My Tryst With Bapu

It was late in the night when I entered my room , extremely tired, unable to think anything, thus without changing I fell on my bed and the last words I heard before sleeping were from my friend Ritesh "Apurv, good night ......” But unlikely, it was a night that made me think the most, forced me from not thinking anything to ponder over everything, a night that triggered my mind and left me feeling relentless..........

After a long jejune schedule and my usual fight with Matko(Kamakshi), I was extremely neurotic and what I needed was just a cosy sleep. I closed my eyes in the hope of that quiet sleep but I had no clue that this quietness was going to lead to the biggest blur of my life. Soothing dreams, a joy ride of funny moments, glimpses of my elfish tasks were all that I was going through in my sleep but suddenly it turned to a bit frigid side, everything got hazed, I started witnessing a horrifying flashback of my entire college day, my mates appearing to me as text appears in "MICROSOFT" in zoomed status, Ritesh dancing in front of my eyes, tiny Ishaan imposing as big as Mukul, Matko torturing me with her everyday "shut up" in a more spooky manner, me totally baffled and as I started to get my nerves back, everything stopped, total blackout as if my laptop shutdowns immediately due to empty battery, and everything got vanished. A suspicious aura with a pinching silence and that silence broken down by the movement of a stick. A geezer holding that stick was coming towards me, I figured him out, his famous dressing style, peculiar way of walking could tell you in a second about him that you are confronting the most famous person of the country, the biggest Saint of modern India, rightly called as Bapu. I stood up and before I could wish him, he asked me "_kaise ho beta?"(How are you?). I said "fine _bapu, you tell" with a smile on my face..... His behavior acknowledged my question but did not reply. I noticed that his eyes were constantly searching something through my room and his face expressions showed that the search was for something very close to his heart as if he had kept that in my room or he was assured of seeing it in my room. I began to ask but again his question fired first "What are you wearing.....?”. I answered in total excitement about my new jeans and t-shirt. It was a new fabric launched in Indian market .He fired another question to my reply "then where is my _Khadi(“khadi” is a fabric which was propagated by Gandhiji) that I taught to the people ?". I shrugged and replied "It went with you bapu”. A reply which startled him for a moment, but considering my behavior a part of my ignorance, he continued the discussion. Then he quizzed me about the education framework of country, asked me about my engineering prospects and a lot other quarries as my father used to ask at the time of my admission and counseling -procedure. I told him everything, including my notion of going out of India after my M.B.A to which he asked in a loud noise "then, who shall serve my INDIA "......I stepped back , unable to see in his eyes which were not frightening but wailing......... I offered him water to which he denied .........My eyes whirled towards clock, it was 2 in the night. I couldn't hear any voice of any of my friends in my wing as if everybody had gone to sleep. My roomy Tushu was sleeping the way he usually sleeps _kehte hain na gadhe-ghode bechkar( a phrase used in Hindi for deep slumber) . But rightly in Jawaharlal Nehru's famous words framing my situation, at the stroke of the midnight hour when the entire wing was sleeping, I was awaken for my tryst............... _Bapu initiated another topic "ok after these sixty years of independence, tell me about the living standards of my people, is there still any person who dies out due to
hunger .....? Is someone still called poor" I replied "_bapu, living standard has certainly risen now, every man goes to big places such as "SHOPPING MALLS", visits MC.DONALDS, enjoys good food, wear good clothes, there is no end to luxuries if you intend to have them". _Bapu exclaimed with a sigh of relief "that means, nobody is poor in my INDIA ". He was delighted, and I could see him grinning. He rejoiced saying again" nobody is poor in my India.""Na _bapu, aisa nahi hai ", I replied, his happiness ceased and he asked" what do you mean by that? ". I began to murmur "_bapu, somewhere _tandoori nights are in full swing, booze and music, to add to the zing, men and women come and enjoy, while somewhere a child plays with a broken toy, the rich are getting richer, the poor are like a pitcher with a hole at bottom, which grows in size, but no one hears when poor cries.......". "Then who is heard?" , _bapu enquired."the man who holds you _bapu...... ", I remarked with a selfish tone in a whining voice, "bole to _bapu , the man who carries that green note with your face on it ,_vo kehte hain na bapu,apne desh mein jab tak jeb mein paisa hai, log pucchte hain, kaisa hai?"(the one with money, is only greeted). It is shameless to say that but I fail to understand why I was having a proud feeling in telling all this to him as if INDIA belonged to him only. I knew he needed time, and something more than that to digest what I had vomited. He sat on my chair, with his eyes staring towards the floor still trying to absorb to the conversation .I needed some air, so I took _bapu"s permission to give a halt to this discussion. I opened my door and stepped outwards, closing the door delicately. I inspected the ambience, "pin-drop silence" phrase achieving its literal meaning in my hostel wing for the very first time. Slowly I marched towards the
