Monday, June 25, 2007

Mitthu: A Five-Year-Old

" Mitthu- My Parrot Boy"


Tattered clothes, white turned into grey by overuse, Laddakhi lepcha boy with green eyes. He is a frail figure, the eighth kid of the family -- father and third brother dead and missing respectively. This boy, Mitthu, must be fifteen now, but my story is set in the summer of 1997, and he was only five then. My school Don Bosco High School has a compulsory NSS requirement: you are supposed to complete 100 hours worth of social service. Having done almost nothing for the whole year, I got this special make-up assignment that included teaching the alphabet to illiterate or semi-literate kids in May in Don Bosco welfare workshop.

Here began my discovery of the life and times of a few fellow residents of my nation's Business capital. For today, read on the true story of Mitthu.
Father Orville our school vector introduced me to the kids.

Catholics and social work well that’s a different story to be told some other day…

Mitthu at once caught my attention for he was the youngest of the lot, unique for his green eyes and the most active one. Within minutes I saw him running around the chawl shouting "nawa teacher yela: aaj class hoenga". Within fifteen minutes, ten kids were all around me, sitting with notebooks and pencils that were provided by Father Orville.



"Don Bosco High School - Alma mater"

Evidently I was not the first teacher they had, beside Don Bosco High School welfare workshops conducted regularly they told me stories about another teacher, much elder in age to me who used to come on a Hero Honda and used to eat in the expensive hotel on the other side of the road. Also they asked me the question, "Sirj aap kab tak rahenga." I felt a bit guilty for I knew the only reason I had jumped into the activity was to get the NSS hours and maybe spend some quality time with my vector.

We got on with the alphabet and arithmetic. Mitthu turned out to be the brightest one. While some senior students were learning multiplication, he caught on fast, and soon was doing it faster than eight and ten-year-olds. In just a couple of days, he really sped from multiplication tables of two to twelve. Day after day, I would reach the Chawl, and find Mitthu the first one to meet and greet me, and within no time he had all his friends languidly walking or running breathlessly, all at their own pace. Slowly, I became an outsider to whom these children could tell all sorts of stories of their lives, and Mitthu my favorite, was the one who spent the most time with me.

He was the eighth in the family, had three elder brothers, the third was missing, and four elder sisters: three were my students. His mother was a frail woman, wrinkled more by the troubles than time, all skin and bones but perhaps iron bones that supplied her strength for waging the unlimited struggle called life. She did some odd jobs, worked in some houses, had sold papad and was very good in keeping accounts. But her condition allowed her to work in only one or two houses for around 200 rupees per month.
I asked him how they managed to survive with just 200 per month.

"Well," he said, "both my brothers, who are sixteen and fourteen also work."
"Where?"
"In a roadside hotel, for 250 and 200 per month. Elder brother got a job in a press, and it was really a good job, they gave him 1500. But one day he went to a friend's marriage, and drank a lot of local liquor. When he came home he vomited blood, and was ill for a whole month. By the time he recovered, the job was gone, and the money was mostly spent on his treatment. Now he works really hard throughout the day, and mummy always gives him the biggest portion of food."

One day Mitthu was unusually sad. His elder sister, who was perhaps thirteen or fourteen had beaten him. She rarely came out of the house and I never got to see her. Mitthu then narrated his sister's story: She was married a year back. Her in-laws demanded a huge dowry that they could not afford. They wanted a TV, a pressure cooker and lots of gold ornaments among other things. After the marriage her husband beat her, kicked her, pulled her hair, slapped her for every possible excuse and hit her with red-hot iron rods. Her back still carried the marks of those beatings that sometimes even left her senseless. Then he and his parents, on occasion refused her food and hurled endless abuses at her. She came home twice but they sent her back.
"But then someone from her Chawl told us that if we wanted her to live even another week, we must bring her back. They brought her home last month. She only sits at home and cries and cries and shouts at everyone. When she cries mummy also cries. The jeeju is such a devil and we are on the girl's side: so we cannot do anything. Going to the police only means more trouble and they would help only jeeju for he can bribe them. So my sister will now stay here for life."

On another day, Mitthu remembered his missing brother who had learnt how to repair a bicycle and had gone missing three months back. He fell in bad company and used to take smack near railway yard. They tried hard to stop him from taking that and then one day he stole whatever was worth stealing and ran away never to come back.

On my last day I had a few kids giving me well rehearsed farewell speech along with a souvenir, Mitthu stood away in the corner. Infinitely sad. His eyes showed pain, and yet somehow he just kept quiet. I shook hands with him. He walked down to the road with me. I asked him to study hard, not stop going to school, and to stay good and away from any bad habits.

My words sank in, but he kept moving softly, silently and waved miserably when I left him. His forlorn face is still embedded in my memory, and I wish I could have done more.

School…junior college…Engg college…

At times when taking my daily dosage of codeine I think did my words that day was of any use to Mitthu… Someday I will visit Mitthu... If I am able to kick this addiction... maybe Jammu, Sharad, Chandan & Kali will join me then.

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