Saavar

While having dinner with Papa last night,  the conversation turned to how a lot of our poor acquaintances are marrying their children during this lockdown to escape the enormous Indian wedding expenses. It’s simple and economic for the bridegroom to go to the bride’s house with 2 people, perform important rituals, and come back home without violating Section 144.
Then, a benefit to the newlyweds is the absence of annoying people and ceremonies to thwart their first night 😉. Although it is a financially prudent decision, those poor have to suffer uncountable taunts for their stinginess and reclusiveness.
 Many BHUAJI’S are upset as they are missing out on large numbers of sarees and enormous sums of ‘shagun' cash.

As Papa is, he never stays behind in making a remark.

“This ‘5 men rule’ is good not only for those who can’t afford inviting relatives but also for those who don’t want to.” He said.

Puzzled, I asked, “C’mon, who doesn’t want to invite relatives to his wedding, Pa?”

“Yea, we believe that our kinfolk accentuate the beauty of our wedding functions. But people like my cousin Saavar should never take more than 5 people to their barat.” He said like an old monk still leaving me confused.

“Why?”

“It’s a long story”, he said.

“Abhi maza ayega na Bhidu!”, I bubbled over with joy 😁.
Papa’s childhood stories are always fun (except when he narrates his travelogue of a 2000 mile journey to school crossing the seven oceans, floundering through lava, diving in the deepest trenches and flying above the Himalayas on his way 😅).

“When I was 15,” he elaborated, “I had gone to his barat. In the evening, after the rituals were done at the bride’s home, we were told that the barat would return to our village the next morning.

We had a whole night ahead!

So a group of us 6 decided to go for a movie in the only theatre in that town.

I was the second oldest of those 6.
Sundar, Saavar's younger brother, was not only the eldest but also the richest among us.
Their grandfather had forged a fortune during the World War-II by selling duplicate ghee to the British soldiers in Kolkata when all business had collapsed and the ‘baniya’ businessmen had already evacuated the city (Marwari vaise bhi paisa aur chutiya bahot sahi bana lete hain).

Thus, Sundar- Saavar were the spoiled successors of a nefarious grandpa and a greedy grandma.

Returning to Saavar's wedding…

When we returned back to the wedding house after our night show, there was no one from the barat to be seen. On enquiring we learned that the barat had left a long ago, scared of some canard about a ‘gang war or something' about to happen.

We were flabbergasted. None except Sundar and myself had the fare to travel back home by bus.
Although Sundar had both sufficient money as well as the responsibility to take us all with him, he refused and fled saying he couldn’t sacrifice the rituals with his new bhabhi the next morning.

I couldn’t afford everyone's fare. Although I could have managed my own, the other 4 were too young to be left alone. We had no option but to stay there overnight.
It was decided we would sleep in the wedding house and leave early the next morning for home on foot.

At dawn, the next day, all of us were ready to leave. We went to the bride’s father to inform him of our departure and requested breakfast.
He served a “What do we owe you breakfast for now that the wedding is over? It was your responsibility to go back with your people yesterday.”

We were kids!

So after swallowing all that down, we left for home.”

😡

My nostrils flared on hearing this and I wished Papa had kicked that uncle’s walnuts out of his babbling mouth!

However, the surprise was yet to come…

Papa saw my furious face, yet decided to ignore it. He probably knew it was a very common typical ‘Bhanu extravaganza'.


“Years passed by.” Papa continued, “Saavar started drinking exorbitantly. His liver gave in, his family and fortune gave up.

15 years later, Saavar's in-laws happened to meet me during some family get-together. His father-in-law started complaining about Saavar’s debauchery. He requested me to counsel Saavar. After all, I was now a 30 years old mature, educated man in my village (well, that’s the reputation of a govt. lecturer 😛).

I calmly replied, “You should not have married your girl to him in the first place.”

“We were unaware of its enormity.” He sighed.

“Well, it’s the law of nature that an ignominious rascal deserves another ignominious rascal. You were meant for each other.”

He was taken aback. He hadn’t expected that reply in front of so many family members.

Offended, he growled “What nonsense! What made you accuse us of such abhorrence?”

 “Your own deeds.” I replied with the same calm, “You couldn’t even feed 5 children who came to your daughter’s wedding.”

“Untrue! Who told you that?” He snapped back.

“Nobody, I was myself one of them”, I ended the conversation.


He couldn’t even save face after that remark.”

😌

Papa smiled at me. I beamed at him with awe and admiration with my Shizuka eyes 🥺. I could totally empathize with Papa's pleasure of revenge.

Aaahh! Sweat revenge ❤️.



THIS IS WHERE THE REAL STORY BEGINS…

I had one question boiling in my tiny brain.

What was the ‘gang war or something’ rumor that had scared the baratis?

Papa explained that the bride was a widow. Her ex-husband had died just 6 months before her marriage with Saavar.
When he died, she was already pregnant with his baby.

