Dr. Moushumi kandali
-Assam Desh. August 25, 1835-
John M’coshe saheb’s face was like a pale sapphire stone. In the light of the fire made by burning dried nahar seeds, those sapphire eyes were as mysterious as two black king cobras twinkling in the dark.
M’coshe saheb was suffering from heartburn. What magic potion had that enchantress given him? He poured a little gin into a tall earthen jar. Two other earthen pots nearby roasted deer meat and silkworm fry.
Captain Janikson had sent a housekeeper and a servant with household goods needed for M’coshe’s makeshift house—from an embroidered mattress to a cane box, a pruning knife to dazzling metallic bowls to pitchers—but M’coshe saheb poured his drink into the earthen jar. The taste of gin and the flavour of the vessel blended together and danced in his mouth. Each drop of his blood jumped rhythmically—gin, gin gin gin gite, te tak te, taginita… gin gin ahh! The blood carried the fire to every pore of his body, while the fire fueled by the nahar seeds was dying. Bringing a seed from the basket kept handy, he picked up a long bamboo stick and stuck a seed into its far end. The fire started once again, and his heart lit up bright as well. You black magic woman, what did you feed me in the afternoon?
The aroma of the burnt earth of this part of the globe mingled with the exotic taste from a faraway country, burning into his consciousness. His tongue, engulfed by that fire, started muttering,
“To James Ranken
Dear Sir,
My report will be ready soon. I will be submitting to you the strange census undertaken by the Statistics Department under the Administration of Her Majesty and the Company. However, sir, I feel as though an angel or a witch or a river spirit has put a spell on me, my mind is not in my control. I… I…
The white saheb collapsed.
On unsteady feet, he managed to drag himself to his curved wooden bed, and as he lay there he could hear her giggles. She had said, “Saheb, this type of fever cannot be cured with an herbal medicine pack on the head and a monster leech on the body. Even if a monster leech sucks your hot blood out for seven days and seven nights, this cursed fever of yours will not recede. Are you listening to the sound of the kalghanta bell? Your time is ticking away.”
******
Hearing the beating of the drum in the middle of the night, M’coshe saheb broke into a cold sweat. Getting up from the bed, he started towards the window secured by bamboo grills. Opening it slightly, he looked outside. It was just the sound of the Dala ghata Banti pura rituals.
A strange custom of this strange country, hunting in the middle of the night while sailing on a boat. Opening the door, the saheb came out to the courtyard. He saw, against the current of the overflowing Pagala River, a boat, a Buti or Selengi boat, moving slowly, keeping close to the bank. Standing on the concave heart of the boat were three shadowy figures.
The one standing in front, closest to the mast, was holding a burning torch. Behind him was another man, holding a bell or a cymbal, and beating it hard. Behind him was the third man, holding a spear or a javelin.
Spellbound by the illusion created with the light and the rhythmic sound, a herd of deer would approach the boat from land or a shoal of huge garua, bargala, bami and bahpati fish would charge towards the boat, and the spear or javelin would pierce through their heart. Dala ghata, Banti pura. Rhythmic sound, blazing fire. Sound and fire, fire and sound. Does the fire dance to the rhythm of the cymbal or does the cymbal move to the dancing fire? A mesmerizing scene, lyrical and mysterious. It was enchantingly paranormal, enthrallingly fear-inducing. A shiver went down M’coshe saheb’s spine.
The heartrending cry of a deer cut through the night. The boat picked up speed excitedly.
Riding on a similar boat from Kolkata, Makshe saheb, as the locals would call this man from a foreign land across seven seas and thirteen rivers, had travelled to this part of the country. He had alighted at Pandu Ghat. The first half of his journey was carried out in a huge wooden craft with a sail, and later he continued on a rowboat. Those oar-propelled boats were usually used for carrying soldiers and inland letters and parcels. In one of those overcrowded vessels, he had reached Pandu Ghat.
While sailing in the huge river for days, he was fascinated to see the many moods of the river. The river never looked like a river, it looked like an ocean. They said it is a male river, the son of Brahma, the creator of the universe. In this land, even the rivers were male or female.
His journey continued on elephant back. In the towns, he travelled in a horse-drawn coach provided by the Commissioner, Captain Jackson. Jackson had supplied him with all the necessary documents needed to carry out the survey. A mine of information collected by Mr. Scott, Bukanan and other locals and written by hand. Looking at the treasure trove of knowledge and data, he was ecstatic. How many articles would he now be able to send to the Asiatic Society Journal or to the medical science journals for publication?
Like a true-blue adventurer, he was constantly on the lookout for new truths and discoveries to unravel, while travelling by boat, elephant, horse, and at times on foot. Starting from Pandu, travelling hundreds of miles upwards, he had reached the final point of the landmass. During his journey from the lower part of the state to the upper part which stretched from the foothills of the Patkai range to the Himalayas, he felt as if he was in an art gallery. One painting after another—landscape consisted of different people, different cultures—filling up each frame with a variety of colours, rhythms, forms and beauty.
