“Now this chamki-flowered horse, this horse with glittering gold sequins... I am getting really angry with it! Isn’t it because of this doll that I am not able to talk with Munnee? Go …go away, you Chamki!”

Saying this aloud, Apoo threw the doll in her hand on the bed. You know how delicately she threw it? With fear in her heart that something might happen to it, she threw it down as softly and gently as possible.

Afterwards, she murmured: “Let it be, you wretched Chamki.” Then she ran up to the bed, picked up the doll and caressed it lovingly, wondering if it had been hurt.

How Apoo adores this horse made of chamkis! On the tender mango-leaf-coloured horse, a black mane. On its back a velvet cloth, shining red makhmal, with glittering chamkis stitched on to it. When she is sliding slowly into sleep at night, after all the lights are turned off, how those tiny chamkis sparkle and shine! That is when Apoo shares many secrets with Chamki.

As for why she adores the horse… you know how lovingly Munnee had given it to Apoo! Munnee is very dear to Apoo. To say it in Munnee’s mother’s words, Munnee and Apoo are both jigar ka tukda, parts of the same heart!

When Apoo is away from Munnee, she draws Chamki close, hugs it, and coos at it, again and again: “Munnee!” Apoo tells Chamki all the news she wishes to tell Munnee. Even when she is in her mother’s lap, looking at the sky through the window, she shows Chamki the stars in the sky. And counting them, she drifts into sleep.

It has been five days today—five days of Apoo not seeing Munnee, not playing with Munnee.

There are no stories, no news shared with Munnee. She cannot go to Munnee’s house and sit in front of her grandmother, Fatamma. She cannot say “oo” in response to Fatamma who keeps telling them stories.

It was Fatamma who told Apoo the story of the pir on the evening of her first pir festival. Till then Apoo thought that “pir” only meant a doll in the shape of a hand. But after listening to Fatamma’s story, she understood that pirs were not mere dolls, they were great people like gods. That was why all the people in the village prayed to them so devotedly.

“Of course, would people become gods just like that!” Saying this, her mother repeated the same story that Fatamma had told her. There was a story that when there was famine in the village, it was the pir god who got rid of it. And another that when a large crowd waged a war on the village, the pir god took up the sword, pierced through the crowd, staked his life and rescued the village. There is another long story sung in the pirla chavidi (shrine) that in the final war the enemy plotted and killed the pir god on the battlefield.

But all that aside, how wonderfully Fatamma makes palakhova! What is Fatamma doing right now with the piece of palakhova that she would save up just for her? Would Munnee eat it up without her? Or would she hide all of it and give it to her when they meet? In Apoo’s thoughts and dreams, there is nothing and no one else but Munnee.

It is so surprising that she has neither spoken to nor played with Munnee for the last five days! In that house, her father’s tyrannical orders make even Apoo’s grandmothers shiver. Then what about nine-year-old Apoo? Even so, she must go to see Munnee and return, even if by stealth! But Apoo was scared that she would get caught, just like in the game of thief-and-police.

“Arey, don’t you dare go anywhere near Munnee’s house. Your Nana has eyes at the back and the front of his head! Don’t know how he finds out, but if he does…your back will be soundly thrashed!” Nanamma had already warned her. How could Apoo forget the beating when she last returned from Munnee’s house?

“Why are you killing a flower-like child by thrashing her like this?” Nanamma had intervened. But Nana does not care who is in front of him at such moments and he will just shove them aside with one hand! “Arey, Suresh, you are not even capable of distinguishing between the old and the young!” Saying this, Nanamma had left angrily.

The day Apoo had brought home the chamki-flowered horse, Suresh had shouted at her in rage, “If you dare step into that house again, I won’t keep quiet,” and he had gone away to the night bhajan at the temple.

That was it! From that day, all talk between Apoo and Munnee stopped. Their playing together stopped. It caused so much trouble that even the crows from this street would not go and caw in that street.

But Apoo somehow saved her beloved horse doll from all that commotion by throwing it under the chair, and praying, “Jai pir baba, save Chamki from these blows!” No matter what kind of difficulty it is, if you think of pir baba, it disappears just like that. Isn’t that what Fatammagaru said the other day? It seems pir baba came to their village on that very horse. A very long time ago when a great battle took place, after wiping out all the enemies, it seems that he got on to that same horse and rode away somewhere. That is why on the walls of the pirla chavidi there are so many pictures of horses. Those were the horses on which pir baba rode away to safety. All the people in the village believe that they are sacred horses.

At this moment it does not matter to Apoo whether it is a Rama or a pir baba, but only that someone who will listen to her woes and make Munnee and her meet! That’s all!

“Satyamma! Here, I have brought something for you!” Saying this, a month ago their neighbour Aruna’s mother gave Apoo’s mother a calendar full of pictures of pirs. It seems she bought it in a fair in the neighbouring village during the pir festival of that village. After praying to the pirs in this village, Aruna’s people would also go to the neighbouring village to attend the pir festival there. Aruna’s mother said that the powers of that pir, who was killed very young in the battle, were even greater.

“If the picture of that pir is in the house, no evil powers will dare enter. Thinking that niyyat and barkat—good intentions and prosperity—should always be with you, I brought this for you,” said Aruna’s mother.

“Akka, you know this, don’t you—these days my husband does not like anything Muslim, Muslim pictures, Muslim words…” Satyamma was about to tell Aruna’s mother. But would she listen!

“Everyone goes to the pir fair. This is our village custom. Aren’t you and Ramesh’s people the only ones who don’t pay heed to the ways of the ooru and wada, the village and its neighbourhood? Why, Satyamma? When I saw this calendar, I thought of you. Take it, Satyamma! Put it on the wall of your house. It will protect your home!” Saying this, Aruna’s mother placed the calendar in Satyamma’s hand and left.

When she heard Ramesh’s name, Satyamma felt the anger rise sharply within her. “That Ramesh, he comes here once a week and makes your Nana and three other temple elders sit down and talk all kinds of unnecessary things, like ‘our dharma’ and ‘their dharma’. ‘That is not our religion, that is not our dharma. Our dharma is Ganga water, and their dharma is a desert!’ Such things we heard only from Ramesh for the first time.”

On hearing that name, Apoo immediately asked her mother, and not once but twice, “Amma, what is dharma? What is religion? Are they some new kind of dolls?”

“Amma, isn’t it because of that Ramesh uncle that we have stopped going to the pir festival? How wonderful it is to go to that festival! All my friends would meet there. We would play. Eat a lot. Don’t our neighbours, Aruna’s people, next door, also go to the pir festival? It is our festival too, isn’t it, amma? We can also go, can’t we, amma?” 

Selected by Mini Krishnan

Reproduced courtesy of Orient BlackSwan

Illustrations by Siddharth Sengupta

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