this last? You have to stand up for yourself and tell him what’s yours is yours. And he is yours, honey. People are beginning to talk.’ But Sushma would reply, ‘I’m no homewrecker, Amma. He has kids don’t forget. Let it go for as long as it goes.’ Deep inside she was sure it would go on forever, for the rest of their lives.

If people asked Ramnivas where he’d suddenly got so much money, he’d say that he’d got in on a half-million rupee pyramid scheme in Saket, or that he was playing the numbers and he kept hitting. Or that he’d won the lottery. Or — and this he reserved for only a few — that he’d met a great holy man near the mosque who whispered a very special mantra in his ear that caused future stock-market figures to flash before his eyes. In turn, Ramnivas whispered the same mantra into the ears of several people, all of whom failed to see the numbers flash before their eyes. Ramnivas explained that in order to see the numbers, one’s heart must be pure. First you must bear no ill-will, prey on no one, cause no harm, and then you’d see: the market and lottery numbers would dance in your mind’s eye!

Whenever Ramnivas felt like it, he’d go and fill up his bag with a few stacks of cash from the wall in Saket. It was amazing that no one had stopped him or arrested him, and no one had moved the stacks of rupees around. Spending the money as he pleased for so long with no one stopping him had turned Ramnivas into a carefree man, and so his daring grew. And yet he was still beset with worry that one day the rightful owner of the money might show up and take it away. So with wisdom and foresight, Ramnivas did two things to lessen the impact in case the money ever disappeared. First, he bought a ten acre plot of land in Loni Border, and put it in his wife’s name. Second, he took three-hundred thousand and deposited it into various savings accounts in several banks, all under different names. One of them was a deposit of fifty thousand in Sushma’s name, who had by then decided she wanted to go on forever with Ramnivas, just the way things were. LOVE AT THE TAJ MAHAL, AN AIR-CON ROOM, EAGLE EYE, AND THE POLICE

It happened about eight months ago.

Ramnivas made big plans to take Sushma on a trip to Jaipur and Agra, where, of course, they’d have their photo taken in front of the Taj Mahal. It would be a fun getaway for a few days. Sushma instantly agreed. They travelled to Agra by train.

They found a taxi driver the moment they stepped out of the train station. Ramnivas instructed him to take them to a hotel. ‘What’s your price range?’ the taxi driver asked, sizing him up.

Ramnivas could tell that the driver thought he was just an average joe, or worse, some schmuck. ‘It doesn’t matter so long as the hotel’s top-notch,’ Ramnivas said firmly. ‘Don’t take me to some fleabag, cut-rate flophouse.’

The driver appeared to be around forty-five; he had a cunning look on his face and dark eyes as alert as a bird of prey. He smiled, asking sardonically, ‘Well, there’s a nice three-star hotel right nearby. Whaddya think?’ The man must have been expecting Ramnivas to lose his cool at the mere mention of a three-star hotel, but Ramnivas was unfazed.

‘Three-star, five-star, six-star — it’s all the same to me. Just step on it. I really need a shower, a hot shower, and a big double plate of butter chicken.’

The taxi driver gave him a long look, which he followed with a piercing, hawklike glance at Sushma. Pleased with himself, and now mixing in mockery, he added, ‘Yes sir! On our way! And do you think I’m going to let you settle for a plain old hot shower? I’ll see to it you have a whole big full tub of hot water! And butter chicken? Did you say butter chicken? I am going to take you somewhere they will serve you not just any old butter chicken, but whatever your heart can dream up!’

Ramnivas laughed at this and said, ‘That’s more like it! Now step on it.’

The taxi driver then asked, ‘So where are you from, sir?’

‘Me? I’m a Delhite. What, did you think I was from U.P. or M.P. or Pee Pee or someplace like that?’ Ramnivas quipped, smiling at Sushma as if he’d just won the war. ‘I come to Agra all the time. With the company car, every couple of weeks,’ Ramnivas added, hoping that this shrewd driver wouldn’t ask him about his big job. What would he say? Grade Four sanitation worker? Broom pusher? Janitor? But the driver didn’t follow up.

When they got to the hotel, Ramnivas took the luggage out of the trunk. The driver told him, ‘Go and see if they have any rooms. If not, we’ll try someplace else.’

Ramnivas left Sushma in the taxi and went inside. When he got to the reception desk and heard the rate, he wondered if they should find a cheaper place to stay. But he soon signed on the dotted line for an AC room with a deluxe double bed for fifteen hundred a night. The man sitting at the reception desk sent Ramnivas upstairs to take a look at the room, and sent a bellboy on his way to fetch the luggage.

When Sushma arrived along with the luggage, she looked a little worried. ‘Wow!’ she exclaimed. ‘What kind of a place is this, anyway? Everything’s so shiny and polished, like glass. I feel like I shouldn’t touch anything. What if it gets dirty? There’s something about all this stuff, and the bellboy, too, that gives me a weird feeling,’ Sushma added hesitantly.

After the bellboy had finished with their luggage, showed them that the pitcher of drinking water was filled up, and left, Ramnivas said to Sushma, ‘Just enjoy yourself, and don’t worry.

We’ve still got some stashed away, so why fret?’ Then, lovingly, he added, ‘Come over here and give me a big smooch. And crack open that bottle in my bag while you’re at it.’

The knock on the door came at half past ten that night. It had already been a long day of sightseeing at the Taj, with all sorts of poses for the camera, then buying trinkets on the road, on top of which Sushma bought a set of Firozabadi bangles that had made her ever so happy.