The notebooks on his shoulders were growing heavier. On his lithography slates, the figures and forms were presenting themselves in a variety of expressions—the banks of the Brahmaputra, earrings, dul pendants, moupiya birds, dancing birds or looms, textiles, utensils, bows and arrows, herbs, flowers of unknown wilderness. With the hands of an amateur lithographer and his wanderlust-sharpened mind, he captured many aspects of life here—the people, history, culture, nature, folklore. What he was most curious about was the local Kabiraji way of practicing medicine, and the ways of the witch doctors with their wry smiles. Moving around these areas, he was sniffing out these practices.
After all, he himself was a medical practitioner.
On the trail of one such case, he had reached the gates of a rickety hut. He had wanted to observe a doctor who was practicing the local medicine and, possibly, try his hand at it too. By the time he returned, he was infected with a strange virus which made him listless. His body trembled from a nameless fever. The trembles had begun the moment he set foot into the gate. He was a well-built man too, this robust M’coshe saheb!
From the gate he could assess that it was a poor household. The roof, which had definitely seen better days, was now a cluster of dry grass and the cane walls were equally worn out. The man lying on a bamboo bed was a mere skeleton. He had no clothing except for a loincloth from the waist down.
“Hey, bring a cloth and cover this trembling body,” the witchdoctor shouted at someone. He put a cold water-soaked cloth on his head.
M’coshe, the skillful assistant to the doctor, dug out a dry leafy packet from the pocket of his baggy trousers, and took out elephant leeches to release over the trembling body. The leeches would suck the infected blood and detoxify the body.
An idol made of burnt terracotta appeared in front of him, with a complexion as white as a gulanchi flower. Her chest was covered with a green bustier. She wore a red embroidered mekehla that reached her knees. Her bare arms were shone like ivory even in the darkness. She was carrying a large cloth to cover the patient.
She was surprised to find him there, but without any inhibition or fear, she stood close to her sick father. The saheb observed her with admiration—such a poor woman, but what a regal aura! The moment he set his awestruck eyes on that aura, the terracotta figurine turned into a monster elephant leech and started sucking the blood from his heart. In all honesty, she had been sucking his blood for quite some time. The leech was becoming plumper, and he was getting paler by the day. He was ready to surrender.
One day, he reached this place after travelling a long distance on foot, while the sun was doing the tandav (dance of destruction) in gay abundance. People were reeling under the heat. The vigorous saheb too was exhausted. Resting for a while under an elephant-apple tree, as he was pouring a little sugarcane juice along with some homemade liquor from an earthen pot, his glazed eyes saw a wave of reapers with bare arms and bare calves, holding shiny sickles, coming out of a paddy field. They looked like a group of colourful butterflies hovering around the greens. Saheb was bewildered. He had never witnessed something like this before. He had seen many female bonded-labourers at work, in several places in this huge country, now a colony of his own country. Never before had he seen a group of women so alive and energetic, laughing and chatting among themselves without fear or hesitation. With broken sentences in the local language, he asked them, “What are these tools for cultivation, would you explain?”
They did not stop out of imposed modesty, nor did they became coquettish and flee, nor did they pull the veil over their face and keep mum following the dictum that a woman should not talk to a strange man. Rather, using gestures, they responded quite naturally—they did not have the time to chat. However, one sweet face among them smiled and gestured— follow us. After following them for a short distance, she pointed at a beautifully carved house with a lush garden and instructed him to go inside.
Inside M’coshe met the witchdoctor, Ujha Manmath. Though the witchdoctor was from the lower part of the state, he had made the upper part of the land nestling at the foothills of Patkai his home. The royal family there had entrusted his forefathers to carry out prayers and rituals. He would visit his native place once in a while. Whenever he went on a pilgrimage it was either out of the state to the faraway ghats of the Holy River or to pay obeisance to Goddess Bagala atop the sacred hill Nilachal Kamakhya, near the majestic river of his native place, the same river which had brought John M’coshe to the shore of this land. After a few days, as per the instructions of the good doctor, the saheb made a temporary shelter at this secluded place close to the river. Along with him were a servant and a housekeeper carrying the goods Commissioner Jackson had sent. On one side of his temporary home was the vast expanse of green fields stretching as far as the eyes could see and beyond that was a deep jungle that reached a range of hills creating an undulating terrain with its high peaks and deep valleys. On the other side flowed the turbulent Pagala River. Nestling in its bosom was the vast greenery, which kept chuckling like a healthy child. The saheb was unaware that the healthy child did not just chuckle, it sometimes cried with hunger and often slept after being fed opium.