Under family pressure for remarriage, she aborted her baby before marrying Saavar- not that big a deal in those days.

Her ex-in-laws were unaware of the abortion.

So someone spread the word about their plan to start a new chapter of Gangs of Wassepur with her new in-laws.

This was the reason the barat had fled early.”



  Wait!

Why did we marry Saavar to a pregnant widowed woman? People say he was a very bold, handsome, young man.

“We did,” Papa said, “because he was notorious as a scandalous man. So much that he was the first man in our village who faced a crisis of marriage. NO man wanted to marry his daughter to him.”

 “Was it because of his alcoholism?” I asked.

“ Yeah …… err…… that too,” Papa said quite hesitantly, “But worse, er…… he was a …… psychopath.

This seemed to be quite a stupid incomplete reason. I knew Papa was beating around the bush.
It took me at least 5 more questions to make him answer something sensible.

Eventually, papa revealed in quite scientific terms, “He was a patient of hypersexuality.”

I don’t know why our parents still want to believe we are babies- ignorant and innocent! 😒

“Oh!” I snapped my fingers, “Did he leer at women?”

“Yeah ……  but he did more than that.

 He was so fucking desperate that he would roam on streets in search of appropriate prey. It didn’t matter to him what hour of the day it was, what age his victim was, what relation he had with her, or what species she belonged to. In fact, he was so oversexed that he was caught and beaten countless times breaking into women's bedrooms late at night.

He was a demon who didn’t even know the difference between the children and the elderly and to the extreme- ANIMALS when it came to fulfilling his whim.”

🤯

I was thunderstruck. Then I gained some sanity and laughed for 10 minutes while Papa wondered what an animal he was himself parenting.

After I was done, he continued again.

“Saavar was so defamed as a beast that if he was found being beaten somewhere, the passerby would say, “Yes, yes. Two more blows to his fucking head” without bothering to know what the matter was.

Although everyone blamed him for what he was, I had this theory that a woman of his family, whose name I don’t want to disclose, misused him quite often when he was a child. That must have led him to become the shit he was.”

 “Do you mean he was molested in his childhood?” I interrupted.

“That’s what I think. And my hypothesis is not blind and baseless. This particular woman who had kids Saavar’s age often behaved in a certain questionable manner with him.
Everyone noticed it but no one gave a damn.

After all, a guy couldn’t be molested! That’s a GIRLS' thing! 🤔

This woman’s husband used to go abroad for months to earn.”

I was stunned. “Shit! I thought these psychopaths were a mere manifestation of Hollywood and Netflix directors’ imaginations.” 😲

“Where do you think they get the idea from? It is mutual inception … the society---the movies---the society…” Papa said.

“Then?” I couldn’t wait to hear the story.

“Saavar had a nephew named Bholu.
One night, as per routine, Saavar headed to Bholu’s house and managed to break into his wife's bedroom.
The incident was the hot grapevine talk the very next morning.
Bholu’s poor wife complained to her mother-in-law about Saavar's effrontery. But instead of comforting, everyone started taunting her. Women started teasing and blaming her for having baited poor Saavar. Her mother-in-law tormented her calling her a slut.

Her life became hell.
.
.
.
A few days later, she committed suicide.”

😶

I couldn’t believe that my village had been a live witness to such a dramatic dark Hollywood tale.

Papa figured out my curiosity to hear more.

He said, “I can also recall some other incidents that seemed quite unrelated 30 years ago, but now when I rethink, they are like pieces fitting into places.

Once on Holi, when Saavar was still unmarried, Govardhan, another of my cousins, was hunting for Saavar everywhere with an ax in his hand.

Swearing and cursing, he was determined to chop Saavar to pieces.

This was a small incident as such ones were quite common.
.
.
.
 A few days later, Govardhan’s sister was married to a lunatic in a faraway town. Initially it seemed so funny how Govardhan had been so careless in finding a sane life partner for his sister. Later it was found that the marriage was fixed in such a hurry that he had had no time to verify about the groom or his sanity.

 Now, these two incidents seem interlinked.

Govardhan's sister's life is ruined, of course. That loon doesn’t earn. She has been feeding him and his family for the last thirty years of her marriage.

On the contrary, Bholu’s life was not completely ruined. He was remarried. Yet he used to curse Saavar to rot in his death bed, which Saavar really did during the last months of his life.

 He became an incorrigible drunkard. His liver failed. He rotted in bed due to lack of money for treatment and eventually died in his late 30’s.”



Sometimes I really feel that the society is our colossal enemy. I rarely see us standing together for a cause until our self-interest is in danger.

Request...

Do not judge someone over a rumor or a small talk.

The Fuss always has air. Attempting to fly in that air is utterly futile.


However, one fruitful attempt would be to comment your feelings about this story and follow CHILLY INSIGHTS for the upcoming interesting ones. 🙃


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