Kuchalambal deals with Demon-etisation

 

It was six in the evening; Ramprasad came around shouting, “ammaji”, “ammaji”.

Kuchalambal had just sat down for her evening prayers. Holding the table with one hand she slowly got up from the chair, and hobbled up to the window to check.

“Kya hua ramu”?  What is the matter she asked?

“Ämmaji, the cash van has just come in and filled in the ATM, people have already Queued up, I thought I should let you know as well” said Ramprasad.

“Oh! Ok Ramu,  may god bless you” said Kuchalambal and went searching for her ATM Card,

She had all of eighty seven rupees in her purse, and her medicines had run out, she had stopped her medication around 3 days back due to lack of cash.  No chemist in the immediate vicinity accepted cards, nor would they give credit to anyone, and cash she had none. The recent government order demonetising rupee notes of Rs.500 and Rs.1000 denominations had brought the nation to a halt.  

It has been eleven days since the announcement had come one night and from the next day onwards the banks became inaccessible to the public, either they had no cash or they had a serpentine queue of hired labourers waiting to get money changed; albeit for a small commission. The prospect of standing in the queue for hours together was daunting for a frail person like Kuchalambal, so she postponed her visit to the bank surviving on what little she had.

Her ATM card was paraphernalia she had never used. She could not remember having been issued any password for the same. Like clockwork she would every month visit her  bank, clean out that months family pension, pay the land lord his rent, and the remaining amount would just be enough for her to get her groceries, pay for her medicines and doctors consultations. So there was no need for her ATM card, which had remained unused so far.  As luck would have it, she had not been keeping well and could not encash her pension this month before the announcements. The rent remained unpaid, her groceries yet to arrive and fast depleting, and no money for her medicines.

Yesterday she had gone to the pensioner’s bank. Hoping that ten days from the announcements, life would now have come back to normal.  But the crowds were larger than before. The least that she wanted was, to get a password activated for her ATM, but the nationalised bank she banked upon, was not very friendly with its online services, so she had to line up at the bank after all.  One hour of waiting her head began to spin, fortunately someone in the crowd took pity on her and escorted her to the head of the queue. Just when she heaved a sigh of relief, the bank announced that the cash boxes were empty, and people would now have to come back the next day. With a sad heart, Kuchalambal somehow got her ATM password enabled, and hoped that soon she would be able to use the ATMs.  That was not to be, for the ATMs, would remain crowded for weeks to come.  She was at her wits end now.

Then she remembered her kitty. She could, just about save some small change every month, notes; she would slip into her wardrobe, underneath her Kanjivaram sarees. The sarees preciously guarded and maintained over the years were carefully kept in cardboard boxes they had come at the time of their purchase. Some sarees were from way back in time and a few more recent acquisitions which her kin had gifted on various occasions.

Flashbacks and memories sustain us in more ways than one. When memories start fading, and loneliness the only consistent factor that keeps one’s company, then old picture albums, trinkets from the pasts, clothes, mementoes take over your life. The very act of prising them out of various nooks and corners, cupboards and attics,  running ones finger around those memories, help in reliving those faded moments and bring some irrational hope that the past will somehow help you tide over the torturous present and help in alleviating the hopelessness of the future.

In that mood when Kuchalambal sat down to retrieve her cash savings from various saree boxes, more than her meagre saving, she managed to retrieve boxes full of memories.  Letters, invoices, peacock feathers, pouches of sandalwood powders, tiny bottles of Itr’s , all came sliding out from underneath those sarees.

She opened the box containing her most precious saree, the one gifted by her grandfather, for her marriage reception. Bright saffron in colour, with borders heavily brocaded in gold, the border and Pallu in  royal blue depicting a swan amidst a lotus pond. The silk still feeling the same after five decades of usage.  Her frail hands had difficulty holding the heavy saree, was it the heaviness of the past, or the frailness of the present should could not make out, she gently lifted the saree out of its box, and laid it on the bed, opening the folds to reveal the golden thread-work, the swan still very vibrant and vain, the lotus still basking in the sun, if anything had faded it was Kuchalambal’s eye sight, she ran her skeletal fingers over the rich fabric, and tried to connect to those memories of her marriage day.

 Memories being memories, play hide and seek, they would not be commanded to come out of their hiding, as if they had an ego of their own,  they would creep up slowly, sometimes eerily out of nowhere, making you gasp in horror, or smile in surprise. One had to have a knack of coaxing them out, and then they would coyly submit to your command, and play your tunes. What the saree could not accomplish, the letter underneath the saree did, in pulling out those hidden memories. She gently prised open the aged, creased, blue, inland letter which had been resting under the saree for half a century now. The address written with a royal blue fountain pen, announced Mrs.Kuchalambal, C/o, Pattabhiraman, 1^st floor, above Ram Chandra Kishen Chandra, Ajmal Khan Road, Karol Bagh Delhi 110005. The hand writing all too familiar.