One day, waking up from an opium-induced sleep, the saheb heard a strange noise. It was rhythmic, followed by some melodious notes. In women’s voices. The music was so pleasing that the saheb, mesmerized, started towards the source of the melody. He reached the huge banyan tree in the middle of the field and stood there bewildered, like a cow bitten by a snake. It was the women from the paddy fields. They were dancing in circles playing a musical bamboo instrument. In gay abandon, they hooted and swayed to the melodious song. They seemed to be in a trance, as if they had consumed liquor. Adding another note to their music, some birds, either a cuckoo or a keteki, cooed hauntingly. The combined melody tied him to the spot. Among those women, the saheb saw that bewitching face as well, whirling like a top, creating a surreal web. The curves of her body started sucking on his heart like hundreds of elephant leeches. His throat had gone dry with a thirst that could not be quenched.
Noticing his red eyes when he returned home at dawn, his housekeeper threw a loaded look at the servant and said, “I hope he has not gone crazy, seeing those women dancing Bihu the whole night.” The servant replied, “It’s time he should be taken to Mayong. The black magic women of Mayong can shoot their magic arrows and turn him into a lamb. He need not go back to the mainland or back to his white country. Let him remain here as a lamb,” they chuckled.
Hearing the word Mayong, the saheb understood something. He smiled to himself and thought, “Why does anybody need to go to Mayong? This part of the country has witches everywhere. All of them are black magic women.” Did not one of them just tear his heart apart with a deadly arrow? The enchantress who first alighted from the green field in an afternoon and then danced Bihu at the middle of night? Midday, looking like a terracotta figurine, she appeared in the dark dingy hut which was illuminated with her presence, and instantly she turned herself into an elephant leech.
After spending a few minutes with the patient, John M’coshe was leaving the dingy room. Kabiraj was walking ahead of him. Outside, M’coshe saheb saw the sky was overcast with dense clouds and, like a sharp spear, a streak of lightning cut across the sky. The song of the doikala bird was growing intense and arousing. What was the ethereal voice calling out from behind, a thousand times more melodious than the doikala?
Looking back, he saw her. That terracotta doll. She was beckoning him back into the hut. As he reached the courtyard, she joined both hands and stretching before him, and like one does before God, she bowed her head. John M’coshe was bewildered. Not knowing what he was expected to do, he looked at her helplessly. He noticed a dark green leaf in her palms. The shape of the leaf was that of a heart. Saheb was startled. The leaf silently conveyed to him a thousand meanings. On that leaf was a small fruit, cut into two equal halves. Amidst the web of intricate patterns on the fruit was a spot of white. Spellbound, he gazed at the betel nut and paan and, accepting the offerings, he put it in his mouth.
The sharp secretions from that exotic betel nut and paan wreaked havoc on his unaccustomed tongue. It overpowered him, he felt as if a drum was beating wildly inside his chest, capsizing his heart. His ears grew hot, droplets of sweat appeared on his forehead and the pulse rate soared. Seeing his condition, she grabbed a ball of jiggery and thrust it into his mouth. Oh ho, saheb, you are not yet used to having raw betel nut and paan like us, right? She offered him a brass bowl filled with soothing cold water.
He recalled what Kabiraj had told him the other day, after the night he had watched the Bihu dance. He had explained to him the suggestive meaning of Bihu and the symbolic gesture of a Bihuwan, the long white silk-cotton cloth with red flowers on the border which the women weave with their wooden handlooms. The wise Kabiraj had revealed to him the secret of the tune of Bihu, which was full of indicative meanings about offering betel nuts and paan.
The betel nut and paan the terracotta doll had offered him was nothing but a token of gratitude for a godsend witchdoctor.
Reeling under that burning sensation, as he was recalling the juicy words coming from the expert narrator, the respected one, saheb couldn’t see the dichotomy of the narrative. The weather was disturbing, the clouded sky cut through by frequent lightning. The doikala bird was cooing hauntingly at regular intervals. Moreover, he had been engrossed these days in reading the emerging poets of Romanticism and its overwhelming reverberations among the literati in his faraway country, which came down like sudden torrential rain over his dazed soul on this exotic afternoon and gave birth to an obscure sensitivity. Seeped in that intense feeling, his soul did not allow him to sleep in peace ever again. With a restless soul, he was now standing in his backyard, watching the primitive way of hunting and fishing by beating drums and burning torches. Dala ghata, Banti pura.
The arrow that pierced through the heart of the deer injured his heart too. She was hunting. A hunt carried out by creating a deceptively beautiful illusion with rhythmic sound and bright light. M’coshe saheb went back inside. He poured the remainder of the jar of Beefeater Gin into his throat. Burning another nahar seed, he opened the notebook lying on his camp khat. Sitting on a wooden maisa, using a tall wooden stool for a table, he started writing the findings of his survey.
He started to scribble something in the notebook, thought of something and closed it. He absentmindedly rubbed the knife used to sharpen pencils on the leg of the big stool, making his feather pen and the inkpot shake. The saheb too was shaking inside. There was a fierce battle going on in his subconscious, between his brain and his heart. His heart said, “She is not a deceiver. She is a real woman made of flesh and blood. A simple, independent, free-spirited woman, the way nature made her, which was hitherto unseen, unknown in any other part of the world. She and her ilk. Perhaps she is a representative of a handful of women in the world who are not bound by tradition or forcefully subjected to a defined system. She is not a water spirit or some divine angel. She is a human. A woman who can complement a man as his equal.”