water- cooler, and as I brought my mouth near its tap, I realized that I was not thirsty, I stepped back, my steps lead me to the washbasin, I washed my face, and as my eyes turned towards the mirror fixed directly above the washbasin, _bapu"s smiling face was already there to catch to my eyes, as if he was standing at my back. I turned back, he was not there, I realized that he was still waiting in my room, I ran towards my room to see he was there only........He was still sitting on that chair but now he appeared a little bit settled. I thought it impolitic to say anything for a while and it also gave me time to get relaxed. I was reclining on the bed and lacing my hands behind my head, when suddenly _bapu said "then, why young people like you do not step forward to change the society?”. I answered without actually asking myself about it as if I had a prepared answer "_bapu, if you are gonna change this system, nothing gonna happen, it will change you, nobody listens. It is a kind of social challenge which ends with the end of the one who shouts."Stopping me in between _bapu remarked" why the young turks see it as a social challenge, do see it as a managerial challenge, for example, earlier you told me about the exposure of management to Indian students, why don’t they use it to bring the change in society, start from the lesson of team leadership taught to them in class to imply in MNC's to the administration of the country. "Personally, I sensed a great piece of advice in it feeling that it was not a usual remark which you expect from a freedom-fighter and then claim it as a boring speech, it was something which showed what GANDHISM really meant. I realized that why his most famous slogan "EKLA, CHALO RE" accompanied the support of each and everyone. By the time, i experienced that unknowingly I had got interest in his catholic views, I wanted to learn from him, and at the same point a question uttered from my mouth "_bapu, in our country, every politician says he is a politician of principles, but alas we can’t find any political party of principles. WE lack a leader, people’s leader. Why? , What really makes a leader? ". He replied as if he had an answer to my every question "beta, when you have a sense of spirituality added to your character, so that public can relate to you, it turns you from a politician to a leader, people's leader". A precise answer which contained everything, proving why he is being called as _bapu, the father of our nation, the biggest leader ever. His views provided a solution to my each and every quarry, and I subsequently learned that his ideas are not invincible, behind his every practice, there was a mission, he followed non-violence because it had a vision of love behind it, and if that vision could have been achieved by non-violence, he would have gone for non-violence. I was enjoying a great time with him, he had found a learner in me, and I was feeling blessed to be with that savant of his own experimented ideas, I should rather say his experiments with truth. But eventually when he was telling about his biggest tools -truth, honesty and non-violence, he praised himself by saying that my people could not have forgotten them, do they follow and lead these principles even today with great epitomy. I did not want to hide it from _bapu, hence
I told him that "_bapu, in today's India, truth is like an extinct element only preserved in books, the person who says it is a sufferer, and who moulds it is the beneficiary, honesty is a forgotten policy, corruption surpasses it in every government office right below your picture , every demand in the country , be it reservation of some minorities, or be it a rift arising due to some regionalism or religionism issue, always tends to be heard after brutal violence activities in our country, thus murdering your ideals and hanging them on a cross of iron.........." .I was narrating him the face of today's India but I think he could not handle more than it....... he stood up and snapped at me " is this the INDIA, for which we laid our lives, its good I am not still alive and there is no need to lament for me or any freedom fighter, unless and until you really do not value it........" .He headed towards the door, sobbing for his land and for every martyr of this land. I was listening to him quietly unable to answer him and I could not realize that he was going, he went out of the room crying "ITS NOT THE INDIA OF MY DREAM". I ran outside to stop him, but by the time he had gone , where? I do not know .... I tried to search him saying "_bapu, _bapu", I was shouting in the midst of the corridor and everybody came to stop me, and then I realised that everyone was still awaken, and nobody had gone to sleep, it was 3 in the night and students were still roaming usually as they normally do here and there by this time of the night. Everyone asked me what had happened to me but I could not say anything because I knew they won’t trust. I came back to my room mulling what was it all about? Was it a dream or something else....? It was surely not a dream, but scientifically it could not have been more than that.........

Please note - all the words in HINDI language have been preceded by '_'.