It was a letter her mother had written to her; soon after the news her first conception reached Madras. It was a long list of instructions, warnings, precautions, recipes, all scribbled together in one ‘Inland Letter’, a letter which could accommodate  not more than five hundred words was crammed with as many more,  even the flaps had tips written over them.  Then her signature ending, she would always draw a picture of a hand raised in blessing at the end of each letter, in this one there was place for none, yet she made sure that a miniature sketch was put in place.

 Kuchalambal picked up her spectacles and read through that letter again.  An ironic line attracted her attention, her mother had written “when food repels you with waves of nausea, don’t go on an empty stomach, have at-least curd rice with Narthanga. She burst out laughing, here she was seventy eight years of age, surviving on curd rice and Narthanga, nothing else appealing to her any more in her sickness and she remembered her days on the same regimen some forty years back, during a good part of her term carrying Siddharth.

Like wine memories age, but like wine, they intoxicate too, so have to be consumed in limited proportions, with a tear in her eye, Kuchalambal folded away the letter, collected the remaining notes from under various other sarees, and all that she could count were around five thousand rupees in all.

But the pain was not over yet, there were in all just about eight hundred rupees in loose change, the rest were in five hundred rupee notes those which were not valid anymore, one could deposit them in one’s bank, or get them exchanged at counters where teeming queues waited for their turn. Daunting prospects for Kuchalambal, especially the waiting in the long queue. Finally she decided that it was not going to work that way. She called a friendly gatekeeper  and asked him to get the money deposited into her bank, and promised him a small tip of rupees hundred for standing in the queue on her behalf. 

She heard the bad news in the evening; the gate keeper had collected similar amounts from other vulnerable citizens in the housing complex and had flown the coop.  

The shock was too much to bear, a small amount, but large enough to make her sob inconsolably. Apart from a few thousand rupees in the bank, she did not have anything to fall back upon. She did not want to write to Siddharth to send her an allowance, and he was oblivious to her meagre existence.  A small piece of land that Pattabhi her husband, had purchased was the only asset she had. She had ventured to sell it and get herself a decent bank balance with which she could pay for her rent. Unfortunately the piece of land was encircled by two large gated holdings belonging to a real estate tycoon. She was told that her land was worth twenty lacs, but since it was sandwiched between the tycoons other properties, with no free access , the influential tycoon was hell bent upon acquiring it for a pittance, the last offer was for five lacs. But Kuchalambal had hung in there, not wanting to sell at those rates. She had hoped that once Siddharth came back from the US he would be able to get a better deal out of the tycoon.

She was preparing for one more trips to the ATM, her last attempt it would be, not for her this painful wait.

The bell rang. She hobbled to the door, and opened it,   standing in the dimming light was Siddhaiah, the tycoon, an man of enormous proportions, dressed in spotless khadi, (he as aspiring for political fame now, she was told), he let loose a big grin, revealing a gold capped tooth. A Large golden chain, strong enough to pull a chariot, dangled from his neck, and all his fingers adorning stones of various hues mounted on gold, silver and copper rings. He seemed to be a walking jewellery shop.

“Amma !!   how are you, can I come in”  ?

“Oh come in”said Kuchalambal a bit reluctantly.

“Amma!!  Someone told me you are into hard times”, boomed Siddhaiah “so I though is should definitely help a senior citizen like you”

“No sorry Siddhaiahji, I don’t think you can help me in any manner”

“Yes Amma, I can.  You remember the land that you wanted to sell, you see I did not have money to buy it all this while” lied Siddhaiah,

“As god would want it, I suddenly got into some cash and I though what better use for the money than, helping an old lady in need. So here I am at your door-step. You had asked for twenty lacs for the property, and I though what is a little sum of money when it comes to doing public service, so I just collected the cash and came right away to close the deal, if you want we can organise the transfer of the property before the end of the week, I have got all the papers ready all you have to do is sign off the deal, and all this money is all yours”.

So saying Siddhaaiah started stacking twenty lacs of five hundred rupee notes upon the table.

Kuchalambal stood there perplexed, not knowing whether this was a boon or a bane.

Slowly she gathered the money and kept it away, promising in her mind to pay the taxes,  there was no guilt of being instrumental in white washing Sidhaiaah’s black money, was she not a victim here ? as long as she paid the taxes, let other people pay for their own sins, she may perhaps have thought.

 

The poor standing out on queues leaving their jobs, the rich fixing the sudden holes in their buckets to ensure that at least a half of their dubious earnings remain with them, people sold by the dozens, traders complacent that they have fixed the problem by discounting the old notes, knowing that but for further regulations change, they are home and happy. Politicians fighting it out, bruised on thier own losses, but rejoicing the rivals discomforts,unable to express their pain. Amidst all this the nation waits and wails.

Between the extremes are caught the middle class, people like Kuchalambal, who carry on with their lives, taking each blow as it comes.

                                                                   @@@@@@