However, John M’coshe was also a man. Like every man, he too could visualize a woman only in two extreme avatars—either a pure, virtuous goddesses or a witch or enchantress. No man can accept that a woman can have both the virtues and the vices.
John M’coshe’s brain kept hammering, “She is an enchantress. She is a huntress. She is unrestrained. She is a seductress. There is not a single grain of morality in her.”
M’coshe was wearing a coat of Victorian morality. Most men cover themselves with a Victorian shawl. Knowingly or unknowingly, they carry that shawl all the time. This was why the Kabiraj had explained to him, “Do not befriend these low caste women who dance at night. Why did you go to watch the Bihu dance? One can never vouch for those uncultured, footloose and fancy-free women. Our upper class royal women are different, they are very wise. You must have heard of Queen Phuleswari Kuwari? Have you written down all the information about her in your notebook? There was another warrior called Mula Gabharu. There was Jaimati, a pure virtuous woman. There were women who wrote poetry. I would still say—beware of women. Whatever class and caste she may be—beware! Nobody can tell what a tiri, that’s a woman, is plotting. Our women know black magic. The old name of our country is Kamrup and our women were called Mohini… Did you get it? Have you, by the way, visited the Madan Kamdev Peeth, the sacred temple of our God of lust and love? It is just a little way away from the capital. Go and visit, you will find plenty of inspiration for painting.”
The wise one had chuckled. He was a well-read and well-informed witchdoctor. Due to his wisdom, the people had accorded him the status of the village head. This wise old man’s advice made a lasting imprint on saheb’s mind. Everywhere in this world, the way men think is more or less the same. After all, it is a world of men, by men and for men. Isn’t it, O wise one? In every battle between the heart and the brain, the brain always wins. That night, once again, the heart had lost the battle. The night let out a howl like the injured deer. The saheb stopped pacing. He sat down once again on the wooden maisa, the stool. He picked up his notebook and the bird-feather pen. Compiling the report for the Company, he started writing.
“The women of this country, they form a striking contrast to the men. They are very fair indeed, fairer than any other race I have seen in India. Radiantly fair. Many of them would be considered beautiful. I do not mean Hindostani beauty, but the Assamese women have a form and feature closely approaching the European. In parts of the country not frequented by Europeans, the women roam about in public divested of the artificial modesty practiced by native ladies in the other parts of India. Unfortunately, their morality is at a low ebb. The inhabitants of most provinces look down upon the Assamese as enchanters, and the women come in for a large share of suspicion—indeed, they all are believed to be enchantresses.”
As he wrote, John M’coshe kept murmuring, “Yes, they all are black magic women. They are.”
Delhi: August 25, 2015
Got a black magic woman,
I got a black magic woman,
Got me so blind I can’t see,
That she is a black magic woman,
She’s trying to make a devil out of me.
She was reading a book and listening to Santana. She felt good listening to this song, Gypsy Queen or Black Magic Woman. Since she had shifted to this new residential area, she had been feeling quite like herself. In the easternmost part of the national capital, this was a residential colony surrounded by tall walls, CCTV cameras and security guards at the entrance. No unwanted elements could enter this area. There were pavements for pedestrians and beautiful gardens dotted the whole complex. Much to her relief, judging by the way they dressed and spoke, this was a considerably cosmopolitan colony.
Before she moved here, she lived in the older part on the periphery of the city, which appeared to live in medieval times. The place fell amidst many state boundaries, and was prone to crime and smuggling. The area proudly announces its identity as the largest Chor Bazaar, chock-a-blocked with stolen goods. A few lanes away, crossing a vast barren land, is the garden named after some Dilshad. Who was this Dilshad, she often wondered. Every time she walked through it, she was filled with frustration and sadness. It is not Dilshad but Dil Sad. A saddened heart.
The roads echo with sarcastic laughter and abuses filled with sexual innuendos, from hungry eyes always on the lookout for prey. The ugly words and laughter have become accepted as a norm.
She recalled seeing a huge crowd near the slaughterhouse in the market. She had stopped out of curiosity. A woman in the crowd told her, “It’s nothing much. A nine-year-old is lying there. She had been missing for the past two days. Somebody was in heat.”
She was shocked at the way that woman spoke. Over time, she had observed that such ugly, unnatural things were accepted as normal, while things which should go unnoticed got their antennas up.
One day she had found herself at the receiving end of their curious antennas. She had ventured into a Saturday market, which reminded her of the Sunday markets at the tea estate from her childhood. As a wave of nostalgia washed over her, like a newly born calf, she ran towards the hazy by-lanes from the past. How enticing the fares were, from colourful balloons, ribbons and terracotta toys to chickpea fries and puff rice, from plastic bangles and hairclips to ornate calendars of a girl holding a rose and saying namaste. She was a child again looking here and there, at this and that, not knowing what to buy and what not. From Kolhapuri chappals to knives and pans! From blingy dupattas to hot jalebis! She was Alice, moving on the colourful lanes of Wonderland. She ventured further in to buy an aluminum kettle and a few ladles. Suddenly, she felt like she was being attacked by thousands of eyes from every direction. On the surface, nothing was wrong, but something was terribly amiss.
Surveying her surroundings, she realized it was an area meant only for men. In long kurtas, surma-smeared eyes and netted skullcaps, she could see only the silhouettes of male bodies. There were women as well, but only a few, facelessly in the shadow of the male figures. A black robe covered them from head to toe. With their eyes, their only live feature, they were pleading with her silently—Go back. Go back home. Don’t hover around this place like a butterfly. Go back sister, go back home.
A male voice struck her like an arrow, “Mohtarma, dhang ke kapre pehna kijiye. Akele mat ghumiye. Shyam ke bad toh sirf dayan hi nikalte hai.” Why have you come out alone in the evening? Only witches come out in the evening.
How strange this metropolis is, where the ‘village’ called Hauz Khas that boasts of a nightlife like the one in Paris coexists with this. Here you are taunted because you are wearing a pair of jeans and walking alone in the evening. In a huff, she turned back and, like a flying snake that flies up onto the water bed, jumped on the first rickshaw available, still panting.
When she had regained her composure, the rickshaw-wala asked her, “Beti, why did you go to that market alone, without a male escort? That marketplace is not frequented by our people you know, it is their area, don’t you see? Don’t you hear everyday how they scream on top of their voices, that too into a mic, five times a day tearing the sky and our ears apart? On top of that, you are dressed in English clothes. Pants and shirt. Don’t mind. It’s just fatherly advice.”
Dropping her in front of her rented apartment, he said in a parting shot, “See there is a temple just across. You should be going there. Do you ever go there? Go there everyday, at least every Monday, okay? All marriageable girls should pray to Shivji. Shivji will fulfill your wishes. The priests in the temple campus would protect you if necessary. God bless you beti.”
For the first time, she looked at the temple with interest. A temple made of colourful shiny tiles. Each tile contained a blue image of Shiva holding a trident. Somehow, she couldn’t find the grace and beauty of the stone-cut ancient temples from her childhood days in her native place. There was the strange song, Jai Bholebaba, continuously playing on loudspeakers. Strange, because the tone of the bhajan was based on a popular Hindi song—Mere sapno ki rani kab aayegi tu — Mere sapno ke Bholebaba kab ageya tu… Comparing Shiva’s blue visage with Rajesh Khanna’s clownish dance, shaking his head for no rhythm or reason! Whenever she would try to meditate about Shiva, this clownish dance and Rajesh Khanna’s funny movement would overpower her vision leaving no space for imagination or meditation. This confluence appeared tasteless. Wouldn’t it be a better idea to read the verses by some Virashaiva saints and some Andal poetess or some Therigathas or some Sufi saints lying on the bed and attain some spiritual fulfillment closing your eyes afterwards, like a cow which chews the cud calmly in the night at the cowshed? What about Rumi’s divine verses which carry a deep meaning beyond words? How beautifully an ethereal rhythm strings those words together.
However, the last resort for the people suffering from worldly woes, the temple which had provided so many a ray of hope couldn’t be ignored. Every morning as she stepped out to collect her newspapers from the gate, she would throw a curious glance at the temple premises. Early in the morning even God seemed to be at peace. A few meditative monkeys would welcome the morning, and the hopping squirrels would declare in glee. The day would pass peacefully.
On one such calm morning, she saw five men walking towards her gate. Red tilaks marked their foreheads. Colourful threads adorned their wrists and rudrakshs hung around their necks. They made her uneasy. Bypassing her, they barged into her house and before she could say anything, one of them with a baritone voice ordered her, “Pay some respect to God, Madamji. Give Rs. 5,000 for Mata’s jagaran.” In front of the five domineering men, she did not know what to do. Two of them had crossed the living area and were peeping into her bedroom, saying, “You live alone. You should worship God, He will protect you.” Those adamant men with their sinister laughter extracted Rs. 3,000 from her. Before leaving, the one with tobacco-stained teeth said to her, “Give us your mobile number. We can ensure your wellbeing. We have heard about the Kamakhya temple at your native place and that black magic is practiced over there. Mysterious things happen there during Ambovachi mela. Do you also know any black magic Madamji, kuch jadu tona? Hahaha… don’t kill us ok?”
Who was killing whom, bit by bit? With hunting eyes, every second, day and night, at home and outside? Whose eyes and whose face?
She was not one to be cowed down. True, a few bitter experiences had painted dark circles under her eyes, but she was still in control, she knew how to sit behind the steering wheel of life and change gears. Like Mr. Gogol in The Namesake, her name too had become a burden on her shoulders. Axomi. Why was she christened with that name? Her colleagues teased her by calling her Asami, a criminal. Sometimes she thought she indeed was an asami, imprisoned in her uniqueness, the way she talked, the way she dressed up, the way she behaved and, most importantly, the way she looked. Why didn’t she have a location neutral, culture neutral name? Despite this, she was in control of her life. She could fully enjoy the dialogues of the plays by Manto or Chugtai, the evergreen Mrichakatikam staged at Mandi House, the passionate bargaining amidst the cacophony at Sarojini Nagar market or Lajpat Nagar bazaar, the haunting kalbelia tunes played at the courtyard of Dilli Haat and the rows of galleries with their experimental arts in Ladoo Sarai. Friends came over and played fusion tunes with their guitars. She tasted chakli and littichokha with them and, on Christmas Eve, she hung a shining star on her door. A lone star. It twinkled amidst the anarchic surroundings. The very next day she had to face a volley of questions, “Star? Why are you putting up a star? Who are you? Where are you from? Religion? Caste? If you are not a Christian, then why are you putting up a star, you crazy woman? Look, this is not your native place where you can do whatever you like, even dance naked, here we have culture, great culture and tradition.”
Without losing control over the gears, she drove the car of her life. She thought, “This is only a reflection of the thick polluted air that blows daily in this city. There must be a pure breeze blowing somewhere. There must be someplace somewhere in this ancient beautiful city where you can relax at your courtyard, even if it is a rented one, and gaze at the stars which sometimes look like pearls and sometimes wounds at the chest of the sky.”
The cemented backyard of her rental house, nestled in the underbelly of the city, was barricaded by the walls of three buildings. Between the gaps of the bricks grew a few papal saplings and a yellow creeper. She used to dry her clothes in the backyard and when she went to collect them after returning from work, she would often gaze at the small square of sky available to her, the twinkling stars winking at her from a black velvety sky. How familiar it looked. They seemed to be calling out to her as they winked. Stretching out her hands, she would sway at the spot. Once, as she was looking up at the sky, she saw something falling. What was it? A shooting star? Nah. A small packet landed next to her. In the darkness she could not make out what it was. The next morning the cover of the packet revealed its contents. Repulsed, she picked it up and threw it to the dustbin, the hidden meaning of that packet assaulting her sensibility. More such packets came her way at frequent intervals and one day, it took an ugly turn when the suggestive gesture, instead of coming down as an empty packet took the shape of an inflated balloon. A small transparent pink balloon, filled with a semi-liquid substance called semen. This time the balloon took the shape of a slimy snail and, leaving a trail of slime behind, came towards her to gobble her.
Just a few days later, carrying her belongings in an auto-van, she moved into a flat into the residential colony with its CCTV cameras and alert guards with a register to note down the names of anyone who desired to enter this castle. As she unlocked her flat with the cartons of her belongings, her books and CDs, she felt good, like stepping on a lush green garden after spending days in a stinking toilet without water or fresh air.
The flat had been arranged by a few of her acquaintances. They were permanent residents of the colony which had roughly thirty multi-storey apartments, ten flats on each floor. Opening the window, she saw a row of deodar trees, a few green conical yearnings rising towards the sky. Colourful kites dotted the sky. A flock of sparrows and cormorants flying and piercing the air was the cry of a peacock. Harsh but beautiful as it carried the promise of a golden-blue beauty. It felt magical.
She replayed the song Black Magic Woman. The deep baritone filled her room, “I got a black magic woman…” She looked at her watch. 11 pm. She did not feel like having dinner. In the evening, catching up with her friends at the green courtyard of the Press Club, they had wiped out the snack plates. The memory made her smile. It was so much fun spending time with her girlfriends, like getting on the bus to go on her first ever picnic. Their conversation would always venture into the same old premise. Someone was a lecturer, someone an NGO worker, someone worked at a call centre and someone worked at a corporate house. The organizer of their get-togethers was a busy newspaper reporter. They worked in different fields, had different experiences and thrills, but on one particular area they all could relate to one another, as if they were all riding on the same boat. No, not fellow riders of a boat but inmates of the same prison. They all wore the same uniform. A uniform which was thrust upon them. A uniform woven with set stereotypes and fantasies about an unknown exotic land and its people with a distinct look and way of life. The women in this uniform talked and shared their tales munching peanuts and chicken fries in the open lawn.
Somebody was offered a lift by her colleague on her way back home. Seeing a familiar face she trustingly got into his car. Another one, seeing her colleagues having lunch at the canteen, walked up to them and occupied the empty chair. Someone else broke out in laughter while standing close to a colleague. These are a few snapshots from a routine life, but these normal behaviors become offensive while getting distorted with accusing fingers. Everyone was awarded with adjectives—cheap, easy, loose, available, asking-for-it types. Slut, seductress, enchantress. Surprisingly, they got such names from their own acquaintances and companions, their friends and familiar ones, not from some stranger.
Sharing and talking about all these, they would feel like a patient who was not properly anesthetized before the surgery. They felt the nausea, lying inert and dizzy, stuck in an operation table in a frosty room, the entire world felt like a sick world. A sick world which has never seen any woman, or any woman like them.
“I have never seen a woman like you in the entire world Suzanne,” as if Leonardo Cohen was addressing her in this song. This song was dedicated to Suzanne. She felt like Suzanne, she felt happy listening to this song. After Santana, she started humming Cohen’s song.
“Suzanne takes you down to her place near the river,
You can hear the boats go by,
You can spend the night besides her,
Just when you mean to tell her,
That you have no love to give her,
She gets you to her wavelength,
And she lets the river answer,
That you have always been her lover,
And you want to travel with her…”
Listening to the song she thought, “Really? Was there a man in this world who would sail away on an unknown trail with a woman by his side?” As if to answer her question, at 11.15 pm, the phone rang.
A familiar voice. He had never called this late before. In the background other voices could be heard. And laughter. He was not alone. He admitted that he was enjoying a few drinks with his friends. She asked anxiously, “Why did you call so late? There must be something important.” He broke out in a throaty laughter and said, “Nothing much. Just called to find out how you are doing. You live so far away, God knows what you would be doing. What a life man. Good for you. You are leading a charming life. You are really enjoying life. Whatsay? We were just talking about you. Our historian was saying ‘What to say about these Kamrup women? They know black magic.’ How many people have you cast your spell on?”
The historian friend snatched the phone from his hand and said, “By the way, have you watched the news? One magic woman from your country has sent the entire country into a tizzy. What a horrendous crime she has committed.”
She had watched the evening news, the national channels as well as the regional ones. She had seen the woman, Indrajaya, who had sent the country into a tizzy. She had seen the result of an alleged cold blooded murder. The most heinous crime a mother could commit, killing her own child. But was it the general norm? If what was being shown on TV was the truth, it was an exception. Someone gone astray.
Why should every woman from her place bow down her head in shame? In a bloodied script of consumerism and greed for power set in the entire world, it was an extreme epilogue, fit to be a case study for psychologists.
She thought of the honour killings that took place every day. How parents snuffed out the life of their children in the name of honour of their clan. She thought of incidents where parents killed their newborn daughters by stuffing salt into their mouth or while she was still in her mother’s womb. The Indrajaya incident had turned into a melodramatic play. A high-profile entertaining thriller for the upper echelon of society.
As television channels fought for bytes, most women in the panel discussion roared in animated fierce verbosity, trying to justify themselves to the world, “Listen, I love my child, I go out for work, but my top priority is my child and my family.” Is there a woman who does not think of her child as her everything? Why were they trying so hard to prove their stand? Were they suffering from some prosecution mania? Were they scared that they too would be included in the Indrani category? We are ashamed, really ashamed, we are not like her.
One man mocked, “Arre yaar, yeh hain women liberation mere bhai. Narivaad ki Jai Ho.” Another one started in a meditative stance, “This is what they do for money, honey-trapping. They prey on business tycoons with their charm and beauty, these modern day enchantresses and seductresses, like the ancient apsaras seducing the saints and Nagarbadhus and trapping the kings and generals.”
As the TRPs soared, people sat on their couch engrossed, some cursed and lamented at the fall of free modern women, some laughed at the marvelous spectacle unfolding on the screen before them, some poured more drinks in their glasses and some like this historian and his sophisticated Mayo-bred CEO friend made this call to her, teasing her “just in banter” that Indrani had carried forward her legacy by performing black magic on that old business tycoon who fell for her mesmerizing charm and turned him into a lamb. They asked her if she too had similar plan. “Just joking. Don’t all the women from your place perform black magic, especially those women from Mayong, don’t they turn a man into a lamb? You too are a black magic woman, right?” They all laughed, and repeated, “Just in banter, just in banter…”
Keeping the phone down, she thought, ugh, there is no escape. Just when she had thought that she could breathe easy. One thing remained constant, the way you will be looked at. Slouching down at the washbasin, she spat. Filing the mug with water, she threw the water at the wall. The wet portion of the wall looked like a huge mushroom. Like a mushroom cloud.
She picked up two books from her bookshelf. The first one was a report, which she had found in the library of a research institute. She had chanced upon the photocopy of the report of a land survey as she was flipping through some historical documents. The man who had compiled the report was John M’coshe. The statistics was compiled for the Company, addressed to Sir James Ranken. The date of submission was June 14, 1837. Reading the long comment on pages 22 and 23, she was shocked. The comment was on the women of her region.
“The women of this state are beautiful, but practice black magic. As they mingle with people freely, they are morally loose. They are enchantresses.”
She was speechless.
She recalled another comment from the medieval era. A comment that stemmed from a similar observation made through the patriarchal lens, from the King of Gaud, Shayesta Khan to Ram Singh.
Ram Singh was a General in Aurangzeb’s army, the son of Jai Singh. Shyaesta Khan had told Ram Singh, “Don’t bring women of that country to the camp. They are beautiful enchantresses from the land of black magic.” The same thought echoed in the statement of Sihabuddin Talish, a companion of Mirzumla. From Shayesta Khan to John M’coshe, everyone had to utter the same words, “Mohini, Mohini… the Black Magic Women…”
She opened the second book and a smile touched her lips. She turned to a particular page of the huge volume. A poem that spread from page 659 to 668. She started reciting that beautiful poem, pouring her emotions into it,
“I am Pragjyotika, Kamrupa, I am like the cascading stream.
Every day in my heart thousands of turbulent waves of hundred rivers of the Brahmaputra rise up and die down, blending with the mesmerizing painting like blue Naga Hills.
I am the queen of nature, I am the painter, I am the creator of this new world.
I will travel from country to country, through land and sea.
I will light up every soul in the world.”
She kept reciting and her eyes welled up. Overwhelmed with gratitude, she let her tears, crystallized with heartfelt emotions over the years, fall. On an impulse, she picked up the phone and called back her callers. “Listen, it’s late and you people are drunk. Tomorrow, in the daytime when you all will sober up, I will post a poem to you all. It was written by a man like you all. Most interestingly, his forefathers had migrated from this side of the land to our part a hundred years ago, his ancestry was similar like yours, but they settled there and mingled, married and assimilated with us. That man wrote this on June 3rd, in the year 1943.”
She kept the phone down and noticed another strange coincidence. John M’coshe had written the report in the month of June. Almost a hundred years before Jyotiprashad wrote this poem. Both of their visions were focused on women, but what a diametrically opposite outlook. She tried to make sense of it, why did John M’coshe write such a thing in that report? On what grounds? Who did he see? Who did he meet? On the basis of what had he called the women Black Magic Women? What had happened to you, John M’coshe? Being in the company of elephant leeches and bitter herbs, had you forgotten about the fragrance of gulanchi flowers?
She visualized John M’coshe, imagined her predecessors whom John M’coshe had probably met on the streets or in public spaces. How were they? Were they characterless just because they did not fit into the parameters of John M’coshe’s world? Like M’coshe’s contemporary men had termed the black African women as aggressively sensual sluts? Comparing them with the upper class European women, they called the lower class dark skinned women as ugly sinners? Did John M’coshe do the same thing?
What about Jyotiprashad? Why did he write this poem? It is a somewhat romanticized depiction, she knows. What intense urge had he felt that he had to write it, especially those two lines – I will travel from country to country, through land and sea, I will light up every soul in the world.
A photograph she had seen years ago in an anthology about Jyotiprashad came to her mind. A black and white picture. A boat sailing in a river, Jyotiprashad sitting on that boat. In the backdrop, a cityscape of a western country. Perhaps Berlin, where he trained for filmmaking. This was her favourite picture of Jyotiprashad from the printed collection of photographs in that volume, which remained etched like a metaphor in her subconscious. In her imagination, she too sailed in that boat in the cascading river that flew into a wide horizon. In an incoherent voice, she asked him, “Jyotiprashad, did you ever get tired? Sometimes I feel very tired. Like a water carrier, I have been carrying the bamboo stick with two heavy containers on my shoulders since time immemorial. When will the weight from our shoulders lift? Only if we could throw away our identity shackles as easily as we remove our brassiere before we go to sleep! We could have slept in peace forever.”
Keeping the book open over her chest and swimming along her imaginary river, as she surrendered herself to a deep sleep, Axomi saw that she was rowing her own boat across a turbulent river. All around her was nothing but grey waves. Above her was the open sky.
As the boat rocked she felt afraid. She looked back in apprehension. There was nothing but silence all around. She was so lonely.
Amidst that haziness, she saw another boat. On that boat was Jyotiprashad. Jyoti waved at her and his voice echoed over the turbulent waves, “Move on, move on, keep going, don’t look back. Bon voyage, bon voyage…”
***
Dr. Moushumi kandali
Moushumi is a bilingual fiction writer, art historian and translator. Her book “The Black Magic women” published by Penguin was awarded the South Asia Ladli Media Award for Literature in 2023. She has authored 5 collections of short stories, 6 books of art historical research on North East India and two books of translation, one the Missing folk poems of Assam into English and the other, the translation of the artist Salvador Dali’s autobiography into Assamese.
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** The character named Jyotiprashad narrated in this story refers to the real life persona of Jyotiprhsad Agarwala , the cultural doyen of Assam who was a renowned progressive writer, lyricist and aesthetician. He also made the first Assamese film Joymoti in 1934.
The story has been written in response to a report ‘Topography of Assam’ by John M’Cosh, an assistant surgeon who submitted it to James Ranken, Esq, MD, Officiating Secretary, Medical Board, Bengal in 1835. The published report in form of a book has been archived in the library of Indian Institute of Advanced Studies, Shimla. In this book, John M’Cosh commented about the Assamese women (Section 2, Chapter 3, Pages 22, 23) that they are all enchantresses with low morality who practice black magic. The monologue given at the end of the first part is a quote from this report. In 2012, while browsing through the archive with writer journalist Sangeeta Barooah Picharoty , we came across this report. I hereby sincerely thank Sangeeta. This story would have not been written if you hadn’t jumped in excitement and cried out, “Hey look at this!”
